2020’s BECKY was a shocking, mile-a-minute thrill ride featuring a 13-year-old girl tearing through a cadre of white supremacist escaped convicts like an avenging angel from a 70’s Grindhouse flick. With expert support from Joel McHale and a chillingly dark turn from comedian Kevin James, BECKY was an underdog hit during the pandemic. It even held the #1 spot at the US box office for two weeks that summer, and it gave us a fiery new talent in Lulu Wilson (who had actually racked up an impressive 21 credits before starring as the titular killing machine Becky).
Fast forward a couple of years, and original writer Nick Morris (a Nova Scotian screenwriter whose first screenplay was a ShriekFest finalist, and whose second script was BECKY) has handed off the reins to writer/director team Matt Angel and Suzanne Coote, who previously helmed the Netflix thrillers HYPNOTIC (2021) and THE OPEN HOUSE (2018).
Two years on in Becky’s universe, we catch up with our self-reliant sociopath as she’s hiding out in a small town, living a quiet life with a solitary old woman, and working at the local diner in a costume straight out of Mel’s Diner. Enter the requisite bad apples, this time in the guise of a trio of incel ‘rebels’
on their way to protest an appearance by a female Governor with their shady cabal of insurrection nutjobs, here called “Noble Men” in an obvious jab at the likes of the Proud Boys.
After a run-in with our heroine at her day job, these scumbags decide to terrorize young Becky by attacking her at home and stealing her dog. Things, of course, go wrong. Much blood and carnage ensue.
The caricature stock bad guys: chaotic fun-boy DJ (Aaron Dalla Villa); meek and nervous follower Sean (writer and co-director Matt Angel); and their leader, the feral, testosterone-fueled D-bag Anthony (Michael Sirow), leave Becky alone and unconscious and go about their merry white terrorist way,
headed to the secret lair of their heretofore unseen leader, Darrell.
Becky obviously follows, intent not only on retrieving her dog Diego, but enacting her specific brand of murderous revenge on the three men who wronged her, in true Becky fashion.
Between an animated credit sequence and a quick handful of establishing scenes to set the scene (obviously intent to get straight to the “good stuff” that the original was so lauded for), we’re straight into the action at that secondary setting within the first 15 minutes. Where the first film gave us a solid intro to the characters, a backstory for Becky and her dad, and a valid reason for Becky’s prickly demeanor and hidden fury, the sequel just blazes through the setup. With little establishment of the weight of Becky’s losses, no emotional investment or real character development, and more focus on the over-the-top criminals, we lose a lot of the suspense and dread that made the original film so fascinating.
Thankfully, while the writing can be weak at times, and some of the supporting cast come across flat in their stock characters, the main cast more than makes up for any lack of finesse with charismatic and entertaining performances. Veteran scene-stealer Courtney Gains is hilarious as a blundering, over-confident wannabe hillbilly, long beard and tank top, picking his banjo and storming out to war with all the pretend bravado he can muster. Likewise, Jill Larson, while cast in the inexplicable role of the female leader of the incel “He-Man Woman Hater’s Club”, still plays the hell out of the poison Southern Mama bit, chewing scenes like she’s sucking the chicken right off of the bones.
Ultimately, just as the first film belonged to Lulu Wilson and a brilliantly cast-against-type Kevin James, this one belongs to Becky and her main antagonist, here played by an under-the-radar Sean William Scott. Scott is as good here as he has been in anything else. Charming, quiet and disarming, with a base layer of sensitivity that is at dramatic odds with his actions and motivations. His slow simmering anger at the ineptitude of his gang, and their inability to handle a single teenage girl, is a perfect foil of Becky’s balls-out fury and in-your-face attitude.
Lulu Wilson, despite her character being reduced to less substance and a whole lot of attitude, still owns every second she’s on screen, whether it’s snarling sarcastically in the face of brutish Anthony and his twitchy trigger finger, masterfully mocking Gaines’ flummoxed hillbilly, or obliterating a grown
man with a machete. Wilson proved her ability and charisma in the first film, and this one just drives home how talented she is, not just for her age, but in terms of most actresses in movies of this calibre.
Technically, the film is put together very well. The work from the special effects team is bar none, and the action is cut masterfully by editor Stephen Boyer. Especially noteworthy is the cinematography by Julia Swain, who paints beautiful outdoor scenes with an almost ethereal light before the violence, mayhem, and gallons of blood explode all over the screen.
Essentially a modern update on 70’s revenge flicks like the original I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE and LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, it’s most telling that – unlike those films, that revolved around random evil men raping and degrading unsuspecting young women, as was all over the news during the sexual revolution of the 1970’s – these films revolve around a much more modern threat. Here we have white supremacists and militant anti-government misogynists. Two categories of violent and deluded angry white men, raging against the profound shifts in society that are making it clear that they are no longer relevant and showing them that they were never really in power, despite what their Cheeto-tinted heroes tell them.
If you, like most of us, would love to see the loudmouthed ignorant ass-backward types that make our modern world so dangerous for so many minorities, women and innocent people just trying to live their lives, finally get their comeuppance… you could do worse than 85 minutes of living vicariously through Becky and her ultimate badassery as the teenage John Wick we all need.
