Review: Edgar Wright’s ‘The Running Man’ Is a Bold and Exhilarating Reinvention
Glen Powell in The Running Man - Courtesy of Paramount Pictures
I recently revisited Paul Michael Glaser’s The Running Man (1987) before seeing Edgar Wright’s reimagining, and it reminded me why that version still holds a certain pulpy charm. It’s colorful, campy, and unapologetically of its era: a muscular, neon-soaked satire that turns Stephen King’s dystopia into an ‘80s action spectacle. But Wright’s The Running Man is something else entirely: an exhilarating, high-concept reinvention that honors King’s original vision while propelling it into a new cinematic gear. It’s sharper, faster, and far more immersive, a film that grips from its first frame and never lets go.
From its opening sequence, Wright establishes a world that feels both expansive and terrifyingly familiar. Set in a future dominated by corporate power and surveillance media, the film follows Ben Richards (Glen Powell), a desperate man who volunteers for a global survival game show to save not only his sick daughter, but his family from poverty. The contest’s premise is simple: survive for 30 days while professional hunters—and millions of online viewers track your every move. Easy right? The stakes are astronomical, the spectacle unrelenting, and the moral cost devastating.
What sets Wright’s vision apart from the 1987 adaptation is its fidelity to King’s original tone. Instead of leaning into camp or muscle-bound heroics, Wright’s version of The Running Man channels the cynicism and humanity of the novel. Wright also embraces the story’s global scope, providing Richards the opportunity to go anywhere in the world that he pleases, allowing him to be pursued anywhere, transforming the chase into both a visceral thriller and a critique of a world addicted to mediated violence. The film feels less like a confined game show and more like a panoramic nightmare of modern entertainment culture.
While not his career best performance, Powell is clearly still phenomenal as Ben Richards. Known for his charismatic charm, Powell digs deeper here, capturing the exhaustion, fear, and reluctant defiance of a man pushed to his limits. He most definitely also has some great one-liners that audiences should appreciate, just as Arnold had in the 87’ version as well. Here, Powell’s physicality is commanding, but it’s his emotional restraint that lingers. Wright and Powell smartly avoid turning Richards into a one-dimensional action hero—he’s flawed, scared, and achingly human, which makes his journey all the more gripping.
Additionally, the supporting cast adds a good amount of texture and tension throughout. Just like Powell is great as this new version of Richards, Colman Domingo is equally as great as the show’s host—a figure of smiling menace whose charm conceals the cruelty of a system built on exploitation. Other standouts include Josh Brolin as the shows overseer, Dan Killian, who is responsible for finding the “runners” to compete. We get the typical trope of villainous monologues - Killian explaining to Richards why he believes he could “win this thing” because he is different than any of the others that have come before him. Killian admits he has said that to every other contestant previously, poking fun at the fact that he only needs Richards for minimal entertainment, just enough to become a favorite of the audience and for his inevitable death to be meaningful. One thing that Brolin is great at is being a villain so it is refreshing to see him step back into those shoes. Another stand out to me was Michael Cera, who I like in pretty much everything he is in. No surprise here that Wright brought back some fan favorite cast members of his from previous projects, and they work here just as they did in previous Wright films. Every performer seems fully attuned to Wright’s rhythm, which oscillates between sardonic humor and nerve-shredding suspense.
Edgar Wright’s direction is also nothing short of spectacular. There are some long takes in here that I very much love. One of my favorite moments, glimpsed briefly in the trailer, features Richards sprinting down a long corridor as a drone tracks him from behind, bullets tearing through the walls around him. The sequence lasts barely eight seconds, yet it’s a stunning example of Wright’s precision and kinetic storytelling. Throughout the film, he fully embraces the dystopian aesthetic: drones hum overhead, neon billboards flicker, and holographic projections swirl in a dizzying collage of constant surveillance. Every frame reinforces the feeling that Richards is never truly safe, trapped within a world that’s always watching.
Beneath the spectacle, however, lies a deeply resonant critique. Wright’s version of The Running Man captures the soul of King’s story: a society that treats suffering as entertainment and morality as marketable content. In an era of viral fame and algorithmic outrage, the film’s message feels eerily contemporary. Yet Wright resists didacticism. He infuses the film with wit, empathy, and just enough absurdity to remind us that we’re complicit in the very culture it condemns.
By the time the credits roll, The Running Man stands as one of the year’s most exhilarating and relevant blockbusters. It’s a film that thrills the senses while engaging the mind, a pretty rare feature in modern studio filmmaking. Edgar Wright has not only reimagined a cult classic but elevated it, crafting an action spectacle that feels genuinely alive with purpose and personality. I really enjoyed this one.
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