I finally caught up with Colombiana, the Luc Besson producer Zoe Saldana starring action film. A film that is effectively inspired by the idea of what a sequel to The Professional might be like, if they were legally able to move forward with one.

I was always quite worried about the idea of a sequel as it would be so hard to capture that magic again, particularly since Besson seems to make bog standard action films these days, and while The Professional had a couple great action set pieces, it was so much more than that.

But Colombiana has made up my mind definitively. The film opens with a Mathilda substitute who goes through something similar, setting up the revenge angle for when Saldana takes over. But this Mathilda substitute is a joke. It’s like someone saw the scenes or photo stills where Mathilda looked badass and tough and wrote a take on that character without seeing the scenes where it’s clear that Mathilda is trying to act adult, but is still very much a child.

This little mini Saldana flies around like a parkour master. She has the brains to swallow some kind of microchip and the balls to force herself to throw up the contents of her stomach, right on a policeman’s desk, to get that microchip back. It is ridiculous in the extreme and isn’t helped by an actress who doesn’t exhibit and ounce of…anything human.

When we transition into Professional 2: Mathilda’s Revenge territory, it doesn’t fare any better. Just another stock standard style over substance leave your brain at the door action flick.

The one caveat is that Besson didn’t direct this film, but I think we need to face facts.

We’re better off never seeing Mathilda again.