1. The premise is both absurd and intricate.
2. The ambitious staging of Jaa's lean and long-limbed Muay Thai fight scenes makes them look impressive. There is just too little happening in between to engage a wider audience.
3. You're going to The Protector for the skull fractures and sky-high knees to the groin. And if this is all you're after, your mind may be black and blue, but you'll be all smiles by the end.
4. Who needs plot when you have all of this ***-kicking?
5. No one can do that cool running knee drop like Tony Jaa, but he'd better start flexing his smiling muscles more if he wants to be the next Jackie Chan. All the bone crunching makes Steven Seagal look like a restrained kitty.
6. The moral of this story is if you steal a kung-fu master's elephants, you WILL have your legs broken. Period.
7. The Protector is a jaw-dropping, exhilarating action war cry rarely offered to American audiences anymore, and presents Tony Jaa as a timeless martial art icon to rival Bruce Lee.
8. You know you have bought a ticket to the wrong movie when star Tony Jaa confronts the bad guys, strikes a fight-ready pose and screams, 'Where are my elephants?'
9. Scene after scene is fashioned together in the most confusing (read that as meaning 'dull') fashion, like a 500-piece jigsaw puzzle missing half the pieces.
10. The downtime since Ong-Bak has left us hungry enough not to care that the plot and frequent action feel a bit recycled.
Based on these individual reviews, what is the critic consensus?
Despite some impressive fight scenes, this trimmed-down version of the Thai action pic is an off-putting mix of scant plot, choppy editing, and confusing subtitles and dubbing.