The One Thing Everyone Hates About The Gladiator 2 Trailer
Will Jay-Z bring Rome to its knees? Fans are giving the "Gladiator II" trailer the thumbs down over one glaring misfire.
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00:00Will Jay-Z bring Rome to its knees?
00:02Fans are giving the Gladiator 2 trailer the thumbs down over one glaring misfire.
00:07The epic first trailer for Gladiator 2 teases a film full of action, drama, and shocks,
00:12and visually looks like the film Gladiator fans have been waiting for for 24 years.
00:17Despite all of the entertaining carnage on display, however, some fans can't look past
00:21the trailer's song choice.
00:23The audio track over the last third of the trailer is Jay-Z, Kanye West, Frank Ocean,
00:28and the Dream's 2011 hit, No Church in the Wild.
00:31It's a good song on its own, and the lyrics do reference bloodstained coliseums, but some
00:35folks understandably don't want it to accompany the trailer for a Ridley Scott historical
00:40epic.
00:41One person wrote on X,
00:42"...why is there modern rap music over it?
00:44They took the heart and soul out of it with the incredible score of the first one."
00:48This view was echoed by a Redditor who claims that it makes the movie seem amateurish, writing,
00:53What's cool until No Church started, modern popular song over Gladiator felt very high
00:58school film project to me.
00:59Gladiator is one of the biggest Ridley Scott movies of all time, with tons of fans to this
01:04day, so it goes without saying that the sequel is highly anticipated.
01:08A huge part of the reason the first film worked was Hans Zimmer's epic, sweeping score, which
01:13brought some easy comparisons to the use of No Church in the Wild in the trailer.
01:17One YouTube commenter wrote,
01:18We've gone from Hans Zimmer to freakin' Spotify music.
01:21Clearly, the mob is not entertained.
01:23The gods of Spokane!
01:30And the choice has seemingly soured some people on the upcoming second installment.
01:34Another person took to Reddit to say,
01:35I'm a massive Gladiator fan, and the music for this trailer just took me out completely.
01:40It just does not fit the tone set by the original movie at all.
01:44The criticism isn't limited to the general fandom, either.
01:47The song also caught the attention of Hellboy co-writer Peter Briggs, who took to X to note
01:51that it's one of several bad ideas associated with the sequel, writing,
01:55That song was a god-awful marketing idea for an unnecessary Gladiator sequel.
02:00Miskel has the charisma of a block of wood.
02:02Only Washington looks interesting.
02:04I'll see it for Ridley, Psy, and the naval battles.
02:07So is it really that bad?
02:08Sure, but look, marketing is, well, it's marketing.
02:12It's designed to catch as many eyes as possible, even if that doesn't necessarily involve realistically
02:17representing what's being marketed.
02:18One of the TV spots for the first Gladiator intercut action scenes from the film with
02:22clips of modern sports and set it all to a kid rock song.
02:25It was completely ridiculous, and obviously the ones any Bauer-to-Boer needle drops from
02:30Maximus upjumped the boogie in the Coliseum.
02:33In other words, the weird song choice in the trailer shouldn't dampen our enthusiasm for
02:37the movie by itself.
02:38That said, Hans Zimmer isn't returning to score the sequel, but Ridley Scott did tap
02:42Harry Gregson-Williams for the job.
02:44Gregson-Williams has worked with Scott before.
02:46Notably on Kingdom of Heaven, and he scored the first two Narnia movies, not to mention
02:51many of the Metal Gear Solid games.
02:53Clearly, the film itself was in good hands as far as the music goes.
02:56Oddly enough, the music wasn't the only sticking point with the trailer.
03:00Fans were also quick to take sides when it came to Denzel Washington's performance.
03:03Whose head could I give you that would satisfy this fury?
03:07The entire Roman army's.
03:09Too much?
03:10Specifically, a lot of fans couldn't help but jokingly compare Washington's mannerisms
03:14to his role in Training Day.
03:16That would be an interesting combo, to say the least.
03:18King Kong ain't got s---- on me!
03:22In the end, even if the first trailer for Gladiator 2 is leaving fans split, that doesn't
03:26necessarily mean the movie will do the same.
03:28We'll all be able to find out when it hits theaters November 22nd.