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Review of Extraction 2 (Henry Jackman/Alex Belcher)

FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:

Buy it... if you have a framed, autographed photo of Henry Jackman hanging in your bathroom.

Avoid it... unless you absolutely adored the brainless personality of the first Extraction score and have always commented to your co-workers that it could use more distinctly heinous sound effects and brazen instrumental processing.

FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:

Extraction 2: (Henry Jackman/Alex Belcher) One extraction wasn't enough. Two aren't either. Director Sam Hargrave and actor Chris Hemsworth are inclined to provide Netflix with an entire series of extractions, especially with the two of them producing this schlock as well. Sadly, these extractions don't involve toenail extractions or sex toy extractions but instead show largely redundant extractions of human subjects from God-forsaken places where Western white saviors like Hemsworth can kick godless second and third world ass. Extra credit given for a smidge of Thor humor along the way. In the 2020 movie, Extraction, his mercenary character kills ample brown people in Bangladesh. Amazingly, Americans who don't read books decided to watch that film in droves during the pandemic lockdowns. In the therefore mandatory 2023 sequel, creatively titled Extraction 2, the protagonist, Tyler Rake, is going for lighter shades of killing in Georgia and Europe. Different skin colors, same senseless violence. Rake is still trying to reconcile how awful his Extraction experience had been when a random guy shows up at his hideaway and gives him another assignment. This time, he has to rescue a family related to his ex-wife, but they're in a prison with a crime syndicate boss. That bad guy's brother chases Rake down over the rest of the movie, leading to frothy death counts. Just when you think your own family (and especially the in-laws) is dysfunction, Extraction 2 reminds you that other families are actually fucked up far worse. The entire purpose of these movies is to show stylized action, sometimes with long, continuous, single-shot camera angles that stimulate semen production in the core demographic. Viewers want to see angry men thrashed in glorious fashion. What they don't want to hear is any hint of elegance in the music for such violence. The score for Extraction by Henry Jackman and Alex Belcher was appropriately mindless drivel with no intellectual merit whatsoever, and there was no reason to change that equation for the sequel. Jackman, the far more established composer, continues to share top-line credit with Belcher, and the results are frightfully predictable.

Music like this must represent one of the easiest paydays for a composer of Jackman's stature. He and Belcher can recycle most of the first score, emphasize a few distinctly heinous sound effects or instrumental manipulation to a greater degree, and then go out and have a beer. This is the lowest common denominator, folks, and it's the quality of music that films like this deserve. Certainly, the composers must have accomplished something new in Extraction 2, right? Well, maybe they set the record for the most notes on key ever in a single score. (Expect cue after cue rooted entirely with endless notes on key.) Or perhaps some runner-up position awaits for the nastiest processed strings. Other than that... bupkis. That soundscape remains largely same, but with brass seemingly replaced by synthetics. The mix seems more confined this time around as a result of that shift, which is disastrous given the absurdly dry and grating tone of the prior work. Strings continue to do their poor, vintage John Powell routines while percussion is hapless and electronics anonymous. The processed string effects are mangled as a suspense technique, yielding countless unpleasantries. There are more slamming and tapping sheet metal effects in this entry, as in "Forest Chase." Terrible staccato string motions in "Zurab vs. Chopper" are joined by dissonant groans that could represent the textbook definition of amateur action styles. If all of that isn't enough to titillate you, you also receive an encore of the worst of Captain Phillips's pulsating rhythms resurrected in the ironically named "All Aboard." And if you seek scoring techniques so awful that you find them moderately amusing, then enjoy the humorously wretched gym noises in "Prison Escape," the sounds of manipulated weight stack clanging, racquetball clacking, and even a distant lunking grunt to brighten your day. Still not satisfied? Then treat your lover to the deep, synthetic fart noises in the middle of "Garage Escape." Or maybe skip to the garbage can lid-slamming contest in "Tower Escape," which leads to tolling chime effect for the finality of this score's failure. As appealing as some of that may sound in this review, don't be fooled; the actual product is lifeless. On the other hand, though, Jackman and Belcher do reprise the two themes from the prior score. Unfortunately, given their bleak demeanor, few will care.

The personal theme for Rake, which doubles as something of a tepid family motif, does receive some appreciable development by the end of Extraction 2. Appreciable in this case means marginally noticeable for those not actually listening for the theme. The idea's strumming guitar rhythm on key returns in "Starting Over," after which the theme struggles to enunciate on its native piano later in the cue. It's quietly aspirational on violins in "A Second Chance," briefly back to the solo piano at 1:16 into "Sandro Makes Contact," and slight on violins again in "Yaz," where it still manages somehow to drone on key. The final two cues provide overdue heart to Rake's theme, albeit with the muted enthusiasm of the people who stand around watching others play golf professionally. The theme begins "It's Over" on otherworldly keyboarding and grows its chords to a greater degree of warmth on tonal strings. It very slowly sustains this mood on piano in "Brave Like Dad," eventually supplying a soft and somber end to the score. The actual main theme to the Extraction movies is elusive, but most will identify it by a dominant descending phrase. It figures tentatively on high strings at the beginning of "Starting Over" before reprising its full form from previous score's "Finale," meandering through the whole cue. (For those attracted to that work's standout "Finale" cue due to its rip-off of Hans Zimmer's Inception, expect no such obvious fanboy indulgence here.) Very slight fragments of the main theme persist in the latter half of "The Brothers," vaguely guide "Born Into War," and become disillusioned early in "The Morgue." The idea snarls through the processed string action in "Rooftop Ruckus" and is inconsistent late in "Rake Unleashes." Expect little more out of this non-descript franchise identity. If you've been sitting around for the last three years hoping for a magnificent new theme for Extraction 2, then enjoy yourself a cold shower instead. The composers do provide a motif that starts on the same note as the main theme but takes a few staggering turns on its way to irrelevance. Processed strings provide the best rendition of this triumphantly ambivalent theme at the outset of "Avenge Him." By that point in the score, any fleeting dream of achieving intellectual stimulation from the music for Extraction 2 will have been long dashed. Bless Jackman and Belcher for earning money by producing this muck. The hour-long album presentation isn't the most obnoxious film music experience you'll ever have, but it could damn well be the most pointless.  *

TRACK LISTINGS:

Total Time: 60:58

• 1. Starting Over (3:47) • 2. The Brothers (3:24) • 3. Rebuilding Rake (1:14) • 4. Prison Mission (3:52) • 5. Code Red (3:16) • 6. Born Into War (1:12) • 7. Davit & Goliath (1:27) • 8. Riot in the Square (1:11) • 9. Prison Escape (1:56) • 10. Forest Chase (2:27) • 11. All Aboard (1:41) • 12. Something Else (1:36) • 13. The Morgue (1:25) • 14. A Second Chance (0:50) • 15. Sandro Makes Contact (3:47)

• 16. Two Families (0:57) • 17. Garage Escape (3:14) • 18. Zurab vs. Chopper (2:17) • 19. Storm the Tower (2:54) • 20. Mahem Montage (2:09) • 21. Rooftop Ruckus (2:15) • 22. Tower Escape (1:14) • 23. Yaz (1:39) • 24. Cry Uncle (0:59) • 25. No Time for Negotiation (2:11) • 26. Rake Unleashes (2:21) • 27. Avenge Him (1:34) • 28. It's Over (2:28) • 29. Brave Like Dad (1:41)

NOTES & QUOTES:

There exists no official packaging for this album.

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