The Beekeeper is a 2024 action film directed by David Ayer and is co-produced and stars Jason Statham, everybody’s favorite Hollywood crash test dummy. In the film, Statham plays a beekeeper, both in the literal sense and a highly classified killing machine working outside the US government . When someone he cares about is killed, Statham has to come out of retirement to take on two of the modern day’s most notorious villains; scam callers and crypto bros. This leads him on a path that takes him straight to the top of the food chain, vowing to restore order to the hive, so he says.

You see Jason Statham on the poster and you pretty much know what you’re gonna get. An often infallible beacon of justice willing to get his hands dirty when the powers at be cannot, ready to bust out a karate chop to the throat all without smudging that shiny bald head of his. And yeah, The Beekeeper is no different. It’s more of what you’ve come to expect from the British badass, which, depending on who you are, will either be a good thing or a bad thing. You’ll get some decently hard hitting action and impressive stunt work, all meant to mask the fact that the story is incredibly generic, caught in between being straight and serious and laughably goofy. It more or less wants to be John Wick, and yeah, John Wick didn’t invent the John Wick schtick, but this film doesn’t have that special sauce that made John Wick as enjoyable as it is.

Let’s take a look at those similarities between the two films, as I do think there are quite a few parallels which will make it easier to see what The Beekeeper does right and what it does wrong. Both involve an ex-military man of sorts who has someone or something they care about killed, which sends him on a brutal path of revenge that just so happens to target the spoiled dipshit kid of a very powerful figure who now must be protected with every type of soldier and mercenary under the sun. Now look, the first John Wick isn’t a perfect film but I do think it pulls off this kind of character in a much more interesting way. With John, we see him mourn the loss of his wife and discover one last gift from her, being a puppy to help him move forward. But then the puppy is killed, shattering whatever hope Wick had for a better life, which makes him return to his old, violent ways to seek vengeance even though deep down he knows that wound can never be healed. In The Beekeeper, Statham’s character’s puppy isn’t a puppy; it’s an older woman who lets him live in her garage and tend to bees on the property. Their relationship is so underdeveloped and void of any kind of humanity that when she does eventually bite the bullet, you feel nothing. Hell, Statham hardly seems to feel anything, just being like “Oi, that’s right fucked, innit?” before descending on his campaign of terror.

His target is Josh Hutcherson, a spoiled rich kid whose scamming business sits responsible for that poor old lady offing herself. He’s overseen by Jermoy Irons, who uses his powers as former head of the CIA to try and protect Hutcherson and kill this beekeeper. Hutcherson does okay for what it’s worth, embodying an easy to hate douchebag. Jeremy Irons is just kind of there, not really bringing a ton to the table, but I mostly blame that on how his character is written. The two share a scene where Irons explains just how dangerous Statham is, not unlike the scene between the mob boss and his son in John Wick. This is another great example of world and stake building in John Wick. Just talking about the Baba Yaga has this hardened criminal ready to start picking out tombstones for his kid. The way the scene is intercut with Wick recovering his arsenal helps establish him as a legitimate threat that adequately sets the stakes and builds tension for what’s to come. But in the Beekeeper that same tension is mostly absent, even though we do see him messing up some hired thugs a few times. Sure he seems dangerous, but Statham’s stone cold demeanor lacks the ferocious rage that makes John Wick more compelling. His character of the beekeeper is pretty devoid of character, flared up mostly by his need to talk in bee related allegories throughout the whole film. What also helps John Wick be more relatable is the fact that you actively see him get hurt and knocked around only to find a way to get on top. Statham’s character barely gets hit and he kind of just walks through ever encountered with ease.  And look, this kind of character can be fine for the most part. It’s still impressive to see Statham move like this at 56 years old, but really you’re not going to see him do anything all that exciting that you can’t find in his other films. Except for throwing honey at people I guess.

There’s a side plot involving the FBI agent daughter of the older woman who dies at the beginning and her partner who looks like the lead singer of System of a Down. Basically these two are chasing down the beekeeper to stop his vigilante brand of justice, and with this being the daughter of one of the victims of the scam enterprise, there’s potential for a more emotional connection to the story. The “potential” is there, but mostly we just get the two agents showing up to the scene of the crime to have someone explain to them what we just saw the beekeeper do in the previous scene. This repeating of things we already know really pumps the brakes on the narrative, and while they make sense to have in universe, it adds to too much downtime from the action or actually fleshing out the titular beekeeper. 

For a Rated R film, the violence felt relatively tame to me. People get shot and have their limbs sliced off, but it’s never as gross or bloody as I feel it could have been. The action itself is serviceable without being overtly over the top, which I don’t know, if you’re going to have a “beekeeper” themed action film, I think you could get a little more silly with it. There’s glimpses of this, like someone being lit on fire with honey, but the film never fully swings into the more ridiculous side. I’m not saying you need to have the guy sprouting wings and stinging people with his ass, but you can definitely have grounded action while still being a bit crazy with it. What a surprise, John Wick also achieves that, only the action there is way more enticing from the choreography to the way those scenes are shot. 

I really don’t want to keep comparing the two films, but like it or not, the John Wick franchise is essentially the measuring stick to which modern action films will be measured. But you don’t have to be exactly those films. Movies like Nobody or Sisu manage to find their own identity while still delivering on fun action that manages to make the final product memorable. And really, I don’t think this is all that memorable. The concept and structure has been done much better elsewhere and doesn’t exactly bring anything unique to the table. The action is fun to watch for the most part, but there’s far too many lulls in between these scenes, which had me severely checked out for a good chunk of the film. This definitely could have used an inkling more of personality, something I know both Ayer and Statham can be capable of. If you’re a fan of Statham’s films you’ll probably like this one alright, but really I don’t see the point in coming back to something like this when we got Crank or hell even Spy. And, you know, John Wick.

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