Day of Reckoning is the Apocalypse Now of Universal Soldier movies. It’s also a throwback to old-school science fiction/action flicks (Total Recall and Blade Runner, for example, come to mind) in general and Jean-Claude Van Damme’s oeuvre in particular (complete with a doppelgänger for the hero).
The film also features plenty of graphic violence and frontal nudity, both male and female. This is as good a time as you’ll have watching a low-budget VOD sci-fi actioner, but that’s not all there is to it.
Day of Reckoning is surprisingly ambitious, and this allows it to transcend the limitations of its genre and amount to more than just the sum of its parts. Insofar as it thinks outside the box, Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning can be said to be a thinking man’s action picture.
Here we have the makings of an instant cult classic. Universal Soldier OG Luc Deveraux (JCVD) has gone more rogue than usual, doing a Col. Kurtz and holing up in a bunker at the end of a river where he is the patriarch of a band of born-again UniSols, including Sergeant Andrew Scott (Dolph Lundgren), a clone of Deveraux’s one-time mortal enemy now turned into his No. 1 convert/hype man — in other words, Lundgren is the Dennis Hopper to JCVD’s Brando. This is nothing short of genius.
Deveraux is confronted by a new and improved UniSol named John (Scott Adkins). More fitting this could not be, considering that Adkins is a younger, better version of JCVD. Adkins’s addition as the protagonist is a shot in the arm for the franchise, upping the ante with his insane martial arts skills.
(The John we see in the film is actually the latest in a long line of clones sent after Deveraux. This leads Van Damme to utter the unintentionally hilarious phrase, “There is no end. Always another John,” which makes him sound like a tired old hooker)
If you must make a sequel (and must you really, though?), this is the way to do it, as it effectively revitalizes old patterns and introduces new dynamics. If you’re going to bring back old characters, teach them new tricks.
JCVD himself is used sparingly, which would have been at one time counterintuitive but just plain makes sense now. As Lundgren’s fight scene with Adkins demonstrates, certain people are getting too old for this shit, and it’s wise to let fresh blood carry the movie.
All things considered, by defying conventional action movie tropes and incorporating intellectual themes and philosophical undertones, Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning emerges as a cerebral action film for discerning viewers.