Gladiator II Parent Guide

The reach of Rome has grown long, and soon her ships and soldiers are seen on the doorstep of Numidia, along the North African coast. Under General Acacius (Pedro Pascal), the city falls, and the people are enslaved by the conquering army – vae victis (woe to the vanquished), as ever.

Hanno (Paul Mescal) is one of those new conquests, and his physical prowess soon earmarks him for gladiator training. Macrinus (Denzel Washington), who owns a large stable of gladiators, picks him out especially. Succeeding in the arena is one of the only paths out of slavery, but all Hanno wants is revenge. When Numidia fell, his wife was killed; now, he wants Acacius’ head – and Macrinus says he can give it to him.

Larger wheels are turning in the ancient city, schemes that dwarf the vengeful dreams of a slave. The daughter of a beloved former emperor, Lucilla (Connie Nielsen) has seen just how far Rome has fallen under the new co-emperors, Geta and Caracalla (Joseph Quinn and Fred Hechinger). She has persuaded her husband, General Acacius, to plan a coup. The people are unhappy, and if the emperors are gone, then they might be able to restore the Republic.

With enough intrigue to keep any historian busy, Gladiator II almost justifies its two-and-a-half hour runtime – almost. It’s still a little bloated, but it balances all its little subplots gracefully enough that it doesn’t drag all the time. Just here and there. The bigger issue may be what didn’t make the final cut, as there are a number of seemingly miraculous plot resolutions between scenes.

You don’t want to look too closely, but the film makes that easy – panem et circenses (bread and circuses) indeed. There are feasts and games aplenty to keep your attention off some of those inconsistent details. The action scenes are huge and impressive, and also the source of most of the film’s content concerns. Gruesome bloody violence is constant throughout the film, which you might have expected when they all but titled it Bloodsport 2. The script does manage to avoid negative content issues in basically all other categories, though, which is remarkable. However, otherwise clean content categories don’t make this a family-friendly film, even for history afficionados. Gladiator II is Restricted for a reason and that rating should be taken seriously.

I have a confession to make that’s going to baffle a lot of men around my age, but I’ve never particularly liked the first Gladiator. I don’t think it’s a bad movie; it’s just not quite my speed. In fact, I have a lot of the same complaints about the original that I have about this sequel, which leads me to suspect that fans of the first will have a blast with the second. They hit a lot of the same beats, play just as loose with Roman history, get a lot more sweaty guys in sandals and skirts, and spill a lot more blood. What more could you ask from murder-for-entertainment?