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McCall is a psychopath pretending to be a saint?

posted 10 years ago by tommyk1287
26 replies | jump to latest

This movie is already all about preaching from its high-horse, then shows us the deadly super-secret hero McCall murdering people with almost sadistic satisfaction. I understand they were some horrible people and deserved to die, but watching HOW McCall kills them, can you say he did so with absolute piety and morality?

I think having a perfect protagonist is boring, I like my hero having a bit of a dark side, but to parade him around as Jesus Christ then make him sledgehammer a common street thief to death? That's way too far. The worst offense was definitely at the warehouse near the end. McCall strings a guy up by the neck and watches him sloooowly suffocate, stares him right in the eye the whole time like he gets off on it. Even the Punisher: Warzone didn't torture its villains like this, and that was basically a grindhouse film.

Coming from someone who's seen both Human Centipedes and A Serbian Film, I think The Equalizer is one sick twisted disgusting movie. Not to mention it was boring as hell.

[–] huggybizzzle 10 years ago

I don't think McCall is meant to be portrayed as a psychopath pretending to be a saint. He's essentially a highly trained weapon who is tired of seeing society going down the sh-tter; someone who likes to stick up for people who don't have a voice. Although McCall does seem to go out of his way looking for trouble, he does have the decency to allow his targets to determine their own fate before he actually kills them. Besides, it's mentioned time and time again throughout the film that McCall had given up on his old life due to his undying love for his wife -- not exactly the ideal description of a psychopath.

I think the movie was more about McCall giving the bad guys a taste of their own medicine. After the prostitute in the hospital told him about the girl with the acid-burned face, and how the Russians keep her around as a reminder for the other girls, he pretty much knew that he had to be just as merciless as them if it came down to a life-or-death situation.

Mafia vs Irish Mob (BROTHERHOOD):https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4C-ogMPoBRk

[–] tandiwe36 10 years ago

Great explanation huggy. It's about justice/vengeance by any means necessary. Didn't anyone watch Death Wish. McCall knew what they were and they knew nothing about him. This is why they all say who are you.........before they die.

[–] ShareStuff 10 years ago

Did you miss the line where McCall tells Ralphie that the Police said he's done this a couple of times and even shot a guy?

Besides, the movie doesn't make it clear if the guy's dead. McCall could have just roughed him up a bit and even if he did kill the thief, that thief has upgraded himself to a (attempted?) murderer.

As for the scene with the barbed wire hanging, like all the other scenes, he's not getting off on violence -- he's showing how desensitized he is to it. Death means nothing to him, it's just an objective, it's what he was trained for, and that man was just another obstacle to neutralize.

You're blowing things out of proportion -- if you can't stomach what their vision of a CIA assassin looks like, maybe you should be watching movies with implied violence instead.

[–] traxxtv 10 years ago

Come on n!gga he was a Pip! Pips are straight up killas. You ain't know!?

[–] SugarShane333 10 years ago

I can't get past your vagina speaking for you. Soft ass tool.

[–] tommyk1287 10 years ago

Look out we got a tough guy here.

[–] wwiisgttom 10 years ago

Punisher didn't torture the villains in warzone?

What do you call leaving a guy in a glass grinder? Anyone with a sense of morality would have shot him.

Hows the pie?

Sooo good.

[–] tommyk1287 10 years ago

This is true, but it's not so much what McCall did, as how they portrayed it. Punisher was never meant to be moral, and I don't think they ever tried to play him up as being an upstanding citizen. In Equalizer, everyone looks to McCall like a saint, and you get the feeling that the writers just wanted to idolize him as much as possible. However, when you see him strangling a guy with a wire, and taking the time to watch him slowly suffocate with the deadest eyes ever, you have to wonder just how much he enjoys it. If they had given him a little more depth or reason for doing it, maybe, but they didn't delve into his dark side at all. He was just a great person who only killed the people who had it coming, albeit as slowly and painfully as humanly possible.

Plus, the movie was boring as *beep* Not one of Denzel's best by a long shot.

[–] wwiisgttom 10 years ago

yeah

Hows the pie?

Sooo good.

[–] actionmanrandell 8 years ago

you clearly don't know how to identify emotions. when ever McCall is killing someone he shows absolutely no emotions. if he was enjoying it he would have had a visible sign of enjoyment. instead he had a look as if he didn't want to do it.

[–] HarpoSpoke 10 years ago

Didn't bother me. Reminded me of Dexter. Some people don't bring anything positive to the world and we won't miss them.

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[–] AntwoinD 10 years ago

Some people need killing.

[–] mclaughlinm1 9 years ago

I don't think we're supposed to think of McCall as some sort of Saint. He's a straight up killing machine just like Teddy.
The scene with the McCall and Teddy in the restaurant when they both ask each other "what do you see?" is interesting. They're both mirror images of each other. They both see themselves. Kind of reminded me of Batman and the Joker in Alan Moore's Killing Joke.

[–] actionmanrandell 8 years ago

wrong. teddy was a straight up sociopath who had absolutely no emotions. McCall didn't enjoy killing. it was simply something he is good at. he was killing those who the law would never touch. he was dispensing justice. Tedddy on the other hand has never dispensed justice

[–] Brandestoc 9 years ago

I think there is some slight truth to what the OP says.

Although it's true that McCall is just trying to do the right thing. He is also retired from his super secret government job. The guy is probably bored.

As much as he wants to get away from his past life, it's probably also something he's used to as well. Killing criminals was his way to partly go back to who he was and go back to doing what he was doing without harming innocent people for his "fix".