Knives Out and Glass Onion have been two of the best written films of the last few years. Rian Johnson’s fantastic murder mysteries have earned him 2 Oscar nominations in screenplay for his entirely original pieces of work. Along with Daniel Craig’s fantastic leading performances, as detectice Benoit Blanc, they have become a must watch, and quickly become a series of films I will watch as long as they make them.

Wake Up Dead Man sees Blanc make the journey to a small town in America where a priest was murdered in impossible fashion in his own church while a service is taking place. Blanc teams up with a priest who was recently moved to the church to uncover the case and question the regular attendees.

Writer and Director, Rian Johnson, has an extremely good chance of picking up a third Oscar nomination in the adapted screenplay category (despite it being an original story, because it’s using a character from Knives Out it counts as adapted, yes it’s stupid). I actually think this one in particular is the most tightly written of the 3 entries as well. I found, particularly Glass Onion, had a couple of pacing issues, which are far from apparent in this one. He keeps you on the edge of your seat, drip feeding you hints and clues along the way, before diverting into the opposite question, and you think you see something but it turns out to be something else completely. It’s genius work from Johnson. The reveal of everything at the end is so perfectly executed, and the cleverest of the three installments.

Daniel Craig clearly enjoys making these films, and delivers another strong performance. However, he’s a supporting character in this film really to Josh O’Connor’s Father Jud Duplenticy. O’Connor’s star’s been on the rise for a few years now, particularly since his role as Prince Charles in The Crown, but his career has just gone from strength to strength, with strong performances in Challengers and now this film too, before he appears in Steven Spielberg’s next film in 2026. There’s a few layers to his character and he has a great arc across the film. He’s definetly the stand out of the film, and if anyone from the film has a chance of getting any award recognition it would be him.

The rest of the ensemble cast consists of Jeremy Renner, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Kerry Washington, Glenn Close, Thomas Haden Church, Daryl Mccormack, Mila Kunis and Josh Brolin. They all do a good job, with varying amounts of screen times. Brolin and Close again are the standouts amongst those names. Both of them in particular for me completely disappears into their roles, completely understanding the tone of what Johnson was writing, and absolutely nail it. In a year where the Oscars are introducing an award for casting, I think this has to be one of the contenders.

Overall, Wake Up Dead Man is another fantastic murder mystery from Rian Johnson who seems happy just making these films, likewise is Daniel Craig. Strong performances in a great ensemble cast. I can’t wait to see what the next will hold, who will get cast in it (hopefully The Muppets like we all really want), and the best news of all, this was the last one in the existing deal with Netflix so we can a studio to actually purchase this franchise and give a proper cinematic release, rather than a small release in a couple of cinemas two weeks before a streaming service.

With the film fresh in my mind, I’ve given it the same score I gave Knives Out, which is half a star of Glass Onion.

What did you think of Wake Up Dead Man?

November’s been a very busy month for cinema trips, and I’m glad I’ve been able to see as much as I can. I aim to keep that up as much as I can in December which is naturally busier for everyone. At the very least, I’ll be doing posts looking back at 2025, and ahead to 2026. So to make sure, you don’t miss those be sure to follow on Facebook, Instagram and X via the buttons below.

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