Actually, this is a little better than its predecessor, I think, but that's not saying much. It's full of silly-ass moments that severely undermine the bleak, harsh atmosphere that it tries (perhaps too hard) to sustain. There's Mr. Kim (Anthony Wong, in a totally different role than in the first movie), a disfigured guy who dresses like it's still the 1700s and controls the world's (or at least Hong Kong's) only known source of clean, drinkable water. All other water has been contaminated by radiation from a big blast a while back which has reduced many people to living in the streets, even though plenty of buildings remain standing. (This blast has also, apparently, done away with color television, as the movie keeps showing us crappy old black and white TV in a feeble attempt to cement a post-apocalyptic setting. And, speaking of limited color palettes, this is one of those Hong Kong movies where every other scene is black and blue...just like all the bruises that people DON'T get from the fight scenes where they dance around without actually hitting each other. They're not all like that, but enough of them are to piss me off.) The government keeps sending people to look for a fresh water source, and they keep getting killed. In one early scene, the widow of one of these unlucky souls barges into the office of the police commissioner (Wonder Woman's husband), undeterred by dozens of armed guards, opens fire with her assault rifle, and then unleashes about 20 rounds directly into her own face. The final result of this is that she dies with a little splash of blood on her forehead. The government is also concerned about Chong Hon (Takeshi Kaneshiro), a charismatic "spiritual leader" (he wears white robes, but never talks about anything spiritual) in Mr. Kim's employ.

So, what have the three titular ladies been doing these past few years? Well, Wonder Woman (Anita Mui) is quietly playing homemaker with a young daughter who spends half the film shrieking "Mommy! Mommy!", Thief Catcher (Maggie Cheung) is still nabbing outlaws for cash while whistling about the never-ending fall of London Bridge, and Ching (Michelle Yeoh, formerly Invisible Girl, but now you can see her) is delivering medical supplies ("I have to get these supplies to those in need safe and sound," she says to herself, as she calmly drives her truck through a big stack of barrels packed with explosives instead of going around them). Ching has a masked, hunchbacked ally named Kau who communicates through crude body language and grunts, and gleefully helps her beat up bad guys. He's really the only likable character in the film. So, of course, he dies. But at least he's not alone. Executioners has one of the highest body counts (percentage wise) I've ever seen in a Hong Kong film. By the end of the movie, almost everyone is dead, yet I still felt unfulfilled.

Directors Ching Siu-Tung and Johnnie To use the film's dystopian setting and high production value to cover up all sorts of nonsense. People keep dying on their mission to locate "the fresh water source" because the surrounding terrain is heavily booby-trapped. Apparently, the radiation that tainted the rest of the water also wiped out all knowledge of how to build things like aircraft and mine detectors. Nevertheless, Thief Catcher and a guy named Tak (Lau Ching Wan) locate this holy grail after just one night of walking, and they're not even going at full speed because they've got Wonder Woman's brat with them. Wonder Woman makes herself a new mask with a piece of scrap metal, pounding out the eye holes with a bolt taken out of a prison floor, and when she puts it on, lo and behold, it's a perfect fit, just as pretty and streamlined as her old one. When the President informs the populace that it is once again safe to drink "normal" water (no real explanation is given), people joyfully turn on their taps and begin to slake their collective thirst; never mind that the pipes and the water passing through them would have an enormous rust content after such an extended period of disuse. And...(skip the rest of this paragraph to avoid an even bigger spoiler than the ones I've already thrown at you)...when Mr. Kim rips one of Ching's arms off and holds her over his head, she yanks an exploding crossbow bolt out of her body and blows them both to Kingdom Come (thus making the Heroic Trio a Heroic Duo)...or so one would think. She dies a messy death, but he just loses an arm. I sense a pattern here. Admittedly, this does lead to the coolest moment in the film, when an enraged Thief Catcher repeatedly punches Kim's burnt, bleeding stump. Still, it's silly as hell when he dies by hand grenade a few moments later. If that killed him, why didn't the first explosion do it? And don't say "super powers".

Bah.

If you can look past its multitudinous absurdities, you may find some amusement in Executioners. The plot is a bit more complex than that of Heroic Trio, and the overall presentation is a bit more solid. But it's still not something I'd recommend to anyone with a distaste for cheese.