by Jack Engelhardt ‘25

The original Gladiator was released in 2000 to overwhelming praise, winning critical accolades, bringing in huge audiences, and accumulating five academy awards, one of which being Best Picture. Gladiator II was given the impossible task of succeeding a fantastic movie 24 years later to audiences who were largely uninterested to begin with. But while it seemed that everything was stacked against it, Gladiator II turned out to be a great film with an enriching story, intriguing character relationships, and pulsing action that will leave your hunger for bloody gladiatorial combat satiated.

This movie wastes no time setting the stage for the viewer. After a brief artistic recap of the first movie, the viewer is flung into a roman siege on the main character Lucius Verus Aurelius (Paul Mescal) and his wife’s (Yuval Gonen) home. This opening ultimately feels rushed as Lucius’s wife is killed almost immediately with no background given to make this death seem at all impactful. After his loss at the hand of Roman general Acacious (Pedro Pascal), Lucius becomes a slave of war, fighting in small gladiatorial rings for local village entertainment. After being taken under the wing of Denzel Washington’s character Macrinus, he makes his way to Rome to fight in the Coliseum where he leads his fellow gladiators to freedom from the tyrannical twin emperors (Joseph Quinn and Fred Hechinger). While Lucius’s trail of revenge against the complex character of Acacious is compelling, it ultimately comes across as an attempt to retell a shallower, more rushed version of the first movie’s story. The death of Lucius’s wife, mentorship under the man who bought him, leading gladiators in Rome, and a dark political narrative all mimic key plot points of the first movie.

While on the surface it definitely sticks close to the first movie, towards the middle half it takes a twist, almost acknowledging its similarities to the first movie and flipping them on its head. This explains the rushed feeling of the first half of the movie as Gladiator II was essentially attempting to fit Gladiator’s entire story into half of Gladiator II’s run time. After the twist, the movie puts the political subplot at the front and almost lets the gladiatorial combat take a step back to allow the rather interesting political narrative room to breathe. This emphasis on character relationships and their dark, scheming subplots highlight a different aspect of this fictional world of the crumbling Rome that we as the viewer didn’t see as much of with the first Gladiator. While it may seem like a negative that the overt fighting is less of a focus, that isn’t to say there is no more action. There are still plenty of scenes, thoughtfully spread throughout the film, displaying masterful choreography and creative bloody battles that, while not being the most historically accurate, will definitely quench that thirst for blood.

While it definitely is not a perfect movie with its almost carbon copied first half and pacing issues throughout, Gladiator II is a bolder and bigger film than its predecessor with many enriching characters and a driving story with scene after scene of pulse pounding action that will keep you hooked till the credits roll.