The plot of this movie is quite simple. A hacker invades the system of the British Intelligence Agency, MI7, exposing the identity of all active secret agents. So the British Prime Minister (played by Emma Thompson) demands to her subordinate that an inactive spy should be assigned for the mission. So Johnny English, working then as a school teacher – which is something reminiscent of the previous movie, Johnny English Reborn, where he was assigned to an important mission while he was living as a reclusive monk in a Buddhist monastery in Tibet, being dismissed from the secret service after a failed mission in Mozambique, an incident upon which the audience discovers later wasn’t entirely his fault – is summoned up to resolve the situation. After a reunion where he accidentally blew up an explosive pen, that made other three inactive agents that could possibly join the mission to lose consciousness, English reunites with his former partner, Bough (played by Ben Miller), from the first movie of the franchise.
With no better prospects, English decides that it would be better for them to stalk the woman they had seen in the vessel. They follow her in their vehicle with difficulty throughout the sinuous roads of the countryside, and eventually gets out of fuel, something for which English blames Bough. But then the woman comes back in her own vehicle, politely approaches the two men – like if they had never met before – and Johnny English introduces himself with a fake name, Basil Golightly. Very conveniently, English tells Bough that going out of fuel was a deliberately calculate idea that he had. Bough then pushes the car until they arrive at the hotel, where, a few hours later, English and the Russian spy meet at the bar.
While English interacts with her, Bough investigates her hotel room. Soon thereafter, Bough informs English that he found in her possessions three fake passports and ammunition. But English – then smitten by her –, denies the possibility, and tells Bough that he is just being paranoid. Later, we see the secret Russian spy receiving orders to kill English.
Later that night, English, unable to sleep, takes some stimulant pills, and heads towards the dance floor. There, he meets again the Russian spy, and they start to dance. She tries several different strategies to kill him, but inadvertently fails in all of them. Meanwhile, the British Prime Minister is eager to form a deal with a mysterious and dubious American billionaire from the Silicon Valley. Eventually, English discovers and informs one of his superiors that the American billionaire may be the culprit behind the infiltration of the MI7’s system.

English subsequently really invades the mansion of the billionaire, and there encounters again the Russian spy. Rapidly, both get caught, but – in an intelligent maneuver – the Russian spy fakes to have intercepted English. English starts to boast about having reinforcement outside, but the billionaire starts laughing hysterically when, by camera, he sees only Bough, desperately running away from his dogs.
Eventually, English manages to scape. When he learns that a meeting of the G12 will take place in Scotland, English decides that he must go there as well. Bough, upon learning this, recruits the help of his wife – that is a Navy official –, and all of them go to Scotland in a submarine.
Meanwhile, the billionaire and the Russian spy are talking to each other, and he reveals to her that he knows exactly who she is. She tries to shoot him, but, without her knowledge, he already had emptied her firearm, which makes her easily vulnerable to him. When he is about to kill her, English, using a special suit – strategically operated by Bough from distance, by remote control –, appears and saves hear. Unfortunately, a suspender device gets stuck by the window, and when English tells Bough to deactivate the suit, a slingshot effect pulls him directly into the ocean. So, the billionaire uses this chance to escape, and attend the meeting.
Then English, wearing a medieval armor, interrupts the reunion. Unfortunately, he slides in the oil that runs from the armor, as he had previously put in the belt an absurd quantity, in a futile attempt to take it off. Then, the billionaire uses the opportunity to try to escape one more time. Nevertheless, English – tough in a very slow move, because of the armor’s heavy weight –, and with the primary help of Bough, intercepts the billionaire, exactly when he was about to embark in a helicopter. English has the mobile computer that could deactivate the helicopter, but the billionaire mocks him, saying that he would never be able to decipher how to use it. English then throws the mobile computer, hitting the billionaire in the head, and leaving him unconscious, thus saving Europe and the G12 countries from the megalomaniac domination plan of the evil corporatist.
With the mission accomplished, English returns to his work as a school teacher, though – as was shown already in the beginning of the movie – he was far more devoted in instructing his students about lessons on how to be a secret agent, than teaching them the ordinary curricular grade.
Like I highlighted above, this is probably the weakest movie in the franchise, but it is not bad. Not at all. If your expectations are not too high, you can definitely have a good time watching it. Johnny English Strikes Again is a very decent continuation of the franchise. In fact, I hope a fourth instalment would be released in the future – not in the near future, of course, if we realized the gaps between all the movies are too damn extensive: the first, Johnny English, was released fifteen years ago, in 2003, while the second movie, Johnny English Reborn, was released eight years later, in 2011, and another seven years would pass, for the release of this third film. This is not a monumental or extravagant movie, especially if compared to its predecessors. But if you like a good comedy-action movie with a goofy central character conceived as an intelligent parody of James Bond, than Johnny English Strikes Again definitely is worthwhile watching it.
Wagner