‘Mayday’ Review: A Cold War Buddy Comedy That Finds Its Wings in the Unlikeliest Cockpit

Apple TV’s new original film ‘Mayday‘ drops you into 1987, right at the tail end of the Cold War, and asks a simple question. What happens when a cocky American fighter pilot gets shot down in the middle of Soviet territory and the man who finds him turns out to be obsessed with everything the United States stands for. Ryan Reynolds plays Lieutenant Troy Kelly, callsign Assassin, a role that fits him the way a leather jacket fits a guy who already knows he looks good in one.

The premise borrows heavily from decades of buddy action pictures, and the film knows it, leaning into that nostalgia with needle drops and a plot that feels lifted from a VHS shelf. Kenneth Branagh plays Nikolai, the former KGB operative who rescues Troy, and the two of them are forced into an uneasy partnership that becomes the entire engine of the movie. Once you understand that this is really a road trip movie wearing an espionage costume, everything about ‘Mayday’ starts to click into place.

What surprised me most is how much of the movie belongs to Branagh rather than Reynolds. Reynolds does what Reynolds does, firing off quips and playing the exasperated straight man more often than you would expect from him, but it is Branagh who commands the screen. His Nikolai is a man shaped by decades of Soviet discipline who has quietly fallen in love with American pop culture from a distance, and watching that contradiction play out in his face is funnier than most of the actual jokes in the script.

The action sequences lean into spectacle without losing the human scale of the story, and there is a set piece involving a military parade and a very large piece of hardware that had me laughing out loud at how gleefully absurd it becomes. The film moves through trains, snowbound wilderness, and cramped vehicles with a kinetic energy that never lets the pacing sag, even when the plot mechanics are paper thin. Where the movie occasionally stumbles is in its willingness to sit in familiar territory a little too long, recycling the shape of countless odd couple thrillers that came before it without always finding a fresh wrinkle.

None of that undercuts what actually makes ‘Mayday’ work, which is the way the friendship between these two men sneaks up on you. It starts as a comedy of national stereotypes bouncing off each other and slowly turns into something with real affection underneath it, the kind of shift that only lands because both actors are fully committed to the bit. Branagh in particular finds notes of loneliness and longing in Nikolai that give the whole film a heartbeat it did not necessarily earn on the page.

Kenneth Branagh spoke about preparing for the physical demands of the role, telling the Variety Lounge at Edinburgh International Film Festival that he wanted to give the impression of playing a former lethal operative, and that early mornings spent loosening up his body made the difference in pulling off the choreography convincingly. That effort shows up on screen in a performance that never feels like a novelty stunt casting choice, but like an actor finding real joy in a genre he rarely gets to play in.

By the time the credits roll, ‘Mayday’ has earned its warmth even if it never fully escapes the shadow of the films it is clearly paying tribute to. I walked away entertained, occasionally moved, and mostly won over by a pairing I did not expect to work nearly as well as it does. This is a breezy, good hearted throwback that trusts its two leads to carry the weight, and they do, giving the film far more charm than its familiar bones would suggest on paper. My score for ‘Mayday’ lands at 8 out of 10.

Let me know in the comments whether you think ‘Mayday’ earns its Cold War charm or whether you found the familiar setup harder to forgive than I did.