One of the major highlights of the past year in the Nigerian movie industry is the release of the movie Merry Men: Nemesis. This is the third installment in the franchise and after the first widely successful one, they released a sequel that was also a bit successful. And now, we have the third movie in the series.

But then, considering how this movie has an ensemble cast, many of whom are great actors in their own rights, it was quite easy for this movie to be a money magnet for the producers and one would have expected that people would keep watching the movie even after the first time.

But then, a lot of things just didn’t seem to jell in the movie. First off, some of the cast from the first and second installments were absent. We didn’t see Falz or Jim Iyke at all in the movie and for me especially, that killed the vibe. I would have loved to see them, even if it was just for a minute or two. But then, these guys are A-Listers, so I guess that if they’re gonna be in your movie, then it would be for more than a few minutes.

Narrative

Merry Men: Nemesis continued after the events of the second installment, and it’s basically a story of revenge. Dafe, played by Chidi Mokeme, wanted to take revenge on Ayo (Ramsey Nouah) for betraying him years ago. Dafe plans this in grand style and enacts his revenge on Ayo’s wedding day when he gets married to Dera (Nadia Buari).

Without any qualms, he begins to kill off members of the Merry Men, those closest to Ayo just to hurt him and the survivors must band together again to defeat a foe like nothing they had ever seen before. Of course, there is Amaju (Ayo Makun) and Johnny (Williams Uchemba). What is left of the Merry Men must come to work with enemies and friends, both against the laws and against their moralities as they try to take down Dafe.

The plotline is quite simple, there will be no twists for you! Or let me just say that the twists in there were poorly delivered and if properly done, would have had a better effect. The writing obviously needed better working, as there were just a lot of characters that didn’t belong, some scenes were unnecessarily long just to make for more watch time, and in some cases, it was kind of obvious.

I think one of the problems with the plot is the same problem franchises have: that is the problem of running out of ideas. It can be hard to keep doing something new, and trying to be unique in every installment will be kind of tricky. Because to me, there’s not much difference between Merry Men 2 and Merry Men 3. Except for the fact that the third movie was just way worse.

Cast

These are all A-List actors and they’re all terrific at what they do. I’m sure that they really tried their best to bring their characters to life, but in this movie, something just seemed off.

Ramsey Nouah as Ayo Aleshinloye

As usual, he’s a great actor and one of the main protagonists of the movie. He killed his role in the first and second installments. But for some reason, he didn’t seem to have all the vibes he had given off in those movies. Here, he was more quiet and withdrawn. One might argue that he was going through a lot with losing his friends and the law on his tail, but that’s not it.

Ayo Makun as Amaju

Another great actor here, but I just have to say that story-wise, his character was not done justice at all. He’s one of the characters that lacked depth and growth all through the three movies. There’s really no difference between the Amaju of Merry Men 1 and that of Merry Men 3.

For instance, the way he was easily overpowered in the sequel where the antagonist used women to get to him and they managed to subdue him without much effort at all while all he could shout was “Who sent you?” And then, in Nemesis, it’s basically the same scenario, but somehow even worse.

This time, a lady he didn’t know told him to read something that looked suspiciously like a terrorist’s manifesto, but he didn’t mind. This is terrible writing, because he’s basically a vigilante and at that point, Amaju should have been cautious and focused because he knew the enemy was everywhere. Allowing himself to be taken in the same manner and made a fool of is just sad. The writers could have done better here!

Williams Uchemba as Johnny

This particular character, I really don’t know what his role in the movie is. Is he the comedian or the hacker of the group? There were a lot of jokes that were not needed, times that should have been serious were simply killed with jokes, taking away their significance.

All he had was snappy talk and his “nerd” lingua was seriously lacking. He wasn’t giving the hacker vibes at all, and as a hacker, I have to say that he didn’t really do much “hacking” in this movie. They could have written something more meaningful for him so his role wouldn’t end the way it did.

Chidi Mokeme as Dafe

This antagonist has a great story, but I guess the character fell victim to overkill. Ayo betrayed him and left him for dead, and during that period, Dafe’s mother fell ill and eventually died because of the poor infrastructure in the community. So, he wanted revenge not just on Ayo, but also on the government as well.

I feel that if Dafe had simply chosen to focus on Ayo, he would have done more damage than wanting to go against the entire country. And that was one of the things that led to his downfall.

My Thoughts

The movie was a disappointment, I have to say. It had potential to be great but it didn’t even try to meet that potential. There were a lot of scenes that were poorly made. The fight scenes were weak and poor, you could literally see that they were not hitting each other. And that kills the entire thing!

A lot of scenes were unrealistic, like the scene where Zara (Ufuoma McDermott) went to rob a bank and the place was flooded with cops in minutes. Some of the cops came from upstairs which didn’t make sense because they were supposed to go in through the door on the ground floor. Unless they dropped in from a chopper and came in through the roof, but I really doubt that’s the case.

While the cinematography is good and the use of colors is top-notch, I’m afraid that all that won’t be enough to make it an enjoyable watch. This is one of the reasons I say that Nollywood needs to invest more in props and stunts, so we’d be able to make more believable action movies. Because when it comes to action, Nemesis ain’t it!

My Rating

If you’ve come this far, I believe you can guess what the rating will be. Merry Men: Nemesis did not live up to expectations at all, and it left everyone who watched it feeling a huge sense of disappointment. I’d be rating it 3/10 and this is because some of the actors gave stellar acting and they were able to carry the movie over. And also, Willams tried in his jokes. At least, if the movie didn’t get you on the edge of your seat, I’m sure it had scenes where you laughed.

I’m saying this again, we need to do better in our action movies. We need to pay more attention to effects because a lack of good effects will put people off from your movie. We need better stories in Nollywood and most of all, we need relatable stories.

I’m sure that we’re almost there. After all, the first two installments of the Merry Men series showed that we know action. And then A Tribe Called Judah came and shot the bar to the roof. I’ve not even forgotten the blockbuster, Living In Bondage… there are so many great movies floating around in the industry and movies like that are what give me hope that no matter what, Nollywood will definitely improve.

I look forward to that era.