  |
This article's content is marked as Mature The page Adam Clay (The Beekeeper) contains mature content that may include coarse language, sexual references, and/or graphic violent images which may be disturbing to some. Mature articles are recommended for those who are 18 years of age and older. If you are 18 years or older or are comfortable with graphic material, you are free to view this page. Otherwise, you should close this page and view another page. |
| “ | I'm a Beekeeper. I protect the hive. Sometimes I use fire to smoke out hornets. | „ |
Adam Clay is the titular main protagonist in the 2024 American action-thriller The Beekeeper.
After his friend and neighbor takes her own life after falling victim to a phishing cyber-crime, Adam, a once retired field agent of the highly clandestine "Beekeepers" organization, embarks on a brutal campaign against the company responsible as well as its high-profile collaborators.
He is portrayed by British martial artist actor Jason Statham, who played Jonas Taylor from The Meg films, Deckard Shaw from The Fast and The Furious franchise, Frank Martin in The Transporter trilogy, Lee Christmas from The Expendables series, Jensen Ames from Death Race, Patrick "H" Hill in Wrath of Man, and Orson Fortune in Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre.
Personality[]
Adam Clay comes off as an enigmatic man with a dark past. During his time as a Beekeeper he was known to be a merciless killer that prioritized "protecting the hive." In his brief stint as a civilian Adam found a measure of peace as an ordinary beekeeper and his bees which he cared dutifully. While surly and a man of few words he was still a compassionate man who held a high standard of morality. Upon learning of the exploitation done by a scam targeting the old and vulnerable, Adam shows no mercy to such people, willing to use brutal tactics to avenge their victims.
Although a dangerous assassin, Adam appears to be very selective on who he kills. During his attacks on the call center and the President's residence, Adam never lethally harms the FBI and Secret Service agents sent to stop him, preferring to incapacitate them, or use them as hostages to avoid further deaths, sparing him from killing them. Astonishingly Adam appears to take the time to know who they are and their family situations. He shows no animosity towards law enforcement, having a respect for those who truly care about justice and protecting the innocent. As oppose to the mercenaries directly hired by his target to kill him and endanger civilians. Due to this Adam shows his willingness to brutally kill or even maim them, possibly seeing them as just killers for hire, and thus not innocent.
Biography[]
Originating from the British Isles with an obscure past, Adam Clay is first introduced working as a live-in apiarist and honey maker for his landlady/neighbor Eloise Parker, a widowed schoolteacher on the verge of retirement, out in the rural American Northeast. Although she knows nothing else about Adam, Eloise considers him to be family after losing her son overseas in the military and is thankful to have him bring life and vegetation to her fields. In turn, Adam, grateful for Eloise's kindness, enjoys the peace of his profession.
While Adam goes about his business with the bees, Eloise suddenly becomes a victim of an online phishing scam orchestrated by United Data Group (UDG), a network of scammers and hackers who proceed to rob Eloise of over $2 millions of her bank account, pension, as well as charity money for a student welfare organization she manages. All of this devastates Eloise. Later that night, just as Adam shows up to the house intending to gift Eloise a jar of honey made especially for her, he becomes bereft to discover Eloise has committed suicide via a self-inflicted gunshot wound. In that moment, Adam is swiftly arrested by FBI Agent Verona Parker, Eloise's estranged daughter. Verona initially believes Adam to be her mother's killer due to his imposing appearance and why Eloise never mentioned him before and as to why he was in the house at the time he discovered Eloise's body. However, Adam is then released when the prints on the gun match Eloise's, confirming she indeed took her own life.
| “ | "Taking from an elderly person is as bad as stealing from a child, maybe worse. Someone hurts a child, their parents or people who care are ready to step in. Someone hurts an older person, sometimes are left to face the hornets alone. Cuz either it goes unnoticed, or no-one cares." | „ |
| ~ Adam Clay telling Verona the circumstances when an older person is fleeced in the aftermath of Eloise's death. |
By way of an apology. Verona and Adam talk inside about Eloise. As the conversation continues, Verona informs Adam that she discovered on her mother's laptop the UDG scammers group that has been operating under the FBI's radar and has been impossible to track. Verona is pessimistic that this group, if found, could ever be brought to justice and undo the lives ruined for their profit. Wanting justice himself, Adam steps out, declaring that he's going to "protect the Hive".
Using a phone stashed in one of the apiaries he tends to, Adam calls up his old outfit, a clandestine organization known as "The Beekeepers". A Beekeeper agent Adam contacts is reluctant to help him as he is retired but relents and gives Adam the address to the UDG call center. Driving his pickup truck to the call center, Adam arrives and brings with him a pair of jugs filled with gasoline. Confronting a few security men at the front entrance, Adam makes quick work of taking them down before proceeding to the front and informing the secretary to leave. Once inside the main call room.
| “ | I will never steal from the weak and the vulnerable again | „ |
| ~ Adam's promising words for the UDG employees |
Adam intimidates a few employees by grabbing one's nose forcefully and bashing in another's head against a desk when they at first laugh at Adam. He also makes everybody chant, "I will never steal from the weak or the vulnerable ever again" before scaring them off with the threat of burning the place to the ground.
As the employees run for their lives, Boyd Garnett, the UDG manager who once had mob ties, storms in with a four-man security team, demanding Adam's actions. Adam introduces himself while emptying the gas jugs' contents all over the computers and servers. Garnett tries to dissuade Adam from his actions, but the former stands his ground. Garnett then orders his men to beat up Clay, only to be given the same brutal trouncing as the security guards from outside. All while Garnett watches in trembling terror. Once the men are down, Adam makes Garnett flinch with a lunge to his face, berating him on his actions at the call center. Once he's finished intimidating Garnett, Adam proceeds to grab his still remaining gas jugs and brings them to an employee's desk and plasters a Semtex brick to each jug. While he hot-wires a nearby phone, Adam warns Garnett that, regardless of who is in the building, the next call from UDG 's phishing operation with set off a spark that will ignite the gasoline fumes via a chain reaction. Adam then leaves with a rattled Garnett following suit as he vainly advises his downed security team to do the same. Like clockwork, a call from UDG goes out to a local family to fleece their funding, only for the electricity from the wires to cause sparks and detonate the Semtex bombs, blowing up a large portion of the building structure UDG used for their call center, killing four inside. By then, Adam had already gotten into his truck and drove out of the premises.
Trivia[]
- Adam Clay has many similarities to John Wick and Agent 47;
- Both were once trained to be assassins for a secret order but retire from that life.
- Both lost someone closed to them from a spoiled brat.
- Both set out get revenge on the spoiled brat who ruin their lives.
- Like Agent 47, Clay never hurts innocents.