Carry-On Movie Review

original-written date: 1/2/25

The Christmas season gave us no shortage of crappy holiday movies, from Holiday Touchdown: A Chiefs Love Story to Hot Frosty to The Merry Gentlemen, as Hollywood continues to find new and creative ways to deliver garbage films that people gobble up when the weather turns cold. But amidst the misfires came a more unique, intriguing form of Christmas movie a la Die Hard in Jaume Collet-Serra’s latest action-thriller Carry-On.  This Netflix original isn’t going to be competing for Oscars anytime soon, but is a fascinating and fun movie with some great actors having a blast in their roles, which really comes through in the final product.

The Plot (spoiler-free)

Ethan Kopek is a young TSA agent who is still trying to find his calling in life after being denied by the Police Academy multiple times. His long-term girlfriend Nora, who also works at the airport as an airline manager, motivates him to continue pursuing the Academy, but more importantly reveals that she is pregnant with Ethan’s child.  On their way into work the next day - Christmas Eve - Ethan is determined to show his commitment to his job and provide for his family. He asks for the responsibility of manning a baggage scanning station (Taking over for his friend Jason) to prove his worth. But when an earpiece comes down the line and he receives a text telling him to put it in, he finds himself in an impossible situation: with a blackmailer in his ear telling him to let an ominous bag through the scanners or his girlfriend Nora will be killed.

The Cast

Taron Edgerton - Ethan Kopek

Jason Bateman - The Traveler

Sofia Carson - Nora Parisi

Danielle Deadwyler - Detective Elena Cole

Dean Norris - Phil Sarkowski

Theo Rossi - The Watcher 

Logan Marshall-Green - Agent Alcott

Sinqua Walls - Jason Noble 

The two standouts are of course the two A-listers at the heart of the film, Edgerton and Bateman.  Edgerton plays the young TSA Agent facing the most stressful scenario imaginable (in the most stress-inducing environment imaginable for me, an airport) and Bateman plays the villainous Watcher who is blackmailing Edgerton’s Kopek into doing his bidding. I love both of these actors, particularly Edgerton because I find him so charming and endearing - he’s the one I’m rooting for every time he’s on screen. The same can normally be said for Bateman, but no one’s rooting for him in this one. He’s a menacing, tactical mercenary, and Bateman plays the role subtly for the most part, only boiling over when absolutely necessary. These two drive the entire plot and the movie absolutely does not work without them.

I had only ever seen Sofia Carson in one other movie, Purple Hearts alongside Nicholas Galitzine, and I watched it exclusively on YouTube and Instagram reels.  But she’s good in this limited role - doesn’t do anything that I found exceptional but doesn’t hold the film back at all.  Danielle Deadwyler plays the detective trying to piece things together on the other side of the plot. I wasn’t a big fan of hers, and this side of the plot was far and away the weakest for me - both in quality of dialogue, execution, and logic, but I try not to harp on these when it comes to a Netflix action-thriller. 

Dean Norris plays one of my favorite TV characters of all time on Breaking Bad, so of course I loved seeing him pop up in this film. Sinqua Wells was also fun in his side role, as was Logan Marshall-Green.  Theo Rossi was an up-and-down performance for me - I really liked him pulling the strings from behind the screen and his role in the terrorists’ plan of attack, but didn’t find him very menacing, which they are clearly trying to make the audience see him as. Him hunting down Nora outside the airport - that scene didn’t work for me.

What Worked

From here on out, plot-specific spoilers will be denoted in blue. As previously stated, the chemistry and back-and-forth between Edgerton and Bateman is my favorite part of the film. I love Bateman in Ozark, where he’s a morally gray character, but in this he’s a straight-up evil villain, which I also liked (guy can do it all).  The way he flips the switch from intimidating to comforting back to vile is impressive. This is also the perfect type of villain for him where he doesn’t have to be this big, strong, threatening figure - he’s a normal looking guy with an extremely well-thought-out plan. 

Edgerton shines in this role and is given so much runway (pun-intended) to cook.  I never have and pray I never will be in the position of his character with the decisions he has to make, but I think if I was, his reactions and emotions are so relatable.  The moral conundrum of saving the one you love (who is pregnant FYI) or saving hundreds of lives from an attack is the Sophie’s Choice of all Sophie’s Choices.  He also just has so many “FUCK YEAH” moments toward the end of the film especially that are so crowd-pleasing.

Despite not loving one of the two plots (the Elena Cole/Agent Alcott/Homeland security side quest) I do think they did a good job of merging them by the end. I think it could’ve been a whole lot smoother, but I was very happy with how the movie concluded and how the plots came together. 

Lastly, I think there were some really solid twists and turns written into this movie.  They weren’t necessarily shocking, we aren’t talking M. Night twists that the whole movie is based on, but I think there were some really smart and creative turns throughout. It reminded me a little bit of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul where the writers would come up with an idea, make it happen and back themselves into that corner, and find a way out of it. For example, the Traveler has the accomplice Mateo transporting the bag.  Ethan gets Mateo added to a list of passengers flagged for inspection.  The Traveler suspects Ethan, confronts him, but Ethan turns the tables and gets hold of his gun. A wrench in the plan, what to do? The Traveler arms the bomb to go off in 10 minutes and forces Ethan to be the one to disarm it, protecting himself and retaking the power. This happens several times throughout the movie (revealing Mateo’s husband is being held captive, Traveler telling Mateo to kill Ethan to get him released, having two boarding passes to use one as a decoy for Homeland security to go to the wrong gate). 

What Didn’t

I’ve already harped a little bit on the LAPD/Homeland security part of the plot, so I won’t go overly hard on them again. I actually really liked the twist they threw in of Agent Alcott being an imposter, and that info being revealed while Agent Cole drives to the airport with him. However, the ensuing action scene of Cole and Alcott fighting mid-drive is hilariously bad CGI.  I thought a different movie came on my screen during it because it looked so cartoony and unfitting for this movie, it took me out of the experience completely for a moment.  A lot of people on twitter seemed to think it was cool, I thought it was laughably bad.

This isn’t a major complaint for me personally because I kind of throw logic out the window when it comes to these types of Action-thrillers, mostly because I just want to be entertained, I don’t care about practicality.  But there’s definitely a lot of liberties taken to get to the big scenes in this movie. For example, I think it would be more difficult for a passenger to sneak their way into the baggage storage under the plane than Bateman made it seem. I think there would be more sirens and alarms going off on the scanner when a 100% fatality-poison-bomb goes through it, and I can’t imagine that suitcase was protective enough for it to bounce around the conveyor belt fight between Ethan and Mateo.  

The CGI across the board wasn’t great, but there isn’t a ton of it outside that wild car crash-fight scene.  Not the best dialogue-writing in the scenes not including Bateman and Edgerton (but their scenes have so much good stuff I almost don’t care).  There was also a whole lot of disposition-dumping in the first half hour or so of the movie that could’ve been cut down (or better yet could’ve been SHOWN to the audience rather than TOLD, like the best forms of script-writing).  And there were a handful of performances I wasn’t crazy about, but didn’t think anyone was downright bad in their roles.

Final Thoughts

I had a ton of fun with this movie and thoroughly enjoyed it while accepting and acknowledging its flaws. If you go into it expecting the second-coming of Heat or The Fugitive, you’ll be disappointed. If you go into it expecting a Kirland-brand Die Hard with two charismatic lead actors that will keep you entertained for 2 hours, you’ll love it like I did.

Score

72/100