for the most part you're getting exactly what you're expecting with 300: rise of an empire: a cgi blood-soaked war film featuring incredible heroics and vile villains as only this story can do. this follow-up to 2007's 300 may fall a bit behind terms of a charismatic lead male character--nothing against sullivan stapleton, he's fine but just no gerard butler--but it makes up for it with the ingeniously vicious work of eva green as persian naval commander artemesia. green gleefully chews scenery as the primary antagonist and provides a much stronger lead villain than xerxes did in the first one. where the persian god-king was more reactive (and is so in this one), artemesia is incredibly hands-on in almost every sense of the word and green takes the opportunity to go all-out to great success. this is not to say there aren't some issues. the cgi blood is more over the top and less realistic-looking somehow than the computer violence of the first film, and norm murros bathes the film in a disconcerting oversaturated look that projects the style but muddies the image. the plot is as two-dimensional as the first film with even more grandstanding speeches and even more archetypal caricatures. but the characters are just as memorable, and perhaps more so in some cases. the performances are all fine with green, lena headey and rodrigo santoro doing the best work. the latter two reprise their roles from the first film and have less to do but look no less bad-ass for it. there are some slight gestures toward relevance in the modern era, with lots of discussion about freedom and uniting that smacks of some geopolitical discussions of the past few years. but in the end, we're not here for the message; we're here for the action. here the film excels. the action scenes are very well-staged and while they are unrealistic at times, there is no attempt to present this as a grounded story so i'm fine with that. in the end, this is an entertaining film that may not have the sheer masculine power of 300 but makes for a solid watch nonetheless.