The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard
Lionsgate | Release Date: June 16, 2021 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
32
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 36 Critic Reviews
Positive:
2
Mixed:
14
Negative:
20
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
RogerEbert.comCarla RenataJun 14, 2021
Directed by Patrick Hughes, this comic book-energy spy adventure, gorgeously captured by cinematographer Terry Stacey and keenly scripted with barbed laden dialogue from Tom O’Connor, Brandon Murphy, and Phillip Murphy, is heavy on blood, guts, action, and star power. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreJun 11, 2021
Perhaps it’s out of date, but if anybody can make the “Latin Spitfire” stereotype cool, funny and scary again, it’s Hayek, who all but takes over the movie with her loud, brassy and delusional confidence. Read full review
60
Total FilmJames MottramJun 15, 2021
The sticking point for some will be the bone-crunching violence, of which there’s A LOT. But if you can stomach that, then this ticks that dumb-fun summer-movie box nicely. Read full review
60
Screen RantMolly FreemanJun 9, 2021
Reynolds has made a name for himself with fun action movies and, though this isn't necessarily his strongest or most successful franchise, it does deliver laughs and an exciting ride despite Michael Bryce essentially being the same character Reynolds has played countless times before. Even if Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard is absurd, it makes for the big, dumb fun movie experience perfect for the summer season. Read full review
59
Paste MagazineJacob OllerJun 9, 2021
The main novelty, and the film’s primary pleasure, is the commitment of its cast to its bloody, profane vapidity. Read full review
50
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisJun 17, 2021
The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is loud, lazy, profane and well nigh incoherent. It’s also at times quite funny, with a goofy vulgarity that made me giggle. Read full review
50
IGNRosie KnightJun 17, 2021
There's not much to praise here. The script is beyond parody, the jokes fall flat, and it arguably wastes some of Hollywood's biggest names. But if you want to see lots of people getting blown up in some very pretty locations while Salma Hayek and Samuel L Jackson make sweet (gross) love while torturing Ryan Reynolds, then this one's for you. Read full review
50
Original-CinLiam LaceyJun 16, 2021
Returning director Patrick Hughes and screenwriters Tom O’Connor, Phillip Murphy, and Brandon Murphy count too much on star charisma and action set-ups to carry the narrative. The result is that the smirks are mild and scattered while the bloodshed, gun fights, and explosions are relentless. Read full review
50
CNNBrian LowryJun 15, 2021
An expanded role for Salma Hayek is the newish wrinkle here, although that's hardly cause for an encore, or even an extra apostrophe. Read full review
50
We Got This CoveredScott CampbellJun 14, 2021
Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard is a perfectly acceptable buddy sequel, but it's all very uninspired and unoriginal. Read full review
50
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJun 10, 2021
The star power trio of Samuel L. Jackson, Selma Hayek and Ryan Reynolds have a few funny exchanges, and there are a couple of physical shtick routines so over the top it’s as if they dusted off the Monty Python playbook for a modern-day action film — but there are far more misfires than direct comedic/dramatic hits in this blood-drenched, explosion-riddled, live-action cartoon of a film. Read full review
50
IndieWireDavid EhrlichJun 9, 2021
Terrible green screen, globs of digital blood, and record-scratch sound effects in place of actual jokes are only potholes along the road for a summer movie that knows what it is, and is slightly less afraid to embrace that than its previous iteration was. Read full review
40
The GuardianPeter BradshawJun 11, 2021
There are some almost-laughs here and there, but please tell me that we aren’t in for The Hitman’s Mother-In-Law’s Agent’s Bodyguard in 2023. Read full review
40
EmpireIan FreerJun 11, 2021
Lacking anything approaching originality, The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is a generic, by-the-numbers action-comedy sequel. Praise be for Hayek, who at least gives it gusto. Read full review
40
VarietyOwen GleibermanJun 9, 2021
So is it, you know, fun? At times it is; at others it’s exhausting. Let’s call the whole thing fun-xhausting. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterJohn DeForeJun 9, 2021
While the team-up still fails to become more than the sum of its parts, at least we can appreciate Hayek’s enthusiasm for the over-the-top role. Read full review
38
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJun 15, 2021
Perhaps the biggest (and most noticeable) fall-off from the first film is the lack of chemistry between Reynolds and Jackson. The two never connect. Rarely have I seen the volcanic Jackson look so disinterested; this is the closest he’s ever come to phoning it in. Read full review
38
Boston GlobeMark FeeneyJun 14, 2021
The humor is crass when it isn’t forced. The violence, which barely pauses for reloading, feels even more mechanical than it does mindless, and it’s very mindless. How can a movie so full of action feel so tired? Read full review
37
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanJun 15, 2021
It ain’t worth the price of admission, but it is, in one of the drowsiest, dullest summer movies ever, a bit of an eye-opener. Read full review
33
ConsequenceClint WorthingtonJun 9, 2021
Sure, it commits wholeheartedly to its bone-dead stupidity more than the first film. But it leaves a final product so scattered and uninspired that, less than 24 hours after seeing it, the vast majority of it escapes my memory. Read full review
33
The PlaylistJason BaileyJun 9, 2021
Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is a marginally better movie than “The Hitman’s Bodyguard.” But that’s kind of like saying that getting stabbed in the gut is marginally better than getting stabbed in the neck. Read full review
30
Austin ChronicleMatthew MonagleJun 21, 2021
The film struggles to carve out a distinct aesthetic for its violence, alternating between crass comedy and cartoonish violence with no sense of how to combine these two into something sustainable. Read full review
30
TimeStephanie ZacharekJun 16, 2021
Sometimes a dumb action comedy can work perfectly well as a one-off, particularly if its writers and director can pull off the illusion that they didn’t have to work hard to earn our laughs. But The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is all work and no payday. Even in the service of airheaded entertainment, no one should feel compelled to take a bullet for it. It’s OK to let a franchise die. Read full review
30
Rolling StoneDavid FearJun 16, 2021
There’s an art to making action films, and that artistry is as AWOL here as it is in the first movie. Read full review
30
Screen DailyTim GriersonJun 9, 2021
For audiences craving shoot-‘em-up carnage, the sequel contains an abundance of explosions, car crashes and kill shots, although the strained air of hip irreverence soon turns suffocatingly stale. Read full review
30
SlashfilmJosh SpiegelJun 9, 2021
Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard – a title, by the way, that is mostly misleading outside of a single scene where Michael serves as Sonia’s bodyguard – has a few brief moments of joy or wit. But most of those moments rely on the audience’s recognition of the all-too-famous cast (such as being delighted at seeing Banderas and Hayek share the screen once more, even with Banderas playing the bad guy). This film, even more than its surprisingly successful predecessor, is exhausting and obnoxious. A few good lines don’t save a slapdash, snarky mess. Read full review
25
New York PostJohnny OleksinskiJun 17, 2021
The characters are so wacky you don’t believe them as killers or strategists or even just bystanders who are in the right place at the right time. You simply don’t buy anything about them. Ever. Read full review
25
Chicago TribuneKatie WalshJun 16, 2021
Some may enjoy the cacophonous, raunchy, lowest-common-denominator dreck that The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard has to offer. To those I say, godspeed. But it’s undeniable that the actors, the audiences and the filmmakers all deserve better. Read full review
25
The Associated PressMark KennedyJun 14, 2021
If there was a stylish chic in the first film, it’s gone in the second, which sometimes seems cloying in its attempt to recreate the first. Read full review
25
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Jun 9, 2021
What the set pieces have in common with everything else in this dunderheaded, insultingly mechanical franchise hopeful is the overwhelming feeling that everyone involved said “good enough” at every turn. It’s savvy only in the way it lowers the standards for this kind of thing, assuring that any future sequels that give half an ass instead of barely a quarter of one will prompt more enthusiasm, or at least relief. Read full review
25
Slant MagazineDerek SmithJun 9, 2021
The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard improves on its 2017 predecessor only insofar as it runs 20 minutes shorter. Read full review
20
The Irish TimesTara BradyJun 25, 2021
Cinemas are finally open; it’s hard to think of a worse way to mark the occasion. Read full review
20
The Observer (UK)Wendy IdeJun 20, 2021
The dismal dialogue wouldn’t matter quite so much if at least the action sequences delivered a few thrills, but the whole thing is so shoddily put together it looks as though it was edited with a strimmer. Read full review
20
The TelegraphRobbie CollinJun 18, 2021
In place of Bay’s provocative humour and unparalleled eye for destructive spectacle are brain-numbing quantities of strong language, action scenes that look as if they were edited with a knife and fork, and a blasé attitude towards violence that renders every shootout pointless, since the bad guys are invariably mown down in seconds while the heroes saunter off with barely a scratch. Read full review
20
TheWrapAlonso DuraldeJun 9, 2021
The Hitman’s Wife Bodyguard is a comedy with not one legitimate laugh, and an action movie where cars keep blowing up while the A-listers yell at each other, as though that were inherently amusing or entertaining. Read full review
0
San Francisco ChronicleCary DarlingJun 10, 2021
Full of action without thrills, comedy without laughs, noise without meaning and violence without reason (or even any cool combat choreography), it’s a headache with a Hollywood marketing budget. Read full review
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