Bad Boys: Ride or Die

4 outta 5

Bad Boys: Ride or Die is the fourth installment in the Bad Boys film franchise. There’s usually a decade or more gap in between installments (1995, 2003, 2020) but this film is only four years, a pandemic, and an Oscars slap away from the third movie. The producers unfortunately named the third movie Bad Boys 4 Life but that would have been a perfect name for the 4^th movie, and now it is just as a somewhat generic Ride or Die subtitle. This is still a very solid and fun entry in the franchise, a lot of cracking wise back and forth, some big action scenes, lots of gunfire and swearing as the chemistry between the two leads is as enjoyably wacky. The bad guy is kind of lame but the bad guys in these movies are always kind of lame. And this film insists upon throwing in Mike’s illegitimate son as a fully fledged member of the crew and he’s just sort of there, getting in the way of the still awesome banter between the bad boy buddies.

Detectives Mike Lowry (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) are still on the streets of Miami and taking on criminals, although there have been changes with Mike getting married and Marcus recovering from a heart attack. They receive a digital message from their long-deceased friend, Captain Howard (Joe Pantoliano) that leads them to investigate a criminal mastermind, James (Eric Dane). Along the way they need information, so they go to Mike’s illegitimate criminal son, Armano (Jacob Scipio), who is currently incarcerated. This gets more complicated when both Mike and Marcus become suspects and they end up on the run with Armano. They are pursued by a federal agent, Judy (Rhea Seehorn) who is also the daughter of their former police Captain. Now as the villains are closing in, the two bad boys must find any way to survive, which is difficult as Marcus’ poor health has led to him having a spiritual reawakening which has convinced himself that he is immortal, and Mike is struggling with debilitating panic attacks.

This series has often been defined by its chemistry between the two leads, how good the action is, how funny the quips are, how often the swearing is, and how much collateral damage they leave behind. Both Lawrence and Smith are still funny in their roles, Smith’s Mike Lowry seems even more exasperated with Marcus’ constant shenanigans. The opening of the film has Mike racing to his own wedding, but Marcus is having a freakout about his blood sugar, so Mike lets his buddy out of the car for 45 seconds to get a soda, naturally Marcus screws it up, orders too much food, and then some random crook tries to rob the place. Having survived a heart attack, and having seen his Captain in an afterlife plane that looks like something out of Black Panther, Marcus has lost all fear and is convinced of his own immortality.

This leads to all kinds of funny dumb situations where Marcus is walking into traffic or going face to face with crocodiles that will most certainly eat him, but he refuses to believe he can die. At one point, Marcus is babbling about how in a past life he used to own Mike as a donkey, and Mike just looking completely done with his buddy’s rambling nonsense. There is a fun bit where they steal the clothes of some rednecks and then must come up with an example of a Reba McEntire song. It devolves into them just quoting the Bad Boys song and then escaping while a Reba country cover of Bad Boys plays.

Killing off Pantoliano’s Captain in the last movie was a bit of a bummer as Pantoliano enlivens what can be a dull exposition part, but not even death can stop his Captain from returning. When Marcus first has his heart attack, he jumps to an afterlife world where he sees the Captain and that may not make a lick of sense but it is pretty funny. The addition of Seehorn as the daughter has a lot of Sehorn glowering but she does quite a good job glowering, and it is a bit like if Kim Wexler from Better Call Saul got a job as a federal agent. It is not a very compellingly written part, but Seehorn elevates it just because she is a sturdy performer. Adding in Armano as a side character who takes up a bunch of screentime away from the buddies, although he has some good reactions to their idiocy. Dane as the main crook really isn’t very interesting although the movie gives him a pretty menacing scene where he confronts some schmuck about transferring money. There’s also a subplot with Ioan Gruffudd as a politician who is clearly evil, but the movie wastes time presenting him as good.

Bad Boys: Ride or Die provides lots of action; there’s a shoot-out in a club that looks very cool, Mike Lowry battling a giant albino gator, a car chase where the van catches on fire while they’re driving and more. The directors, Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, do a good job of emulating original director Michael Bay’s signature mayhem. It certainly looks and feels like a Bad Boys movie and even though the guys get creakier, they can still shoot lots of stuff entertainingly.