Denzel Washington’s Equalizer 3 Already Setting Franchise Record
It’s been five years since Denzel Washington’s Robert McCall took down some baddies but he’s finally back in The Equalizer 3. Audiences have been long awaiting the third and final installment in the Antoine Fuqua-directed franchise and it shows. With the film just hitting theaters overnight, The Equalizer 3 is already surpassing the two titles that came before it with the best rating of the franchise on Rotten Tomatoes.
With a 77 percent critics’ rating and a whopping 91 percent audience rating, Denzel Washington’s work in Equalizer 3 is his best yet. Comparatively, 2018’s The Equalizer 2 sits at 52 percent critics’ score and 60 percent audience, while the first film in the trilogy, 2014’s Equalizer rated 61 percent with critics and 76 percent with audiences.
The Equalizer 3 has the highest Rotten Tomatoes score of any movie in the franchise
A nice boost of publicity, the Rotten Tomatoes rating, and word of mouth from those early theatergoers will likely help Equalizer 3 continue on an upward trajectory.
When audiences pick up with Denzel Washington’s ex-Marine and former DIA Robert McCall, he’s living a life of peace and quiet in Southern Italy. Enjoying his life of solitude, McCall gets called out of retirement when he finds out that the local crime organizations are wreaking havoc on the locals – which include his newly found friends. The Equalizer 3 sees McCall snap back into action, hitting the crime bosses and their underdogs with everything he’s got.
Joining Denzel Washington in The Equalizer 3 will be Dakota Fanning
Along with Denzel Washington, The Equalizer 3 also stars Dakota Fanning, Remo Girone, David Denman, and Sonia Ammar. The feature marks a special reunion for Washington and Fanning as the pair previously worked alongside one another on Tony Scott’s 2004 action thriller, Man on Fire. Now, almost two full decades later, the pair is back together again yet another high-octane flick with Fanning kicking butt right alongside her old castmate.
The success of the film shouldn’t come as a surprise as fans have been clamoring for Antoine Fuqua, who is also known for his work behind titles including Training Day and The Magnificent Seven, to reteam with Denzel Washington for another installment in the franchise.
While The Equalizer 3 is being touted as the last film in the series, Fuqua has made recent comments giving audiences hope that if Washington would ever want to reprise the role, he’d be in for another one.
Meanwhile, there have also been whispers of a prequel project coming along sometime in the future with someone like Michael B. Jordan or John David Washington in the role of a young Robert McCall.
Beyond Denzel Washington’s legacy in The Equalizer 3 and the two films that came before it, the character of Robert McCall has been a money-making one for the entertainment industry. Originally, the ex-intelligence officer was played by Edward Woodward (The Wicker Man) in the four-season-running ‘80s television series of the same name.
Following the success of the Denzel Washington-led features, CBS put its own spin on the story with Queen Latifah playing Robyn McCall.
Ringing in the first box office weekend in September, Denzel Washington and the rest of the cast of The Equalizer 3 have their eyes set on the prize. With Oppenheimer finally besting Barbie at the box office, audiences will now have even more options for their cinematic experience.
