At this point, Rian Johnson’s name should be included with some of the all time great murder mystery writers. After 2019’s stunning Knives Out and the equally impressive sequel, Glass Onion, Johnson and Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc make for a duo synonymous with some of the best whodunnits in decades. Now, there’s the much anticipated third installment, Wake Up Dead Man, which has all the trappings of a Benoit Blanc thriller, only this time, there’s a profound and character focused center in the middle of a wildly entertaining tangled web of lies.
A young priest by the name of Jud Duplenticy (Josh O’Connor) is sent to a small town church run by the radical Monsignor Jefferson Wicks (Josh Brolin) who runs his flock with an iron fist. When Wicks is murdered in seemingly impossible fashion, Jud and Benoit Blanc must team up to solve the murder and weed out the many secrets of Wicks’s flock, each one more dangerous than the last.
Much like Knives Out and Glass Onion, this film has Blanc weaving his way through a twisted web to get to a central truth, but as always, he’s not our central character. Instead, it’s O’Connor’s Jud, who has not only a personal crisis to solve, but a religious one as well. He finds his faith and resolve to do good tested right out of the gate, but always has a desire to do the right thing in the end, even if it’s to his own detriment. The clash between him and the questionable methodology of Wicks is compelling and at times, uncomfortably on the nose for our current climate.
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O’Connor and Brolin are both fantastic in their respective parts, but this being a murder mystery, there are plenty of other suspects to sift through. In his much hyped return to the big screen following his 2023 near death experience, Jeremy Renner plays a far cry from any hero he’s embodied in the past and it’s truly fun to watch. Kerry Washington, Cailee Spaeny and Mila Kunis are all interesting characters in their own right, but one of the big standouts is Glenn Close as a devout follower of Wicks, who Close plays with lots of layers and shows her fantastic range as a legendary actress.
But the mystery itself is what will draw legions to Netflix come its December streaming drop and as always, Johnson’s script does not disappoint. The twists here are not only shocking, but plentiful- rarely does Johnson give the viewer a chance to breathe without throwing a whopper at them, which can be seen as a bad thing, given how intricate the plot is and that you truly need to always be on to catch certain clues. And yet, through it all, Blanc and Jud get lots of chances to shine and you’ll truly be invested in whether or not they’ll solve the seemingly perfect murder.
Wake Up Dead Man is a thrilling and unexpectedly profound entry in the Benoit Blanc canon that cements Rian Johnson as the premier whodunnit maestro. If Johnson and Craig are down for another twenty of these, so be it; film and murder mystery fans alike will be seated for whatever they’ve got up their sleeve next.
Wake Up Dead Man is now playing in select theaters and streams on Netflix December 12.
