In 1985’s Commando, there is a fight between Arnie and Bill Duke that perfectly encapsulates that film’s unique appeal. While the two actors trade sledgehammer blows, and the fight ends with Duke’s character getting fatally impaled on a sharp piece of wood, the scene never gets too brutal and remains light and breezy throughout.

Furthering this vibe are the very funny one-liners that accompany the fisticuffs, and not just from the combatants themselves, but also from Rae Dawn Chong’s character, Cindy. “I eat green berets for breakfast. And right now, I’m VERY hungry!” “Fuck you, asshole. No, fuck YOU, asshole.” And “These guys eat too much red meat!” All of these zingers blunt the edges of the violence occurring on-screen, sending a signal that none of this should be taken very seriously. And that razor-sharp grasp on tone is why the film remains a classic to this day.

Speaking of today, we now unfortunately find ourselves saddled with movies like The Beekeeper, a joyless, ugly actioner that speaks to why Commando and Schwarzenegger were truly one of a kind. The movie stars a way too self-serious Jason Statham as Adam Clay, a retired government assassin (referred to, inexplicably, as a “beekeeper”) who goes after a criminal phishing ring after it targets his doddering old landlady. 

Throughout the film, we learn that the beekeepers are not just run-of-the-mill assassins you might find in the real world but function almost like the League of Shadows from DC’s Batman. They operate extrajudicially, cleanse society as needed by “protecting the hive” and will even become a “queen killer” if required by knocking off elected leaders who have “defective offspring.”

It’s all pretty absurd at the end of the day, which would be fine if The Beekeeper had as strong a grasp on its tone as Commando did. Yet the film never seems fully self-aware of the demonstrative silliness baked into its script. It is, in fact, weirdly humorless. The film also includes copious amounts of bloody, bone-crunching and flesh-lacerating violence that has no place in such an outlandish, over-the-top plot.

I attribute this failure in part to Statham’s insistence on playing Clay without a whiff of irony. Despite reports to the contrary, this commanding cueball can act, can be funny and can imbue his performances with some degree of self-awareness. If you don’t believe me, all you have to do is watch The Bank Job, The Meg and most importantly Spy for evidence. The last of those is a particularly glorious example of the type of self-referential goofball energy that The Beekeeper desperately needed. This is especially true of the scene where Statham screams at Melissa McCarthy “I KNEW YOU’D FUCK THIS UP!” right after he, in fact, has completely fucked things up.

The Beekeeper’s myriad failures, though, must also be laid at the feet of its director, David Ayer. Just like Statham, Ayer has talent. His work on films like Fury, End of Watch and especially Harsh Times are a testament to a clearly skillful filmmaker. But he’s utterly wrong for this type of story, with his grimy and occasionally portentous style looking for meaning, gravity and resonance where there clearly is none.

There are a couple moments throughout The Beekeeper where you think this duo, who would reteam for A Working Man just one year later, seem to finally have gotten in on the joke. A brawl breaks out at one point between Clay and another beekeeper played by Megan Le, whose cackling, colorful, gatling gun-toting lunacy is so cartoonish that you can’t reach any other conclusion. But it doesn’t last, and before long, the movie is back to the same of grim viciousness that is its calling card. And this is ultimately a shame, because when done right, few things are more pleasurable than a grandiose action film with a sense of humor about itself.

Commando and many of Schwarzenegger’s other films intuitively understood that fact. They recognized the camp at the heart of their stories. Moreover, they leaned into it and always delivered violence with a wink and a nod. It is that quality that made them iconic. And it is that lack of them that ultimately makes The Beekeeper one you should skip.