Good Ending to the Trilogy

While its no way comparable to Taken, it does have its moments. The original (and even the sequel) had Bryan Mills in a foreign country with nothing but his wits to assist him. Taken 3 moves the setting to Los Angeles where Mills has plenty of assets to include weapons and allies. It didn't have the same impact as the first movie or the sequel IMO. However, Neeson does a really nice job of conveying a man on a hunt and willing to do whatever it takes to clear his name and avenge his ex-wife's death.

What I liked about Taken 1 was its ability to keep the action focused on the character. Bryan is understandably distraught about his missing daughter and goes to great lengths to find her in Paris. We travel almost exclusively through his eyes on the journey as he makes his way from one scumbag to another until he rescues Kim.

In Taken 3, that POV is removed in favor of a lot of action set pieces. Massive car crashes, a borderline terrorist attack on a college campus, lots of graphic deaths, etc. In comparison to Taken 1 & 2 it suffers for this reason. As a pure action yarn, its not too bad.

The plot is pretty straight forward. Bryan's ex-wife is murdered and its made to look like he did it. If you have even a passing knowledge of these types of movies, its not hard to figure out who did it. Getting to the why of it has only a slightly rewarding payoff. Still, some of the stunts were cool and seeing Bryan's CIA buddies in the field was a nice addition.

Famke Jansen is great as ever and I was sad to see Lenny go from the series. Kim takes on a more active role in this movie (as she did in Taken 2). but she started turning into another Kim (from the TV show 24) that I despised for always being in danger. Maggie Grace seemed bored by the role. Dougray Scott takes over the role of Lenny's husband from Xander Berkeley who played him in the original. It was a poorly crafted replacement as I was confused to about 30 minutes as to whether this was the same character or if she had gotten divorced again. Since Stuart is integral to the plot, it was kind of off-putting. Forest Whitacker joins the cast as the stereotypical super smart cop who figures everything out from a minor detail (bagels in this case). The role was weakly written but Forest does a nice job with it.

If this is the last we see of Bryan Mills, then the series did its job. Lots of good acting and great stunts. Hopefully, Bryan can relax now and the only "taken" he has to worry about is if he has taken his meds.



My memory foam pillow says it can't remember my face. I can tell its lying.