Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans Are Ready to Brawl in First Trailer for Netflix Blockbuster The Gray Man

Facing its first real subscriber crisis since the beginning of the digital streaming age, Netflix is banking on big success from its pricey, would-be blockbuster original movies. And none of them are bigger than upcoming spy thriller The Gray Man, which dropped its first trailer online today. At a budget of $200 million, it’s the single most expensive Netflix production to date, headlined by some of the biggest stars in Hollywood today and directed by the Russo Brothers in their post-MCU phase. It hits the service on July 22, 2022, and the trailer can be viewed below.

In terms of its construction and premise, The Gray Man feels pretty boilerplate—like a spec script written by Michael Scott of The Office, in which he would intend to play the title character. As the rather terse plot synopsis puts it:

THE GRAY MAN is CIA operative Court Gentry (Ryan Gosling), aka, Sierra Six. Plucked from a federal penitentiary and recruited by his handler, Donald Fitzroy (Billy Bob Thornton), Gentry was once a highly-skilled, Agency-sanctioned merchant of death. But now the tables have turned and Six is the target, hunted across the globe by Lloyd Hansen (Chris Evans), a former cohort at the CIA, who will stop at nothing to take him out. Agent Dani Miranda (Ana de Armas) has his back. He’ll need it.

In addition to the big names above, The Gray Man also stars Regé-Jean Page, Jessica Henwick and Alfre Woodard, among others. The trailer certainly has no lack of Mission Impossible-style action and CGI-laden destruction in it, but what will probably get audiences salivating most is the chemistry between Goslings and the mustachioed Evans. The inevitable hand-to-hand clash teased at the end of the trailer will no doubt be the highlight of The Gray Man for many. Check out the first trailer below.