Manners Maketh Man

I was able to see this movie over the weekend. I love the first Kingsman movie. Naturally, when I heard about the sequel I couldn't wait for it. Especially after I saw the first trailer. Sequels usually aren't as good as the first and yet this sequel was everything I could hope for in a second Kingsman movie. Spoiler alerts ahead.

The Golden Circle takes place a year after the first movie, even though it has been 2 years since the first movie. Eggsy (Taron Egerton) has taken over at Kingsman for Harry Hart (Colin Firth), the man who introduced Eggsy to Kingsman. The movie starts off with Eggsy getting in a fight with a former Kingsman applicant, Charlie (Edward Holcroft). Through a daring fight and car chase through London (including down Bayswater Street and through Hyde Park), Charlie manages to hack into the Kingsman database. We learn Eggsy lives in Harry's house and has basically left it the way it was except for the office which now has the headlines of missions that Eggsy has completed. One is that Elton John has gone missing (this is really important to something later in the movie). When Eggsy is debriefed at the Kingsman mansion, he learns of the Golden Circle which is an illegal drug company run by Poppy (Julianne Moore) and of which Charlie is a member. Later on that day, Poppy sends missiles to every Kingsman agents' house and the mansion, successfully destroying the agency. Only Eggsy and Merlin (Mark Strong), an agent and tech expert, have survived. They team up and initiate "the Doomsday scenario" which is to open a vault where they find they have to go to Kentucky. There they meet the Statesmen, their American counterparts. While the Kingsman code names are members of King Arthur's court (hence Merlin and Eggsy being Galahad (which was once Harry's code name)), the Statesmen take their code names from different alcoholic drinks. They meet Tequila (Channing Tatum), Ginger Ale (Halle Berry), Whisky (Pedro Pascal), and Champagne (Jeff Bridges). Champagne is the head of the Kingsman and Ginger Ale is the Statesman version of Merlin. While at the Statesman HQ, Eggsy and Merlin learn that the Statesman were able to save Harry but there were side effects to the treatment that they had given him: he didn't remember anything from being a Kingsman. While Eggsy and Whisky carry out their mission to track down the Golden Circle, Merlin and Ginger Ale attempt to help Harry get his memories back. This includes putting him through some of his Kingsman training exercises. Eggsy is the one who helps Harry regain his memory. He brings Harry a puppy that is exactly like the one that he had during Kingsman training and, like in the Kingsman training, threatens to shoot the dog. Harry tries to protect the dog and the memories of Kingsman come back to him. While Harry is brought up to speed, one of the Statesman (not one helping them) tries to make Harry leave. In true Kingsman fashion and almost a carbon copy of a scene from the first movie, Harry locks the door to the bar and says "Manners maketh man." This does not go like the first movie and Whisky ends up finishing the fight. Harry joins the team and they head off to stop Poppy. We've seen some of what it is like working for Poppy, which isn't very pretty, and learn that she has two robot dogs named Bennie and Jet. If you put two and two together you quickly figure out that she is the one who kidnapped Elton John (this is where the headline in Eggsy's office comes in) and if you can't get it from the dogs (a play off of "Bennie and the Jets"), you definitely get it when she makes him perform for her and Charlie. Eggsy, Whisky, and Harry rush to find the antidote that Poppy is supposed to be working on for her killer drugs. While fighting some of Poppy's men, Harry shoots Whisky and justifies it by saying that he is working with Poppy. Whisky is brought back to life just in time for him to show up and fight Eggsy and Harry who are trying to get Poppy to give up a code which would distribute the antidote to everyone that had been affected by her drugs. They end up getting it (although a lot of people die for them to get it including Poppy, Merlin, and Whisky) and Statesman starts an alliance with Kingsman (this alliance is shown through both agencies buying a distillery in Scotland). Ginger Ale takes over for Whisky and Eggsy gets married. The film ends with Tequila showing up in London and going to the new Kingsman shop.

There are so many good parts of this movie. I love the scene where Eggsy helps Harry get his memory back and I was super excited from the second I saw that Merlin was bringing Harry up to speed in a bar because I just knew "manners maketh man" would come up again. Throughout the movie, I had so many moments of "I was there! I saw that! I walked there!" I guess it is one of the side effects of having gone to London. I mentioned earlier that a car chase happens at the beginning of the film and that it goes down Bayswater Street. Some people may ask how I know that, wondering if I caught the street sign and they didn't or if it was mentioned between Merlin and Eggsy but it's not. I know because of the buildings along the street and the statues in the street. I know because Eggsy turns into Hyde Park directly off the road that he was on and only makes the one turn. I know because there is a series of white buildings that go by very quickly (those are hotels. I stayed in one of them). A phone call is made later in the film from a phone booth that I was at and have a picture of. I know the number of the Kingsman shop (11 Savile Row. Okay that was actually in the movie but very quickly) because its on Savile Row, the same street as the Apple Studios owned by the Beatles. When Eggsy comes out of the building, the camera is looking down the street and you can see a brown building with white trimmed windows and there you go. That's Apple Studios (well technically it's an Abercrombie and Fitch for kids but it was Apple Studios first). I have a picture of the Kingsman shop too. It was just so cool to see places that I know and love on the big screen. I kind of wish I wasn't that excited about the setting and was even more excited about the movie but it is unavoidable.

 Kingsman (really Huntsman) shop

 I left the theater excited for the movie to come out on DVD already. But I do have some questions left over that the film didn't quite answer and I'm hoping a third movie would.
1. What happens to Eggsy? Harry had said that Kingsmen don't have any attachments because it just makes their job easier. But Eggsy is married! That's like the ultimate attachment. So does he stay a Kingsman or do they make him quit?
2. Who becomes the next Arthur/head of Kingsman? There isn't even a suggestion that Kingsman is even rebuilt. I think Harry is going to become the next Arthur because it is really just him and Eggsy now. If it is Harry, question 1 gets answered because he would want Eggsy to stay around which means some of the Kingsman rules get broken/bend. But if it isn't Harry, then the fate of Kingsman and Eggsy are both in the air.
3. Is Elton John a Kingsman? We see him "fight" in the movie and he wears glasses all the time (maybe they are special Kingsman glasses who knows?) like the Kingsman do. The only flaw to this idea is that he doesn't know who Harry, Merlin, or Eggsy is. He could have been captured before Eggsy came along sure but he would still have to know Harry and Merlin.
4. Why is Tequila in London? Is it part of the new alliance between Statesmen and Kingsman? Is he there to help restart Kingsman? This is the one question there doesn't seem to be a logical answer to. It is one of those where you just have to wait for the next movie to find out.