Heads of State Review: Two Heads are Less than One

Heads of State shows glimmers of promise through its likeable cast and strong performances, but never fully capitalizes on the ludicrousness of its potential.

Heads of State didn’t need much marketing to convince me to go see it. When I saw John Cena and Idris Elba were the two leads, I was instantly hooked. Elba’s talents have been proven for a long time, but Cena had my attention the most. He’s long past his days as an internet meme and shown he has genuine talent for action, comedy, and even a bit of drama on the big screen. And with a premise like this, things seemed all set for a fun, over the top action comedy, where Cena would get to show off his comedy again.

After seeing it, I can certainly say the biggest strength of Heads of State is the two main characters. Cena’s quirkier, more lighthearted character works well off of Elba’s stoic, snarky manner. It’s the classic performance trope of funny man/straight man, and the two actors play their parts accordingly and the humor works.

It also helps that the two are likeable despite their flaws. Cena could have gotten annoying had he leaned too much into the “big strong guy is actually super scared and incompetent” angle, but while he has bits of that for humor (one especially hilarious bit is when an enemy soldier aims a rocket launcher at his car and he tries to roll up the window to stop it), it’s never to the point where he seems too pathetic or annoying. Similarly, Elba is sharp and serious, but he has moments of levity that help humanize him. This nuance helps the two feel like genuine people instead of walking tropes.

Sadly, everything else about Heads of State ends up being disappointingly middling. Nothing feels outright terrible. The action is competent and the story keeps itself kinetic. However, nothing about it truly feels memorable. Perhaps I had too high expectations, but when you give me a premise like this, I presumed the film would lean into the silliness of John Cena as the president of the United States. Yet the tone of the film is surprisingly less over the top than I thought, opting instead for a relatively more grounded approach to its action and story.

That itself isn’t a sin, but then you have to do something memorable with that grounded approach. Instead, the plot ends up being a by the numbers spy story, and the character beats feel far too familiar. If the film had leaned to a more campy approach, those tropes would have been part of the humor. A lot of plot holes or cliches can be forgiven in over the top stories because you expect a focus on fun and energy over everything else. In this dramatic context, however, the tropes instead feel meaningless. The film even attempts to have a message about global cooperation in the climax, but it falls flat due to it being hammered into us through the two main characters blatantly making a speech about it.

This issue extends beyond the plot. While I said the characters were likeable, they also feel just as forgettable as the rest of the movie. The actual backstories are hardly delved into, and what little we get again come off as hackneyed. So while I am enjoying Cena and Elba’s interactions when they’re together, individually I struggle to recall why I should care for them outside of not wanting to see John Cena get murdered. The main villain, played by Paddy Considine (Deep Cover), shows a bit of promise, as he’s fueled by a borderline insane drive for revenge against the US, but like all other elements of the movie, he neither gets much scenery to chew nor does he carry any proper dramatic weight.

Heads of State needed to choose a clear path. It could have either doubled down on the silliness of the premise and gone full 80s style camp with its tone and action, or been a bit more original about its drama and spy thriller plot. When the film tries to take the middle road, it ends up flatlining, and we’re left with a movie that’s neither memorably silly nor memorably serious.

I still don’t have the heart to rate this super low. After all, seeing Cena and Elba interact provided me with an adequate amount of entertainment for two hours. Unfortunately, Heads of State proved to be junk food entertainment rather than a proper meal like Fish and Chips. (You’ll get it if you see the film)

Heads of State will be available to stream on Prime Video on July 2, 2025.