Shelter (2026) from "Who is this guy?"
A staple of the action genre is the "who is this guy" plot. A bunch of ne'er do wells go about their crimes, but catches the attention of a hidden badass living amongst the goodasses. As their best fodder is being destroyed, the guy next to the head evil guy will say, "who is this guy?"
Many made this subgenre their end of career cash cow. Jason Statham has done these roles his entire career for one reason: he's great at it. Probably a couple hundred other million reasons, but those don't affect me. In 2026's Shelter, nothing is new yet it's all good.
You have seen this movie. Director Ric Roman Waugh and his crew do a great job of mimicking the action movies of the last twenty years. That's not a slight. The man is a former stunt performer so everything looks great. They took some John Wick, a lot from the Bourne movies, threw in some Lone Wolf and Cub out comes an action gumbo that has a few technical flaws but has little heart to it despite trying very hard. Mason is a hermit living on an island, a young girl comes under his protection at the same time the people he was hiding from find out where he is, so he has to kill everyone to make sure she's okay.
Also they kill a dog. A very good boy. It did not feel cheap for the story, organic in the moment, but I am not sure what the point was other than to transition our feels to the girl for Statham's protection. I'll talk more on that when I get to it.