History YMMV / KingsmanTheGoldenCircle

* UnintentionallySympathetic: Unlike the traitorous Charlie, the unapologetically evil Poppy and the ignorantly corrupt President, [[spoiler: Whiskey is given a sympathetic and relatable backstory as a FreudianExcuse for his villainy, and he just so happens to be a walking CrowningMomentOfAwesome. Yet he's given the most brutal fate of the four aforementioned characters, as if he was meant to be a HateSink for the audience rather than the [[EnsembleDarkhorse exact opposite]]]].

* CompleteMonster: [[TheAggressiveDrugDealer Poppy Adams]] is the [[BigBad head]] of the Golden Circle, the biggest drug empire in the world. When an employee named Charles brings his friend Angel to her as a new hire, she punishes Charles by forcing Angel to put him into a meat grinder and then forces Angel to [[ImAHumanitarian eat a burger made of Charles's meat]]. After achieving all the Kingsman locations, she has them all blown up and kills all of the Kingsmen, only missing Gary "Eggsy" Unwin and Merlin. She takes singer Music/EltonJohn hostage as a pet and as personal entertainment with a shock collar. When Angel uses one of her products, Poppy has her robot dogs attack and tear him apart. The [[PoisonAndCureGambit crux of her plan]] to legalize the drug industry so she can make even more money is to have the millions who she sold to infected with a deadly virus through her products that lasts three stages before death. If her demands aren't met, she fully intends to withhold the antidote and let everyone die.
* CriticalDissonance: The film sits with a "rotten" 52% on Website/RottenTomatoes, and Metacritic reports that professional critics give it "average" reviews. Although fans cite it as a SophomoreSlump in the storytelling department compared to the original, it's still received rather warmly by audiences.

* HilariousInHindsight: Channing Tatum is a southerner in a film where John Denver's "Take Me Home, Country Roads" is one of the characters' favorite songs and an important thematic element? It happened [[Film/LoganLucky twice within a month]], (though in this film it's Merlin's favorite song, not Tequila's).

* NarmCharm: In a movie with cybernetic arms that can attach instantly and gel that can recover agents from being shot through their eye, the most impressive piece of technology may be the ordinary looking meat grinder at Poppy's that can convert a full human body into perfectly prepared ground beef in seconds.

* CriticalDissonance: The film sits with a "rotten" 51% on Website/RottenTomatoes, and Metacritic reports that professional critics give it "average" reviews. Still, though fans cite it as a SophomoreSlump in the storytelling department compared to the original, it's still received rather warmly by audiences.

* CompleteMonster: [[TheAggressiveDrugDealer Poppy Adams]] is the [[BigBad head]] of the Golden Circle, the biggest drug empire in the world. When an employee named Charles brings his friend Angel to her as a new hire, she punishes Charles by forcing Angel to put him into a meat grinder and then forces Angel to [[ImAHumanitarian eat a burger made of Charles's meat]]. After achieving all the Kingsman locations, she has them all blown up and kills all of the Kingsmen except Gary "Eggsy" Unwin and Merlin. She takes singer Music/EltonJohn hostage as a pet and as personal entertainment with a shock collar. When Angel uses one of her products, Poppy has her robot dogs attack and tear him apart. The [[PoisonAndCureGambit crux of her plan]] to legalize the drug industry so she can make even more money is to have the millions who she sold to infected with a deadly virus through her products that lasts three stages before death. If her demands aren't met, she fully intends to withhold the antidote and let everyone die.

* HilariousInHindsight:
** It's [[Film/DieAnotherDay not the first time]] Creator/HalleBerry plays an American counterpart to a British agency in a TuxedoAndMartini spy film. Nor the first time she plays a character named [[Film/{{Swordfish}} Ginger]].
** One of the weapons that Creator/PedroPascal's character wields is a whip. Then, you noticed in ''Series/GameOfThrones'', one of his character's daughters also uses a whip as her weapon. Either that's plain coincidence or it runs in the family.
** Music/FrankSinatra's "My Way", which was used in the trailer, was also featured in Creator/TaronEgerton's previous film, ''WesternAnimation/{{Sing}}''. It's even more hilarious that Taron's character also sang "I'm Still Standing" by Music/EltonJohn who is also in ''The Golden Circle''.
** A character played by Julianne Moore [[spoiler:feeding human meat to someone? Must have picked it up from [[Literature/{{Hannibal}} Dr Lecter]] ]]
** Channing Tatum is a southerner in a film where John Denver's "Take Me Home, Country Roads" is one of the characters' favorite songs and an important thematic element? It happened [[Film/LoganLucky twice within a month]], (though in this film it's Merlin's favorite song, not Tequila's).

* UnintentionallySympathetic: Unlike the traitorous Charlie, the unapologetically evil Poppy and the ignorantly corrupt President, [[spoiler: Whiskey is given a sympathetic and relatable backstory and just so happens to be a walking CrowningMomentOfAwesome, yet he is given the most brutal fate of the three, as if he was meant to be a HateSink for the audience despite actually being the [[EnsembleDarkhorse opposite]]]].

* UnintentionallySympathetic: Unlike the unapologetically evil Poppy and the ignorantly corrupt President, [[spoiler: Whiskey is given a sympathetic and relatable backstory and also just happens to be a walking CrowningMomentOfAwesome, yet he is given the most brutal death of the three, as if he was meant to be a HateSink for the audience despite actually being the [[EnsembleDarkhorse opposite]]]].

** Music/FrankSinatra's "My Way", which was used in the trailer, was also featured in Creator/TaronEgerton's previous film, ''WesternAnimation/{{Sing}}''. It's even more hilarious that Taron's character also sang "I'm Still Standing" by Music/EltonJohn who will also be in ''The Golden Circle''.

* {{Anvilicious}}: The film's not-so-subtle commentary on the United States' long-running War on Drugs and substance regulation. It's much more overt and pointed than the original's satire of climate change and Silicon Valley tech culture.

** The reveal that Eggsy and Tilde have been in a relationship for a year after the events of the first movie. Some were pleased that Tilde wasn't cast aside and forgotten in the way of Bond girls and were interested in her character, while others questioned the necessity of a romantic subplot (pointing to it adding to the the film's oft-criticized {{Padding}}) and found it pointless or unbelievable [[spoiler:especially the ending, where their marriage turns Eggsy into royalty.]]
** [[spoiler: Merlin]]'s sacrifice in the climax. Some think the scene is a [[HeroicSacrifice good]] [[DyingMomentOfAwesome sendoff]] to the character, while others think it's a [[StupidSacrifice lazy]] [[SenselessSacrifice way]] to write the character off from the story by way of [[spoiler: Eggsy suddenly grabbing the IdiotBall by stepping on a landmine even with a mine detector in his hand and requiring Merlin to sacrifice himself.]]

** Much like [[Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxyVol2 Yondu Udonta]], Creator/MarkStrong's portrayal of Merlin wasn't exactly without fans, but his expanded role in this film and [[spoiler: DyingMomentOfAwesome]] have led even detractors of the film to name him as one of the film's strongest elements.

* HoYay: So Elton was totally flirting with [[spoiler:Harry, in a CallBack to when Tilde flirted with Eggsy in the first movie.]]

** [[spoiler: The president willing to let millions of drug users die just to say he won the war on drugs. As pointed out, this includes innocent people that only tried a drug ''once'', people who used marijuana for medicinal reasons, ''children'' who were born addicted thanks to their mothers using while pregnant, sex slaves forcibly drugged to make them more compliant and even ''his own Chief of Staff'', who only started using because of the president's demanding workload. (And they didn't mention it, but there ''are'' some parts of the world where pot is legal, so he was also dooming people that legally ''did nothing wrong''.)]]
** Charlie goes over by [[spoiler:all but decimating the Kingsmen for the humiliation he had received from the end of the second act onward. Among the casualties are Roxy, the new Arthur, and a couple of collateral victims who had nothing whatsoever to do with Charlie's humiliation]].

* MemeticMutation: The Statesmen always/excessively interject "Yeehaw". Made perhaps even funnier by how this usage seems to have no real basis in canon and is simply the result of promotional material humorously playing up cowboy stereotypes.

* Whiskey's feelings towards drug users and Poppy's plan, motivated as they were by his tragic backstory, could have been discussed a lot more over the course of the movie, especially since the Statesmen are largely out of focus for most of it. [[spoiler: Instead they're just there to give him an excuse to have a climatic final fight against Eggsy and Harry]].