He has covered everything from Marvel to the Oscars, and Marvel at the Oscars. He also writes obsessively about the box office, charting the many hits and misses that are released weekly, and how their commercial performance shapes public perception. In his time at Collider, he has also helped drive diversity by writing stories about the multiple Indian film industries, with a goal of introducing audiences to a whole new world of cinema.
Having clearly appealed to fans across demographics, a new Prime Video movie is proving to be a major hit for the streamer amid much bigger titles. It was released in the wake of star-driven tentpoles such as The Wrecking Crew, led by Jason Momoa and Dave Bautista, and Mercy, the sci-fi mystery starring Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson. Both films dominated the Prime Video streaming charts for several weeks before the all-female action movie came out of nowhere to take the number one spot. It remains one of the top 10 movies on the global Prime Video leaderboard, and recently passed a major milestone.
The movie, directed by Vicky Jewson, features a quintet of young women as ballerinas who must defend themselves against a sinister adversary played by Uma Thurman. The five protagonists are played by Lana Condor, the star of Netflix’s To All the Boys trilogy; Iris Apatow, who played a supporting role in the Netflix series Love; Millicent Simmonds, who starred in A Quiet Place and its sequel; Maddie Ziegler, who rose to fame after appearing in a couple of Sia music videos; and Avantika, who played a supporting role in the Mean Girls remake.
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Your partner doesn’t talk much, doesn’t need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you’ve finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You’ll never need to ask if he has your back. You’ll just know.
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it’ll take you a moment to remember what’s actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You’ll never be bored. You’ll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar’s eye and a brawler’s instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn’t matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you’ll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren’t so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you’ve finished reading the briefing, and the plan he’s settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn’t exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
The movie in question is Pretty Lethal. It premiered on Prime Video on March 25 and, according to FlixPatrol, has spent more than 20 days on the streamer’s top 10 charts. Pretty Lethal received mixed reviews and is now sitting at a 56% score on Rotten Tomatoes. The aggregator website’s consensus reads, “Starting off with a fun hook and diluting it with a plethora of clichés, Pretty Lethal doesn’t reach its full operatic potential but doles out enough balletic action to remain reasonably en pointe.” In his review, Collider’s Ross Bonaime praised the film’s action sequences and noted its similarity to other movies produced by the original John Wick’s co-director David Leitch. He wrote, “In one particularly inspired choice, these ballerinas decide to stick a razor blade between their toes and utilize their dance moves to fight off their attackers. Many of these fights are blunt and full of big, wild moments that mostly carry the film, despite its fairly weak narrative.” Stay tuned to Collider for more updates.
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Kelly McCormick, Mike Karz, Piers Tempest, Bill Bindley
Pretty Lethal follows a troupe of ballerinas who must fight for survival after their bus unexpectedly breaks down on their way to a dance competition, leading to a violent escape from a remote inn.