How To Make a Killing in 500 Words or Less

Remember Scream Queens? The Ryan Murphy series that ran for two seasons a decade ago didn't rewrite the television medium but it's one of Murhpy's most entertaining efforts, goofy in a way that embraced Murphy's tendencies toward chaos -- the slapdash quality that sinks so much of his work was there a feature, not a bug. Anyway that was where I was introduced to Glen Powell as the dipshit hunk Chad Radwell, a perfect distillation of the actor's strengths right up front. That character's smugness wasn't meant to be charming... until it was, thanks to Powell's balls-deep performance. Point being I've been rooting for Powell all these years because he charmed me so fully right out of the gate. 

But the iteration of Glen Powell Movie Star that we have in 2026 has become a different beast altogether, and the limits of this current rictis-grin persona of Powell's meet and are beat by their match in John Patton Ford's How To Make a Killing (his follow-up to Emily the Criminal with Aubrey Plaza), out this weekend. What this movie -- which is based on the book Kind Hearts and Coronets, previously turned into a very fun movie with Alec Guinness in 1949 -- needs is a real asshole. Somebody who isn't desperately trying to be liked while also murdering his rich-prick relatives in order to get their wealth.

The actor who played Chad Radwell ten years ago maybe could've pulled this off. But Glen Powell V.2026 cannot. The movie works so hard trying to make his character Becket into a good guy -- despite all, you know, the killing shit -- that it deflates any and all of its satire, instead wandering around some unpleasant uncanny valley for two hours. Powell's face is frozen into an action-figure smirk for the entirety of this thing's runtime, and it's impossible not to wonder what an actor who was actually enjoying their slide into depravity might've brought -- an actor with an edge, somebody who brings a real sense of danger. A Jack O'Connell or LaKeith Stanfield could've rocked this.

The character really needs to have some crazy in his eyes; a sense that he's finally finding himself by discovering and embracing his monstrous lineage of rich shits. But both the movie itself and Powell keep backing off of that at every opportunity. There's no sense of developing tragedy or mounting lunacy -- it's just a bunch of stuff that happens, the end. And it's a genuine disappointment because the good version of this movie is so close, so possible, but it's just a series of self-owning stumbles instead. A cowardly trip, man.