After five years, “The Old Guard 2” is finally landing on Netflix and it’s time for a refresher.
The first film landed on the streamer and skyrocketed in popularity in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. The film is an adaptation of the comic series from Greg Rucka and Leandro Fernandez. It follows a group of immortals who work to protect the mortal world from threats. Charlize Theron led the action film’s cast and is joined by Uma Thurman in the sequel.
Here’s everything you need to remember about the original before diving into the second one.
What is The Old Guard?
The Old Guard is a group of immortal assassins led by Andy (Charlize Theron). The rest of the team includes Booker (Matthias Schoenaerts), Joe (Marwan Kenzari) and Nicky (Luca Marinelli) and their newest recruit, Nile (KiKi Layne).
The group has worked together for hundreds of years keeping each other safe and protected from being discovered for their immortality, while also taking on missions to protect the mortal world from larger threats.
What happens to the team?
The Old Guard is hired by an ex-CIA agent named Copley (Chiwetel Ejiofor) for an urgent mission. The urgency is a set up to record the team’s immortality and ability to heal because a pharmaceutical exec named Merrick (Harry Melling) wants to capture them for study to try to bottle immortality for sale.
The team is captured aside from Andy and Nile and the two have to work together to save them. Unfortunately, Booker decided to betray The Old Guard and side with Merrick. His hope isn’t money – its easy to earn when you never die – he’s sick of immortality and hopes that Merrick’s studies might find a way to end his long life permanently after all this time.
Despite the betrayal, Andy and Nile manage to save the team, convince Copley to side with them as a mortal tech expert, and take down Merrick. After the dust settles, Andy forgives Booker but the group agrees he needs to be placed in exile from them for 100 years.
Who is Quynh?
As the film closes out, we see Booker stumbling through the streets of Paris struggling with his exile when he’s approached by a woman named Quynh. She is another immortal, who was Andy’s closest friend for years, but was captured and placed in an iron maiden that was thrown into the sea.
Despite centuries of searching, Andy was never able to find Quynh, and now it’s unclear if she’s returned to reunite happily with her oldest friend or to get revenge, assuming she was abandoned for centuries to drown over and over again.
Is Andy still immortal?
It’s established early in the film that immortals aren’t immortal forever. Eventually, those with the ability to heal supernaturally quick just lose the ability overnight. As the film wraps up, Andy is struggling to completely heal from a wound Merrick gave her in their final battle. This means her immortality is running out and her next death could be final.
