Vince Vaughn And James Marsden's Sci-Fi Time Travel Hulu Movie Isn't Talked About Enough

When it comes to the time-travel genre, if a movie doesn't have a DeLorean or Bill Murray in it, it doesn't leave much of a mark, no matter how good it is. Instead, time-travelling tales or time loop stories like "Palm Springs" or one of Tom Cruise's best sci-fi movies, "Edge of Tomorrow," get lost in the stream, outraced by Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, and Huey Lewis and The News singing "Back in Time." One such movie that fails to get the kind of attention it deserves and does a brilliant job of playing around with time is a relatively new action comedy that you can watch right now on Hulu. It's crammed with an impressive cast of comeback kings, one of whom gets in one of the best-looking fight scenes you'll have seen for a while.

"Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice" arrived on Hulu in March 2026 and was written and directed by BenDavid Grabinski. Starring Vince Vaughn, James Marsden, Eiza González, and Keith David, it blends old-fashioned crime capers with time-traveling madness. Vaughn plays a loan shark named Nick, who learns that his wife, Alice (González), is having an affair with an equally shady associate, Quick Draw Mike (Marsden). Seeking payback for his work associate going behind his back, Nick sets Mike up for a hit job to frame him, with the target being none other than Nick himself, but from the future. So begins a stupidly sharp, brilliantly structured story that critics loved and that audiences just didn't latch on to.

Earning a respectable 76% on Rotten Tomatoes, "Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice" was praised for being a solid bit of fun, courtesy of a writer and director who had his time-traveling story nailed down. Bilge Ebiri of Vulture said, "It feels destined for cult status," while Stephen Saito of Variety called it "Quite a good time."

With competition from other streaming services and "brain not necessary" movies that could stay on in the background, there's plenty to enjoy. Monica Castillo of Little White Lies said, "It's hilarious and moving, thrilling and suspenseful, a showcase for its talent to shine beyond the trappings of the standard straight-to-streaming action fare."

Katie Rife of IndieWire also said, "This movie is best watched in pajamas, perhaps with a container of takeout on your lap," while Christy Lemire of FilmWeek said, "As movies to fold your laundry to go, this is a decent one." Honestly, isn't that really all you need sometimes? If anything, the one reason to see "Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice" is to watch soon-to-be-returning X-Man James Marsden do his best John Wick impression in a scene-stealing one-shot sequence that showed the star clearly giving it his all. The result is a top-level shootout that Marsden himself revealed he was hungry to prep for to ensure he looked like a lethal gunman, and honestly? Mission accomplished.

James Marsden has had something of a renaissance after giving us a meta version of himself in the hidden-camera show "Jury Duty" and then playing the perfectly noble President in the must-see sci-fi series "Paradise." It's in "Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice," though, that he deserves a lot more attention than he got before his return in "Avengers: Doomsday." As Quick Draw Mike, he rightfully lives up to the name in the film's final act when he decimates a room full of goons and looks incredibly cool doing so. To prep for the sequence, Marsden was entering territory he'd only briefly ventured into over the years but now needed to be locked and loaded for.

"I went to some place out south of Santa Monica to get with these fight choreographers and learn all of these sequences," he told Polygon. "I just was like, I want to get to set. I want to know exactly what I'm doing."

"James spent, I don't know, a billion hours learning his choreography," Grabinski explained (not sure about the count), inspired by classic John Woo movies and paying a brutal but brilliant homage to that era. Check out "Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice" and see for yourself if they deliver, and hope that Marsden comes in just as hard when he reprises his role as Cyclops in "Avengers: Doomsday," which hits theaters on December 18.