Prime Video action thriller, “Samaritan” tells the story of a pair of twins who were born with superhuman strength. They were branded as freaks by the residents of Granite City, and their house was burned with their parents inside it. But the twins survived. One went on to become a symbol of justice, i.e., Samaritan. The other became consumed by revenge and turned into Nemesis. During a pitched battle between the two, both of them apparently died. Over two decades after that incident, a boy named Sam (Javon’ Wanna’ Walton) thinks he has found Samaritan, and it’s the old dude Joe (Sylvester Stallone) living in the building in front of him. And with the rise of a new Nemesis in the form of Cyrus (Pilou Asbæk), it remains to be seen if Sam is right, and Joe is going to save the city, or if he’s just some troglodyte.
Spoilers Ahead
What Leads Sam To Believe That Joe Is Samaritan?
After disrespecting Reza (Moisés Arias) in front of Cyrus, Sam finds himself in his bad books. Reza and his boys corners him with the intention of beating him up. Joe notices this from the bus he takes to the pawn shop on a daily basis and decides to interject. He throws Reza and his crew all over the place like they are made of nothing, and saves Sam from getting hurt. When Reza tries to stab Joe, Sam notices the blade crumpling like a piece of paper in Joe’s hand. So, that kind of confirms his theory that Joe is actually Samaritan. Although Joe walks away from the place, Sam continues to snoop on him, and notices burn scars on his back. He assumes that it’s from his fiery fight with Nemesis and runs to the writer of “Samaritan Lives,” Albert (Martin Starr), to prove that he has found the superhero.
Albert promptly rubbishes the claim by saying that a broken knife and burn marks aren’t enough to prove that Joe is Samaritan. So, to get some “proof,” Sam breaks into Joe’s house and runs away with his scrapbook full of Samaritan-related newspaper clippings. But, he gets the biggest piece of evidence when Joe (after recovering his scrapbook from Sam) gets run over by a car being driven by Farshad (Jared Odrick), i.e., one of Reza’s goons. And instead of dying like a regular guy, he gets back up, his bones mend themselves, and he starts emanating steam. He rushes back to his house to douse himself with water and eat ice cream so that he can cool down and avoid having a deadly heart attack. That’s how Sam reaches the conclusion that Joe is, in fact, Samaritan. That said, the way Joe keeps avoiding any discussion about Nemesis is a dead giveaway that Sam’s theory is a little wrong.
What Is Cyrus’s Nemesis-Inspired Plan?
According to Cyrus, Nemesis always punched up and directed his hatred and anger at the oppressors. He says that Nemesis beat those who deserved a beating. And his death left a mark on not just him, but those who are in his crew. The reason why he dislikes Samaritan is that he thinks that he was a cop who protected the rich and let the poor die. But his deification of Nemesis isn’t limited to that. He and his crew break into a bank of sorts to acquire Nemesis’s infamous hammer and his mask. A brief cutaway to Joe hints that he has some kind of connection to the hammer. Then, we return to Cyrus and his crew wrecking a block with one of their blackout bombs. After getting everyone’s attention, Cyrus dons the Nemesis mask and coaxes the people into becoming his agents of chaos.
After seeing Cyrus capture and kill a cop, Sam realizes that his big plan is to cause a blackout in Granite City, much like the one Nemesis caused by fighting Samaritan at the power plant. Joe has a run-in with Reza and his gang, and the fact that he’s a superhero becomes public knowledge. So, Cyrus ramps up his plan to cause a blackout and kill Joe in the process before he gets to do the same to him. He trashes Joe’s apartment. He takes Sam hostage because he knows that Joe has a connection with him. That inadvertently works out, because when Joe comes to Sam’s house to return his watch, he realizes that Cyrus has kidnapped him and taken him to his headquarters. Cyrus reveals that he is going to set off his blackout bombs all over the city. That’ll upset the order and allow him to establish his brand of equity.
‘Samaritan’ Ending Explained: How Does Cyrus Find Out That Joe Is Actually Nemesis?
Joe arrives at Cyrus’s headquarters and starts trashing it. Assuming that he’s Samaritan, Cyrus hits back with his hammer. While getting struck, we see flashbacks of Nemesis and Samaritan’s fight. In that flashback, Samaritan gets knocked down by Nemesis, causing him to hang from a ledge. Nemesis comes to apparently rescue him. But he fails to do so, and Samaritan falls to his death. A young Joe pulls off his mask (in the flashback, of course) to reveal that he’s the one who survived the fight. In the present, the elderly Joe reveals to everyone, especially Cyrus, that he isn’t Samaritan. He is actually Nemesis, i.e., “the bad guy.” Cyrus’s bombs go off, and Joe/Nemesis goes into a berserk mode with his hammer, killing every single person in the building in the most brutal way possible. His murder streak ends with him wrapping the hammer around Cyrus and throwing him into the fire.
Joe collapses and starts to heat up like before. Sam tries to douse him with water. Joe momentarily loses consciousness. But after resuming his senses, he takes Sam and escapes the fiery building by jumping into the one in front of it. Sam confronts Joe and asks him if it’s true that he is Nemesis or not. Joe admits that he is. Sam says that he can fix this by being a good person. Joe says that things aren’t that binary. He states that if only bad people did bad things, then getting rid of them would’ve solved every problem in the world. But sometimes good people do bad things as well, because everyone is born with good and bad characteristics in their heart. It’s what they choose that goes on to define them. On that note, Joe runs away. Sam tells the press that Samaritan is alive, thereby giving Joe’s actions a positive spin.
“Samaritan” is a 2022 Action Thriller film directed by Julius Avery.
