The next incorporates spoilers for The Working ManThe Working Man suffers from a pacing concern that one minor repair may have remedied. In The Working Man, there’s an offended satirical undercurrent that calls out the trendy media panorama and the best way governments can use it to abuse their populations. It is on the core of The Working Man‘s world and is central to the movie’s themes.
Nonetheless, that theme will get considerably misplaced within the second act, the place issues flip to Ben Richards and his determined makes an attempt to remain forward of the Hunters. It is unlucky, as one character launched within the latter half of the movie embodies these themes fully and will have performed extra so if she’d been in additional of Edgar Wright’s film.
Amelia Williams Is Extra Vital To The Working Man Than She Seems
Launched over midway by the movie, Amelia performs a decpitvely vital narrative and thematic function in The Working Man, and an enhanced give attention to her may have improved the Edgar Wright movie. Amelia is an prosperous citizen of The Working Man‘s dystopian world, however is not essentially a villain.
Serving as a stand-in for most people who’ve come to just accept the Community and their directive over their lives, Amelia is launched casually chatting on the telephone with a buddy a few actuality present they recognize. After being taken captive by a determined Ben Richards, she progressively learns he is not the assassin she thought he was.
Amelia serves as one of many movie’s most vital thematic instruments, a showcase for the acceptance of banal evil for the sake of consolation that propels forces just like the Community into energy. Her arc is finest summed up together with her silk scarf, a trendy piece that Ben factors out may have additionally been spent shopping for life-saving medication for kids.
Amelia not solely finds out that the Community has been mendacity and manipulating the general public by altered footage and manipulated media, however that her personal complicity within the cruelty afflicting different residents makes her culpable on some ranges for the abuse heaped upon folks like Ben and his household. She finally ends up giving the headband to assist an injured Ben.
The issue is that this component of the movie solely comes into play within the second half. It is a component that the film teases with the blanket acceptance of the Working Man TV present by most people, however the second half will get in a short time misplaced in Ben’s efforts to remain forward of McCone and the Hunters.
These sections of the film are nonetheless entertaining, a credit score to the efforts of Edgar Wright and the charms of Glen Powell. Nonetheless, it lacks the emotional core that makes the primary and third acts harder-hitting. The film has a more durable time balancing the bombastic motion and the thematic throughline, resulting in historical past classes adopted by Residence Alone shenanigans.
Amelia may have been the important thing to fixing this component. Her presence, each as a distinction to Ben and an viewers surrogate to depict the film’s ethical, may have given the movie a tighter arc. As a substitute, the movie suffers from a tonal disconnect throughout this part of the film, which slows down the pacing greater than every other Wright movie.
How The Working Man Might Have Used Amelia Higher
Amelia is a stable character in The Working Man, serving as a becoming distinction to Ben. Having her seem earlier within the movie may have given Ben somebody to bounce off, particularly if it prevented the romantic arc that the Ben and Amelia of the earlier The Working Man adaptation and stored issues targeted on their similarities and variations.
Ben may have encountered Amelia earlier within the movie, doubtlessly as quickly as he escaped from Boston. Capturing her at that time when his picture remains to be outlined by the Company’s faux information may have given Ben a direct distinction to the revolutionary beliefs of Elton. In flip, Elton’s arguments may assist inspire her personal evolution.
This could have given Amelia and Ben extra time to distinction their experiences, highlighting Amelia’s inadvertent function in sustaining a world the place one thing just like the Working Man present is feasible. It could have given her extra time to develop as a personality, making her gradual progress really feel extra earned and personable.
This could have additionally been essential to the ending of the movie, which depicts Amelia as a brand new revolutionary who helps get well the black field from the airplane crash that exposes the Community’s lies about Richard. Having that fuller function for Amelia within the movie would have made that flip extra emotionally efficient and underscored her progress.
Greater than something, Amelia having a bigger function within the movie would have highlighted the movie’s final message, meant for the viewers of the in-universe sport present and the real-life viewers of The Working Man. Seeing somebody go from a snug lifetime of blissful ignorance to a freedom fighter proves Ben’s philosophy.
Amelia is Ben’s final victory, a riot in opposition to the system personified by somebody who’s charming in her present function however may have been indispensable to the movie’s effectiveness. Amelia being extra current in The Working Man would have significantly helped the movie.
The Working Man
7/10
- Launch Date
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November 14, 2025
- Producers
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George Linder, Nira Park, Simon Kinberg