When Matthew Vaughn unleashed Kingsman: The Secret Service, based on Dave Gibbons and Mark Millar’s comic book, fans were blown away by the awesome spectacle of it all. With it’s success there was no doubt we would get more entries into this unexpected new franchise, and now the follow up Kingsman: The Golden Circle is finally here, but does it live up to the awesome fun of the original or is it not worth saving the world for?

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Kingsman: The Golden Circle follows Eggsy, Merlin, and Roxy who are forced to travel to the United States when their headquarters are destroyed and the world is held hostage, which leads them to the discovery of an allied spy organization in the US called Statesman, dating back to the day they were both founded. In a new adventure that tests their agents’ strength and wits to the limit, these two elite secret organizations band together to defeat a ruthless common enemy, in order to save the world, something that’s becoming a bit of a habit for Eggsy. This new entry features both familiar faces and new ones including Taron Egerton, Mark Strong, Sophie Cookson, Halle Berry, Julianne Moore, Channing Tatum, Vinnie Jones, and the surprise return of Colin Firth who was clearly killed in the first film. ​Let me start by saying while I loved the fun of the trailers I was a bit irritated that they revealed the return of Firth as they set it up in the film to clearly be a surprise, but that just seems to be the marketing machine these days. That being said it doesn’t completely ruin his return as it does play a major part in the overall film as opposed to a glorified cameo that it could have been. That is left for Tatum’s appearance in the film who is sidelined for the most of it.

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The rest of the cast are all great with Taron Egerton carrying the movie perfectly and even looking like a young Colin Firth. They wasted no time getting in on the action and setting the overall tone of where it was headed. The story is great when it is focusing on the Kingsman and their interaction with the Statesman and each other. Where it lost me a bit is with the villain played by Julianne Moore. There was just something overly cheesy and silly about it that didn’t always work for me. Jackson in the previous film was a bit silly at times too, but he still had some swag and was interesting where she just came off as laughable most of the time. That doesn’t mean the film doesn’t work it is still a ton of fun and offers up plenty of action that fans came to love in the first film.

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While the church scene still stands out as the coolest in the series there are plenty of awesome fun moments this time around. There was an overabundance of CGI that I felt takes you out of things this time around, but not so much to not make it still a blast to see in action. There is a specific ridiculous sequence and ongoing joke that is hit and miss featuring an iconic singer that is really funny when it works. The addition to the Statesman does open up the story on a bigger scale and makes for a reboot of sorts to allow the universe more options to do more in the future. It will be interesting to see where this series goes should there be another chapter.

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This is a great follow up that would have been so much better had they not tried to go bigger and better and in turn made it too packed with nonsense. The main arc without Moore was great on its own and would have been a better streamlined flick, but they are clearly wanting to step the Bond like comic villains up each time so it will be interesting to see what they will be up against next. This is still a fun great franchise that turns the spy genre on its head and despite its flaws this time around still entertains and lives up to the first film.