Is Glass Onion Better Than Knives Out?

Warning! This article contains spoilers for Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery has had its brief, week-long theatrical release, with many wondering how the film compares to its predecessor. Knives Out was first released in 2019 and provided fans with a witty, well-written, fun twist on the murder mystery genre. Shortly after, thanks to the film’s popularity and critical acclaim, a sequel was greenlit before Rian Johnson penned a huge deal with Netflix for not only Glass Onion, but a third Knives Out film as well.

Naturally, as with any sequel released in today’s film landscape, comparisons began with audiences wondering if Glass Onion is just as good if not better than the original film. With many aspects being similar across the two films, such as the murder mystery genre, Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc, a similar style and tone, and a stacked cast with a few surprising cameos, the comparisons between Knives Out 2 and its predecessor began. However, despite Glass Onion being a fantastic film in its own right, here is why the original Knives Out ever so slightly edges out its successor.

Related: Knives Out 2 Repeats The Original Movie’s Best Trick (But With A Twist)

How Glass Onion’s Mystery & Solution Compares To Knives Out

While Glass Onion and Knives Out both have similar premises in that they are both murder mystery films, Rian Johnson has done a great job of differentiating both with their own respective mysteries and solutions. Knives Out was a film with many twists and turns and managed to have its own spin on the murder mystery genre. This was done by seemingly showing the solution to the mystery at the end of the first act, before spending the rest of the film untangling what the audience and characters thought to have happened with more mystery. This ends in plenty of revelations, and the reveal that Chris Evans’ Ransom tricked Ana de Armas‘ Marta into killing Harlan Thrombey, played by Christopher Plummer.

However, due to Johnson’s knack for subverting expectations, this came with other reveals. Marta, simply being a good nurse, did not kill Harlan, and the only cause of his death was suicide by slitting his own throat. This, along with Ransom’s attempts to have Marta caught through blackmail and manipulation, all provided Knives Out with a perfectly convoluted resolution that was still different from typical murder mysteries.

Glass Onion has a similar basic premise in that different murders take place in a confined environment. However, much like its predecessor, Johnson finds ways to put twists on a typical murder mystery. In some ways, it is similar to the first in that the solution to the mystery is shown in plain sight, with the film intentionally misleading its audience through a web of mystery. Glass Onion’s, which is receiving very good reviews, first murder is that of Duke, Dave Bautista’s character, who drinks from the wrong glass. This is clearly shown in-camera to be orchestrated by Miles, played by Edward Norton. However, Johnson wisely writes into the script that Miles intentionally misleads the audience and other characters into believing something else happened.

Chaos then ensues, before Benoit Blanc deduces that Miles also murdered his former business partner Andi, played by Janelle Monáe, alongside an attempted murder of Andi’s twin sister, Helen. This is done in a way that seems very simple, however, the film’s nonlinear narrative and smart script make it so that the audience truly does not know what is fully going on until this deduction scene, which is very similar to Knives Out. While both mysteries are similar, Knives Out has the edge in this department, though fans can deduce this for themselves when Glass Onion releases on Netflix.

Related: What Does Glass Onion Mean? Knives Out 2 Title Explained

However, Glass Onion’s mystery is intentionally obvious, with the film’s script giving hints constantly, and even showing the solution in plain sight before adding layer after layer to the mystery to purposefully cloud judgment. All of this is done intentionally by Johnson to give the title, Glass Onion, much more depth than first thought. Despite this, the fact still remains that Glass Onion’s mystery is slightly more predictable than the first Knives Out, meaning the latter has the upper hand.

Is Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc Better In Glass Onion or Knives Out?

When it comes to Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc, he remains the standout of both films. From the hokey accent to the eccentric clothing and fantastic Craig performance, Benoit Blanc is one of the better detective characters of recent years. Despite being perfect in both films, Glass Onion embroils Blanc in the central mystery more closely than Knives Out did. While Blanc solves the murder in the first Knives Out, large portions of the film center on Marta trying to cover up what she thought was her accidental murder of Harlan. Glass Onion, however, has Blanc investigating what he thinks is a murder from the start, despite telling this in a nonlinear narrative.

Because of this, Blanc plays a much more central role in the sequel alongside Janelle Monáe, while with the first film it can be argued that de Armas’ Marta is the main character. Therefore, Blanc is given slightly more to do in Glass Onion by Rian Johnson than in Knives Out and has slightly more depth to him than in the first film. All of this contributes to why Daniel Craig, and Benoit Blanc, are slightly better in Glass Onion, despite being fantastic in both installments.

Glass Onion vs. Knives Out: Which Cast Is Better

While both films have outstanding ensemble casts, Glass Onion edges out its predecessor for one simple reason: the cast is smaller. While Knives Out’s many actors and actresses are arguably bigger in name, and feature some of Hollywood’s biggest actors of the last 30 years, Glass Onion is much more confined in how the cast are used. Knives Out’s cast centered on a huge family, which meant some members of the cast got more of a focus and left others in the background. With Glass Onion’s cast being much smaller, every single member of the cast gets their time to shine, making Glass Onion’s marginally better.

Related: Knives Out 2 Is Already Avoiding A Fatal Netflix Movie Mistake

Glass Onion vs. Knives Out: Which Movie Is Funnier

One of the harder aspects to give one film the edge over the other is comedy. Both films were written as crime-comedies, with Johnson’s wit being evident in both scripts. One advantage that Knives Out had was simply that it was the first in the franchise, meaning it still could conform to certain murder mystery tropes such as the interview sequence in the beginning. This scene, with Johnson’s script, the cast’s performances, and the smart editing make for a very funny sequence that can later be subverted by Johnson’s take on the mystery, much like Johnson did with Star Wars: The Last Jedi. Scenes like this are sprinkled through Knives Out, with Johnson humorously poking fun at the genre he was dipping his feet into.

Glass Onion is similar, though Johnson also finds one real-world event to draw humor from: the COVID-19 pandemic, Johnson chose to set Glass Onion in the midst of 2020, meaning he could draw humor from the insanity of the world at that time. From the utilization of PPE, lockdowns, and how undesirable people acted during COVID, Johnson manages to pull a lot of laughs out of the film in this way. On top of this, Glass Onion also is simply very funny in terms of its character dynamics, as was Knives Out, more specifically in making many of the film’s characters completely abhorrent. Because of this, Glass Onion’s meta murder mystery may be more consistently funny than its predecessor, albeit not containing as many true belly laughs.

Why Knives Out Is Better Than Glass Onion

Despite Rian Johnson’s sequel being exceptional in its own right, it still cannot quite match up to the original film. While the two films are very similar in their construction, and work perfectly as a two-part series that is soon to be three, Knives Out has one advantage over Glass Onion. This advantage is that intangible feeling of lightning in a bottle. Before Knives Out was released, the murder mystery genre was lacking, to say the least, in Hollywood. Due to this, Knives Out felt insanely refreshing, and rekindled many people’s love for the genre. While Glass Onion is a perfect follow-up, it cannot quite match up to the refreshing feeling of the first that made Knives Out so good in the first place.

Next: Glass Onion Ending Explained: Breaking Down Every Knives Out 2 Twist