Peeling the Onion: Review of Netflix’s “Knives Out” sequel, “Glass Onion”

Murder. Trickery. Betrayal. But add A-list celebrities. When the movie “Knives Out” came out in 2019, I was impressed with its complex take on the classic murder mystery trope. So, when I heard that Detective Benoit Blanc — played by Daniel Craig — had another case, I rounded up my family to go watch it.

“Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” maintains the intricacy of the murder from the first film, but with more dynamic characters, humorous bits and — best of all — the ease of streaming on Netflix.

While Craig’s character returns from the prior film, the rest of the cast is a fresh batch of random celebrities from “Hamilton”’s Leslie Odom Jr. to Madelyn Cline from Netflix’s “Outer Banks.” 

The story takes place on a private island owned by an eccentric billionaire Miles Bron, played by Edward Norton. Bron invites some of his fellow rich and famous friends who dub themselves “disruptors” to join him for the weekend. Mysteriously, Detective Blanc also happens to receive an invitation. As the weekend goes on, tensions rise between the old friends and past drama resurfacing leading to friends turning on each other.

After watching “Knives Out,” I was impressed with the convoluted execution of the murder, but I found myself walking away feeling like I watched more of a how-done-it than a who-done-it. The same applies for “Glass Onion.” With the murderer being pretty clear halfway through the film, the true mystery surrounds how the pieces all fit together and how it’s going to wrap up.

In “Glass Onion,” there is a brilliant use of the flashbacks and fragmented scenes, strategically keeping the viewer on a need-to-know basis. The film stays on a single timeline initially, then snaps back in time revealing what went on between scenes. 

While it sounds confusing, it was carried out in a way that made it easy to follow. The layers of the mystery allow the audience to share Blanc’s perspective, so both are trying to solve the case as they understand more of the situation.

“Knives Out” and “Glass Onion” share a lot of similarities, but the major difference between the two is in their natures. “Knives Out” has a classic feel to it with it being a murder within a family in their stately mansion. “Glass Onion” is more gaudy since it takes place on a millionaires private island filled with bizarre tech and over-the-top personas. While “Glass Onion” is fun, between the two, I prefer a more traditional murder than a flowery one.

Following the movie’s release, like most things in this day in age, controversy was found within its plot. The owner of the island, Miles Bron, is a foolish billionaire who made his millions in tech. 

Sound like someone else? So thought Twitter.

After “Glass Onion” came out, Twitter users quickly came after it for being a poorly done dig at the new Twitter-owner and space tech billionaire Elon Musk. The director Rian Johnson claims that the film is not directly targeting Musk and that it was just poor timing of the release as he wrote the script during the pandemic. 

Another interesting choice by the director is that while the majority of the story takes place on a private island, the pandemic is still a part of the film. The film opens with reckless socialites hosting parties totally within their “COVID-19 pod” and politicians working from home. After the first five minutes, the pandemic isn’t mentioned again in the film, solely being used as a plot device to open the movie. 

Specifically in the scene where all of the characters come together, their choice of masks helps to introduce the personalities of the characters. While I think it’s creative how Johnson chose to incorporate COVID, it felt unnecessary and thrown without contributing to the plot. In general, if you’re going to do a 2020 callback, you’ve got to commit to it otherwise it’s just cringy referencing pieces of the pandemic when the story would go on fine without it.  

Despite its controversies and questionable decisions, “Glass Onion” is worth the watch to see how Benoit Blanc solves yet another intricate murder.