Kris Chaney, a recently released ex-convict embarks on a perilous mission. He kidnaps Elisa, daughter of Vicente, a powerful gangster, which puts them in danger from El Corvo, a psychopathic killer seeking revenge against Vicente's family.
Posted: January 20, 2026
After finishing the new Scott Adkins film Diablo, I just had to read a bunch of other reviews – and, unsurprisingly, most of them were completely ridiculous. Seeing people give this a 5/5 or say “you’ll love it if you enjoy The Transporter movies” absolutely blows my mind. Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed The Transporter films, but Diablo isn’t even in the same universe, let alone on the same level.
So where do I start? Every time I put on a Scott Adkins movie, I go in knowing it probably won’t be great, but at the very least there’s usually enough action to keep me entertained. Diablo mostly sticks to that formula, but even the action this time around felt off and rather weak. It’s your standard Adkins-style kung fu fighting, except a lot of it looks painfully fake. There are moments where he gets lightly punched in the arm and reacts like he’s in serious pain, only to get punched in the face repeatedly two seconds later without even flinching. Come on now – getting hit in the face multiple times should hurt a lot more than a love tap to the shoulder. And then there’s the slow-motion scene where he jumps through a window ’80s B-movie style. Really Hollywood? That is your go to these days?
Now let’s talk about the acting, because it’s rough across the board. That includes Adkins, who doesn’t exactly bring his A-game here. Elisa, played by Alanna De La Rossa, is especially bad, and the criminals somehow manage to be even worse. Honestly, there isn’t a single performance in this movie that made me think, “Yeah, I’d like to see that person in another film” – with the exception of Adkins, and that’s mostly out of loyalty at this point.
The dialogue is another major problem. Since about half the cast is Hispanic, there’s a lot of Spanish being spoken, which is fine in theory. The issue is that characters constantly switch between Spanish and English in the middle of sentences. Just pick one and stick with it. There’s no reason to start a sentence in Spanish and randomly finish it in English. It honestly felt like the movie itself wasn’t sure what country it was supposed to take place in. On top of that, some of the dialogue barely makes sense at all, with lines that sound awkward or just plain wrong.
As for the story – this is easily the film’s biggest failure. The plot revolves around a young girl named Elisa, who gets kidnapped by Kris (Adkins), her biological father. Elisa has been living happily with Vincente, a powerful gangster who framed Kris and sent him to prison. Elisa has never even met her real father, but before her mother died, she told Kris that if anything ever happened to her, he needed to take their daughter away from Vincente. So that’s exactly what he does: he kidnaps his own daughter, and now Vincente and his crew are trying to get her back. Meanwhile, there’s also a psychotic killer seeking revenge on Vincente and his family, because… reasons.
The entire storyline feels like a mess. It’s as if the writers had no idea where the story was going, so they just threw in a crazy character named El Corvo to spice things up. That might have worked if they had actually explained who this guy was early on, instead of waiting until the very end. Instead, we’re left watching people get murdered without knowing who anyone is or why we should care. And El Corvo himself? Not scary. Not intimidating. Not believable for even a second as some ruthless, badass killer.
There are also scenes that make absolutely no sense. In one moment, Kris and Elisa are looking for a car to steal. Kris tells her to look for keys, otherwise he’ll have to hotwire it. Instead of doing either of those things, he pulls out a map. A map! If you’re stealing a car, maybe step one should be starting the car and getting out of there, not planning your road trip.
Then there’s another car scene where Elisa runs over El Corvo to save Kris. After hitting him with the car, she stops, gets out, and starts to walk towards Kris. Kris get’s up, runs back toward the car, but instead of getting in and driving away like any normal person would, they decide to take off on foot. Why? You already have the car. Use it. Especially since Kris is injured and just got his ass handed to him.
There are so many problems with Diablo that I could go on forever, but let’s just say this: it’s not a good movie. Yes, there’s action and plenty of fight scenes, but that doesn’t make up for the terrible acting, weak story, and painfully bad dialogue. Part of me wants to tell everyone to watch it just so they can see what I’m talking about – but honestly, I really don’t recommend it. And to everyone calling this movie “excellent” and giving it a perfect score, I’d genuinely love to hear how you came to that conclusion.
If you’re simply in the mood for another Scott Adkins film, then sure, give Diablo a shot. But if you’re looking for a genuinely good movie, I’d strongly suggest picking something else. There are far better Adkins films out there, and this is one that probably never should have been made.
Overall Verdict: If you're looking for a Scott Adkins film to watch, do yourself a favor and choose a different one of his. Do NOT believe all the critics saying that this is a great film because it's far from that.
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