Outlaw Johnny Black

The intro was slow which was a minor issue but the cast holds the comedy and action well.

The story was funny, light, and engaging once it picked up when Johnny enters the location of majority of the movie.

The time spent with the characters and the way all the actors worked together was amazing you can tell they had fun while also sharing it towards people on screen.

It was a joy to see so many familiar faces, and so many of the cast from black dynamite shows up while seeing new ones.

I'm hard pressed to find someone who didn't deliver, one of my favorite scenes is when the character Jessie lee is introduced.

It had me and others in the theater dying laughing.

I would recommend to anyone who has seen the directors last work like this, and to anyone who enjoys a classic story of a villain turned hero.

Michael Jai White's "Outlaw Johnny Black" (2023) attempts to blend martial arts action with Western comedy, but ultimately falls flat, delivering a lukewarm and utterly unmemorable cinematic experience. The film suffers from a severe lack of narrative focus, meandering aimlessly between its action sequences and attempts at humor without ever truly committing to either. The supposed "charming" interactions and comedic timing feel forced and contrived, lacking the genuine spark necessary to engage the audience. Despite Michael Jai White's physical presence, the dialogue often feels clichéd and uninspired, as if the writers simply strung together a series of genre tropes without any regard for natural conversation or compelling comedic timing. Instead of a fresh and energetic take on the Western, it offers a superficial and often irritating spectacle of forced whimsy.

Is it worth watching? No, unless you have an exceptionally high tolerance for formulaic action-comedies and a desire to see a predictable narrative unfold. There are far more engaging and genuinely entertaining Westerns available.

I am a huge fan of Michael Jai White's BLACK DYNAMITE film and I have been waiting for this film since 2018. At more than two hours it can drag while it sets up all the pieces of its elaborate plot. Jai White manages to blend his martial arts skills into this western with his own signature flare. Michael Jai White and Byron Minns wrote Outlaw Johnny Black and starred in it. Much like Black Dynamite, they bring their sense of humor to the Western genre, but while Black Dynamite was a satire of the blaxploitation, films of yesteryear, Johnny Black is more of a Western with comic relief akin to Blazing Saddles but a bit more restrained. It does have a minimal amount of tongue-in-cheek double entendres. There will be some offended by how the Native Americans are portrayed in the film, even as blatant comic relief but those who understand the satire and humor will chuckle along at the references. Fans of the previous film will notice all of the actors that White and Mimms enjoy working with as repeat faces appear throughout.

Well... that was a watch that leaves me baffled. And I'm a bit sad...

I hoped this one to be more like Black dynamite, but it really ended up confusing me. I actually really liked the more dramatic and traditional western stuff more and those parts are strong 7-8 to me. And I really liked those over the top hilarious stuff, and they were even higher, strong 8-8.5. But this movie mixed those two together the way I can't really like this as a whole movie. So it ends up 6-6.5 in the end. That's really a shame. This movie should have been more "real" or it should have been a proper spoof, but as it is it does not work.

Here is a movie that I struggled with. Michael Jai White is a talented actor and martial artist. One thing he is not is a talented writer or director, and it shows with this new film.

On one hand, you have some incredibly funny jokes that even had my small viewing audience busting a gut. Michael Jai White has a great sense of timing when it comes to his delivery and it works in the films favor.

On the other hand, the story is bloated, with about 2 storylines too many. It really bogged the film down and helped contribute to that extremely excessive runtime. Halfway through, I was hoping for the ending, but there was still over an hour of the film left to watch. I, at times, similarly with Black Dynamite. Although that production had much more going on than this film did, but still knew when to cut it and when to let it roll.

As far as his directing talents go, I was vastly more impressed in the first half of the film than I was for the last. It was almost like he gave up on trying to do anything artistic behind the camera and the film just became a strict point and shoot type of production.

The movie is also very racist toward native americans. The lack of respect shown to the culture is jarring, even when presented in a comedic format such as this. The only joke I could get behind was all of the native americans were played by anybody who was not actually native american and this was to parody that fact from the old spaghetti westerns. Very clever, Mr. White. But other than that, it was very racist and not very funny.

Overall, I enjoyed the film in parts. However, it was too long and feature some pretty relaxed racism towards native americans that I'm sure didn't connect in the way that Mr. White had intended. A pity because with some editing and a few tweaks to the screenplay, this could've been comedic gold. I really hope Black Dynamite 2 doesn't turn out like this one did.

2 outlaws out of 5.