Ella Purnell is one of those performers whose filmography goes much further back than you’d think. She’s the type of actor where you’ll watch an older movie for the first time in a while and realize, “Wait, that was her?” I myself had that exact realization when I rewatched “Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children” for the first time since it came out in 2016. Elsewhere, on Twitter (sorry, X), it seems other people are having the same realization about the 2013 movie “Kick-Ass 2.”
As “Kick-Ass” fans may recall, the superhero sequel featured a storyline about Mindy, aka Hit Girl (Chloë Grace Moretz), trying to transition from a life of fighting crime to one of navigating regular high school drama. In doing so, she runs afoul of mean girl Brooke (Claudia Lee), who bullies Mindy in ways that might come off as trivial but which nevertheless still hurt Mindy’s feelings. One of Brooke’s mean girl sidekicks is Dolce, played by Purnell. Dolce doesn’t have much to do in this film, but rest assured that we’re meant to see her as another shallow girl who very much deserves the same comeuppance Brooke receives.
And what is that comeuppance, exactly? Well, Mindy eventually pulls out a weapon she calls a “s**t stick,” which makes people uncontrollably vomit and defecate the moment it touches them. In the middle of their lunch period, Mindy then proceeds to touch Brooke and Dulce with it, causing both girls to soil themselves in front of the entire school. Yeah, I know, “Kick-Ass 2” is not a good movie, but at least it allows us to watch a pre-fame Ella Purnell enjoy a few minutes of screen time.
