Bourne Legacy

The original Bourne trilogy is, far and away, the best spy movies I have ever seen. Even if he's really only spying for himself. Matt Damon threw himself into the role as Jason Bourne. And moviegoers were treated to some fantastic directing by Paul Greengrass. But we all know Hollywood loves to make money, so they decided to continue the Bourne series even though both Greengrass and Damon decided to opt out. It was a bad move.

Like the poster says, there never was just one. Which we knew from the first movies because Jason Bourne was set upon by multiple highly trained assassin bad guys. If you remember correctly, Bourne was part of a secret government program called Treadstone, or Blackbriar. I forget which because they throw around these names like a great white shark throws around a seal (Shark Week baby). Well, Aaron Cross (Jeremy Renner) is part of another program whose name I didn't catch. Except in his program, each operative is given pills that boost their strength and mental capacity. Trying to engineer Captain America. But in the last film, that Pamela Landsbury woman decided to blow the lid on the whole program because she felt bad for Bourne or something. I should really rewatch those.

Well she blew the lid on Jeremy Renner's program somehow, and the government obviously only knows one way to cover it up so nobody talks about it: by killing everyone. Even civilians. Which is ridiculous. They went after Bourne because they thought he was going rogue. They go after Aaron Cross because they'd rather kill a multi-million dollar super soldier then let CBS News know he exists. Obviously, because he is the main character, Aaron is the only one in his program who escapes certain death.

So he's going to find and kill the people responsible for trying to find and kill him right? WRONG. In the weirdest plot line ever, Aaron rescues a scientist woman, whom he shares no intimacy with even though THERE'S SO MUCH SEXUAL TENSION, in order to find a way to get his superhero pills back. BUT WAIT, he only needs one pill because they injected him with a virus that made the physical pill obsolete. This is literally the plot line right here: Aaron needs the virus form of the new pill because without it, he is literally mentally challenged. They need to get to the Philippines before Aaron gets too stupid to function anymore. A very odd way to run a supersoldier program.

And that's basically the movie. Which is just one big setup for the next Bourne film. Oh and the trailer lied, remember that part that says, "It's Treadstone without the inconsistencies."? That's not referencing Aaron Cross. It's referencing a different program called Larx-3 where they bred the empathy out of their super soldiers. Apparently the government has like 20 of these programs. Aaron isn't that special. Bourne was special, Aaron just has superhuman pills.

So we have a very confusing plot, a pretty bad lead female, a end bad guy fight which is entirely underwhelming and the movie ends with no closure whatsoever. When compared to the original films, it doesn't stack up at all. There is no fair comparison. Jeremy Renner is a great lead, and I hope to god he gets to team up with Matt Damon in the next film, but if they stay the course on this one, Bourne's legacy will be a pile of crap.

1.5 out of 4 stars

-Christopher O'Connell