WARNING: Spoilers for 6 Underground.
Netflix’s 6 Underground bears similarities to many squad-oriented action movies, and actually tips its hat to Ocean’s Eleven during the final credits sequence. The reference to Steven Soderbergh’s 2001 heist film punctuates the main storyline, and also hints at the Netflix movie getting a sequel.
In 6 Underground, director Michael Bay features an underground hit squad known as “ghosts”: people who have been declared legally dead by the government, and are led by former CIA operative One (Ryan Reynolds). 6 Underground’s opening half hour sets up One’s backstory, and explains how he became a billionaire by developing innovative magnet technology. After the squad’s first mission in Florence, which ends with the death of a team member, the crew seeks out a seventh operative, Blaine (Corey Hawkins). Throughout the film, One’s assembled squad aims to de-throne the leader of Turgistan, Rovach Alimov (Lior Raz), and replace him with the dictator’s more reasonable brother, Murat (Payton Maadi). Alongside Reynolds and Hawkins, the main cast is comprised of Mélanie Laurent, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Ben Hardy, and Adria Arjona. 6 Underground was written by Deadpool scribes Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese.
6 Underground’s credits sequence teases future installments by referencing Ocean’s Eleven. After the film’s climax, the mysterious One strolls down a runway tarmac with his team after the focal mission. “Bulletproof” by The Score plays over the moment, and the music dips out for a brief one-liner from the gregarious Three (Garcia-Rulfo): “Next time, can we just knock off a f**king casino?” The collective members smirk at the reference to another team-up movie with a number in the title: Ocean’s Eleven, in which infamous thief Danny Ocean (George Clooney) assembles a team to rob a Las Vegas casino. Soderbergh’s film inspired two sequels - Ocean’s Twelve and Ocean’s Thirteen - along with a 2018 all-female spinoff, Ocean’s 8.
Three’s Ocean’s Eleven joke connects to the team’s first meeting with Seven. As One explains what they do, and why, at their California “Haunted House,” there’s a “hit board” on that wall that includes not one but several targets. The 6 Underground team exists to do all the dirty work that the CIA couldn’t necessarily handle, for one reason or another. The crew’s headquarters has a proper obsession wall and loads of technology, as they’ve carefully planned to bring down a total of 10 men, with the Florence mission already completed (Target #4). One’s team begins their first job with Seven by focusing on Target #1 - Rovach Alimov. With that mission now completed, there are theoretically eight more movies left in Bay’s 6 Underground franchise.
6 Underground includes various pop culture reference as One’s team breaks from the primary action. The Ocean’s Eleven joke isn’t necessarily a total knee-slapper, but it does pay tribute to the grand tradition of movies about assembling a ragtag crew with certain skills to do some dirty work.
More: Every Song on Netflix’s 6 Underground Soundtrack
