Viola Davis spent the better part of a decade trying to convince the world that she was capable of leading an action film. It shouldn’t have been that difficult to sell her for anything: she’s one of the most decorated actors of her generation, and one of a handful to achieve EGOT status. But changing the way that Black women — dark-skinned Black women and Black women over 40 in particular — are depicted in big Hollywood blockbusters is akin to a Sisyphean task. Even after headlining the subversive Widows, bringing DC’s Amanda Waller into live-action, and championing one of the best actioners of the decade in The Woman King, Davis is still pushing the boulder up that hill. But the struggle isn’t always a struggle: sometimes, it gives us something fun and light like G20, a film that, however messy or misguided, still brings us that much closer to the norm Davis has worked so hard to manifest.
Davis’ latest foray into action has a lot more in common with White House Down than The Woman King. G20 feels like an offering from the alternate universe where Kamala Harris won the U.S. presidency: the allusions to the world we could have had are there for those with eyes to see, but this world is still a ways away from feminist utopia. Davis’ Danielle Sutton is a better POTUS than anyone deserves, a war hero made famous on the cover of TIME, and a mother working hard to raise her two kids. But any way you slice it, she’s got a thankless job. Her headstrong, tech-savvy daughter Serena (Marsai Martin) is constantly undermining her authority, and every day, Sutton has to navigate new doubts about her capabilities as president.
