Post-Viewing: Does Taken 3 signal the end of the grizzled action hero archetype?

When the original Taken was released in 2008, something about it clicked with audiences worldwide; the incredibly simple premise of Liam Neeson going round beating up anyone foolhardy enough to get in his way not only turned the actor into an action star, but also created a new archetype in the process. The idea of an older anti-hero pioneered by Taken spawned countless imitators with similar styles such as Stolen with Nicholas Cage in 2012, as well as The November Man with Pierce Brosnan and No Good Deed starring Idris Elba in 2014. Taken itself would see two sequels along the same time period and not even they could recapture what made the original so popular, despite both films being fairly successful at the box office. Now that Taken 3 has been released, receiving critical panning from a vast majority of critics, it’s difficult to see the archetype lasting any longer.

Where did it go wrong? I believe the answer lies with the derivative nature that all the films adopted. Rather than trying to push the sub-genre forward with more creative scenarios, filmmakers instead opted to mostly copy Taken’s design because it proved to be so popular with audiences. In turn they also lost sight of the gritty and more realistic situations that the main character was caught up in and so the films had far less impact than they did before. Taken 3 is especially guilty of this, censoring its once gritty violence with a 12A rating and repeating events from other action films.

Surprisingly, watching Taken 3 reminded me a lot of 2013’s A Good day to Die Hard; both films feature hackneyed plots, suffer from poor editing and throw in a poorly thought out twist towards the end of their run times. This brings to mind the issue of banking on brand identity; because the names have become so synonymous in the action genre, audiences believe what they are about to watch is a well-produced action film that stands out from the others that flood the market. Essentially this can sometimes allow producers to get away with making sub-par films because they know that once audiences see the big name on the poster or trailer, ticket sales are almost guaranteed.

The grizzled action hero archetype appears to have run its course and Taken 3 is pretty much the end of the road. When the series that originally pioneered the idea has gotten progressively worse and can’t get it right anymore, you know the sub-genre just won’t go any further and maybe that’s for the best, given the drastic decline in quality over seven years.