WARNING! This article contains minor spoilers for Hit Man!

Glen Powell’s new comedy movie Hit Man is a massive success on Netflix, and his role makes me way more excited about seeing his upcoming action sequel being released this summer. With his fame having skyrocketed after playing Hangman in Top Gun: Maverick, Glen Powell is now situated as one of Hollywood’s top leading men, landing the actor plenty of high-profile roles in new comedies, rom-coms, action movies, and thrillers. Since starring in Tom Cruise’s $1.5 billion-making Top Gun sequel in 2022, Powell has been on a hot streak with critically acclaimed and commercially successful movies like Devotion, Anyone but You, and now Richard Linklater’s Hit Man.

Alongside Adria Arjona, Glen Powell leads the cast of Hit Man as Gary Johnson, a college psychology teacher who splits his time working as an undercover “hitman” for the New Orleans Police Department. Eventually, Gary falls for one of his would-be “clients,” Madison, while under his assassin alias Ron, with his double life turning all the more complicated when her husband actually winds up dead. Boasting a Rotten Tomatoes score of 97% from critics, Hit Man certainly reiterates Glen Powell’s leading man quality, which perfectly prepares audiences for his upcoming role in the sequel to an action hit from 1996.

Hit Man Is The Perfect Lead-In To Glen Powell’s Role In Twisters

Powell’s next movie is an action-heavy disaster sequel

After Hit Man, Glen Powell’s next big release is Twisters, the standalone sequel to Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton’s 1996 disaster thriller Twister. While it doesn’t appear that any original actors will return for Twisters, the upcoming movie – which hits theaters on July 19, 2024 – already has sufficient star power with Powell as Tyler Owens and Daisy Edgar-Jones as Kate Carter in the lead roles. In Twisters, Powell and Edgar-Jones take on dynamics akin to Paxton and Hunt’s from the original movie, with both being tornado chasers and experts who unite to test out an important theory on the violent twisters.

Considering the 1996 Twister movie made over $494.5 million at the box office (via Box Office Mojo), the pressure is on for Twisters to repeat the original’s summer box office success. However, with Twisters having a reported budget of $200 million (via The Washington Post), this may be a tall order given recent commercial disappointments for 2024 franchise installments like Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga and Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire. It’s tough to say how Twisters will perform compared to its tornado-chasing predecessor, but I’m convinced that the prospects for its success will be even greater after Glen Powell’s acclaim in Hit Man.

Powell’s last theatrically-released movie, Anyone but You, was also a huge hit at the box office, with many calling out how Hit Man should have been released in theaters rather than on streaming through Netflix. Considering how much more fun Hit Man’s twist ending and hilarious moments would have been in a packed theater, I’m all the more excited to see Glen Powell’s Twisters character chase tornadoes and play out some exhilarating, death-defying scenes on the big screen this summer. Hit Man would have been a perfect film to help kick off the summer blockbuster season, and I’m hoping that Glen Powell’s next movie fulfills this missed opportunity.

Twisters Will Include The Real Action That Glen Powell’s Hit Man Barely Touches

Hit Man generally subverts the assassin subgenre action tropes

While Richard Linklater’s movie Hit Man played with typical assassin subgenre tropes under the creed that “hitmen aren’t real,” it wasn’t the high-octane action thriller that some may have expected before watching. Rather, Hit Man subverts these expectations with more comedy and romance themes, which doesn’t seem to be the case for Twisters. Based on Twisters’ latest trailer, I’m inclined to believe that the upcoming disaster movie sequel will be the most action-heavy blockbuster in Glen Powell’s career so far where he’s in a lead role.

Given their extensive resumes in the genre, I was surprised that Powell and Arjona were hardly featured in any intense action scenes during Hit Man. But, if Twisters is anything like the original movie, it’ll keep audiences on the edge of their seats as Powell and Edgar-Jones’ characters engage in some terrifying, potentially reckless activities as they drive into dangerous tornadoes. After seeing Glen Powell’s various Hit Man aliases who discuss their fictional dangerous backgrounds, I’m excited to see him as a character who’s really seeking out the storm-chasing action in Twisters.

Hit Man & Anyone But You Make Twisters’ Romantic Subplot More Promising

Glen Powell continues to be a reliable leading man

After his rom-com successes in both Hit Man and Anyone but You, it seems like Glen Powell is able to find great chemistry with all of his co-leads. While Twisters’ trailers haven’t given too many teases for the romance between Powell and Edgar-Jones’ characters, the original Twister movie’s ending seems to make the two become a couple inevitable. With Anyone but You seeing Glen Powell successfully tackle the leading man role in a Shakespeare-inspired romance and Hit Man seeing him find acclaimed chemistry with Arjona in an assassin-based romance, I have no doubt that Powell and Edgar-Jones’ Twisters character romance will be as compelling as Hunt and Paxton’s in the 1996 film.

Sources: Box Office Mojo, The Washington Post