16 Years Ago, Mark Wahlberg Reinvented His Career With This Underrated Cult-Classic Movie

If you've been skimming through streaming services, you'll start to notice that there are a lot of films starring Mark Wahlberg. Whether it's Prime Video's crime caper Play Dirty, Apple TV's action comedy The Family Plan and its sequel, The Family Plan 2, or the highly divisive Flight Risk taking off on HBO Max, Wahlberg is proving to be a major draw for streamers. Maybe it's the simple premise of these films or the fact that they're the type of mid-budget movies that rarely show up in theaters these days, but their appeal can be traced back to a film that Wahlberg worked on 16 years ago: The Other Guys.

Co-written and directed by Adam McKay, The Other Guys is a send-up of buddy cop pictures like Lethal Weapon or Rush Hour, pairing Wahlberg's loose-cannon cop Terry Hoitz with forensic accountant Allen Gamble (Will Ferrell). The two couldn't be more different, with Hoitz's anger issues leading him to shoot Derek Jeter of all people and Gamble preferring to take low-risk cases. When the duo investigates a minor case involving billionaire Sir David Ershon (Steve Coogan), they find themselves drawn into a web of danger and corruption. Since The Other Guys is now free to stream on Pluto TV, it's the perfect chance to watch what would be Wahlberg's comeback role.

'The Other Guys' Thrives on the Dynamic Between Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell

The Other Guys never misses a chance to skewer the conventions of the buddy-cop comedy, whether it's casting Samuel L. Jackson and Dwayne Johnson as a pair of gung-ho detectives who end up dying after a crazy stunt, or the fact that the billionaire who is poised as the villain winds up needing protection from the protagonists. It's the dynamic between Wahlberg and Ferrell that makes this a movie worth watching, as their characters constantly butt heads due to Allen's reluctance to get mixed up in dangerous cases or Hoitz's tendecy to fly off the handle at the slightest provocation. According to Adam McKay, the reason he ended up filming The Other Guys was due to a dinner he attended with Wahlberg and Ferrell:

"We went out with him, and Will and Mark sat next to each other, and Mark made us laugh all night long. He’s a great guy, really funny. And I just walked away, going, 'You guys have to make a movie, that is one of the most interesting, odd chemistries I’ve ever seen, and clearly he knows how to play.' That was the genesis of it, and just from looking at them, and based on Mark’s background, I thought, well, it should probably be an action comedy. We haven’t done that yet, either, and that’s always exciting."

The timing couldn't have been better for Wahlberg, who was coming off a string of box office flops that included underrated films like We Own The Night, or straight-up stinkers like the one-two punch of Max Payne and The Happening. The Other Guys showed off Wahlberg's comedic range, while also poking fun at the type of hypermasculine action roles that had been his bread and butter at that point. It's also shaped his current batch of roles, as The Family Plan and Play Dirty both lean on Wahlberg's sense of comedic timing as much as his ability to handle action sequences.

After 'The Other Guys', Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell Worked on Another Comedy Film

The Other Guys was a surprising success, racking up solid reviews and a worldwide gross of $170 million. It even toppled Inception in its opening weekend! The film's also memorable for its unique closing credits, which drew a sharp comparison between the benefits that NYPD officers receive compared to the bailouts gifted to billionaires; it was a glimpse at the mix of comedy and social commentary that would fuel Adam McKay's later films like The Big Short and Don't Look Up. Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell even reunited for another pair of comedy films with Daddy's Home and Daddy's Home 2, where they play a pair of dueling fathers.

The Other Guys is both a comedy that manages to play with genre conventions in a hilarious and thoughtful way, and a movie that helped get Mark Wahlberg's career back on track. If you do wind up watching one of Wahlberg's films this weekend, make it this one.