Action/Crime released in theaters January 10th, 2025, streaming on Prime
Den of Thieves 2: Pantera is a sequel to the 2018 file Den of Thieves featuring Gerald Butler and O’Shea Jackson Jr. The movie is inspired by the 2003 Antwerp diamond heist.
The plot of the movie is the same as the first, except in different parts of the world. Sheriff Nick O’Brien, played by Gerald Butler is recently divorced and on leave from the police department, he follows The Panthers to their next heist: diamond vault at the World Diamond Center on Nice, France. Donnie, played by O’Shea Jackson Jr. infiltrates the bank while posing as an executive. In the meantime, Nick connects with Donnie and pushes his way into the team.
As a huge fan of the first movie and strongly invested in the sequel, I am fond of the fact that Butler and Jackson are reprising their roles. Nick and Donnie chemistry remains consistent, genuine cop/robber relationship, making an enjoyable interaction to watch.
On the contrary, the movie started off exceptionally sluggish with couple of the scenes and dialogues not making any sense. Within the first 30 minutes, I had no idea what was going on, the influx of erratic scene sequences along with the overseas dialogue was unclear. Unfortunately, this remained the same until approximately the last half an hour of the movie. Furthermore, the new characters, along with the constant changes, were overstated, unnecessary, and drawn-out, which expanded the movie beyond its audience.
Finally, many people will compare the first movie to Heat; however, I am not discrediting that entirely. Personally, I believe it is more comparable to Bad Boys and Ocean’s Eleven movies because of the directional change with the sequel. Perhaps it’s the fact that we’ve waited seven years for a sequel so, my expectation was exaggerated. Besides, the first film had a lot of action from the beginning to the end, a fun thrilling action thriller, but the sequel didn’t provide the thrill or excitement that I was expecting. Still, Den of Thieves: Pantera is not a bad film, it’s just different. Hopefully the 3rd installment will continue the same formula as the first movie and deliver a fun action-packed heist thriller and we can all forget about part 2.
