Novocaine Review: Jack Quaid Earns His Bone-Breaking Breakout Role

The character of Hughie in Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson’s The Boys comics was modeled after actor Simon Pegg, which put a lot of pressure on actor Jack Quaid when it came to bringing the character to life for the Prime Video series. Despite that pressure, Quaid’s charming and affable performance won over audiences, offering him opportunities to join projects like Scream, Oppenheimer, and Companion, as well as offer his vocal talents to series like Star Trek: Lower Decks and My Adventures With Superman. After years of being a charismatic component of ensemble projects, Novocaine finally offers Quaid (and co-star Amber Midthunder) time in the spotlight that he deserves, which proves he has the romantic and comedic chops to lead a picture. Where the film itself falls short, though, is its inability to pick a narrative lane for a film that never exceeds the sum total of its parts.

Nate (Quaid) has a condition that prevents him from being able to feel pain. Things like pouring coffee or even chewing solid food come with the risk of accidental injury, causing him to lead an insular life that keeps him safe. Despite his introverted nature, coworker Sherry (Midthunder) breaks through his shell to spark a love connection, which gets complicated when Sherry is kidnapped in a bank robbery. Nate refuses to stand by and wait for authorities to track her down and embarks on a one-man mission to recover her, with his unique disorder allowing him to persevere through any injuries he suffers along the way to save the woman he’s falling for.

Not all actors can make the jump from endearing supporting character to carrying an entire film, but fans of Quaid can rest easy knowing that he was more than up to the task of what was required of him for Novocaine. Given the nature of the premise, Quaid doesn’t have to match the same action chops as a Keanu Reeves or a Jason Statham, fighting through countless enemies and surviving based on pure grit. When he scalds his hand in a deep fryer or gets shot through the leg with a crossbow, he’s more irritated about the setback than anything, reacting more with instinctive annoyance than with sarcastic quips. Between the more genuine moments of physical combat or the slapstick comedy of the situation, Quaid also delivers the necessary pratfalls to elicit the intended reaction out of the audience. Midthunder similarly showcases a side of herself not quite seen before, as her starring role in the Predator spinoff Prey put her action chops on full display, while Novocaine displays how she’s just as talented in a rom-com world. Arguably the most effective elements of the whole movie are the sequences of Nate and Sherry falling for each other, only to be frustratingly interrupted by Ray Nicholson’s bank-robbing character.

After a handful of middling projects like Villains and Significant Other, directors Dan Berk and Robert Olsen offer up another tonal mashup, though this one leans into their visual strengths by the nature of the premise. There’s a natural escalation of the injuries that Nate suffers, and in a major relief to genre fans, the directors lean into practical effects as often as possible. Even if the injuries in the film might not be the most brutal thing seen in a movie in 2025, the grounded nature of the experience makes these wounds feel all the more visceral. In an age where action and horror directors are only limited by their imaginations thanks to CGI, it’s both refreshing and effective to see even tamer injuries make audiences squirm in their seats, thanks in large part to the work of the directors.

Where the film struggles is in its sprawling narrative. Writer Lars Jacobson manages to tap into a premise so effective that it’s hard to believe that we haven’t seen anything like it before, especially when comic books have been brought to life for movies and TV with similarly gimmicky premises. Even with Berk and Olsen delivering impactful scenes ranging from romantic conversations over pie to buckets of blood being spilled, there are a number of lulls in Nate’s journey that deflate the momentum the movie is building up. These scenes themselves aren’t necessarily poor, they just occur at inopportune times and run on for too long, allowing the audience to become disinterested. (Jacob Batalon plays Nate’s friend Roscoe and, while the actor is always a delight, feels entirely superfluous to Nate’s goals, serving both as comedic relief in an already-comedic movie and also as a deus ex machina.) Similarly, the film reaches what could be considered a crescendo, only to exhaust the audience with a lengthy, action-heavy scene. Novocaine has a run time of 110 minutes, and had it been capped under 90 minutes, it would be all killer and no filler. There’s also plenty of leaps in logic in the overall pursuit of the bank robbers, and while they don’t contradict the reality of this world, they’re still baffling.

While the overall journey might spread the story too thin, Jacobson does manage to offer an inspiring message without being saccharine. For much of Nate’s life, he saw his disorder as a weakness, preventing him from taking any risks that could come with even the faintest of consequences. This seeming vulnerability is exactly what makes Nate the most qualified person for the job. Sherry also has parts of herself that she hides from Nate, but it’s by showing him these parts that the two can connect with one another over their perceived points of embarrassment and shame. With media often being exaggerated to one end of the spectrum of the other, either embracing cynicism and irony or leaning towards blind optimism, Novocaine does successfully manage to offer an uplifting message without feeling like an after-school special.

Novocaine has a handful of entirely effective action-comedy sequences that are executed to tremendous effect, thanks largely to the performance of Quaid. Additionally, the chemistry between Quaid and Midthunder makes their burgeoning romance endearing and engaging. What holds the film back is its identity crisis and the filmmakers’ outlook of giving audiences every idea they came up with as opposed to leaning into all of the project’s strengths. Still, Quaid successfully makes the jump from a supporting quipper to leading man, and while he might not be inheriting the mantle of an iconic superhero character in the near future, he’s likely not far off from such an opportunity.

Rating: 3 out of 5

Novocaine lands in theaters on March 14th.