The Core

      Continuing in the theme of “terrible movies people may have actually heard of”, this month's offering is 2003's “The Core” wherein the Earth's core has stopped spinning causing disaster, something something, Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) and Boys Don't Cry/Million Dollar Baby (Hilary Swank) and others need to drill down to it and try to restart it using Michael Bay Science (surprisingly, Michael Bay had nothing to do with this movie).  Also, this is going to be the last post that goes up here on Will Gets Drunk And Reviews Terrible Movies.  No, I've not "come to my senses" and either given up drinking or realized no one actually cares about what I think about these movies.  In the future, my drunken reviews will be published over at Five Mole (http://fivemole.com/) where I'm now "Managing Director of Content" or some other made up title.  It's basically a place for stuff like this, whatever other random topics I feel like posting about, and whatever topics and stuff the other people involved in Five Mole want to post about (from the looks of the first few posts they've come up with, there'll be a lot of stuff about hockey, the Flyers and Bruins especially... I should use my powers as director of content to do something about that...).  So yeah, starting with this one and moving forward, that'll be the new home for Drunken Movie Reviews.  For now, though: on with the show!
      There is ominous music over top of the Paramount introductory credit so you KNOW shit is going to get real. Straight into the title after that, no bullshitting around with people's names or anything, that's how you know time is of the essence. After that we go to a fair ground on what we're told is “Green World Day” (sounds suspiciously made up) in Boston where the camera pans to see some douchebags in business suits (two guys and a girl (equal opportunity: women can be douchebags, too)) talking about a business deal with one of them even saying (while walking and looking slightly above the camera, of course) “let's go make three million dollars”. I get the feeling that's as low as the producers set their goals for this movie. Whatever the case is, he just collapses for no reason and then we hear a bunch of car horns and crashes and we pan back to the fair ground which is now in chaos with a bunch of other random people all collapsed for no reason. Something is afoot.
      The University Of Chicago now where Mr. World's Most Cleft-Chin 1992-Present (inclusive) himself (Aaron Eckhart) is teaching a class about sound waves and how they change going through solids and blah blah “science”. Government agents show up and they need him to come with them because I guess he's clearly one of those rogue former government scientists that play by their own rules and are always around in movies. He goes to Washington and meets up with some other French scientist who's an old friend and they bullshit for a while and get walked into a room full of the dead bodies and a general telling them “everything is totally classified”. Turns out everyone that died had pacemakers and some more “science” talk from Eckhart to establish him as the genius of the piece since he figured out the pacemaker thing without any hints.
      Cut to another civilian scene and we've got a bunch of pigeons falling dead out of the sky in London. I guess they're not “falling dead out of the sky” so much as “flying into things, dying, and falling out of the sky” but, you know, same difference. Eckhart is starting to put things together when he sees the news coverage of this and makes some comment to one of his lab monkeys to search the internet for a bunch of different stuff all relating to magnetic fields and animals that interact with them going screwy. I wouldn't bring that up except he says it and the other guy is “that's a hell of a search” and Eckhart says something like “well use that big T1 line, that's why we got it put in”. Now, I don't speak IT-Nerd that well and this movie IS from 2003, but even I know that the number of terms and the specificity of your search aren't effected by the speed of your internet connection. At this point I hope they show the guy on the computer and he's using like Netscape and clicks on an Angelfire page or something. That would make this whole movie worth it.
      The poorly-early-2000s-CGI'd space shuttle is doing stuff now. Not sure what yet but there's a black astronaut at the controls so everyone cheer for diversity and/or make some type of Archer reference. Also, he may be gay with his white co-pilot as they both just sort of reach out and hold hands for a second. Holy crap: gay, black, astronaut in an inter-racial couple? I think Gene Roddenberry's head just exploded from beyond the grave that's so sci-fi inclusive. Hilary Swank is also aboard the space shuttle. They talk for a bit and it turns out she's the space hot-shot to Eckhart's “science” hot-shot. I'm sure this is more coincidence than over-the-top running theme for the people they feature in this movie. Now the shuttle is in trouble because they're out of position by a lot due to the magnetic fields or something and are now coming in for a hot landing over L.A. instead of in Florida (“Michael Bay Science”). Hilary Swank is going to save the day because nobody else has any ideas. They action sequence land in the same place where John Conner escaped T2 on his dirt bike (with a T1 assist on the escape) and I need to check the credits on IMDB again just to make sure Michael Bay really wasn't involved in this. Actually, I don't. Nothing exploded in the landing so there's no way he did. Moving on.

      Eckhart is confronting some douchey ass-hat about his findings and the ass-hat is confirming the findings even though he can't believe them because (and we're about to get to the big reveal)...

      ...in a bit...

      ...suspense by long camera shots and more Hilary Swank...

      ...there are Northern Lights in Washington DC which... I assume isn't normal? I've never been there and there are Northern Lights here all the time so I wouldn't be weirded out if I saw them and have no context for why that's strange except the idea that WDC is pretty far south.

      ...Okay, we may be getting to the reveal here. We get Eckhart brought into the Dr. Strangelove war room where all the military brass is gathered plus the douchy ass-hat from before who is apparently the “science” advisor or whatever and is established as even more of a dick-bag because he's claimed Eckhart's research as his own and has brought Eckhart in as a “contributor to [his] work” rather than as the guy that told him about it. I think we've figured out who's the villain of the piece.

      The stakes of the movie: “everyone on Earth is dead in a year”.

      Why? Wait for a bit, there's “science” being explained by way of comparing the layers of the Earth to the skin-meat-core of a peach because holy shit does this ever sound like a 60s Star Trek explanation! Anyway, the core of the Earth has stopped spinning so shit is getting real. “Three months, gentlemen, and we're back in the stone age. A full year, the [EM] field collapses, and [a ridiculously unnecessary demonstration involving a can of hairspray, a lighter, and the peach/Earth model] happens”.

      A WHOLE BUNCH of “there's no way we can fix this” talk, the phrase “we're talking about jump starting the planet” is used (seriously), some more “this can't be done” lines, followed by (and this IS a quote): “yes... but what if we could?”

      Helicopter flying across the desert towards a mountain range with build-up music playing!

      This really is “Armageddon: The Other Way” the movie.

      Delroy Lindo is in this as a crazy black scientist why has a “legendary ship” that might be able to drill deep enough to get to the core. He has lower grade prototypes made up already and people are impressed (they literally say as much). More Michael Bay Science (“MBS” from here on out... which I just realized is funny 'cause it could mean “Major Bull Shit”, too) and the new element Delroy Lindo has created in the desert as a poor man after being discredited by science and stripped of all grants is (literally) called “Unobtainium” because fuck subtlety, and we get to the scene from the trailer that was meant to hook people in.:

General: “What would it take to get it done in three months?”

Lindo: [laughing] “15 billion dollars.” [laughing continues]

General: “Will you take a cheque?”

      ...And... scene.

      Now we start to assemble the team by playing horrible techno and seeing a junk-filled apartment with at least five computer screens and keyboards that the new guy is trying to “purge” as the federal agents get to his door. Ohhhhhh..... I 'm going to bet this guy is the “hacker”....! This really is awful techno; I can't stress that enough. It's DJ Qualls because of course it is. Dude's entire career is based around the words “nerdy”, “hacker”, and “meth-head-looking”. Props to him 'cause he's been in a LOT of shit based on nothing but being too scrawny to actually live if you're not some type of D&D wizard. Anyway, a bunch of nerd jokes (including a “you're not here to kill me, are you? 'Cause I was really hoping to have sex before that happens” bit which is 'funny' 'cause the dude's like 25 in this and they've already established his graduated from university), he's the best of the best of the best and... my god are we still in Hackers style ideas about what computers can do? Qualls says: “you want me to hack the planet?” and... wow.

      Side note: throwing up pop culture references in your movie is something I totally endorse, but... come on. Aim a BIT higher than Hackers which is a god-awful movie in its own right (almost as bad as Toy Soldiers which was another 90s movie about a hacker kid who went Home Alone on terrorists that took over his elite boarding school but is not to be confused with Small Soldiers which is about action figures coming to life and going Home Alone on a suburban family... and it is just now dawning on me how many ridiculous 90s movies I know...) because seriously: if you're going to set he bar as low as Hackers... and then fail to clear it... you are going to be judged SOOOO poorly.

      Back to the movie: One more nerd joke (“IF I decide to do this, I'm going to need an unlimited supply of Xena [oh the 90s] tapes... and hot pockets”) and we're back into Hilary Swank stuff because I really do think at this point this Oscar winner had no idea what she was signing on for and saw the “pilot the space shuttle for an emergency landing in LA” and signed on without reading the rest of the script. ...she really should have read the rest of the script.

      The “Avengers” (“Planeteers”? “Other reference”?) have assembled and this is just a weird transition scene between introducing everyone and getting on the Fantastic Voyage To The Center Of The Earth and other 60s sci-fi references. Oh: I'm going to call douchy ass-hat “Dr. Smith” from now on because Lost In Space. Also, in case Star Trek fans were feeling neglected after that “the Earth is a peach” metaphor was seemingly the only shout out they got: Alfre Woodard is in it as mission control (...she's in “First Contact”, fuck off that's a great movie). But yeah: training montage mixed with Eckhart's voice-over explaining the MBS of it all for the next three months. Dr. Smith has some lines that make it obvious shit is going to go wrong and it'll be his fault. Also: one hacker shuts down the 2003 internet so that the public has no idea any of this “restart the core” shit is going on. Because fuck logic at this point, everything is stupid. Also also: Eckhart and Swank are developing a “relationship” because it's a big budget movie and they're the two stars. I REALLY want to skip ahead more...

      So I will. (fuck you, it's my review, I do what I want). Worldwide destruction begins, people know about the threat, blah blah blah, Armageddon In Reverse.

      There are six people in the ship (Qualls is back in mission control so it's Eckhart, Swank, Lindo, Eckhart's French friend from the start, Dr. Smith, and the white guy that may have been in the homosexual relationship on the space shuttle who turns out was the commander of the ship and pilot and... look, he's here and we need some people to die along the way, okay?) and we're on our way. Whales start causing shit 'cause apparently no one learned the lesson of Star Trek IV except the whales since they don't so much 'cause shit” as “help them save the planet with their song” because MBS (...that time I think major bull shit is the one).

      I can't get over how stupid some of the CGI is. Like... the best way to describe it is... their “ship” looks like the microscoped up version of a sperm which is apparently caught in a wind tunnel.

      I should end this blog RIGHT NOW because there's nothing I can say to top that.

      Since I'm an alcoholic and won't give up a reason to drink so easily, I'll keep going. They make it through the crust and start drilling their way towards the core based on Lindo's technology and, I assume, “magic”. They've got a couple days to go before they get into the core, so NOW we get to the best part of action/disaster/save-the-world movies: HUMAN DRAMA! ...I'm as excited as you are, shut up and let's deal with it.

      They really do make every scene outside the ship look like sci-fi space from... the 1900s? There's a lot of crystals and such going on but a whole lot of “space ships in space” as well. Diamonds finally stop them for a while because obviously they're the hardest thing ever and blah blah blah MBS.

      “We need to go outside and the only way out is through the propellers on the back of the ship... which we'll turn off with the liquid nitrogen to freeze those propellers even though we need it to keep us cool from the intense heat of the Earth's core that we're buying into.” MBS. Also: the way they test if the “suits” they have can withstand the pressure of however deep they are is by going outside into however deep they are in the suits... several of them... at one time... without testing it beforehand. Are we SURE these guys are the best there is?

      Lasers solve everything... unless they're the lasers that were on the ship which were specifically designed to solve everything they'd face... and also cutting into the floor with lasers somehow lets magma in from the roof. With lasers. MBS. Holy shit they'd all be dead immediately. I mean, with real science. Lava that close and them in dumb space suits that take pressure for no reason? All dead. Anyway, Eckhart almost sacrifices himself to get the ship going again, but they save him at the last second and- WOW. Fuck everything. Triumphant music plays as people stand RIGHT ON THE EDGE OF THE LAVA IN THE EARTH'S CORE and deliver a speech directing the people inside the indestructible laser-powered ship what to do. I have to check if I'm looking at a movie OR the living embodiment of an Iron Maiden album cover. ...is that Eddy in one of the suits...?

      ...It is now seeing as the white commander of the space shuttle that may or may not have been homosexually involved with the black astronaut that hasn't been seen since that first scene is now dead and boiled skin from face in a couple seconds as he falls dead into the lava because- Well.. there's no way to make this easy, but... science won. MBS tried hard, but in the end, the guy remembered that standing on the lip of a magma pool is pretty much a BILLION degrees C or F and you're dead. So he collapsed into it and we get to see Swank as the only one who didn't know this was going to happen.

      MBS keeps Eckhart alive and we continue the movie. And now he's got his shirt off and Hilary Swank is weepy over her mentor dying and... come on, dude. Even I can put my hormones away for a bit (especially around Hilary Swank). This IS the best scene of the movie since the two best actors are trying their hardest to pretend there's some chemistry between them as they're trying to save the world.

     ...Hilary Swank won another Oscar after this movie. Aaron Eckhart was a BADASS Two-Face in Dark Knight and ran house in Thank You For Smoking. Let this be a lesson to everyone: you can be in a shitty movie and still turn your acting career around.

      ...Did anyone EVER have countdown clocks with giant numbers in lime green?

      “We're dodging diamonds the size of Cape Cod, so bear with me here” is a line. This movie is all of that. Also: French friend got cut out and left behind because the section of the ship got damaged and he was behind and... nope. Manual override is bullshit. French is dead. To be fair: “crushed to death by the Earth's core as you fight against all of nature and humanity” is pretty much the best way to die. Ever. Eckhart cries at Swank because she left the blast doors down and Frenchie died, but holy hell: if you were going to die, would you not want it to be as a hero on the quest to save the planet? Get over your sad, Harvey Dent, the fate of the world is in your hands and the girl you want to hate bang is driving the only ship that can save us all... ...if any part of that sentence were ever to be true... We would all be dead.

      I forgot to mention: Eckhart is in a “Canadian tuxedo”. i.e.: a blue jean jacket and blue jeans and an matching shirt. It's odd. And a weird thing that I noticed. Either way he's back but with just a black T and jeans on. Now he's gone rogue... again.

      Now they're getting to the core of the matter. Things are looking up because MBS and their calculations of MBS and... yeah, things are going to go wrong. 3... 2... 1...

      ...“are you telling me the 1,000 megatons of nuclear warheads we haul down here isn't going to cut it?” + “no”. Everyone is sad, MBS is spouted, Dr. Smith tries to talk people into going home (which.. I mean... you're in a one way drill to the centre of the Earth... “dig up, stupid”?), and... there's a “doomsday device” style thing going on (“Dr. Strangelove”) and... yup. This is where this is going.

      Eckhart and Swank want to nobly sacrifice themselves for the random idea that the original plan (which failed) might work if they keep trying it. Ass-hat raises the point that they're idiots and heroic sacrifices only work in movies. Thankfully, it's a movie. So Hilary Swank says “majority rules”, the vote is two against one, Hollywood American flags fly and fireworks spout off to the sounds of the Star Spangled Banner.

      What actually happens: Ass hat gets knocked out by Lindo, and they all go in for the core restart and... Hollywood loophole so that Qualls doesn't have to detonate the nukes.

      This next scene makes it seem like everyone in San Fran will be dead anyway.

      ...And now they're at the last second of anything and the government is against then and... yeah. They win. This is a stupid movie. There's so much dumb shit... Dr Smith keeps going on about trying to keep himself alive (Stanley Tucci is THE BEST character actor ever, by the way), Lindo punches him out because of course, and we all end up with the Core people riding a shockwave out like Lando Callrissian in Return Of The Jedi.

      End with Qualls telling the world how they saved the world in the worst computer graphics you've ever seen. The End with a stupid hat. This movie sucks.

Hulk

So because of the weird combination of extreme laziness and working too much that is my life lately, I haven't gotten around to writing about any bad movies this month.  Thankfully, to fill the void, we've got the first installment of what's likely going to come up a lot with my laziness and all: a guest review!  Everybody cheer... or not, whatever, it's a blog, who cares?  Anyway, onto the movie.

     Here we are, at the very much delayed debut of Stevie Gets Drunk and Reviews Whatever He Goddamn Pleases. My choice is Ang Lee's Hulk, which I last saw as a 9 year old in 2003; it has probably not aged well. The Sprite and on sale terrible banana rum has been poured, let this farce begin!
     Explosions and cells dividing and then jellyfish? This opening sequence is like a rip-off of the actual cool opener in Spider-man with webs and shit. Now they sawed a leg off a jellyfish? Science. Definitely science. And after many random flashes of lab books, equations, and microscopes, I can even further confirm that science is afoot.
     About 3 and a half minutes in and we're still montaging...what the fuck, Ang? Did you even edit this thing? 4:20 and it finally went to a military guy shooting down the science! Progress? And I don't know who the scientist actor is, but I'm calling him blonde rape stache (BRS). BRS has now had a baby that I assume will be Bruce Banner, but who fucking knows.
     Now BRS is shooting up or taking samples from his son, so that'll end well. Yup, BRS is Banner’s daddy and he's been experimenting with Hulk serum on humans; the military seems (actually rightfully) not happy. This child actor is terrible even without lines, but luckily (unfortunately?) we've now jumped to Bruce Banner about to go to college. Another sudden jump from the useless college scene, and Bruce is an adult Eric Bana, at Berkley Nuclear whatever, with a joint Lou Ferrigno/Stan Lee spotting as he bikes (loser) into work.
     While wearing his bike helmet like a real nerd-virgin, a nerd with weird facial makes fun of Bana, and why the fuck is this a scene? Oh look, a hot girl and he takes the helmet off. The hot girl is the girl that goes to that sex club for heroin in Requiem for a Dream, which matters more than anything being said at the 14 minute mark of Hulk.
     Now they're exposing frogs to various science words with many overdramatic shots and weird music, oh look, the frog exploded! Action! Aaaand back to boring Bana, drinking and having a forced flirting scene with heroin girl, how quaint.
     A second love interest for heroin girl appears! Tries to woo heroin girl [editors note: I REALLY hope people start referring to Jennifer Connelly as "herion girl" for all of her movies.  This should make the next time you watch Labyrinth... interesting) with a high-paying job! Gets shut down by heroin girl, but we now know heroin girl's dad is some military big-shot. Plot movement? Also, the transitions in this movie are like a grade-schooler's first PowerPoint presentation. I'm basically expecting laser noises for the next one.
     Anyways, we're on to Bana's former relationship with heroin girl, by way of him fantasizing about a picture. Bana is not even trying to be convincing with his lines, just droning through them. Goddamnit Bana, give Ang's steaming dump a little effort! And time for flashback within a fantasy for $1000 Alex! To heroin girl's childhood and a green Hulksplosion at a desert base we go (probably caused by BRS)!
     Snap back to reality for a poodle to be in the lab and bark angrily when Bana tries to touch it...I think I'm starting to remember the Hulk's shitty foes in this dumb movie. A janitor met for a second earlier is also doing shady shit after hours, I hope he starts experimenting on Bana's lack of effort and Ang Lee's wacky editing/bland script. Bitchass Bana has a nightmare with green flecks and is seeing a creepy guy with creepy dogs including that poodle, but we're gonna pause for another drink.
     Drink poured and we're off to creepy janitor's janky lab and...holy shit, is that Nick Nolte?!?!? What the fuck are you doing as creepy janitor? You're too good to be the old version of Bruce Banner's dad for a movie featuring Eric Bana's complete indifference. Second love interest is now back, being all rapey, and Bana immediately gets catty with him. Don't worry, he maintains his indifference, even through second love interest's threat of hostile takeover (henceforth SLI). Ooooohhhh, hostile takeover, so scaaaryyyy, and....terrible dramatic double-shot of Bana's eyes and SLI leaving the room.
     Now the nerd that made fun of Bana for wearing the bike helmet goes and fucks something up, Bana tries to fix it, and BAM, the Hulk is lamely born at the 30 minute mark with special effects straight from an episode of Power Rangers. There are probably people out there doing better work on MS Paint. Bana has apparently survived the radiation and has indifferently "never felt better". We all know where this is going...another montage, with lizards and jellyfish and the surface of Mars(?). Goddamnit Ang.
     OH SHIT, Nick Nolte's now up in Bana's hospital room with uncombed hair and his 3 weird ass dogs. Telling Bana he's actually a Banner...wait, did he not know his last name? Welp, that didn't reach me, but who cares about the viewer. Nolte's lookin’ like a witch and making crazy promises, and OH SHIT AGAIN, he's trying to act! How refreshing to Bana, who still does not give a shit about his lines. Bunch of bullshit from Nolte, causing Bana to actually raise his voice above indifference, then causing the dogs to be creepy and Nolte mention Bana's temper. How subtle.
     Heroin girl's dear old military dad, complete with distinguished military mustache, now visits. This scene is boring and I bet she's gonna have some daddy issues. Oh look, daddy issues! He's distant! Heroin girl is sad! Go fucking figure. And...HOLY TITBALL SLANGING DICKS, A TRANSITION FEATURING LASERS. CALLED IT.
     Bana's tripping balls with more Power Ranger editing, some scrunching of his nose, and...he actually Hulks out. I think there may be Power Ranger baddies with better suits, but whatever, at least he's free to fuck up a nuclear lab in a shiny shade of green. And...goddamnit Nolte, stop warmly caressing the Hulk! That doesn't even make sense! Quit your terrible fake crying when he jumps through a ceiling that literally can't hold him!
     Fuck, I still have like 90 minutes left, I'm overwriting all the nothing happening. Fuck me, and fuck the cheap banana rum's low proof. Gloriously mustached military dad reappears with Bana's wallet at Bana's house, little does know he's fucking with the indifferent Hulk! Heroin girl moves on to questioning Nolte in his hoarder science pad and gets some rapey pushback. Go for it Nick! You have nothing to lose here! Something, something, heroin girl, double sided dildo...
     Bana now upset with mustache military guy, military guy upset too, don't come near my daughter bullshit, whatever. Back to more ridiculous transitions chosen by some voting block of 7 year olds as "super cool", the highest level of a scale starting at "You are Eric Bana's complete indifference". Nolte calls up Bana, saying he experimented on himself, passing it on to Bana (this renders the opening past sequence mostly useless. Nolte further says his dogs are being injected with Hulk goo and will be going after heroin girl because reasons.
     Second love interest reappears at Bana's house to commit assault and battery for no real reason besides to act as a plot device both impeding Bana's saving of heroin girl and making Bana upset enough to Hulk out. He succeeds on both fronts, and Bana becomes the shade of green ideal for grocery store green beans. The military was still watching the house, so they shoot at the Hulk with gun sounds faker than those in a child's toy. Maybe Ang Lee's sound department was trying to match the lead actor’s indifference here?
     The Hulk grows 3 sizes, kicks shit. Heroin girl has very fake cabin in very fake woods, but hey, at least Hulked out Bana can go full King Kong and show love for tiny heroin girl right before the Hulked out dogs arrive, looking like monsters straight from a mid-90s B-movie. Only thing of note from the fight scene: he totally punches a dog in the dick and kills one of the dogs by punching right down its throat. The dogs die in weird puffs of green so poorly done I expected numbers telling the Hulk how many experience points the kills earned him, but would you expect anything else from this?
     The poodle may not be dead, but thankfully I think I'm halfway through this garbage. We're back to indifferent dialogue, so I'm gonna try to not pay close attention here. Oh look! The military shoots Bana with a knockout dart and an excitingly worthless helicopter transport scene ensues! They could have saved money and cut the movie's runtime by not having this bullshit! Bana has been transported to some secret desert base with very colorful pipes and oddly lit rooms. Heroin girl wants Bana helped, mustached distant father wants him sedated forever, go figure.
     Heroin girl uses "government wants to use his as a weapon" copout line, and we've entered obvious cliché land. ~ Come on Ang! You can be better than this! [editors note: since the only thing anyone really knew Ang Lee had done before this was "Flying Tiger, Hidden Rip-Off", that doesn't seem like it's true in the slightest]~ I suddenly wonder how Nolte's dogs were able to find heroin girl's fake cabin, but we're way past that with Nolte now zapping himself with Hulk juice in another scene with Power Ranger level effects and him gaining the ability to phase into things. Like, he phases his hand into a console and proceeds to hit a security guy with it. This makes no sense, but why should it.
     The desert lab is apparently in a deserted military town where both the opener and heroin girl's flashback took place, and this is way less cool than it could be thanks to more Bana indifference paired with poor writing. Just goes to show, if you can't get your movie to work through standard plot and dialogue, you just throw in endless flashbacks until everything is stupid and nobody gives a shit about the movie's contact.
     Abrupt ruling from unknown/more powerful forces causes heroin girl to be barred from seeing Bana. Ok, whatever. And second love interest wants to "carve a piece" off the Hulk for tests...GREAT ideas here. SLI starts trying to get Bana mad, so he's clearly a real smart guy. Nolte wants to see Bana too, showing up in heroin girl's non-cabin house to request it. More flashbacks and bullshit and cuts to Bana getting tortured in a blue tank as Nolte monologues. This scene blows...OH SHIT, RAPEY MUSTACHE YOUNG NOLTE KILLED BANA'S MOM WHEN SHE TRIED TO HOLD NOLTE BACK FROM STABBING YOUNG BAD CHILD ACTOR BANA. A twist that changes absolutely nothing, but I'll take any actual effort by Ang at this point.
     More bad cuts, tanked Bana Hulks out, fucks shit up, second love interest is surprised and... goddamnit, the sleeping gas gives the Hulk the sniffles. Current Marvel would make sure this is actually funny, but 2003 Marvel makes it very lame. Now the poorly CGIed Hulk is getting sprayed with poorly CGIed foam in the worst poor CGI bukakke imaginable. Second love interest proceeds to trying to drill into foam-stuck Hulks head, and the CGI seems to actually dip below Power Ranger levels; the Hulk rubberizes, second love interest tries to shoot him with an rpg thing, and kills himself in a definitely sub-Power Ranger explosion. Damnit Ang!!!!
     Lots of dramatic shots as the base goes into lockdown and Hulk fucks shit up throughout poorly done gunfire, weird cuts, and the Hulk's poor CGI causing his pants to be part of his legs. Hulk finally gets to the surface, where he finds jumping to be superior to running in getting from point A to B. Ok, whatever, damnit Ang.
     Now, more flashback, rocket fire at the Hulk, endless desert, tanks, and I have no idea why this is happening. Hulk throws a tank by its cannon and punches another tank...maybe Ang just had budget to burn here thanks to completely ignoring the CGI budget. That's all I've got to explain it as the Hulk jumps repeatedly into the distance.
     The Hulk is now majestically jump/gliding around a beautiful desert backdrop. It looks terrible. Stop, Ang, stop! Why is Bana even Hulked out still? Dramatic helicopters with guns/Hulk standoff time! Hulk survives and actually crashes a helicopter by catching a missile, biting off the head, and spitting it at a helicopter. That's outrageous and may be the movie's best part. Actually, definitely is.
     Hulk now just keeps jump/gliding all the way to San Francisco. Sure, whatever. Hulk rides a jet into space, loses consciousness, and Bana hallucinates shaving while the Hulk breaks through a mirror, grabs him, and actually calls him "puny human". I don't get this scene, but it wasn't the worst! Heroin girl now wants to go to the Hulk as mustaches military dad wants to destroy the Hulk, naturally. Hulk awakens, fucks shit up in the city, and stops on seeing his heroin girl in a trendy denim dress shirt. Bana de-Hulks after a clear shot of the CGI-Hulk, wherein we see just how bad it truly looks and the purple shorts shrink perfectly back to human sized.
     Nick Nolte's in jail or at least a holding cell somehow now, and damnit, they've brought him to where they're keeping Bana for some reason. Nolte and Bana start having some bizarro heart to heart and it is dumb. I have no idea why the military is cool with this, but I'm sure Bana will Hulk out once more. Nolte bites a power line and becomes an electricity monster? Well shit, I guess that might as well happen. Meanwhile, Bana Hulks out and the Hulk/his electric daddy fight across the sky.
     They crash back into the desert for Nolte to become a rock monster and more fighting to occur. Hulk touches Nolte, and Nolte starts morphing/phasing into the Hulk. Hulk stupidly tosses Nolte in water, and Nolte becomes a water monster...this fight is ridiculous, but Nolte's powers are kinda cool. And now the two fighters literally freeze. Hulk then tries to force Nolte to absorb all his power, and I have no idea what is happening. Oh, never mind, they go Hulknuclear with Bana left floating in the water.
     One year later...because what's infinite flashbacks without a glimpse of the future. Heroin girl loved Bana, mustached military dad thinks Bana is dead but wants to be told if heroin girl finds him still alive. Sudden shift to some Spanish-speaking jungle...and we find Bana working as a doctor about to Hulk out on some dick. The end. That movie sucked, no actor tried except for occasionally Nolte, and Ang Lee gave no fucks.
     I hope my Canadian railroad overlord enjoys this review. Fuck Ang Lee's Hulk.

Highlander II: The Quickening

     So of the things I've learned on my hiatus: 1: don't trust a college kid to write a monthly review of bad movies while drunk ESPECIALLY if he's going to be going to Europe for a month in that time; 2: Fuck it, I'm going to keep doing this anyway, I might as well write it down.
      So begins Highlander II: The Quickening. Fuck me.
      We'll start by getting a lot of the easy jokes out of the way first: Highlander... is a ridiculous movie. Sean Connery is a Spanish Egyptian with a Scottish accent and he's mentoring Christopher Lambert who is supposed to be Scottish but has a French accent. And that is literally the least ridiculous thing about the first movie! ...Maybe. I personally think the least ridiculous thing about the first movie is that they live in a world where all music is Queen. No one can possibly convince me that a world where Freddy Mercury and Brian May being responsible for all music is not a better world than the one we live in. It also saddens me that I can't make a joke about how the first movie was all Queen and the second movie they're in a world with no Queen because the second movie was made in 1991 and Freddy died of AIDS. In a perfect world, Queen was also the soundtrack to Highlander II... and Highlander II would have been better. We do not live in a perfect world where all music is Queen.       And so we start... in the far off world of the future of 1999... could the early 90s not choose a further place in the future for things to happen just in case they were stupid (like they always are)? Besides that, the ozone is gone by 99, and the world's top scientists plus Connor MacLeod (our hero from the first Highlander) are putting up some sort of satellite fueled 90s effects-style shield to block the entire Earth from the light of the sun... yes, that's as dumb as you think it is. This is Highlander II, after all. Now it's 25 years later, and the immortal Highlander is in make-up to look 25 years older and-
     Can we just ask one serious question of this franchise? Why, if these guys are immortal, did Sean Connery get to be... old, before he kept living throughout the years while Lambert only aged until he was “action hero” age before living for several hundred years (same goes for Clancy Brown (the Kurgan) in the first one)? Who decides when these guys stop aging since they're supposed to be immortal? Thankfully, there's an answer in this next scene where old (Connor has aged all of those 25 years... putting this year at 2024) Highlander is at the opera and dead Sean Connery (he died halfway through the first movie) is talking to him.
      Connery's voice: “Remember, Highlander, remember your home. Another Galaxy.”
What?

      Lambert's voice: “Yes! Yes I remember! 500 year ago!”

Given that Connery was supposed to be from ancient Egypt: WHAT?!?!

      Lambert again: “...on the planet Ziest!”

WHAT?!?!?!?

      This suddenly turned into Lawrence Of Arabia crossed with the lowest budget Star Wars rip-off (Ice Pirates? No, Ice Pirates is awesome). And now Sean Connery is saying a bunch of bullshit... but it's no matter, anything said in Sean Connery Voice is automatically important. Then some bullshit “Quickening” that basically sounds like Sean Connery has just tricked Christopher Lambert into marrying him.

      MICHAEL IRONSIDE! How in all fuck does he look like a grizzled, 40-something, seen-it-all, asshole that owns every scene he's in for like... 30 years? Seriously, He looks the same now (minus the ridiculous mullet) as he does in every movie he's ever in. And he sounds the same too. Just pure “don't give a fuck, I'm the one with power” bad-ass. Michael Ironside is the best, is basically what I'm saying.

       He's the bad guy and he wants to kill Lambert and Connery. Despite Ironside having the better last name, any match that features “Connery & Lambert vs Ironside”... I'll vote James Bond and Highlander vs a guy whose name is better than any nickname he could get). Wait. He's the ruler of the Highlander race (on planet Ziest because: stupid) but he's willing to take the leaders of the rebels into custody and then give them a trial in front of impartial judges where they are sentenced to banishment (“to the planet Earth. Once there, you will be immortal” …and this is their punishment?) and he accepts it. Are... are we cheering for the bad guys?

      Now there's some black suited terrorists trying to break into the shield complex through the dam that is, for some reason, part of the shield against the sun. This is dumb, but Virginia Madsen is their leader and she's hot and we've been told the Shield corporation is evil so I guess it's okay.

      There is SOOOOOO much cheesey sci-fi backgrounds going on. If this movie were made now I'd venture that the sets were made intentionally to be a parody of awful sci-fi. As it is, they have old (previously immortal) Christopher Lambert putting money into the juke box in some early 90s equivalent to an 80s dive bar in a move set in the mid-2020s... AND IT'S STILL NOT QUEEN!

      Seriously, you have your hero from the 80s picking a song... and you DON'T make it “Champions Of The Universe”? The literal theme song to his last movie? How could you NOT do that? There's so much irony, there's so much... oh wait. They are playing a Queen song. It's... not a good song. It may just be somebody trying to sound like Queen. Fuck 'em, some random fat girl in a flower dress decided to attack Highlander while he was old and in a bar. She got away and he got hurt and this movie is all kinds of stupid. Virginia Madsen is now talking to Highlander outside the bar and trying to tell him she isn't a terrorist despite her being a terrorist. Turns out she's just a whistle blower smeared by the corporate world. Also: that whole terrorist raid, but whatever. Moral high ground to the hot girl vs the faceless corporation!

      The Planet Ziest. Michael Ironside is sending two nimrods (he literally mumbles the words “it's so hard to find good help” before sending them off) to go kill Lambert on Earth despite... all logic. Even the idiot henchmen know sending Ziestians to earth will make Connor MacLoed immortal again since he will no longer be the last Highlander on Earth which... magic... heads cut off... oh my god this franchise is fucking stupid.

      Hoverboard fight scene with the idiots vs Lambert (MacLoed) and he's calling for “his old friend Rameriz” (Connery). I hate 1991. This movie thinks it's Michael Keaton's Batman and-

      WHY IS THERE A TRAIN IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD!?!?!?!?

      Seriously, there's a train. Going down the middle of a street. Not one of those San Fran street cars or anything, a literal train going down the middle of the street for no reason other than to have MacLoed fighting on top of it. Oh, and now that he's killed one of the henchmen, and broken everything in the surrounding area (serious electric storm going on during this), he's young again... and looking like he's trying to model shampoo. I swear to god, there were a lot of shots in the first movie where they were basically framed JUST so Christopher Lambert could look like a hair product model. This movie... he does it once, and goes into a flying sword fight with the other henchman. Literally flying. They have hoverboards. This movie is stupid. There's too much flying. Not just for “beleiveabilty” or anything (that went out the window long ago) but just in general. There's too many and too long of shots of people flying and not nearly enough actual fighting for this fight scene.

      And now, for only slightly non-contractual reasons, Sean Connery shows up. In the middle of a performance of Hamlet and... “comedy”? This movie is awful. Fuck everything. There are bag pipes playing as Connery leaves the stage performance of Hamlet on Broadway. None of that makes any sense in this world or any other. Fuck you, planet Ziest.

      So Virgina Madsen (in her late 20s/early 30s at this point) just saw the 60ish year old guy she'd come to confront about the shield keeping the sun away fight two dicks on hoverboards and change into a 30some year old 80s action hero looking guy.... might as well make out with him in an alley!

      She does try and sum up the stupid of the plot. As they're both standing in flashy silk robes and drinking in the middle of a room so big that it could never exist outside of cartoons/comics in New york City. She makes it sound stupid, like it is, and then Connor (Lambert) just flicks it away by saying “yes, something like that”. THE BALLS ON THIS MOVIE! I salute them. Think about it: how many retarded movies are made nowadays. How many of them point out that they are retarded, And how many of them do that with a guy that looks like early 90s Christopher Lambert in jeans and a black sweater toasting a drink to the literal explanation of the retarded plot? None. Highlander II is king of everything.

      I hate this movie. So dumb. We're going to skip ahead for a long while. The version goes: The radiation above the shield is normal, Dr. Cox from Scrubs is being his dickish self but evil. And he can act circles around Chris Lambert... but is TRYING SO HARD NOT TO... and then Ironside shows up on Earth. Is as awesome as his name is (as far as a terrible movie allows). And then is MORE awesome because the entire subway scene is stupid beyond words. Everything about it re-inforces Michael Ironside's commentary about the movie where he says: “it was a piece of shit. If I was going to be in it, I was going to be so over the top...” (paraphrases)

      The scene in the church is ridiculous. Ironside acts circles around Lambert. The diolgoue pushes the limits of what is... well, not “believable” since they lost that long ago, but even “stomachable”.

      And now Sean Connery is walking around Scotland looking for a new suit and... comedy? This movie sucks. SOOOO HARD! This scene: fuck all things ever. For all time. AND HE DOESN'T EVEN END UP LOOKING GOOD! (Sean Connery aside). The suit is awful, the comedy is not, everything is wrong with this movie and I hate you all.

      The whole point of 5 minutes of this movie is: Sean Connery is a pimp, regardless of the age or planet his born into. That could literally be summed up by just a picture of Sean Connery and those words being spoken by him. No one else, even despite his “punching women in the face” stance, could ever just stand behind a picture of himself, tell you he was awesome, and then have all the ladies wanting him, and all the guys wanting to punch him for stealing the ladies but being too scared to 'cause he's Sean Connery. Seriously? How could you punch James Bond? What happens when you miss?

      Highlander II is still happening.

      It really shouldn't be. But Michael Ironside DEMANDS he have a sword fight at some point. (35 minutes left in the movie) Ironside shows up at the corporate meeting that Dr. Cox is trying to run and... GETS SHOT BUY DR. COX'S GOON! That is LITERALLY the best thing about this movie and the start of some 80s/90s hybrid that involves RoboCop.

      ROBO-COP VS HIGHLANDER!

      TELL ME you would not pay to see that movie!

      Patent pending.

      Ironside doesn't die... I still think it's odd a guy has a hitman with him in a board meeting... and then Ironside takes over. He's talking with Dr. Cox and they are trying SOOO hard to be good actors despite the movie they're in. They both succeed. Lambert: does not.

      Virginia Madsen: goes from terrorist leader to “sleeping love interest” within half an hour and the movie is only 90 minutes long. The 90s/80s?! Either way, being a woman in an “action movie” (this one lacking ALL the action) sucks. At least in Die Hard, Holly tazered the guy.

      Literally, 2/3rds of the way through the movie, Lambert and Connery meet up. This isn't so shattering a news except the ONLY REASON this movie was made was the first one made money, and Christopher Lambert became friends with Sean Connery while filming the first one to the point where he INSISTED Connery be in the second one (even though Connery's character died) or he wouldn't make the movie

      I... start to see why this movie was so ridiculous..

      Side note: is Christopher Lambert in the Expendables yet? I feel like he should be in The Expendables if for no other reason for there to be a ridiculously large explosion (80s/Expendables-style) and have him walk out of it afterward and be like “yeah, what did you expect? I'm never going to die.”

     That'd be the hat tip for the end of that franchise. As for this one:

      For no reason Sean Connery and Christopher Lambert sword fight and trade quips. And then are friends and drinking. And then Virginia Madsen shows herself and Sean Connery says (I kid you not): “It’s nice to see some things have improved over the years”.
      This means: A: women have improved in the last 500 years that Sean Connery hasn't been around for. B: Literally everything Sean Connery says in this movie is based on the camera being pointed at him, the director whispering “action”, and him just saying whatever the fuck came to mind as he was boozing it up with Lambert and playing the “I'm James Bond” card.

      Oh my god, they try to do comedy. WITHOUT playing up the fact Lambert has been in America for (at least) dozens of years and hasn't lost his accent. Also, they have Sean Connery saying lines while he's CLEARLY in the “fuck it, I want some money” part of his career.

      (Personal note: I blame this movie for League Of Extraordinary Gentleman even though it was like 10 years after the fact and Connery was in The Avengers before it was cool and... well, basically I blame this movie for EVERYTHING Sean Connery related and James Bond related.... except for the GoldenEye game for N64. That was AMAZING and could only have been improved by having Connery replace Brosnan)
      The movie. Still going on.

      The Highlanders are in a car. Getting shot up by goons. Why is this dramatic? They're IMMORTAL and everyone knows it. ...And Virginia Madsen plays the dumbest blonde ever... and... it works? I hate this movie, this plan, this stupid fucking idiot fucking shit.

      Clearly now they are in the morgue (which is where Madsen is because she's a witness and dumb things are going to happen this movie, accept it).

     All alive, one liners, plot advancement. I would rather play GoldenEye.

      I could literally not care less about this.

      Holy fuck: Ironside and Dr. Cox are in a scene and trying to out act each other. This might b the best scene of the entire movie considering these are the only two actors (non-Sean Connery edition) who can actually act. And they, at this point in the movie, know how shitty it is. This is going to be Shatner levels of awesome.

      IronCox are idiots. They think they can leave killer fans around James Bond and think it's going to kill James Bond, Highlander, and [Hot Girl #85].

      There's literally no way that happens in any movie franchise either of them are in. (side note: Christopher Lambert is in Southland Tales which is an AWESOME movie and he... is AWESOME in it)

      None of this makes sense in the movie. Everyone that has ever sen this is stupid. Ironside and John C. McGinly are lucky to be so awesome they get away from this.

Highlander fights Ironside. Highlander wins.

      Highlander went on to be Christopher Lambert who was AWESOME in Southland Tales and also great in Expendables.... 4? I seriously think Lambert (the Highlander) needs to be in Expendables.

      Sean Connery went on to be bitter. Turn down Gandalf, and then make LXG because he was old and didn't know better.

     Virginia Madsen went on to be “that girl who's the wife of the guy” in a lot of movies but still hot 20 years later.

      Michael Ironside went on to be AMAZING. If you need a reason: “The Machinist” with Christian Bale, Also: any other Ironside performance, ever. Hardest Canadian since Bob Baun.

      John C. McGinley went on to make friends with Oliver Stone and be in all movies he's ever made. Plus Dr. Cox on Scrubs.
     Highlander II is awful. Even Highlander movies and the series that came out after it ignore it.

Theordore Rex: Part One

     Before anything else, a note: I'm going to stop doing these reviews for a while (which would pretty much mean business as usual given how many weeks/months/whatever I miss anyway) but I've given control of the blog over to someone else who may or may not get around to writing some reviews of his own in this space.  Best of luck to Stevie and hopefully it goes so well that everyone who reads this (it very well might just be Stevie anyway) forgets all about me and doesn't want me back.  Anyway, on to the review of part of Theodore Rex.


     It's Fan Appreciation Month! ...Or at least “take a fan's suggestion 'cause I don't have many fans so I should try not to alienate them” month. Either way, up on the block is 1995's “Theodore Rex” which I always though was basically a buddy cop comedy starring Whoopi Goldberg and a dinosaur of the Jim Henson's Dinosaurs TV show variety. This, on the surface, seems like a can't-lose prospect. You've got the buddy cop genre that was in a bit of a lull between Lethal Weapon and Rush Hour, plus dinosaurs which were surging in popularity from Jurassic Park and the aforementioned TV show, and also Whoop Goldberg who was Guinan on Star Trek: The Next Generation and also did comedy work in Sister Act (which, now that I think of it, was just an Americanized version of Nuns On The Run since they're both about people trying to run from the mob and hiding in nunneries except Sister Act has one fewer Monty Python member and one fewer scene of Catholic school girls showering so it's CLEARY the inferior of the two) so this should've been awesome. But then again, so should Street Fighter have been (JCVD doing fighting, Kylie Minogue in a bathing suit, Raul Julia being awesome) and that... actually, I stand by my opinion that Street Fighter is one of the greatest comedies ever made and the only problem is very few people seem to understand that that's what it is (Raul Julia did, though, but he's dead so he can't back me up on this). Anyway, onto Theodore Rex so we can see how they managed to fuck this up.
      A voice-over reciting the lines that appear onscreen in a font that looks like it belongs in a fairy tale set in the middle ages... I'm not sure they knew what type of movie they had on their hands with the concept I just described. This isn't promising and neither is the fact that the first line is “once upon a time in the future”. We let Star Wars get away with crap like that because A New Hope was awesome, less slack will be given to you, Theodore Rex, you've been warned. The voice-over just gave away pretty much the bad guy's entire plot while clumsily trying to set up the story (just like Star Wars... guys, I really think the people in charge of this have no idea what kind of movie they're making) which is not really a good thing to do in a buddy cop movie.
      They're now trying to be very dramatic with a black & white, slow motion scene of some guy in a trench coat running through the woods or an abandoned amusement park or something. He's got a gun and is chasing somebody and... THERE'S THE DINOSAUR! It... it does not look well. Not in the “it's sick” kind of way, either, just in the “shouldn't we maybe spend a bit of money on the dinosaur costume for our movie where the title character is a talking dinosaur? Nah, I'm sure it'll be fine with two bucks worth of plastic and rubber” kind of way. Oh look, some colour added to the scene in the form of a digitally animated butterfly that flies over and lands on the dinosaur's nose. This serves more to highlight the fact that there WAS technology available for things like “effects” and “special effects” but they chose to use it on butterflies and (I assume) high grade cocaine and heroin rather than on the dinosaur. I... would like to think I'd make a different choice if only because if the dinosaur looked better maybe the movie would've made more money and I could then use THAT money on the high grade drugs.
      The butterfly explodes and it turns out it was just a dream as (who I assume is) Theodore Rex wakes up in some adorable pajamas and a sleeping cap while also startling his dog. Yes, the Tyrannosaurus Rex has a pet dog. This is the kind of movie it's going to be. Just accept it and move on. Also: we're in colour and his arms are long enough to reach for a phone and bring that phone up to his head so he can talk into it. “Teddy Rex” is a cop and calls in to see if anything odd happened that night because “he had a funny feeling”. Upon finding out there was a murder and saying he was on his way, he rushes... into the bathroom to take a shower and sing a Sesame Street style song. He also talks to himself a lot and puts on a neon orange flannel coat and says to himself in the mirror he's “looking good”. The 90s were weird, okay?
      He owns a device called (and labeled) a Cookie Shooter. There are no jokes to be made for this. I would just like to say that I would invest money in this product and would like to get in on the ground floor of whoever builds a working prototype.
      The cityscape looks like some mix of Dick Tracy (the movie) mixed with mid-90s computer graphics in cartoon-bright colours. I'm not sure what else I expected them to be, now that I think about it.
      A guy is roller-blading and gets shot by what I assume are the bad guys and Whoopi Goldberg is zip lining from the rooftop in order to bust into their truck and announce herself as a cop after some dialogue with her partner about her CPU being ready for action while wearing black leather everything while still in the cartoonish cityscape I mentioned. I feel like this scene needs to be mentioned more often on lists of the most 90s things to ever 90s. Especially with the “witty” dialogue going on. And of course there's a shootout and Whoopi ends up riding the underside of a surgical table while being dragged from the back of the truck and shooting at the henchmen. And now, after the chase/fight ends with the truck exploding (because of course it does), Whoopi and her partner get yelled at by the chief (“you call yourselves cops? You're a circus act!”) via hologram. This could be the greatest cheesy movie ever.
      I guess the first dinosaur wasn't just in a dream since there's a dead dino in a pond and this is the one that Teddy Rex shows up to and talks to some human cop about how “all dinos have a 'feel' for each other”. Is... is this some new kind of racism? Are dinosaurs supposed to represent minorities and this is some racist white guy assuming all blacks/Hispanics/Asian/whatever are telepathically linked? That's weird, even by racism standards. Worth mentioning: all the human cops are wearing black leather and looking (well, TRYING to look, remember: two of them are Whoopi Goldberg and some doughy white guy that looked like Andy Richter) like pre-Matrix bad-asses, while Rex is wearing the orange coat, a purple shirt, and a green sweater underneath the shirt with a rainbow scarf on top of it all. I suppose when you're a goddamn Tyrannosaurus Rex you don't need to be worried about looking like a bad-ass: you ARE a bad-ass.
      The bad guys are now in conference. Then henchman from Whoopi's scene is reporting to “Mr. Edge” (the bad guy that killed the first dino. It's a quick scene and pointless since all that happens is henchman gives Edge a medallion off the guy he killed.
      Raccoons are extinct and young black children are working at dinners and sounding like old black men who work in dinners and say things like “what's happening to the world today?”. The kid wants to set Whoopi up with his dad who apparently owns the place, though so I guess he's just a kid not some weird case of... I don't even know. Also, Whoopi is “off work now” but gets called in and just immediately folds over. Same as when the kid asks her to come meet his dad. She says no, and then says yes right away. What the hell kind of cop is she?
      Teddy Rex is at some ball trying to meet the commissioner. There are some “hilarious” “he can't control his tail” moments and then he meets the commish, and the doctor that revived dinosaurs (and the hot girl that is just there to be hot... which she is). Also, Rex is just a “community relations” police officer. Just a publicity stunt. But he wants in on the case because it's the first “dinocide” in history. This is also TOTALLY about racism, by the way. The commisioner (who is black, by the way) and his aide (who is white) are talking in the most racist terms imaginable about the headlines where the “visionary comissioner who had the foresight to see beyond race appointed the first dinosaur detective”. Teddy is also a recovering carnivore. That is the dumbest term for vegitarian ever. And now Rex is being partnered up with Whoopi in classic wacky buddy cop movie logic. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Last Action Hero (in this case with the scenes where the desk sargeant is partnering up teams of cops in the most opposite fashion possible) is an amazing movie and anyone that doesn't understand why is a fucking idiot. The commishioner is also wearing a white scarf like he's in Tim Burton's Batman. Whoopi doesn't like dinosaurs. She's speciest.
      The aide is on the payroll of the bad guys (the scientist who created dinosaurs and the hot girl as well as the others from before) and he LITERALLY says that he's “teamed up the division's token dinosaur with a burned out cop” to solve the case and that “they'll definitely blow it”. How could that NOT be considered heavy handed forshadowing?
      Rex is a bumbling fool. That's basically the jist of the next scene with him and Whoopi. No movie where Whoopi Goldberg is the hard-ass of the pair should be taken seriously and I wonder why this ever was. I mean, they're having a dino autopsy in the Museum of Natural History and the doctor in charge is the “head dinosaurologist” and I did not make that term up, they did. This movie is the best. Also, Teddy now mind melds with the dead dinosaur... and also gets a piece of the exploding butterfly out of the snout of the dead dinosaur. And then uses a tail print like a finger print (because why not?) and they're led to the Extinct Species Club where the most terrifying version of a triceratops I've ever seen is working the bar while wearing a checkerboard shirt. Or maybe he's the DJ. It's... it's not important since there's some other dinosaur that meets them at the door wearing a PVC French maid costume and speaking with an overly flamboyantly gay accent. This movie is so ridiculous that I can't even imagine. They're served some plastic seaweed and we're treated to some discussion about eating meat and we learn that dinos call humans “soft bodies”.
      And now the “Jessica Rabbit introduction” scene. Because Who Framed Roger Rabbit was awesome so why not ape that? Her name is Molly Rex and she's Carmen Miranda or Madeline Kahn in Blazing Saddles and just ridiculous. But, as my friend Julie pointed out: they put enough thought thought into the movie to give her a mic to wear and sing into to make it realistic... but not enough to care about any other realism.
      For no reason Rex and Whoopi are backstage after Molly's dressing room talking to her and telling her the dead dino was registered as living with her and... okay, it's not important because she's changing costumes and they're trying to make it sexy and... WHO IS THAT SUPPOSED TO APPEAL TO? I mean... if it's a parody, sure, but this is just something else.
      Now the bad guys are chasing Teddy on skateboards while he's in a car and they're keeping up. This is ridiculous. Also, clones or something a creepy doctor doing the autopsy for the human Whoopi is investigating. Teddy doesn't believe in violence. Doesn't even have a gun. Whoopi's response when she responds to his call for help? “you don't believe in violence? And you want to be a police person?” HOW IS THIS NOT THOUGHT OF AS HEAVY HANDED “SATIRE” AND THE PINACLE OF 90S MOVIES?!!
      Now they're getting yelled at by the commish again. After Rex was starting to unleash his rage on the desk seargeant when asking for a new dino friendly car. And for no reason Whoopi was defending him. She hated him not two seconds ago. Whatever.
      Teddy wants to go undercover so he goes to the transporter room (that is what it looks like and is obviously meant to be) and talks to some woman in charge of it and she pushes some buttons while he's on the transporter pad and makes him look like a Bugs Bunny-style opera star and then pushes the button again and give him a stereotypical 1800s Mexican revolutionary look. This is the movie we're watching. He talks it terrible Spanglish until they push the button again and make him stereotypically Hawaiian. And then Scottish. Funny? I guess. But the final thing he gets is... I don't even know how to explain it except to say “late 80s rapper” with a T-Rex wearing it and saying “yeah. I'm too sexy for my clothes” while Whoopi Goldberg says “you look like a real cop”. WHAT KIND OF WORLD ARE THEY LIVING IN? That's undercover? What in all kinds of fuck?
    Their new car is a garbage truck. This seems dumb for mor reasons than ever. Now they're going to play hockey on rollerblades and I REALLY think I need to review Mighty Ducks 2 since this is now the scene where they have kids teaching them how to knuckle puck. Except Teddy scores three goals with his tail while the goalie does nothing. There is no reason for this scene.
      Whoopi and Teddy get to the park where the evil doc is doing evil things. The hot girl in red greets them and does nothing exept lead them to the doctor. Her whole point in this movie is “be hot”. It's tragic because it's so obvious. I mean, there are SO MANY other”just because you're hot” roles for women out there, at least they could have made this one less conspicuous...
      The bad guy talks English with a German accent. This is the most common thing EVER in Hollywood movies... maybe second common to Russian bad guys. Third is “Arabic” villains like in True Lies and other movies... All of that racism aside, there's now a German villain talking about the extermination of people/dinosaurs/etc.  Just throwing that out there for all the history majors in the crowd.
      Whoopi Goldberg mimicking the hot Chick in red is... funny? That seems to be the idea... it falls flat. I'll say it since no one else wants to: Whoopi Goldberg had lesbian sex with Demi Moore in the movie “Ghost”. Pat Swayze was dead and possessing her, sure, but it's still Whoopi's body that was finishing Demi off.  Try to get that out of your head.
      Back to the movie.
      There's a a BUNCH of bullshit... from dinosaurs and they all get placated by foreign sounding guy and red dress sounding like they care about the death of a dinosaur. I... I can't even guess how racism this is. It's a lot.
      For literally no reason, the black kid that was running the dinner is now being hassled by the bad guys. He tries to fight but... we're cut with Rex getting drawn into Jessica/Molly Rabbit/Rex and her... wait? Why are we at Teddy Rex's place? Seems like a poor place for whatever witness she was supposed to be. This is... going to be like the lizard sex scene in Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas.
Whoopi calls Teddy out and, for no reason that can be explained, he leaves a “hot” reptile lover to go with Whoopi Goldbberg to try and solve a crime. And ther's the most 90s... this blog doesn't do pictures, but the shot of him leaving his apartment to fight crime now takes over as “most 90s thing ever”.

13/13/13 ("lousy Smarch weather")

      We're going to call my missing February an “Olympic Break” (even though I only watched a total of like four hockey games and enough of the closing ceremony to see a giant crying bear and that was it for my Olympic experience) rather than just say I got lazy and skipped over it. Also, even though it's March and I should probably do something St. Patrick's Day related like Leprechaun (or one of its sequels) or move into reviewing terrible movies people have heard of (like The Core) or something like I'm thinking about doing, all of you can shut up because we're doing “13/13/13” this time. Why? Because there's a Simpsons quote about something like that (Marge: “It all started on the thirteenth hour of the thirteenth day of the thirteenth month. We were there to discuss the faulty calendars the school had purchased. Homer: “Lousy Smarch weather. Do not touch Willy. Good advice!”) and I haven't stopped giggling about the coincidence since I found out this movie was a thing in January and the description of it makes it sound like something even present day Simpsons writers gave up on for being too dumb. Namely: “For millennia, calendars have added an extra day every four years. In doing so, they violated the ancient Mayan calendar. Now we are in the 13th month of the 13th year of the new millennium, and the few who survive will battle a world of demons.” Lousy Smarch demons invading our world somehow.
      We start with a guy turning into his driveway and walking into his house from the car. This is only notable since, for some reason, as the camera is tracking along beside the car as it slowly rolls up the driveway. It cuts... to the exact same shot of the car slowing rolling up the driveway from the exact same angle. There's a little break that's hard to notice and I probably wouldn't have if I'd been drinking more already, but I kinda want to know why that happened. Did somebody working the camera trip over a tree branch or something and they figured rather than using a whole new take, they'd just start it over from roughly the same spot?
      Enough of that, though, back to the movie. The guy walks through the house and finds a little girl wearing a Leatherface mask. Except I don't think it's a mask as she's standing beside the bed while a different girl sits playing with dolls and a bunch of “blood” all over her face so I think it's supposed to be her skin that's been cut off and used to make the mask the first girl is wearing. The second girl wants the dad to “come play doll house” with them, and then the first girl jumps at him and we cut to... I think it's the same guy (I didn't get much of a look at him in the car) waking up in a tent while three other dudes sit around a campfire in lawn chairs drinking beers and laughing like idiots. So a pretty good representation of camping, I guess. He gets out of the tent and they start to pressure him into drinking even though it's morning while one of the other dudes is telling a story that turns out to be bullshit. I'm more and more impressed with how the people behind this movie were able to do such a good job capturing the reality of dudes going camping.
      The first guy's looking at his watch (it says “13:13” for the the time! ...although they didn't use the seconds to make it 13:13:13 because subtlety I guess) and he asks who was messing with his watch 'cause he doesn't use military time. Nobody was messing with it, of course, so he just tries to set it back. It doesn't seem to go and now we get 13:13:13 on the watch. That's probably a well developed set-up by this movie's standards.
      They pack up and we find out the first guy's name is “Jack” and that he and at least one of the other guys used to be cops. His other buddy calls him “Killer” so I'm guessing Jack shot somebody while on the force. Oh, and it turns out that first part was just a nightmare. These guys are old friends and Jack is in the middle of a divorce so they're all going on a camping trip to get his mind off it or something. And the car radio clock says 13:13 now, too. Before leaving (although if they haven't left yet, why were they out in the woods in tents around a campfire already?) they stop at Jack's old house to see his kids and soon-to-be-ex wife. It's probably worth noting at this point that there doesn't seem like a lot of reason these guys should be friends. Jack's pretty soft spoken and “nice” or whatever so far, his other cop buddy has been acting like a douche bag, the fat guy has been trying to act like a Douche Cop but comes off as a complete fucking idiot (I'm going to call him “Fat Idiot” until I find out his name... and probably after that, too), and the fourth guy hadn't said much but after Jack mentioned making a stop to see his kids (the oldest daughter is supposed to be 12... I'm guessing she has a birthday coming up) he starts talking and giving off this creepy pedophile vibe that only gets worse when they get to the house and she's playing outside. Douche Cop and Fat Idiot just say hi to her and follow Jack inside after he talked to his daughter, but Probably Pedo says hi and then kinda lingers around for a couple seconds looking at her all creepily before going inside with the rest of them. The daughter then crushes and eats a spider she had in her hand.
      Jack then walks into the kitchen and starts raiding the fridge for beer for his friends. The wife (Marcy) is washing her hands in the kitchen sink because something “won't come off. It just won't come off.” I'm guessing maybe they were actually coming back from the trip rather than just about to go? I might have misheard what they were saying in the car, but now Jack is inviting the rest of the guys (Douche Cop is named Quinton, Fat Idiot is named Joe, and Probably Pedo still doesn't have a name yet) out to dinner since he's taking his daughter Kendra out. It's at this point we see that Marcy has been trying to wash off blood or something as she's ripped open the inside of her left forearm so looks like dinner is canceled and we get a trip to the Poorly Acted Hospital instead.
      Everyone, from other patients, to relatives, to orderlies, to the doctors have their acting turned up to -11 and are complaining about being busy and generally being snappy with everyone. Marcy is, of course, in room 13. As Jack is going back to see her he passes a doctor who says “that's like the thirteenth guy I've lost today” then snaps at him.
      Back at the house, Probably Pedo is looking out the window and creepily watching Kendra play in the driveway while Quinton and Joe sit on the couch drinking beer. Quinton starts “acting” by snapping about wanting a beer. Probably Pedo now goes out to talk to Kendra and yeah, he's definitely a pedophile that Jack's apparently warned his kids about already. This raises the question of why a former cop would even be friends with a pedophile let alone bring him around to his ex-wife's house where his two daughters live and then especially raises the question of why he'd leave the daughters there with the pedophile when he went with his wife to the hospital. Turns out the guy's name is Trevor but that doesn't matter as Kendra ends up violently beating the shit out of him and smashing the back of his head against the driveway while Quinton and Joe sit inside on the couch debating who's getting up to get the next beer. There are many odd things and questionable choices going on so far but no demons and nothing really “bad movie” bad except the acting.
      When Joe and Quinton finally go outside (for no real reason it seems) they find Kendra sitting on Trevor's dead body and then she attacks them and Quinton naturally figures the best response is to attempt to run her over. I know I've mentioned the bad acting a couple times already, but the way the guy playing Quinton goes after it just reminds me of Nicholas Cage for some reason. Just over the edge over the top crazy at all times. Also, other people are starting to randomly attack people as one guy is crawling along the sidewalk and gets his eyes gouged out by some random chick. Quinton Cage (I'm just going to assume that's his last name) knows how to handle this! Full reverse! Ram over top of two people and instantly kill them! Claim it's worth “ten points” and you're “going for a high score” while your dim-witted buddy who can't even hold down a 12 year old girl so you can run her over nods along! Exclamation points after everything because you're intense! Stand around looking at each other not saying anything for way too long! Go back in the house as if nothing's wrong!
      Back to the hospital where Marcy is waking up and it looks like the doctors could only be bothered to bandage up a third of her arm as most of it is still uncovered and all raw from her scratching at it. They really take the whole “your medicare only covers THIS MUCH” thing seriously in the States, huh? Jack explains that the doctors don't know what happened with her but think she may have had a stroke or something which kinda makes me think he might have been talking to a janitor rather than a doctor. The one doctor he was talking to before did throw his doctor's jacket at Jack so maybe he threw it at some other random guy who actually kept it. Jack decides to call Quinton to check up on things at home and Quinton answers and is able to put Kendra on the phone to talk to Jack? This seems odd considering as well as all the murdering people that was going on in the last scene, Kendra also ran off so she shouldn't be home at all. Also, Jack keeps talking like there's only one girl so maybe there isn't another daughter and there absolutely being another daughter in the nightmare scene should just be forgotten. Anyway, Marcy decides now is the time to take the IV drip out of her and attack Jack by jumping on his back while he's on the phone. I'm not a lawyer, but I'm betting Jack's got a good shot at retaining custody of the kid(s) when all this is said and done. Funniest scene in the movie so far: after getting Marcy off his back and restraining her, she ends up biting Jack's arm and he pushes her away causing her to fall over onto the hospital bed which causes him to suddenly forget everything that's happening and start apologizing (“I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to push you that hard”). Unless there was some previous history of domestic abuse that I'm not aware of, that just seems like the most hilariously wrong reaction to a situation since the guy at the start of Bloody Mary stabbed his wife to death because she was naked in bed with another hot girl. And now, Marcy jumps out the third floor window and kills herself for no reason. Suddenly that little “scuffle” is going to lead to some major questions for Jack.
      Quinton and Joe are inside the house again (noticeably absent: Kendra who was just on the phone when Jack called Quinton) and are sitting on the couch about to start drinking beer again. Quinton uses a knife to open his beer can, then decides it'd be funnier to stab Joe in the stomach with it. Joe, after initially crying for a couple seconds, agrees that it's more funny than sad (the exact opposite response people watching this have to this movie) and starts to laugh along with him and they decide to start finger painting the walls with Joe's blood because drinking and as-yet-unmentioned Mayan calendar demons turn you into a violent, artistically-inclined four yet old (also known as “a four year old”).
      The people at the hospital seem to have had the same reaction as Jack leaves the room to find the rest of the hospital looking like the aftermath coma patients in other movies wake up in to discover their in a zombie/Resident Evil movie. This is impressive because in those cases it's taken months or at least 28 days for everything to fall apart like that, but in this case Mayan super-efficiency has made it happen in a matter of minutes. Jack is pulled into a different room which was bound to happen since there's still almost an hour in the movie and all, but the fact that she just randomly opened the door and pulled him in at the exact time he was standing in front of it with his back turned even though there isn't a window in the door for her to see that he was looking away (or, better yet, to see that he was “normal”) makes for some suspiciously good timing. Jack wants to go back and save Kendra, but the girl says Kendra's “as good as dead” out there. This lady seriously underestimates the daughter of a former cop. If she can take on one pedophile who had already started to slap her in the face, I think she's got a good shot at taking on the rest of this crazy, messed-up world. The woman ends up telling Jack her theory that people born on leap years aren't effected because both her and Jack were born on leap years and they're the only two who haven't gone crazy. I'd like to point out that this sort of goes entirely against what the plot says of the movie since, by that logic, February 29^th is just another day without any special meaning to it. I'm not sure anyone involved bothered to read over this a second time (or even a first, most likely), though, so we'll chalk that up as another “but weren't there two daughters?” moments.
      Joe and Quinton now have Jack's guns and are loading them up to go “hunt some dinner”. Quinton also flat out tells Joe to “stop laughing like an idiot” which I find funny 'cause Quinton's spent the whole movie laughing like that, and Joe's spent the whole movie being an idiot.
      Candace, the girl who can see through hospital doors, is explaining that “it seems to effect people differently. Some go in and out of craziness, some seem to have multiple personalities or PTSD, but one thing they have in common is they're all incredibly violent towards one another. Over this we get shots of various people covered in blood and wandering through the hospital hallways but also a CGI shot of a glowing blue skeleton holding it's head as it's bright pink brain radiates waves of, I assume, craziness because how else are you going to illustrate that concept? Also, there's “news footage” from riots in Berlin in order to show it's everywhere. I guess if it's happening in L.A. and Germany, then it's gotta be everywhere, right? Two places is enough evidence to conclude that it's a worldwide thing. Jack and Candace now decide it's time to “if I told you, you'd think I was crazy” duel each other. Jack leads off with “everywhere I go today I keep running into 13/13/13” after seeing three 13s on the thermostat (he also calls seeing “13 13 13” on the thermostat “using Celsius” as in “we don't even use Celsius in America” because having the number thirteen on a temperature display three times is clearly Celsius and that's part of the metric system and the metric system is the tool of the devil!). Candace counters with “That's what I've been trying to tell you! Today is 13/13/13!” and goes on with how leap years were invented by adding a day at the end of February and how after 120 years it was “supposed to add up to a whole other month” and how “mathematically speaking” so “today is 13/13/13” (her words, by the way. All stupid, plot-driving, craziness of it). I'm not going to bother with the math or to look up the history of leap years, but I can already say that's fucking duuuuuuummmmmmmb. Also, in this theory, they aren't suicidal so Jack figures that's the point that proves her wrong since Marcy jumped out a window by herself. In case you're keeping score at home: there's still been no mentions of the Mayans.
      It's decided that Jack and Candace are going to fight their way out through the hospital to go find Kendra. Candace says that's a crazy idea 'cause “they can't even see through the door” which seems odd since that's exactly how she met him in the first place. Loss of super powers aside, they arm themselves with scalpels that are just lying around, and open the door. At first it seems clear bet then some guy comes in and there's a struggle before Jack ends up killing him by squishing his head with the door. Of note from this (aside from a relatively little-used horror movie weapon in “door”) is that the new guy somehow knew about and mentioned Jack's daughter while they were wrestling. Damn crazy people and their super powers of reading minds.
      At the house, Joe and Quinton are busy being crazy and apparently forgetting that it was Quinton that stabbed Joe because they just argue about that for a while before going back to shooting the “crazy people outside”. And their finger painting masterpiece was just a couple (I'm guessing there's really three and I've only seen two) 13s on the walls. They decide to board up the windows using a two by four that was just lying around somewhere in the house. Probably a sound tactic, except that they forget the nails and Joe ends up just trying to hammer the board into the wall using the butt of the gun. I'm not sure if these guys are supposed to be the comic relief or what but it's not working.
      Arming themselves with a fire ax and the knife a crazy lady who'd already made one face mask and was trying for a second dropped, Jack and Candace go through the hospital on foot (so they don't get out of the elevator on the ground floor only to be surrounded) looking for the keys out of dead doctor's pockets so they can use on of their cars to escape to Jack's house since they'd both arrived via ambulance. That's actually pretty smart thinking, even if it's just convenient-to-plot so they can get chased down the stairway by a group of crazies.
      Before going on, though, a quick note about that. Why the fuck was that stairway group working in a pack? If all these people have gone crazy and are turning super-violent against each other, wouldn't this bunch (not to mention Quinton and Joe) have ripped each other apart before going after other people? Me and a friend had come up with a theory how regular zombies (think Walking Dead and Romero's Dawn Of The Dead and that style) don't kill each other off 'cause they only attack live prey so, when they see another zombie walking around, they're drawn to it thinking it's possible food but end up finding out it's not alive so they start wandering off together and that's how packs of them form, but in this case that doesn't apply 'cause these aren't “zombies” like that, they're just going crazy and killing each other. What's the logic behind them working together? Shoddy film making, no doubt. Anyway, Jack sprays the first stairway crazy in line with mace that he picked up... somewhere, and he and Candace escape because that first guy fell down and the ones behind him decided to stop running after that. I should really be drinking more as we're pretty much two thirds through the movie and I'm not feeling any buzz yet and it's starting to annoy me that I've been watching this sober for so long.
      On the ground floor, Jack and Candace take some of the “we should REALLY be quiet right now” time while they're searching dead bodies for car keys in a hospital full of murderous psychos to start loudly talking to each other. Jack mentions that he used to be a cop but left the force four months ago and Candace asks about it. Rather than answer Jack says “don't you think it'd be better if we didn't know that much about each other? You know, just in case...” No, Jack, no we do not think that as there is no “just in case” that I can think of you might be alluding to that could be harmed by knowing something about the person you're trying to escape Monster Hospital with (can't call it “Zombie Hospital” since they're not zombies and can't call it Crazy Hospital 'cause those are called “Mental Institutions” now). Confronted by this logic, Jack admits that he was kicked off due to excessive force and goes into great detail telling the story about how he beat a guy to death who was attempting to rape a 17 year old girl. This also somehow, led to Marcy leaving him (kicked off the force? Maybe; wife leaving you because you killed a rapist attacking a teenage girl? Questionable) but the main thing to take away from this scene is that they're in a hospital surrounded by people who want to butcher them and they take the time to stop what they're doing (looking for keys so they can drive out of there and get to Jack's little girl) to talk to each other in non-whispered voices from ten feet away for a few minutes. As you might guess, this attracts the attention of those people that are trying to butcher them so now they have to run again.
      They get into the parking garage and hid behind a couple cars while the group of three crazies stalk them. The leader of the bunch tries to talk Jack into coming out and fighting him face to face while one of the others keeps looking and finds Candace, dragging her back to where his friends are standing. The competition for which of the two sidekick crazies is dumber heats up as even though the one that found Candace failed to look directly across from her to where Jack was crouching beside a car (making no real effort to hide himself other than “don't poke your head up”), the other guy keeps standing beside the leader as the leader makes a speech about “making it a fair fight” while brandishing a knife. So yeah, the second sidekick gets killed. Oh, completely random: looking at the IMDB page of the movie and the lead crazy 'cause I thought he looked familiar (turns out I've never heard of him which I should've guessed considering how there was likely a total of zero dollars in the casting budget for this movie), it turns out he's Ian Roberts who was the first openly gay professional athlete in a team sport (rugby in Australia). So there's a trivia fact for you. After shouting some more, lead crazy walks ten feet with his remaining sidekick (they leave Candace on her own behind them so she can go pick up the fire ax she'd dropped), finds Jack, then starts stabbing the sidekick leaving Jack enough time to walk up and slit the leader's throat while he was busy stabbing his friend. What in all kinds of fuck? They were building this up like it was going to be some sort of major fight scene between Jack and this crazy guy, and it just turns into nothing and is over in less time than it took you to read about it. Did they leave this scene to be shot last and ended up spending all their money before they could do it so just had to cut what so far is looking like the Boss Fight (obviously a fight with Quinton and Joe is still coming up and then probably one where Jack has to kill his daughter) of the movie? Fucking tease.
      Despite a lack of nails (although a close up shows that they've found some... but still no hammers as Joe's still using the gun), Quinton and Joe have sealed up the windows of Jack's house during the night. A night that it totally wasn't in any of the scenes involving the hospital and totally isn't anymore when they should a shot of other crazies outside the house, but that's not important since the shot from outside shows those crazies all gathered around clearly un-boarded up windows. Was there literally no one watching for continuity on this movie? Besides that, Quinton is in the middle of giving a speech how Jack's house is “our home turf. Nobody's taking our home turf. Like fucking D-Day”. I'll let that sink in for a second. … Good enough? Okay, now for the slow students, I'll point out that D-day was the Allied invasion of Nazi occupied France in World War II. An invasion that the Allies won, thereby taking away the “home turf” of the Nazis. I'm betting this was intentional because God help us as a species if it wasn't. I'm secure in “fully intentional” on that line as Quinton goes on to say something about George Washington and other war-like symbolism. Also, there's some more footage from around the world including a soccer stadium, various cities with “foreign-looking” (re: not white) people in them, and also a shot of a dude waving a hockey stick around from outside of the back window of a car. That is now the single greatest “violence in the streets of a world gone mad” shot in the history of zombie/zombie-like movies. It might be Canadian-bias, but just hear me out: the “emergency broadcast network” is going on about martial law being declared in a voice over, you have shots of riots and things burning from places “all over the world” and then... guy swatting a hockey stick around from the backseat of a family car. There isn't even any death or destruction going on in that shot. Just the car driving on the road and a dude with a hockey stick out the back window. I think they just found that on YouTube or something and realized they'd been given a gift to glorious NOT to use as stock disaster footage. I'm going to have to watch that again. It kills me.
     On second viewing: it definitely IS just footage they found on YouTube (or somewhere like it) because there ISN'T any destruction going on in the streets, but there are people walking and one of them is wearing a Montreal Canadiens jersey so that's gotta be just random footage somebody took outside the rink before an NHL game (it couldn't have been from after a playoff game, 'cause if it was Montreal would have lost and there really would've been cars overturned and on fire for them to film! Go Leafs). Even given that everything else in this montage is just random stock footage of riots from around the world, that still seems like the weirdest thing to put in there. Anyway, back to the movie.
      Jack and Candace get to Jack's house and there's crazy things going on outside and people attacking each other all over the lawn and driveway. That's going to effect the re-sale value considerably towards the negative side. Gaining access to the backyard after opening an unlocked gate that no one else bothered with, Jack finds the spare key and he and Candace head inside. Joe's dying inside and Quinton's trying to talk him through it by saying “he's been hurt much worse than this!” like back when they were in the Korean War together! ...fighting for North Korea. This makes the Nazi thing from earlier more obviously on purpose (although it raises a question about why he was talking about Washington wanting them to fight for their homes if he's channeling the “bad guys” in American wars), and also leads to the best stand alone line of the movie where Joe says “...I'm Asian?” and Quinton responds “we're ALL a little bit Asian!” Nick Cage would be proud. Jack tries to talk some sense into the both of them by reminding them that they're not Asian and haven't been in any war, but Quinton isn't having any of it and continues on pretending they're in a war zone while telling Jack that Kendra ran off after “smashing poor Private Trevor's head in”. Jack takes Quinton's gun, in response Quinton takes Joe's gun. They point them at each other but decide to point it at the outsides as the crazies outside pick this moment to break in. They end up both out of bullets but get the door closed and blocked off anyway (even with Dawn Of The Dead remake style sound effects from the “I swear to Go they're not zombies” zombies). Quinton kills Joe and... what? The two of them are brothers? The fuck? They look nothing alike and no one's mentioned it before (although I guess that clears up why Jack was hanging out with the other three: Quinton was his partner as a cop, Joe is Quinton's brother, and Pedo Trevor was, likely, Joe's friend rather than a friend of the two cops). Whatever, at this point Kendra walks in through the back door (despite Jack saying he locked it behind himself) and Quinton uses the gun he said was out of bullets to shoot her in the head because fuck logic at this point.
      Guess there was only the one extra bullet left since when Quinton turn the gun on Jack it just clicks empty for him, but he still manages to over power Jack, take the knife, and stab him with it while quoting Deliverance (again: Crazy Quinton Cage has to be the best written least self-aware character in B-movie history since the original context of “squeal like a pig, boy!” involves a whole different type of stabbing). Candace tries to attack Quinton with a fire ax but is somehow unable to do so effectively even when he's busy on top of Jack so she gets over powered and Quinton throws her to the ground and starts punching her in the face and tearing her clothes. This is obviously meant to be a parallel to the story Jack told about the rapist he killed to get kicked off the police force because exactly that happens again and Jack punches Quinton to death.
      Jack wants to stay and “die with his family” but Candace insists on trying to help him limp along (he was stabbed in the gut so the limp seems out of place). He tells her to grab the ax and knife but she has to let him go to do it... causing him to fall over. That was actually pretty damn funny, I'll give it that. They do end up walking out and getting from the backyard out to the car again while the crazies stay occupied with the house for no reason. Then they drive off. And we find it's night again and the streets are full of cars being driven by people because fuck logic. There's a bunch of wrap up dialogue and Jack ends up dying from his wounds. Candace is left crying over a guy she just met earlier that day (despite there being a whole other night in between, this is all supposed to have been one day), and then the credits roll.
      So to recap: no Mayans or any mention thereof. Two daughters in a nightmare suddenly become one daughter in real life and it's never mentioned again. Leap years were added every four years “just because” and February 29^th which, in this “just because” logic shouldn't have any special meaning at all, should flat out just not exist which is why people born then are fine. What are supposed to be major plot points based on their build up (the parking garage fight, finding Kendra) are in fact nothing. Actually writing an ending is hard, better to just leave it with the hero dying and the girl crying. Oh, and people who look nothing alike, sound totally different, and are never mentioned as being related before can be revealed to be brothers in the end of the movie because fuck all of your continuity and story telling conventions.
      To close out, I'd like to point out that, from what Netflix has shown me, this is something of a series. There was an 11/11/11 (two, actually; although one looked like it was actually made by a studio with money), a 12/12/12, and now this. If/when 14/14/14 shows up... well... you know where to find this blog.