Vin Diesel, perhaps thinking the Fast and/or Furious stuff was not silly enough, takes on the role of an unexceptional veteran soldier whose wife is (apparently) murdered before his very eyes, just before he is himself (apparently) executed. Wakes up in a private laboratory (run by a slumming Guy Pearce) a whole new cyborg with revenge on his mind. 

But his rebirth involves quite a bit more than, say, a robotic limb or two. No, his very blood has been replaced with millions of nano-bots that rapidly repair any bodily damage. Kind of like that creepy silver liquid Terminator. 

It isn’t until after he gets his inevitable revenge that it slowly dawns on him that (spoiler alert!) he’s being elaborately manipulated into becoming a serial assassin.  I was briefly entertained by this wonky, everything-you-know-is-wrong concept, but only briefly. 

So, just your average ultraviolent, six-billion-dollar, Universal Soldier, bionic, pseudo-Terminator Matrix revenge thriller; one of those overcooked, suspense-free, back-asswards movies where the plot merely serves the special effects and the fight scenes. Angles for a sequel. I don’t think so.

(109min)