10 Terrible Third Acts That Ruined Recent Movies

Rather than outright disparage The Equalizer 3's third act, it might be more apt to say that it feels like a movie that doesn't even really have a third act, as if the studio either forgot to shoot or screen it to audiences worldwide.

If the threequel's action feels noticeably pared-down compared to its predecessors, this is most noticeable in the finale, where Robert McCall (Denzel Washington) mops the floor with mobster Vincent Quaranta (Andrea Scarduzio) and his fleet of men in supremely rushed fashion.

Director Antoine Fuqua eschews a high-octane action finale in favour of a brief horror movie-esque sequence where Quaranta's men are picked off with little on-screen involvement from Washington - the goons largely being shot anonymously or stabbed in the shadows.

And though having McCall ultimately kill Quaranta by overdosing him on his own junk narcotics makes sense, it all feels far too easy, robbing the finale of most of its potential tension in the process.

This disappointingly low-key climax pales massively in comparison to the first film's soaking wet warehouse standoff in particular, and ultimately felt more like a low-effort way to disguise Washington's age rather than a genuinely inspired attempt to do something different.