WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Extraction, now streaming on Netflix.
Extraction is a dark film that takes place almost entirely in the city of Dhaka, Bangladesh. In the film, mercenary and ex-Australian soldier Tyler Rake, played by the Marvel Cinematic Universe star Chris Hemsworth, is dispatched to rescue a young boy named Ovi Mahajan, the son of a powerful local drug lord. Ovi is taken by one of his father's rivals, Amir Asif, and Rake is brought in along with his team of specialists to retrieve him.
Hemsworth's Rake is a man of few words. He's haunted by the loss of his son and his time at war, and he's got something of a deathwish. But he doesn't let that distract him from his job. Before long, Rake locates the boy. However, he is unfortunately led in the middle of a trap. In mere moments, Rake's entire support team is taken out, and he finds himself alone, fighting the forces of an entire city to save Ovi's life.
And when the mercenary kicks into action, he shows that he could give Keanu Reeves' fan-favorite character John Wick a run for his money.
When Rake first gets into contact with the men who have kidnapped Ovi, he plays along and follows his orders to pay the ransom and secure the boy. But after his team is killed, Tyler changes the plan and takes out an entire room of thugs to free Ovi. As he does so, he shows that a dozen armed men aren't really a challenge for him. He bursts into the room with his gun, and it's there that he shows a fighting style similar to John Wick.
Throughout the John Wick trilogy of films, Keanu Reeves' character introduced a new fighting style known as gun-fu. It combines his martial arts skills with all manner of handheld weapons, and it involves multiple body shots that are quickly followed by headshots. It's become a signature of sorts for John Wick, and it has helped redefine what a modern gunfight action scene can look like on film. Now, in Extraction, Tyler Rake shows that he has the same type of gun-fu skills.
With his weapon, he is incredibly quick and efficient and, like Wick, he uses body shots before aiming for the head. Plus, like Reeves' character, his reload time is also rapid and efficient, and he doesn't hesitate to use any object in his environment to keep fighting, whether it's a coffee cup or a car door, which Wick has also been known to do.
What's more, like Wick, Rake goes through the movie enduring one incapacitating injury after the other. It slows both men down in their respective films and yet, both keep moving.
Perhaps the biggest main difference between the two characters is that Rake lives in a darker, grittier world that doesn't have the benefit of rules or an assassin code. In Extraction, Rake ends up getting shot from behind in the neck -- a wound that, by all accounts, should take the hero out for good. But, like Wick, perhaps Rake also has the uncanny ability of surviving even the worst of fatal wounds.
While it's unclear as the movie comes to an end, Rake might yet live to go on his next mission. If he does, then Chris Hemsworth could have his own gritty action franchise, much like Keanu Reeves does. For the time being, fans can now argue as to who would win a fight: Reeves' Wick, or Hemsworth's Rake?
Directed by Sam Hargrave and written by Joe Russo, Extraction stars Chris Hemsworth, Rudhraksh Jaiswal, Manoj Bajpayee, Randeep Hooda, Pankaj Tripathi, Derek Luke, Marc Donato and David Harbour. It is currently available on Netflix.