He doesn’t know who you are. He doesn’t know what you want. But what you will find out is that he possesses a very particular set of skills. Skills he’s acquired over a very long career. And they are skills that set Oscar-nomineeLiam Neeson’s career in an entirely new direction all the way back in 2008 when he took on the leading role of Bryan Mills, the aged action hero at the center of the firstTaken, which is set to stream free.
Not only will the firstTakensoon land on the free streaming platformTubi, but so will its sequels,Taken 2andTaken 3, meaning that you can sit back, relax, and watch Neeson knock bad guys’ heads together for an entire trilogy. If that’s your idea of relaxing, of course. All threeTakenmovies are set to hit Tubi on June 1.
Divisive Prequel to Liam Neeson’s Best Action Movie Packs a Punch on Free Streaming
Audiences can’t get enough of these particular set of skills.
Directed by Pierre Morelfrom a script written by Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen, the firstTakenfollows Neeson as a former government operative who comes out of retirement and uses all his extensive training to rescue his estranged daughter from a slave trade operation. The movie put Neeson on a very different path as an actor,cementing him as an all-new action icon.
‘Taken’ Changed the Trajectory of Liam Neeson’s Career
Picking up two years after the movie which, spoiler alert, sees Neeson rescue his daughter and leaving piles of bodies along the way,Taken 2was unleashed in 2012 and finds Bryan being taken after he is targeted by the father of one of the men he killed while saving his daughter two years earlier. The third and currently final movie in the franchise,Taken 3, sees Bryan once again in the crosshairs of the CIA, the FBI, and the policeafter he’s framed for the murderof his ex-wife. Big mistake.
After the firstTakenwas met with largely positive reviews from critics (60% on Rotten Tomatoes) and acclaim from audiences (85% on the Popcornmeter),the sequels sadly offered diminishing returns.Taken 2stands at just 22% on Rotten Tomatoes (52% from audiences), withTaken 3even worse off at 12% from critics (and 43% from audiences). But you’re not here for a cinematic masterpiece. Neeson has plenty of them in his back catalog. No, you’re here to delight in seeing the renowned actor deliver justice with his fists. And, with this in mind, you could do a lot worse than theTakentrilogy.
While Neeson has now revealed that he plans to retire from the action movie genre soon (though he does have several action movies in the works, includingCold Storage, The Ice Road 2: Road to the Sky, The Mongoose,and the action-comedyThe Naked Gun), fans will be wondering if there are any plans forTaken 4before that happens. Sadly, it sounds like the actor has left the incredibly capable Bryan Mills behind for good,with Neeson saying in 2016…
“No, there’s not. There’s only so many times your daughter can be taken. Actually if we do have another it will be, ‘Please can you take my daughter’?”
