See Ryan Gosling And Chris Evans At War In Action-Packed The Gray Man Trailer

The trailer for the new Ryan Gosling-Chris Evans action thriller The Gray Man is here and we have some facial hair related thoughts.

By Nathan Kamal | Published

This article is more than 2 years old

the gray man chris evans

When you really think about it, Ryan Gosling has never really been in an action movie. He has gotten close on occasion with movies like Drive and Gangster Squad, but heart-stopping thrills and high-octane gun battles have never really been his thing. However, it appears that the La La Land actor is finally going to give it a try. Ryan Gosling has teamed up with Chris Evans for Netflix’s upcoming action thriller The Gray Man. The full trailer was just released, have a watch:

First things first: it appears that Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans are in a full-on terrible facial hair battle in addition to their high-volume espionage fights. As Evans is the playing the villain of The Gray Man, a CIA agent named ​​Lloyd Hansen apparently going rogue, we can see why it is an appropriate choice for him to have a creepy little mustache

Chris Evans The Gray Man

It is less certain why Ryan Gosling’s Court Gentry (aka Sierra Six aka The Gray Man) has a bushy mustache and goatee if they want us to root for him, but it certainly is a choice. 

ryan gosling

The trailer does also show us Ryan Gosling’s mentor character Donald Fitzroy (Billy Bob Thornton, aging nicely into silver fox territory) with a very similar mustache and goatee look, so maybe it’s just the style for black-ops CIA agents. 

ryan gosling the gray man

The opening moments of the trailer show Ana de Armas describing what she knows of Ryan Gosling’s character, which is that he is a legendary CIA operative specializing in wetworks, which is a euphemistic way of saying killing people because they can’t figure out anything else to do. It seems that Chris Evans is activated to hunt down and kill Gosling for some covert reason, and we do see a quick shot of some kind of microchip that The Gray Man is carrying around, but we’re really here for the action. Like this shot of Ryan Gosling running across the top of an exploding train:

ryan gosling the gray man

The Gray Man is based on a series of books by novelist Mark Greaney. If the general vibe of covert missions and grim-faced government men seems familiar, it may be because Greaney is something of an acolyte of the late Tom Clancy, the man who basically defined the modern espionage thriller. The Gray Man is Greaney’s own entry into the canon of the genre, and he also collaborated with Clancy on his final books and now is authorized by the Clancy Estate to keep it carrying on. 


Reportedly, The Gray Man is Netflix’s most expensive production ever at over $200 million, which is nice when you hear they are laying off hundreds of workers and basically shuttering their animation division to cut costs. If the movie is successful, it could likely be a franchise starter for both Ryan Gosling and Netflix, as Greaney has a whole slew of The Gray Man books already under his belt and another announced to be published soon. The Gray Man is scheduled to be released on Netflix on July 22 and is directed by The Russo Brothers.