As someone who didn’t find there to be anything particularly special about Olympus Has Fallen, I was blown away by how well the action-thriller performed at the box office, but I guess that’s just the power of a solid marketing campaign. The first teaser for follow-up London Has Fallen doesn’t pretend to be anything more than more of the same, but given the warm welcome for Olympus, Lionsgate clearly believes it doesn’t have to do much more than put the film out there, sit back and rake in the big bucks.
There’s really not much to say about the content in the first teaser, which dropped tody. I wanted to beat my head against the keyboard watching the solemn title cards – “In 2013, Olympus fell. In 2016, London will fall. DUN DUN DUN” – and there’s literally nothing else to it than generic-looking explosions, the most morose cover of “London Bridge is Falling Down” ever, and stars Gerard Butler and Aaron Eckhart running around with grim, resigned looks on their faces.
[zerg]Sure, subtlety may be asking a bit much, but here’s hoping the actual trailer for London Has Fallen – or the film, in fact – is a little more interesting than paint-by-numbers action.
The sequel finds Secret Service Agent Mike Banning (Butler), who previously rescued Commander-in-Chief Benjamin Asher (Eckhart) when terrorists took over the White House, running through the streets of London after a funeral for the British Prime Minister, who died under mysterious circumstances, turns out to be a trap for world leaders. With dignitaries gathered to pay their respects, a nefarious group of terrorists appears on scene to slaughter them all – and, in Hollywood fashion, only a grizzled pair of American badasses can save them.
Babak Najafi took the reins from Antoine Fuqua on the follow-up, which also stars Morgan Freeman, Angela Bassett, Melissa Leo, Robert Forster, Sean O’Bryan, Radha Mitchell, Jackie Earle Haley, Alon Aboutboul, Charlotte Riley and Waleed Zuaiter.
London Has Fallen opens October 2 in the U.K. and January 22 stateside.