Trigger Warning (2024) Review!!

Synopsis – A skilled Special Forces commando (Jessica Alba) takes ownership of her father’s bar after he suddenly dies, and soon finds herself at odds with a violent gang running rampant in her hometown.

My Take – As someone growing up in the 90s and the early 2000s, it was hard not to crush on Jessica Alba, specifically when she appeared as the lead of the FOX sci-fi television series Dark Angel (2000–2002).

Though she soon gained widespread recognition with her big screen breakthrough role in Honey (2003), and found box office success in films like The Eye (2008), Valentine’s Day (2010), among others, fan boys (like myself) mainly still remember her for role as Sue Storm/Invisible Woman in Fantastic Four (2005) and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007), and Nancy Callahan in Sin City (2005) and Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (2014).

However, hampered by her poor choice of scripts that failed to support her, soon diminished Alba‘s potential pull and ability to appear in what could otherwise be standout roles. Eventually reducing her first feature film appearances.

Now returning after five years, after guiding her business venture The Honest Company to a billion dollar-plus valuation, Alba makes a decent bid for action stardom in the form of a derivative yet watchable attempt to kick off a new franchise.

Marking the English-language debut of acclaimed Indonesian director Mouly Surya, best known for thrillers like her 2008 debut Fiksi and 2017’s Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts, the Netflix feature is neither a good noir nor a particularly strong action flick, but as a modestly entertaining vehicle for Jessica Alba to come at goons with swords, knives, and guns, it gets the job done.

Sure, it’s a pretty straightforward reintroduction but an effective one and while nothing here is distinctive enough to demand more from Alba‘s lead character, there are many more worse sequel prospects, especially within Netflix’s franchise bargain bin farm.

The story follows Parker (Jessica Alba), a highly skilled military combatant and investigator, who while on active duty overseas heads back to her hometown of Creation upon receiving news of her father’s tragic passing, due to a cave-in at the mine of their New Mexico land, from her former boyfriend turned Sheriff Jesse (Mark Webber).

In addition to the mine, her dad also ran the local watering hole, and though Parker has little interest in taking over her inheritance the longer she hangs around, the more suspicious she becomes of her father’s death. Something which is complicated by her history with Jesse, his up to no good volatile brother Elvis (Jake Weary), and their father and conservative senator Ezekiel Swann (Anthony Michael Hall).

And when she finds black-market arms dealers prowling around the town, she begins investigating. Unsure of who she can truly trust, Parker draws on her commando training and proves herself a force to be reckoned with as she hunts down the truth and attempts to right what has gone wrong in Swann County.

Compared hilariously and ambitiously to both Rambo and John Wick franchises upon announcement, the film essentially plays like a variation of Walking Tall (2004) starring Dwayne Johnson.

The by-the-numbers story-line unfolds exactly as you’d expect, despite screenwriters’ John Brancato, Josh Olson and Halley Gross attempts to lend some quirkiness to the proceedings with such moments as the senator telling Parker that his great-grandfather was Native American.

Though, Parker also receives some help from her hacker covert ops colleague Spider (Tone Bell) and one of her dad’s employees, Mike (Gabriel Basso), but eventually she goes the solo way like a 80s and 90s action hero, having already exhibited a knack for close-quarters combat and wielding a knife.

Thankfully, director Surya reveals an assured command of the form, delivering enough bone-crushing and knife-wielding sequences to satisfy undemanding, action-craving viewers. Mostly, it’s an excuse for Alba to display her impressive physical fitness in a series of intense fight scenes.

And although Jessica Alba doesn’t quite have the full-bore charisma to make her character particularly interesting, this mode works well for her, convincing both in her many hand-to-hand combat scenes and as an old-fashioned film star.

In other roles, Anthony Michael Hall, Mark Webber, Jake Weary and Kaiwi Lyman are appropriately villainous, while Gabriel Basso, Tone Bell, Hari Dhillon and Stephanie Jones provide decent support. On the whole, ‘Trigger Warning’ is a decent yet distressingly familiar and forgettable action flick starring a competent Jessica Alba.