Da 5 Bloods Netflix Original Movie Review

Major Spoilers are included in this movie review. Please read with caution.

On August 28, 2020, I decided to watch Da 5 Bloods in honor of Chadwick Boseman’s death. After hearing he passed away that same night to colon cancer, I gave up sleep—which I do anyway for writing or reading—to watch this amazing movie on Netflix. I needed to know him for something other than Black Panther, which isn’t a bad thing at all, but Chad Boseman was more than just Marvel’s Black Superhero.

Da 5 Bloods is a war drama film—released on June 12, 2020—centered around the story of four Vietnam War Black veterans who regroup in Ho Chi Minh City—Saigon is the preferred name—to complete two missions: recover the body of their former commander Norman (Chadwick Boseman) and the gold bars they buried with him.

When everyone—Paul (Delroy Lindo), Otis (Clarke Peters), Eddie (Norm Lewis), and Melvin (Isiah Whitlock Jr.)—gathered together at a nightclub, the movie seemed set-up to be a hangout type movie where they causally reminisce about the past before diving into the mission, but it becomes clear that there is more to the characters and their traumas from the Vietnam War as their conversations continued.

Otis is the unofficial leader of the group, Eddie is a businessman, Paul is the gruffy Trump Supporter, and Melvin is the group’s conscience. Out of the four, Paul is the most traumatized and damaged due to the guilt he carries over Norman’s death and his wife’s.

Paul also harbors resentment toward his estranged son David (Jonathan Majors) because his wife’s death was due to a complicated delivery. David—a schoolteacher—crashes the veterans’ trip to reconcile with his father, completing the group before they embarked on the two-part mission for Norman’s body and the gold bars.

Chadwick Boseman’s character—Norman—was only seen in flashbacks throughout the film, but the movie uses him to double down on how Black draftees were used as cannon fodder to keep the White officers out of harm’s way, comparing the treatment to how police officers would treat Black people back in the United States. Through the characters’ perspective, they viewed Norman as their “Malcolm X” who passed on his skills to the main characters for survival and taught them the lesson on how they were treated less than White officers.

Without going too deep into what else happens in this movie, I will close out this review with this statement: Da 5 Bloods is a movie about how war never truly ends—not the Vietnam War specifically—but the constant war against Black Americans, who have to fight for survival, equality, liberation, and justice. Black Lives Matter!

Thanks for reading this movie review, everyone. May you rest in power, Chadwick Boseman. Thank you for everything.