In Your Mall, In Your Mall....Zombie! Zombie!

Originally written on 11/7/06, this post is for Film For The Soul's Counting Down The 00's, for the year 2004.

I'm gonna assure most of you right now that the only similarities between this supposed "remake" and the kickass original is the title, they're in a mall, and maybe one similar scene. Everything else is pretty much just the writers going "Hey, we wrote a zombie movie and it takes place in a mall...wait, that was done before? Shit. Well, let's just call it a remake." So with George A. Romero's blessing (I'm assuming), they slapped the title on this little zombie flick.

Let's be honest though, any zombie movie anyone will make is gonna basically just be a rip off of the Romero's films. Sure I've heard of the Italian version, but would it exist without "Night of The Living Dead"? Probably not. Even "28 Days Later" was "Night" with fast moving zombies.

We meet Ana, who is played by the one blonde chick from "Go", and she's a nurse. She's leaving her shift at the hospital and arrives home. Her and her boyfriend/husband (It wasn't really clear) Luis immediately start fucking in the shower. While they're boinking (I have my own thesaurus of words similar to "sex"), the news report that some serious shit is gonna go down.

The next day at (sigh) "DAWN" (Hey, at least they tried), the happy recently gotten laid couple wake up to a little girl busting down their bedroom down. Luis treats this has normal, even though the girl is the neighbor across the street. The girl looks like she was smacked across her face with a anvil, so Luis wakes Ana up. While doing so, the girl jumps across the bedroom and bits Luis in the throat.

Ana doesn't seem too confused that the girl across the street from her suddenly attacked her boyfriend/husband at 6:15 in the morning and instead locks the girl out of the room. Luis doesn't make it and he raises from the dead and starts attacking Ana. Yet again, she doesn't react to this and immediately escape. Honestly, I'm glad cause I'm sick of women in movies being stupid and going "Honey, what's wrong?" then getting chomped to death. But on the other hand, Ana has no idea there's a living dead epidemic going on, so to think nothing of her boyfriend/husband suddenly waking up is kinda off-putting.

Ana escapes through the bathroom (It's suppose to be "she came IN through the bathroom window) and about 10 minutes into this epidemic, it's fuckin' armageddon! Everything is on fire, people are being eaten left and right, and other people are shooting other people.

Fifteen minutes into the end of the world, Ana is attacked by a paramedic (I'm thinking she knew the guy, but the movie wasn't too clear), and this causes her to crash her car into a tree. Twenty minutes into the movie, we get the opening credits and shots of news reports and whatnot. None of this is important so I'm skipping it.

Sometime later, Ana is still in her car somehow still alive despite her car door being open and zombies like 15 feet away from her. This is where Officer Ving Rhames comes in. He goes half the movie nameless (even the captions called him "OFFICER"), so just for fun I'm gonna call him Officer Ving, also because he's pretty much just playing himself in a zombie movie.

Officer Ving finds Ana and she tags along. About 10 feet away we find Andre, his very pregnant girlfriend Luda, and Michael. After Andre and Officer Ving saying to each other "Wait, we're both black people in a horror film? How did that happen?" they decide to head to....

Ok you guy's saw the original, guess where they go to?

Yep. Disneyworld! A zombie Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck chase them around the Matterhorn for 2 hours. Ok, not really, but I plan on writing that movie soon.

No, they go to the mall. Everyone separates to check to see if any zombies are inside. Andre finds one at the door, Michael finds another in a sporting goods store. They head upstairs to see what's up there and to make this totally different than the original, upstairs are three asshole security guards. They steal Andre's and Ving's guns and pretty much treat everyone like shit. The main security guy, C.J, is possibly the biggest asshole and what's weird is he looks like Morgan Spurlock. Hm, that'd be an interesting episode of "30 Days", 30 days trapped in a mall full of zombies.

And actually one of the security guards aren't really assholes, and his name is Terry. C.J locked the gang into a store but Terry let them out. Outside they hear a truck squealing around in the parking lot. C.J refuses to help, so Terry becomes a traitor and knocks him and the other guy, Bart (really? Bart? Ok...) out and they lock them into a little holding cell.

After some drama with "how are we gonna get the people in the truck in the mall", they do and we get a whole new crew. Glad this "remake" is adding characters not seen in the original. Anyway, we meet Norma, a trucker, Glen, a gay organ player (wow, that was a subtle joke I didn't get until now), Steve and his girlfriend, who are the inspirations for SNL's "Two A-Holes" characters, Nicole and her father Frank, played by Matt Frewer, who you know as Max Headroom and the other father on "Honey, I Shrunk The Kids". Oh and a fat dying chick. Well, she dies and is now the worlds first overweight zombie.

Everyone finds out that Frank got bitten and since that's how this "virus" is transferred, they have to shoot him. After a drawn out "goodbye" from Nicole, Ving shoots him.

Andre and Luda, meanwhile, are locked in a toystore. Luda is a full blown zombie because she got bit before entering the mall, so Andre kept her chained down so she can give birth. Well, Luda does in fact give birth...holy shit I can't believe I'm gonna say this...it's a MOTHAFUCKIN' ZOMBIE BABY!! HOLY FUCK!!! Andre has gone mental and shoots Norma for trying to kill Luda and an odd Mexican standoff ensues with Norma and Andre shooting each other. Ana and the gang find them and the mothafuckin zombie baby and Ana shoots it. Damn, that would've been awesome for the rest of the movie. Just a zombie baby running around, biting people. Man, I need to get into the movie business.

Anyway, everyone decides it's time to get the fuck out of the mall, so they take two mall shuttle buses that are in the parking garage and reinforce them so the zombies don't attack.

I should point out a few things quickly. They let C.J and Bart out of the holding cell, but Bart gets eaten by some zombies in the parking garage. There's a montage of the gang doing shit in the mall, with Steve and his girlfriend boffing and filming it. Officer Ving has spotted a dude named Andy across the street from the mall and they communicate by holding up signs to each other. They all decide to save Andy since he lives in and owns a gun shop, so he'll have plenty of ammo and he's a good shot. Oh and there's a dog that Nicole calls "Chips". I dunno why.

Ok, we're caught up. Andy complains of being hungry, so Ving suggests they send the dog over since the zombies aren't interested in the dog (zombie dog! FUCK YEAH!) with food and a walkie talkie. When Andy lets the dog in, some zombies get in too and attack him. Nicole gets all worked up about the dog so she steals a truck and hightails it over there. Andy is a zombie and is attacking Nicole. The cameraman is scared of zombies too so we can't get a shot of any of this happening. Terry (who has been sporking Nicole) decides to plan a rescue mission...for the rescue mission.

Now, I don't know what happened next. Why? Because you fuckin' people don't know how to take care of DVD's!! Seriously, what the fuck do you people do with rental DVD's, give them to your kids to play with or something? JESUS!!

So I'm assuming they find Nicole alive and they climb onto the roof somehow and C.J throws a propane tank and blow up some zombies. This gives them plenty of opportunity to climb through the sewer to get back to the mall. One of the dudes, some guy named Tucker that I completely forgot about until now cause he wasn't important, gets bitten in the legs, so Ving drags him along while Tucker holds two guns and shoot at zombies. Sound familiar? This was in the original when the one dude is in the wheelbarrow and the other dude (I think it was the black guy) is pushing him. Yep, there's your remake. Well, anyway, Tucker Carlson is toast so they leave him behind.

They get back to the mall and get into the buses and hightail it out. They barely can get past the mob of zombies in the parking lot, so C.J climbs up, throws out another propane tank, and in one of the coolest scenes, blows it up, taking about 300 million zombies.

So they take a lovely tour of Zombiopolis when one of the buses, the one carrying Glen, Steve, his girlfriend, and Terry, gets attacked, so Glen pulls out the chainsaw, but when Terry makes a hard left, the chainsaw falls out of his hands and cuts Steve's girlfriend's arm off (another cool scene), then the bus crashes. Everyone inside dies except for Steve, who because he's another asshole, makes a run for it. But he doesn't last long, a zombie eats him. Ana takes great pleasure in shooting him. Then she steals the keys to his boat and they take off to the pier.

They arrive, but Michael has to stay behind cause he got bitten, and this is after he and Ana just cemented their relationship after farkin'. So Ana, Ving, Nicole (and the damn dog), and C.J get on the boat and leave. Michael shoots himself and the credits roll.

BUT! During the credits it turns into "The Blair Witch Project" when Nicole finds a camera on Steve's boat and films every little damn thing. They find an island but it too is full of zombies. Then the camera falls to the ground and the rest of it is the camera being past through the zombies. I dunno if this means they escaped or what. And there's an extra on the DVD that shows things from Andy's point of view but it's done in V-log style, so it's like watching a boring video on "youtube". Apparently we get from this is that the world eventually got returned to normal, so if Ving and his crew didn't get attacked on Zombie Island (another horror movie reference), they eventually survived. I guess.

Honestly, this movie isn't THAT bad, but I think they shouldn't have claimed it was a remake of "Dawn of the Dead", because in case anyone forgot, "Dawn" was a sequel. Why anyone would remake a sequel is beyond me. If you wanna make a zombie film, fine. Have it take place...at Disneyland! Like I said! And have zombie Mickey, Goofy, Minnie! OH! And zombie babies!! AND DOGS!! WOO!! Oh, right, this movie. Ok, this movie showed us some tits, so that gets some points, and the story was slightly interesting. I'll pretend this isn't called a remake and rate it like an original movie, cause it basically is.
Ok, back to my movie. DISNEY ZOMBIES!

-Jason

CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month: Invasion, USA

To bring CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month to a close, one of my favorite bloggers, the Reel Whore, sent in his review of the classically cheesy Chuck Norris Opus, Invasion U.S.A. Much thanks to him and Devon for participating in this month and I'll definately be doing it again next year.

***



How could I not contribute a guest post for this iconic 80's action movie? During the height of the 80's, CHUCK NORRIS!!!! leapt onto the big screen with Invasion U.S.A. I call this iconic because it has five hallmarks of what makes 80's action so great. First, it's from Cannon Films, a true mark of 80's quality; producers Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus knew how to turn quick cash into a big bang. The story, penned by CHUCK NORRIS!!!! along with brother Aaron Norris and James Bruner, centers around Russian terrorist Rostov (Richard Lynch). The film creeps along at times and isn't always coherent, but it goes something like this:

Rostov ships in hundreds of highly-skilled international terrorists to Florida and sets them loose to terrorize Americans during the Christmas season. Before his crew can open up a can of terrorist whoop-ass, he needs to buy weapons from a shifty drug dealer. This brings us to the second mark of 80's quality: Mickey the drug dealer is portrayed by none other than Billy F'n Drago! Granted, Rostov goes all Dark Knight Joker on Mickey's bitch and promptly removes Drago from play, but his role is key to illustrate to audiences that Rostov is nobody's bitch.



Except it turns out that Rostov was totally owned by Matt Hunter years prior, and he still has nightmares about taking the CHUCK NORRIS!!!! foot of fury in the fucking face. Determined to not suffer a repeat beating, Rostov and company hunt down Hunter at his ancestral shanty in the Florida Everglades. This leads us to our third mark of quality: explosions. Unlike current films, the 80's didn't waste any time in blowing shit up. Rundown houses - Kaboom! A parking lot of boxy hooptys - BWOOSH! Churches - BLAM-O! Rostov's attempted assassination of the peaceful, retired Hunter only accomplishes one thing; to piss Hunter off by killing his beloved armadillo. Sure, his swamp rat neighbor John Eagle (Dehl Berti) dies too, but CHUCK NORRIS!!!! really loved that armadillo. Hunter reconsiders the Feds' offer and jumps in his big-A truck to quell some Russian-led aggression. VROOM!

Thinking Hunter dead, Rostov rains terror down on us innocent Americans. A quiet, suburban subdivision? Blow this motherfucker up! Meanwhile, Hunter shakes down Rostov's goon and somehow provokes the ire of two bar thugs. This next moment leads to the fourth mark of quality: awesomely cheesy lines! CHUCK NORRIS!!!!, annoyed by the intrusion of thug #1, tosses him aside and pointing a forewarning finger, calmly utters, "If you come back in here I'm gonna hit you with so many rights you're gonna beg for a left." Boo-yah, baby! That's what I'm talking about. You really should replay this scene several times to revel in its glory. After this, Hunter's dialogue is reduced to a combination of the words "Rostov," "time" and "die."



Our fifth 80's hallmark, Eddie Jones, plays Detective Cassidy whose sole purpose is to express to the cops, the press and the audience that the U.S.A. isn't prepared for this sort of terrorist insurgence and they can't really do a damn thing to make people safe. As he sputters on, Rostov sends more terrorists to blow up a shopping mall. The terrorist drops off the gift-wrapped package and briskly walks away. A good-natured American hears the loud beeping, and assuming the individual left his newfangled alarm clock behind, proceeds to chase him through the mall. As the terrorists' covers are blown...you guessed it. VROOM! Hunter crashes through the mall, taking down terrorists (and possibly bystanders). Jason Statham ain't got nothin' on CHUCK NORRIS!!!!

From here out Invasion U.S.A. goes all Pert on us; Terrorists, CHUCK NORRIS!!!!, repeat. By far the best of the bunch is the school-bus bomb. Terrorists roll up alongside a school bus in their hoopty, strap a bomb to the side, then speed off. Wait for it...VROOM! Hunter appears, snatches the bomb, double VROOM!, straps said bomb to the terrorists' hoopty and BOOM! An amazing feat, considering this sixty-second bomb appeared to have a ninety-second timer. Gotta love the 80's.



After some more terrorism and Hunter muttering something about time and dying and Rostov, Hunter lures Rostov into a trap. We quickly see Rostov get owned by a CHUCK NORRIS!!!! foot of fury to the fucking face maneuver. Shaken, Rostov grabs a rocket launcher and starts skulking around. Unfortunately, Hunter is wise to this douchebag's game and has his own rocket launcher ready to go. CHUCK NORRIS!!!! then calmly utters "It's Time." Before Rostov can get a bead on him, CHUCK NORRIS!!!! sidearms his weapon, sending lovely showers of Rostov blood and limbs out the fucking window. There really is a spray of blood and a boot flying through the air! Watch closely.



The best part; in an amazing feat of skill, he managed to kill the bad guy without incinerating the decorative curtains framing the window.

That's classy.
That's the 80's.
That's CHUCK NORRIS!!!!

CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month: The Delta Force

My friends, I personally have come to the end of the Chuck Norris Theme Month. I planned on this movie being the last movie that I would do. Hopefully there should be one more Norris film in the pipeline written by somebody else if they come through. I only hope that movie is better than this one. Cause holy crap.

When I was going through Netflix, planning this month, I found this movie not only starred Mr. Norris but LEE MOTHAFUCKIN' MARVIN! I mean, holy shit! The combination of them two? I can't go wrong. This was the big showstopper. This was suppose to be the movie to end all Chuck Norris movies. I put in the DVD and I see the words "A GOLAN/GLOBUS PRODUCTION" and I knew I was in shit territory.

But no wait. They also did "Missing in Action", which was alright. There was a lot of fighting and explosions. I should be fine. Then the movie started.

I'm gonna just tell you now that all the good stuff that you probably want to see doesn't happen till the end of the movie. The stuff before it? Slow. As.





....




....




fuck.

I never shouted so much at my TV before and I watch MTV.

Ok so the plot is a plane gets hijacked. We meet our unfortunate passengers which includes and I'm not shitting you: Shelly Winters, Joey Bishop, Martin Balsam, the Mom from "Gigli" and "My Big Fat Greek Wedding", and George Kennedy. Fuck, George Kennedy? Why even get on the plane, you know when he's around there's trouble.

Nice hair.

What, is this a Chuck Norris movie or the Love Boat?

Fuck, we're dead.

It's established that Shelly Winters, Joey Bishop, Martin Balsam, and Big Fat Gigli Mom are Jewish. We also see our bad guys roaming around the airport in Greece, where this doomed flight is taking off from. A bad guy pretends to be a janitor and hides a handgun and some gernades in the bathroom. Talk about a well stocked bathroom. I'm lucky if the toilet flushes on my flight.

The plane boards and not even five minutes after take off, the bad guys reveal themselves and hijacks the plane. You know the entire movie "United 93" about the taking over of that plane on 9/11? If these guys took over that plane, it somehow would've crashed in the Atlantic Ocean. Plus there's only two terrorists and like a billion passengers, which Shelly Winters helpfully shouts out. Sorry Miss Winters, if you had problems with the script, you should've bought them up before filming.

Our Lead Hijacker Abdul (honestly, that's his name, don't send your letters to me) informs us that he's the leader of some group that hates America and blah blah blah. Let's get to Chuck Norris drop kicking into the airplane and kicking some terrorist ass! AMERICA! FUCK YEAH!!

But...Norris, playing McCoy (Dammit Jim!), is just at home eating. Lee Marvin, plays Nick, is at a bar picking up a skank. Alrighty then. Our heroes ladies and gentlemen.

But soon enough the U.S Government gets their shit together and forms our Delta Force! And they break into the plane and kick ass!!! Um, no not yet. First we need to sit around for a few hours and talk about how to break into the plane. I don't care HOW they do it, I just WANT them to do it. Jesus.

Back on the plane, Abdul seperates everybody like crazy. First it's men and women, then women and kids, then women and fat guys, then black and white, then dogs and cats, and finally, DNA strands and DNA strands. Soon enough, Abdul learns there are Jewish people on the plane and has them seperated too. This scene goes on wayyyyy too fucking long. Example:

Abdul: Ok, call out the first Jew.
Crazy Haired Stewardess: Mr. Joey Bishop.
(Joey Bishop takes 10 minutes walking to the front of the plane, stopping to talk to everyone on the way and tell a protesting Gigli Greek Mom to sit down.)
Abdul: Ok, next.
CHS: Mr. Martin Balsam.
Shelly Winters: NO!!! NO!!! NO!!! (repeat 10 more minutes.)

UGH!!! Chuck Norris, will you just fucking fly into the plane, do some roundhouse kicks so we can go home?

Well, he's now on an airplane...still in America. I think two days have gone by. DO SOMETHING ALREADY!!!

I'm gonna do the next few scenes in dash points cause I'm irritated.
-Abdul finds some Army guys and seperates them as well, then he picks on one Army guy and beats him senseless.
-George Kennedy claims he's a Jew, even though Kennedy or his characters last name O'Malley, don't sound Jewish at all.
-The Other Hijacker Not Given A Name switches from being super crazy to suddenly caring about a pregnant AMERICAN woman. But death to America or something.
-More shots of Lee Marvin and Chuck Norris sitting on their goddamn plane, talking to Robert Vaughn, who's also just sitting around.

Well, it's a Chuck Norris movie. Time to get some sleep.

-The plane's destination, Beiruit, won't allow the plane to land. After 2 minutes, the plane lands.
-McCoy and Nick are still in the plane. At this point in a NORMAL Chuck Norris movie he would've flew his own airplane, jumped onto the plane, punched his way in through the window, kicked Abdul's ass, shot the pilot and landed the plane his own damn self. And somehow land in Veitnam, where now they have to escape by foot.

What Chuck Norris and Lee Marvin did for HALF THE MOVIE.

-Some guys come onto the airplane, take the Jews out, and takes them to some building with jail cells. How Abdul planned this spontaniously is beyond me. Cause he didn't know there were Jews on the plane, even though the odds of it are pretty high. I mean, the plane has over 120 people. At least ONE of them has to be Jewish. But whatever.
-After refueling, the plane leaves. So...we're not gonna stay in Beiruit? Ok.
-The plane is now going to Algiers and this is where McCoy and Nick land.
-After 20 minutes of nothing, and a disturbing shot of a 6-year-old girl shirtless, Abdul lets the women and children go. The men are still on the plane.
-FINALLY we get some action when McCoy and his men are set to take over the plane. Crazy Haired Stewardess, who's German and found the Jewish plot disturbing, says there are more terrorists on the plane and they'll kill the Jews if the plane is hurt in anyway. It is now Day 5 of this hijacking.
-Nick calls the ambush of the plane off and it flies away to...somewhere.
-For no reason, we get a training session of McCoy breaking into a fake plane and shooting dummies. JESUS GET TO THE REAL THING ALREADY!!!
-Nothing happens.
-Nothing happens.
-Nothing happens.
-Some Greek priest knows the whereabouts of the Jews but Abdul, now off the airplane, kills him.
-It's now 2 months into the hijacking. McCoy is eating a burger and doing a crossword puzzle. I'm crying cause I'm bored and dissapointed.
-Nothing happens.
-Nothing happens.
-A mild shoot out/chase scene happens but it ends too quickly.
-Nothing happens.

Ok. You get the point. Let's just get to the end.

First they rescue the regular male hostages from one building. Shit gets blown up good. Then they rescue the Jews and Army guys. More shit gets blown up good. McCoy rides a motorcycle that farts missles, which is awesome. Now it's time to rescue the flight crew. Nick does this while McCoy tracks down Abdul and more or less teases him and kicks his ass with his farting motorcycle. Finally, McCoy gets bored and just blows the fuck out of Abdul.

Nick kills the guys guarding the plane and tells the pilot to take off once all the hostages are on board. The typical "But what about McCoy?" "Leave 'em we gotta leave!" "LOOK! HERE HE COMES!!!" *Farts missle* scene happens where McCoy takes out some more guys, then climbs into the plane. Jeez, he should've done that 90 hours ago.

Everyone's happy, one of McCoy's friends didn't make it so he's sad, familys are reunited and all are happy. Including me cause this boring ass Chuck Norris movie has come to a close.

Seriously, this movie is 2 hours and 8 minutes long. Why the fuck is it so long? Why waste the awesome power of Chuck Norris and Lee Marvin by having them sit around just waiting for shit to happen? Why all the dividing of the people? WHO ARE YOU????

Sadly, this brings my portion of CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month to a close. I am sad. I think I need to watch Rambo 2 and 3 to cheer myself up. Or get some tits in my face. That always works.

-Jason

CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month: Breaker, Breaker!

Hey, did you guys know that Chuck Norris made a trucker movie, back when making trucker movies was the thing to do? I know, amazing, right?

The year is 1977 and everyone is wishing it was the 80's already so they can stop listening to disco and wearing ugly ass polyester clothing. And what's worse is there was a trend of movies, the trucker movie, that took the nation by storm. There was "Convoy" which is either based on the song, or the song was based on the movie. I don't know what's worse. Then on TV we had "B.J and The Bear" which I won't even touch without putting on some disco-fied bell bottoms. So when Chuck Norris was done kicking ass for a living and made the trasistion to film, the studios didn't know what to do with him, and they realized they had this dumb ass trucker script lying around and thought "Hell, it could use some roundhouse kicks" and gave it to Norris.

Chuck Norris is J.D, a trucker and a world famous one at that. How you get world famous for being a truck is beyond me. He has a younger brother named Billy who's new to the trucker world. His first gig is to take some T.V dinners (important) to some other location.

I'm looking for the man who took my mustache!

Meanwhile, our bad guy, Judge Joshua Trimmings, has gathered his cult followers into some patch of land and says he has proof the state of California has declared this a "town" and it shall be named Texas City and it shall be good. Apparently this Texas City is known in the trucker world has a speed trap where truckers get pulled over and are given the choice to pay 250 dollars or spend 250 days in jail. There's a sinister motive behind that. The judge uses the money to make illegal moonshine and uses the cars they take as scrap to sell to get MORE money to make illegal moonshine. So this cult worships moonshine apparently.

We get back and forth shots of Billy driving and J.D having dinner with a weird-eyed friend when some other guy comes in and says he wants to challenge J.D. J.D doesn't wanna do it but the guy more or less bullies him into it. So, since this is Chuck Norris and NOT Sly Stallone, I figured it was street fighting or something karate-like.

Well, I was wrong. It is indeed arm wrestling. Is it written somewhere that all truckers have to arm wrestle? Then again, juding by the people watching the event...

Of course J.D wins and a fight breaks out, which J.D quietly sneaks out of. Back with Billy, he's tricked into going through Texas City and is immedately pulled over. He's taken to Judge Joshua who makes up all these charges and tells Billy the two choices he has. Billy picks option 3 which is "I'm Chuck Norris' brother and I choose to kick ass!" as he jumps through a plate glass window and tries to escape. But Chuck Norris he is not and of course he's caught.

Some time later, J.D is worried about Billy and through some weird miracle he finds out Billy was last seen in Texas City. I don't know how he found this out, he just said "Billy's in Texas City!" So you know what he must do! GET IN HIS SWEET SWEET VAN AND KICK SOME TOWN'S ASS!!!!




Fuck. Yeah.

J.D gets to town and he's almost immedately shot at but he's ok. He pulls his sweet sweet van into a mechanic and talks to the town's retard, named Arnie. Arnie's brother Wade is the mechanic and J.D tells him to fix the radiator. You ever see the movie "U-Turn", that late 90's movie with Sean Penn, J.Lo and directed by Oliver Stone? This movie kinda makes that town look like Pleasantville.

J.D goes snooping around and meets a friendly waitress named Arlene. Arlene seems to be the defiant one in this town so naturally J.D will be boning her later. And what's odd about this movie is it has no notion of time. Arlene is working at the diner and J.D leaves. He meets up with the two cops in this town, both named Strobe, and runs away. He runs over a hill and here comes Arlene, wearing different clothes, in her car, with her son Tony. Maybe this town is on some space-time continum thingy.

There's a town meeting and J.D crashes it, demanding to know where Billy is. Joshua sends the entire town after him and J.D does the smartest thing ever: he literally grabs onto a beam holding the roof up, pulls himself up, and lets the entire town (all 8 of them) run underneath him. J.D comes crashing down and goes face to face with Joshua, who just yells at the dumb townspeople to go THAT WAY!

J.D finds his van was fixed (sure the mechanic hates J.D but he can't pass up working on a sweet sweet van) and uses it to get outta Texas City. He pulls up to Arlene's house, where she tells him to park it in her back. Then later, he "parks it in her back" if you get my meaning.

It's now the next morning and we learn via Tony that J.D and Arlene had sex in his sweet sweet van. Of course they did. The instant she laid eyes on his sweet sweet van she was instantly moist and was practically grinding against anything in sight. Chuck Norris' boner just happened to be there.

Somehow this inbred (oh yes, they're inbred) town affored a helicopter, but I get the feeling they stole it, and one of the 8 people in this town is flying it over Arlene's house, where they spot J.D's van, probably with it's axel's blown. The pilot informs one of the Strobes of this and they go over there.

Thankfully for breakfast, Arlene made some T.V dinners, the same ones Billy was hauling! GASP!! This somehow tells J.D where Billy is hidden and he goes to find him. This takes J.D to the wrecking yard where this inbred with a unibrow is smashing cars. J.D breaks in and is discovered by the hick in the sky. And you're not gonna believe this. The hick in the sky and Unibrow Man are talking to each other WITHOUT a walkie-talkie. They're just shouting at each other. That guy is 300 feet in the air and with a loud ass engine like 2 inches behind him and he's able to CLEARLY hear what Unibrow Man is saying? Bullshit!

Anyway.

And ladies...he's single! RAWR!

J.D manages to kick Unibrow Man's ass enough times to get him to say what happened to Billy, by which he glances at the car squisher. J.D freaks out, which gives Unibrow Man an advantage and throws J.D into the squisher. Of course, J.D gets out and another fight breaks out where somehow Unibrow Man dies.

Joshua and both Strobes are at Arlene's house. Joshua has Tony on his knee and this scene is mildly disturbing cause of the whole inbred thing. I'm not gonna get totally into it but we learn that Tony calls him grandpa and the more this movie goes on, the more we're suppose to hate Joshua. The Strobes get a call about Unibrow Man and that Wade (I think, all inbreds look alike) managed to corner J.D. He only cornered him after 10 minutes of J.D running through town kicking every body's ass! It was a delightful scene.

So they put J.D in a jail cell, Joshua shows up and tells J.D he's been sentenced to death, and Tony managed to escape his creepy grandpa. Arlene manages to escape via dirt bike but doesn't get very far. She finds an abandoned cop car with it's walkie talkie still working. I honestly have no idea what this car is about. It's a major deus ex machina if you ask me.

Arlene uses the walkie-talkie to call every trucker in the country to come help J.D and boy howdy they sure do. The last 10 minutes of this movie is a fucking doozy. I almost thought I was dreaming and I kept slapping myself to make sure I was awake. My fiance thought I finally lost my mind. I assured her I wasn't and I continued watching.

So every trucker in the world shows up on Texas City's doorstep and just basically start ramming through buildings. J.D is taken out of the cell, which is a bad idea cause now he can totally kick some ass. Wade is about to shoot him when Arnie shows up and Wade accidently shoots him. Because of this, Wade plays nice and tells J.D that Billy is alive and tied up in a barn.





J.D goes to the barn, where one of the Strobes is beating up on Billy. This of course pisses J.D off and he goes into full attack mode. It's hard to put into words the asskicking this guy got. Let's just say the guy is minus some lungs. So the ending shows us the town of Texas City as it goes up in flames. A truck plowed through Joshua's house so he's gone. And I guess everything has a happy ending.

My major complaint was the time listed on the DVD. It says one hour and 5 minutes. I was like "Eh, it's short, I can do that, and have dinner cooked before 8, then work on the review." The one hour and 5 minute mark came and went. I was like "um, ok?" Turns out this movie is the standard one hour and 30 minutes. Way, way off DVD company.



Oh and during the final fight scene with Strobe, they kept showing a horse for no reason. Repeatedly. I don't know what that was about. This entire movie was pretty much "The 1970's: The Movie" what with it's music, clothes, filming style, etc. It's not good, it's not bad. It's just a cheesy early Chuck Norris movie and that's all you really want when you see the star is Chuck Norris.
Good buddy.

-Jason

This Post=Betrayal!!

I know my whole schtick is to write about bad movies and try to be funny (Note the word "try") but I wanna mention two things, one isn't about movies and the other is about good or at least semi-decent movies.

1. There's apparently a shitload of TV shows that everyone says to me "ZOMG! You need to see right now, mothafucker!!!!!" while dodging hail of bullets cause I talk to people in war zones apparently. Somewhere during the "HOO-RAH!!!'s" I'm told I should watch the following shows:
Dexter
The Shield
Breaking Bad
Weeds
Mad Men
More Walker Episodes

The problem is most of these shows have a lot of seasons on their belts. I'm a busy guy. Making fun of movies about alien vaccum cleaners ain't gonna write themselves, y'know. So what's a dork to do? Well, I'm probably gonna just get the first disc of the first season of each show and check it out. If I can't get into it after that, then screw it. And don't try to tell me that a show really picks up in season 3, if I can't get into it after episode 4, then it's not worth my time. Sorry.

Of course, there are shows where I did watch the first season of but didn't pay any attention to the next seasons. (Veronica Mars, Boomtown) and that's only cause I'm mildly lazy.

So I'll report back on which shows I do find awesome and worth my time. In the meantime, here are some shows that I do watch that ZOMG YOU TOTALLY NEED TO SEE, MOTHAFUCKER!!!!:
It's Always Sunny in Philidelpha
Psyche
Monk (It's about to start it's final season in August. Sad face.)
Penn and Teller: Bullshit! (Finally, the truth shall be heard...or something)

2. Last Friday I was over at Final Girl's place. No, nothing like THAT! We're just friends. Honestly. Anyway. Every friday, she posts posters relating to a theme. On Friday it was Roman Polanski films, which was pretty neat learning about other Polanski films other than Rosemary's Baby and the one where he supposedly got it on with a minor. Then I saw this poster:



And I was just like "Wow". Then it gave me an idea: what other pairing of movies could possibly top that? Like two movies that are so different from each other that watching them back to back would probably cause a black hole to form in your living room or movie watching space? I decided to find out. I asked my mass invaders to send me some movie titles and a few responded. (I think the ones that didn't are mad at me about something. You burn ONE cat...) I took those titles, paired them with movies in my movie collection and/or movies in my Netflix queue and during the month of August and possibly beyond, I shall watch them, two at a time, back to back, and see if anything can possibly top The Odd Couple/Rosemary's Baby. And of course, that'll be the first pairing, to see how well those two go together.

I probably won't write full reviews about both movies, just write about the experience and what I found. I will do regular bad movie reviews as well during this, so don't worry. I'll get to 3 Ninjas: High Noon At Mega Mountain soon. I promise.

Oh and here's a picture just for random sakes:


-Jason

CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month: Walker, Texas Ranger: In The Name of God

This "Walker" recap was written by Mass Invader Devon. She reported to me via Twitter that this episode pretty much broke her spirit and her will. I sorta feel bad about this, so hope you guys enjoy this review.

***

So this episode starts with Walker and Token Black Guy Whose Name I Can't Remember crouching down in the wild, leafy depths of the wilderness someplace and gazing through a pair of binoculars at a group of squirrelly, gun-toting men congregating around a pickup truck. One of the guys getting spied on is that same doofy illegal weapons dealer from the first episode who claimed he sold weapons to Libya or something, but really he didn't, but I guess now he's out of jail and selling illegal weapons to other people instead. Black Guy is appalled that Doofy Weapons Guy is still out and about and doing his funky thing on the streets with the illegal weapons. Walker responds to Black Guy's indignation by making a crack about how Black Guy basically bragged to him a few episodes ago that he once unleashed poisonous snakes in Doofy Weapons Guy's house just to fuck with him, which Black Guy now fervently denies any responsibility for.

In the true spirit of the show, Black Guy's first suggestion for how to deal with the illegal weapons dealer and his two scraggly patrons is to DROP A FUCKING BOULDER ON THEM using Walker's truck. Walker thinks this is a bad idea, not because of how illegal, immoral, or extremely brutal it would be, but because “it won't work.” Walker stalks off in disgust, and Black Guy trails after him momentarily, whining that Walker “never listens to [him]” and is “too stubborn” before defiantly spinning around and declaring, “It will TOO work!”

While Black Guy gleefully revs up Walker's pick-up truck and starts ramming the front end of it against the boulder, Walker actually conducts himself like a normal law enforcement officer for a change by walking down to the place where the weapons deal is taking place, drawing his gun, and calmly informing everyone that they're under arrest for trafficking in illegal weapons. Just when he's got everybody tied and/or handcuffed, the boulder gives way before the mighty force of Walker's crappy pick-up truck, and comes tumbling down the hill straight toward them. Walker yanks Doofy Weapons Guy out of the way, but the other two guys have to run away from the boulder so they don't die, and they sort of just keep running, and then they're gone, like, they totally escaped. Black Guy is really happy with himself, even though basically all he did was create a diversion so that two of the three people they already had in custody could get away. Walker shakes his head affectionately, plops the weapons dealer in the back of his pick-up truck, and then peels out recklessly in pursuit of the two totally harmless and nonviolent criminals that he just peacefully apprehended thirty seconds ago. Welcome to this show's ethos.

Opening Credits Montage! Walker Texas Ranger IS Chuck Norris!

This episode is entitled “In the Name of God,” and the first post-teaser scene takes place in a compound which is conveniently labeled with a bunch of signs that say “New Caanan Congregation” and “New Caanan Heaven Compound.” This episode is especially tasteless, by the way, because it originally aired like RIGHT after the WACO seige happened. Like later the very same year.

A lot of pregnant ladies are standing around in vegetable gardens reading Bibles and stuff, and some guy outside the fence is sitting in his car and spying on them. Most sinister of all, we see an American Flag – MOUNTED UPSIDE DOWN YOU GUYS. THESE PEOPLE TOTALLY HATE THE AMERICAN GOVERNMENT AND AMERICAN FAMILY VALUES AND THE REAL JESUS.

The guy becomes furious suddenly, slams on the gas pedal, and drives his car through some wimpy little unguarded wooden gate that was apparently hidden off to the side for some reason, even though the main entrance to the compound is like all barbed-wirey and surrounded by guards with AK-47s and stuff. Suddenly he's INSIDE THE HEAVILY-GUARDED COMPOUND where he's not supposed to be! All because somebody was so dumb that they FORGOT to guard that little wooden gate over there! Golly boy howdy, cult members are stupid, you guys.

So anyway, of course the guys guarding the main entrance are mad. They pull the guy out of his car and start punching him and stuff, and he yells at them that he's here to get his daughter back, and they claim she isn't there. But then his daughter comes waddling out all big and pregnant, screaming not to hurt him because he's her dad. They have a tearful reunion and she tells her dad that he shouldn't have come there, and then the cult leader guy comes out and is like, “yeah, you shouldn't have come here, dude.” Only he says it with prettier words than that, and quotes from the Bible and stuff. Angry Dad aggressively disagrees, but no one cares what he thinks. His daughter tells him again that she wants to stay in the wacky religious compound and that he should go away, so finally he does, looking crestfallen.

Elsewhere, people are throwing a surprise party for the District Attorney lady that Walker is secretly fucking probably. Someone claims she's turning 28, which is not true. More like 38, for realsies. District Attorney Lady makes a sarcastic joke about how her life is exciting or something. Then Walker gives her a present, which turns out to be a really ugly turquoise bracelet. She blows out her Birthday candles, people start to get bored and wander away, and then District Attorney Lady immediately starts bitching about how she can't get some witness to testify in the murder trial she's working on right now. Walker and Tonto say that they will do her a special Birthday favor and go serve the guy a subpoena right this very minute so she doesn't have to worry about it anymore.

So of course it turns out that the guy they're going to harass is some huge, obnoxious guy with a shaved head and a handlebar mustache who is busy dumping cans of garbage into a dumpster. This man immediately becomes my hero by responding to their issuance of the subpoena by grabbing them both by their shirts and hurtling them backwards onto the pavement. He then tries to escape from them by climbing up onto some scaffolding, and they follow him and try to wrestle him to the ground or something, which of course results in all three of them falling comically into the dumpster.

Back at the D.A.'s office, that guy who broke into the wacky religious compound earlier is freaking out about how he needs someone to go rescue his daughter. He explains about how his daughter went crazy after her mom died, and now this evil guy who runs the religious cult is manipulating her to make her want to stay there. The whole cult basically consists of a lot of dumb, pregnant teenage girls, and some older men who Angry Dad claims are “just a bunch of cons.” D.A. Lady points out that his daughter is legally an adult and therefore nobody can really do anything, but he says something sentimental about not wanting to lose his daughter blah blah, so because she's a woman, D.A. Lady immediately reverses herself and drops everything she's doing to drive out to the compound where the daughter is being held and “talk to her.”

Walker and that other guy return to the station with the guy they arrested earlier and sit down to start booking him. Other people in the office make jokes about how they smell bad from being in a dumpster. Walker and his little sidekick are both annoyed and talk about how their clothes are ruined. Blah blah filler.

The Sexy D.A. pulls up in front of Loony Bible-Thumpers 'R' Us, gets out of her car, and starts talking to an ornery looking young lady with a garden hoe who is either fat or preggers. Fatty Preggo McFatsalot inquires as to whether Sexy D.A. is looking for Deacon John, explaining, “the pretty ones always come looking for him.” Sexy D.A. says no, she's looking for this other chick who's supposed to be there, and Preggo agrees that they should go see her.

Somewhere else on the compound, a bunch of guys are doing some kind of elaborate military drill that involves randomly firing automatic weapons and shouting a lot and rolling around in the dirt. The cult leader guy, who I guess is Deacon John, stands on a platform that looms high above the activity and brandishes a large weapon. He fires a few rounds at some random person on the ground, and another, ferrety individual in a black suit freaks out and tells him not to do that because that's live ammo. Then a guy walks up underneath the platform and tells them that the District Attorney is there and she's talking to Emmy. Deacon John is upset that the Sexy D.A. was able to make it past security and quickly lopes off to deal with the situation in person.

Emmy is having a good time conversing with the Sexy D.A. when Deacon John drives up in a big red Jeep. “Isn't he just to DIE for?” Emmy chortles stupidly. Deacon John gets out of his car, saunters over to them, and puts his arm around Emmy as the Sexy D.A. explains that she is there on behalf of Emmy's father, who wants to press charges for aggravated assault. Deacon John says that no aggravated assault took place, and the Sexy D.A. asks Emmy what she thinks happened. Emmy is simultaneously ditzy and evasive, as is clearly her wont. The Sexy D.A. says she'll leave, but first she wants to talk to Emmy in private. They start to walk away toward the big front gates, but then all of a sudden, the gates slam shut. A big burly guy grabs the Sexy D.A. roughly by the shoulders, jerking her backward. “LET GO OF ME!” she squawks, but Deacon John quickly explains that the gates are electrified, that they close automatically at the same time every evening, and that they are operated on a timer that can't be overridden. So the Sexy D.A. is basically stuck there until 6:00 the following morning. Sexy D.A. wants to use a phone, but Deacon John only leers at her and pronounces, “We have no phones, no television.” No boats, no goats, no motor cars. “We have the Bible,” he adds. The Sexy D.A. looks scandalized.

I guess it's the next day, although the Sexy D.A. really doesn't look like she slept on her hair or anything, but whatever, I guess it's hard to tell with '90s hairstyles. She talks to Deacon John some more, telling him that her conversation with Emmy the night before revealed that Deacon John is guilty of statutory rape, which is a felony (Emmy is 18, but she got knocked up while she was still 17). She also tosses off a reference to “the paramilitary drills” and accuses Deacon John of using “mind control.” Deacon John freaks out and grabs her by the arm, and then he has her dragged away by some thugs while she squeals about how she's the District Attorney and they can't do this.

Walker and Pocahontas are concerned that Alex missed her court date and isn't answering her phone, so they decide to go to her apartment and check on her. There is some eyebrow-waggling banter outside her apartment about how Walker has been to her apartment before. No one cares.

Inside the apartment everything is pretty much normal (well...normal for 1993, I guess). Walker stalks around the place broodingly like his spidey sense is tingling. He eventually charges upstairs to Alex's answering machine and plays her messages. One of them is from Emmy's dad, who wants to know what's going on “at the compound.” Walker immediately ascertains that he is talking about “that religious cult out in Decatur.” The wheels of Act II – they have been set in motion!

Deacon John's weasely lawyer chastises him for kidnapping the District Attorney, an act which Deacon John refers to as “damage control.” They argue about it and it's boring. Deacon John has a religious freak-out and pins his lawyer to a tree, spouting a bunch of crap in his face about God and redemption and stuff.

Walker and the other guy pull up in front of New Caanan. In a room somewhere, Alex beats a door with her fists and wails, “NOOOOOOOOO!!!”

Deacon John comes out and Walker asks what happened to Alex. Deacon John claims she took Emmy back home to her father. Walker wants to search the compound and Deacon John says that's fine but they have to leave their weapons, so Walker agrees and hands him their guns, which seems like a really dumb thing to do, but whatevs. They go around and ask a lot of fat pregnant women about Emmy, and everyone pretends they've never heard of her. Alex pounds plaintively on a window, through which she can see her friends meandering around the compound like dumbasses looking for her.

Walker and Blackie leave. Deacon John glowers after them. “Remember his face, Luther. This is the face of death and destruction,” he intones sullenly to some meathead mullet guy standing next to him.

Back in the car, Walker reveals his brilliant plan to get Deacon John's fingerprints off the guns and “find out who this guy really is.” I get into a minor argument with my roommate about whether or not they already have enough evidence to get a search warrant. Don't they already pretty much know that he's been fucking underage girls in there? Whatever. I've noticed this show likes to pretend sometimes that doing things according to established procedure is really difficult and time-consuming when actually it's not, because that makes it seem less inappropriate when Walker just ignores the law and does whatever he wants.

In the next scene, Blackie returns from somewhere, hands Walker a piece of paper, and starts telling him all about Deacon John's criminal record, which involves things like aggravated assault, rape, and possession of illegal weapons. Blackie expresses deep skepticism about their chances of getting a warrant based on this information.

Walker shows up at a county jail someplace where Doofy Guy from the teaser is telling the story AGAIN about how the black dude once put snakes in his bed. Walker tells Doofus that he wants him to go to New Caanan and sell Deacon John some illegal weapons in exchange for a plea bargain, but Doofus says he won't do that, because he knows that guy and he's crazy. Then the black dude shows up and Doofus starts doing his tired, lame, “HEY GET THAT GUY AWAY FROM ME HE'S CRAZY” schtick that he always does whenever Blackie shows up, and so then I guess Doofus changes his mind out of blind fear and decides to go. I hate this show.

Deacon John preaches wackily to his flock for a little bit, and then he goes in to see Alex, who has been refusing to eat anything. “I'll eat when I'm on the outside!” she seethes. She calls Deacon John “the sickest human being I have ever met” and says what he's doing is “unconscionable.” Deacon John starts hinting around that maybe they'll let her go if she agrees to come be their lawyer. Then he grabs her by the throat and implies he's going to kill her. This whole scene is just filler and it's dumb. Why are the episodes of this show so fucking long?

Outside, where it's nighttime, Walker and Tonto show up and start kicking people's asses. Walker kicks like nine guys' asses in succession, then busts into Alex's room and starts making out with her. “I love you!” he whispers. Then Alex sits up in bed panting, because it was just a sexy dream she was having. OH MY GOD FILLER. TAKE A STORYTELLING CLASS. This episode soooo clearly needed a B story, seriously.

The following day, the Real Walker and Tonto are outside the compound taping a wire to Doofy Guy's chest hairs, which he complains about. Doofy goes inside and confronts Deacon John, who is intensely suspicious. They go inside to talk, but Doofy freaks out when he sees that they're going to make him go through a metal detector. Deacon John rips open Doofy's shirt and finds the wire and yells at him. Outside, Walker and Tonto are pensive.

Deacon John takes Doofy into a room that looks like it should be in a whorehouse, where absolutely everything (walls, sofa, nick nacks, etc.) is royal blue. They ask him some questions and shock him with a taser whenever he answers them. Doofy basically tells them everything about what Walker and Tonto are doing, like, who the hell saw that coming? Doofy promises to “run a doublecross” and trip up Walker and Tonto by lying to them, so Deacon John agrees to let him go. Why does everyone keep trusting Doofy to do what he says he'll do?

Doofy peels out of the compound in his car trying to escape, but Walker and Tonto easily overtake him in their Rangermobile. They pull him out of the car and he snivels incoherently at them. Walker and Tonto jump back into their car and flip a U-y back toward the compound, where Deacon John is hastily climbing into his Jeep, intending to abscond with Alex. Before he can leave, however, a bunch of police cars pull up in front of the compound and some Sherrif's Deputies get out. One of them mutters something about how they have a warrant.

Deacon John leaps out of his car, shouting at all his mulletheads to secure the entrances. He then runs across the compound to one of the watchtowers, climbs up to the top, and starts recklessly firing a machine gun over the fence at the Sherrif's Deputies. Hey, guys, I have an idea! Let's pretend that this is what happened at WACO!

The Deputies duck and cover helplessly as David Koresh blows holes in their windshields, then eventually they start shooting back with regular, non-automatic rifles. A bunch of Koresh's evil henchmen are seen firing automatic weapons also. Nobody fired automatic weapons at WACO, you guys. All they did was hug their children and cry.

Walker pulls up in his big, fat SUV. He has some brief words with one of the Deputies, then grabs a megaphone and informs Deacon John that he's outnumbered and that reinforcements are on the way. Deacon John says he wants them to bring him a helicopter so he can escape to safety, and if they don't do that then within one hour he's going to start executing people, starting with the District Attourney.

54 minutes later, Walker and his colleagues are still trying to figure out what the fuck to do. Up on the watchtower, Deacon John nuzzles Alex and murmurs some lurid sexual remarks into her ear.

Walker gets Deacon John on the walkie talkie and lies to him, claiming they found a helicopter but that it won't be there until the following morning. John is upset about this, but ultimately shuts up and decides to wait. “If this is a scam, she's DEAD,” he grumbles.

Back on the ground, Walker is unveiling a plan which involves TURNING OFF THE FUCKING POWER GRID. Well, no shit, guys.

Yeah, so then they cut to a scene where everything's dark and David Koresh is yelling about the power being out. David's lawyer tells him they should tunnel out of the compound because it's dark and no one can see them. David shoots his lawyer in the head, like, uh. Okay.

Meanwhile, Walker and Tonto are cutting through the fence with with wire-cutters. A guy sees them and tries to shoot them, but Walker shoots him first. Tonto compliments him on his aim. They stalk through the compound, peeking furtively around corners and punching errant watchmen in the face.

In her room, Alex somehow intuitively knows that Walker and Tonto are coming, but before they can arrive and rescue her, David Koresh shows up and starts spouting insane bullshit about how he's sorry he never got a chance to “convert” her, but he's going to have to kill her now. He pushes her down on the bed and starts attacking her, and she flails her arms and screams.

Luckily, at that very moment, Walker busts into the hall outside her door, punches a bunch of guys to hell, and then charges into Alex's room and flattens David Koresh. Then Walker and Alex hug, and it's basically exactly like what happened in the dream she had earlier, except that instead of saying “I love you” when they pull away from each other, Walker tells her that she's a dumb girl and not to ever do anything without his permission ever again. Alex finds this touching, and kisses him.

Annnnnd....that's...the end.

Uh.

Hooray?

CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month: Walker, Texas Ranger: Lucas

This is episode 3 and episode 4 of Season 5. Judging from the style of this episode, Chuck hired a new editor and/or got some fancy editing equipment. All the transitions between scenes gave me a headache.

But that's not important. What is important is that this is, in fact, another "special episode of Walker, Texas Ranger". Again, cause it's the '90's we need to learn about something that was effecting the world and this time Walker is gonna roundhouse kick the big one: AIDS.

But how? Is Walker gonna get AIDS, almost die, but after dreaming about eagles he gets over it, much like Magic Johnson? Sadly, no. But what does happen is even more insane then that. I will get this out of the way though: it was a tough episode, emotionally. Too bad it took for-fucking-ever.

We start off with Walker and Trivette pulling up to a crack house with a bunch of other Rangers. The rangers bust the door down and immedately start shooting, fighting, and arresting. We focus on our main bad guy Rafer. Cause this is an episode of "Walker", he's an over-the-top bad guy. He actually growls in certain scenes. Here, he grabs Mackenzie Phillips, holds her hostage, and leaves before being arrested.

Walker searches the house and finds a door with a lock on it. He simply busts the lock off and opens the door and inside he finds a dirty Haley Joel Osment. Cue credits and Mr. Chuck "The Voice" Norris singing the theme song! (I still can't believe he sings...)

When we come back, Haley is in the hospital but he isn't talking to no one. Walker goes up to him and roundhouse kicks him until he speaks. Ok, no he doesn't. He just starts yammering about guessing people's names until Haley goes "SHUT THE FUCK UP! My name's Lucas!"

One montage (get use to those) later, not only is Lucas talking but he's friends with Walker. We find Rafer and Mackenzie in a hotel room and learn that Mackenzie is Lucas' Mom. Mom has AIDS which means be default Lucas also has AIDS. Get those Kleenex ready!

Now that Lucas is finally social-able it's time to turn him around and send him to a County Orphanage! Yeah! He's gonna be the talk of the building! Well, he is. See, Walker didn't tell Lucas he has AIDS cause he doesn't know how to break it to him. But everyone else in the entire state knows and cause no one knew anything about AIDS back then, they think Lucas is Death and avoid him like the...well you know.

Walker immedately busts him out of the orphanage and it's another montage of Lucas and Walker on Walker's ranch, skipping stones and riding horses. Maybe Lucas will live?

We go back to Rafer and Mackenzie and he slaps her for saying the name Lucas. He overacts some more, does so much cocaine that the "Scarface" dude is like "Whoa back up!" and does some more yelling.

Walker and Trivette do another drug bust, looking for Lucas' Mom. No one knows where she's at. Really? You try to bust some other drug dealers hoping they'd know? That's like arresting one criminal hoping they know where some other random criminal is. Sure, they might know but the odds are slim.

Mackenzie managed to break away from Rafer long enough to call Walker and demand Lucas back. When that goes nowhere, Mackenzie runs back to the abusive Rafer. I dunno, if I got away from him, I would just leave the state and/or country, knowing my son was in good hands. Course I'm not a crackhead.

Lucas has a nightmare which is important later on cause it gets changed and it's really noticeable. Lucas is standing on a balcony or something and reaching over the railing for his Mom, who's trying to grab Lucas. Soon, Mom changes to Rafer and he growls some more. Lucas wakes up screaming.

After that it's more heartfelt stuff with Lucas and Walker. There's even a disturbing scene where they help a horse give birth and they ACTUALLY SHOW IT BEING BORN OH MY GOD!!

When that's not happening, we get some more details about Walker's childhood. Remember how his parents died and how it helped a rape victim? Well the rest of the story helps a kid cope with AIDS. Walker was sent to an orphanage himself where he didn't get along with anyone cause he was part Indian, even though he looks completely white. Soon enough, his Uncle Ray, last seen in the first episode, picked him up and takes him to live at a reservation, where now he's outcasted for being white. Soon, Uncle Ray teaches him the ways of the Indian and soon he's accepted by everybody. Yeah yeah but how did he learn how to kick ass!

Whatever, anyway.

I can't recall how but Walker knows where Rafer and Mackenzie is and busts down the door. Rafer discovers that his bank card and saftey deposit box key is missing and knows that Mackenzie gave it to Lucas. He escapes Walker but leaves Mackenzie cause she's too sick.

Mother and son reunite at the hospital and after a tearful "I love you" she dies. And end of part 1. Yes, this entire story is told in two parts. It could've been only 1 if they left out the fucking montages and trips to the past but whatever, again.

Part two, the craziest part of the story, begins with Walker still not knowing how to tell Lucas about his AIDS. C.D casually mentions that he's now staying with Walker while his place is fumagated. Gee, thanks for setting up a plot point later on. Walker decides to take Lucas back to the reservation where he grew up and maybe he'll find the inspiration to tell Lucas.

Walker takes Lucas out to some part of the woods for a camping trip and tells him about his mentor White Eagle and how he helped Walker out with troubles and problems and stuff, but in a wise Indian kind of way. Lucas has his nightmare again but this time it's way different. Here, he's being chased by Rafer. It totally makes sense that he's having nightmares of Rafer since he locked him in a room and stuff but the different nightmares of him just growling don't make too much sense.

Lucas wakes up and runs away and he literally runs into White Eagle! Why, imagine that! Before we get to him, we find Rafer breaking into Walker's house and searching Lucas' room for the key and bank card. I don't know how he thinks Mackenzie gave Lucas the key and card, if she did, wouldn't she have just taken Lucas and ran off with the money? C.D, who's staying at Walker's cause of the fumagation, finally wakes up in time to see Rafer gone. Thanks old guy.

Back in the woods, the insanity starts. White Eagle thinks Lucas needs to go on a spirital journey to help rid of his nightmares. The solution, which I promise I'm not making up: get naked in a tiny tent with steam. I swear.

So there's Chuck Norris, Haley Joel Osment and an old Indian sitting in a tiny tent, near naked and sweating. The gods were smiling down on me today, I tell you. They tell Lucas to have the nightmare again but this time Walker and White Eagle will be there to help out.

Lucas starts having the nightmare and is being chased by Rafer. Finally, he runs into Walker and White Eagle and they try to kick Rafer's ass, but he soon takes them down. He's about to growl at Lucas, when Lucas picks up an ax and threatens him. This makes Rafer back away and eventually explode. I forgot to mention that this entire scene is filmed in LSD-mode, with different colors flashing up and the camera being whipped around at weird angles.




Lucas wakes up and is happy he finally defeated his nightmare. White Eagle goes back to where ever he came from and Lucas and Walker return home. Somewhere along the way, Walker finally gets the courage to tell Lucas he has AIDS and Lucas is ok with this. In fact he wants to go on a speaking tour across the country. Honestly.

So Lucas goes on his tour and Rafer finds out and gets even more mad. Late one night, Rafer breaks in and sneaks up on Lucas, asking where the key and card is. Lucas, remembering the whole thing with the ax is unafraid. Rafer notices the picture frame of Lucas and his mom and realizes that wasn't in the room before so he goes after it. But Walker comes in and kicks his ass for good. And sure enough the key and card was inside. Yeah I have no idea how the fuck that happened. But the episode is almost over so let's not think about it too much.

Next scene is suppose to be after Rafer's trial. So about a year has passed since Walker found Lucas in the closet I'm guessing. Lucas goes to bed and starts coughing. Uh-oh! But before any bad stuff happens, it's Lucas' birthday! Yay! And now he has all kinds of friends who support him and his AIDS! Yay!!

Ok, time to die.

Lucas is coughing and Walker takes him to the hospital. Lucas tells the horse that he saw be born goodbye "for now" and, well...Lucas died. We don't see him die. But we do see the funeral, which is one the one non-weird/bad thing about this episode so I'll just leave it alone.

But that's pretty much it. There's the "AIDS" episode. God, I should watch every episode to see every issue Walker deals with. How did he deal with the ozone layer? How did he deal with the whole Bosnia thing? And how did he deal with the break up of Milli Vanilli?
-Jason

CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month: Walker, Texas Ranger: The Convenant

When I decided to do episodes of "Walker, Texas Ranger" I didn't read up on any of the episodes. I planned on doing the first episode and the one coming up tomorrow with Haley Joel Osmet, but anything else was pretty much just at random. So I popped in Season 3 disc 3 and picked the episode "The Convenet", thinking Chuck Norris has to save, or better yet fight, some nun's. Turns out I was way off.

I need to watch more episodes to see if this is true but I'm getting the feeling the more the show went on, the more Chuck Norris wanted to send a message. Sort of like an ass kicking version of "Degrassi". (By the way you have to read those recaps from Albert, they're hilarious. After this review of course.) This episode that I watched dealt with kids and gangs. This show mainly came on in the 90's and all the hot button topics back then was kids, drugs, and gangs. And acid rain. I look forward to the episode where Walker threatens to roundhouse kick acid rain.

First off, why the fuck didn't anyone tell me Chuck Norris HIMSELF sings the goddamn theme song??? I mean...he sings????



I love those lyrics. "When you're in Texas look behind you, cause that's where the rangers will be." I'm sure Bruno will be happy to hear about that.

The start of the episode reveals that it's Christmas cause when I think Christmas, I think Mexican gangs in Texas! Our gang, the Los Locos, are walking around and they walk into C.D's bar. Typically, the actor playing C.D changed since the pilot episode. This C.D isn't as heavy and the whole "I usta be a ranger" is downplayed a bit.

This C.D is more like a jolly grandfather. The Locos show up and pretty much exhort him for protection money. But like any Texan grandfather, he pulls out a shotgun on the gang and they quickly leave. I'm surprise this gang can extort anyone in Texas, doesn't everyone down there carry guns?

C.D then goes out to this truck to get more Christmas decorations when the Locos spot him and immedately run him over with their car. At this point Walker and Trivette, still played by the same guy, find C.D passed out in the street. Walker stands up, squints into the camera and shakes his head. NOW it's personal.

For the record, C.D is ok, he's just banged up and he's complaining about being in the hospital. Oh C.D you jolly old man you. Through a bunch of exposition dialouge, it's revealed that Walker teaches karate and we join him in class. I can't make fun of this part cause Chuck Norris won awards for karate and stuff and having Chuck Norris teaching you karate is like having Michael Phelps teaching you how to swim.

There's one part that hits the point of the episode home. Walker calls up a little kid and asks him where his green belt is. The kid tells us that his little brother got killed in a drive by and he put his belt in the coffin so he'll take it to heaven with him. This of course works and Walker gives him a new belt. Wow. Lesson learned, kids: if you forget your homework, say your little brother got shot and you put it in the coffin so he can do math homework in heaven.

I'm going to hell for that. See you there cause you're totally laughing at that.

This touches Walker so deeply that he has to stop class to stand out in the hallway and look pensive. We now meet another student of Walker's name Tommy. He has an old brother named Ernesto who's a manager at a car shop. Ernesto use to be in the Locos gang but he broke out.

Tommy goes to the garage and Ernesto immedately puts him to work cause managing little kids is what got him the job. While doing something, The Locos pull up and the leader, Sonny, steps out and wants to recruit Tommy. The typical "Leave my little brother alone, you got me you not getting him" thing happens and we know something's bad gonna happen cause Tommy is looking forward to putting up the Christmas tree with Ernesto later that night.

Oh yeah, it's Christmas. This hardly factors into everything so why they saved this for the Christmas episode is beyond me.

Ernesto and Tommy come home with the tree and their Mom is happy to see them. Oh boy. Soon a darkened car comes by, someone shouts something, and bullets go flying. Ernesto is shot but somehow Tommy isn't. In a scene that reminded me of the Nick Cage "The Wicker Man", Tommy helpfully shouts out "THEY SHOT MY BROTHER!" Yeah yeah and the bees are in your eyes. Thanks, we kinda figured.

We then see the Loco's shoot up their rival gang The Gang In Red. I forgot their name, sorry. But since we're knee deep in Mexican's we gotta bring in anything and everything Hispanic. The mom is praying with a priest. The Mom works in a tortilla factory. Walker brings in a Hispanic Ranger whom I'm sure was never mentioned before and vanished after this episode. Surprised no one had the La Cucaracha car horn.

Ernesto is in critical condition and only time will tell and it's in God's hands and stuff. Tommy is pissed and wants to do something. Thankfully, here comes Sonny and the Loco's (That needs to be a band name, NOW!) saying that The Gang in Red shot Ernesto and if he joins them, he can get revenge. This is all Tommy needed to hear. NO! TOMMY!

Walker tries to arrest Sonny but they can't hold him on anything without evidence. Walker then talks to The Gang in Red and since he and that gang leader are tight somehow, he makes them promise not to retaliate until Walker says so. Ok.

Tommy is now in the gang and he's avoiding Walker, who just wants to tell him that Ernesto survived and he's gonna be ok cause when you're shot 100 times you simply get over it. Sonny is getting his gang all riled up to start a gang war with The Gang in Red and I swear to god he says this line of dialouge:

"What's the word, mockingbird?"

Is this a tough Mexican gang leader or a 87-year-old Grandma?

One gang member remembers that it's Christmas and would rather be at home opening gifts than shooting people but Sonny promises to be the new Messiah. Honestly, I couldn't make this up if I tried.

So now Walker has to stop a gang war and save a kid or two from a gang. How does he do it? By roundhouse kicking of course! He challenges Sonny to a fight and of course Walker hands his ass to him. The truth about who shot Ernesto is revealed and the gang look at Sonny like "Dude, not cool" and more or less throw him under the bus.

So Tommy is saved and now he's a green belt. I don't get the colors of belts in karate. I know white is beginner and black is master. But what's in between? And how many? And what order? Anyone here take karate classes?

Yep we get our sugar coated ending and the day is saved thanks to Walker kicking some ass. The way it should be.

Coming up tomorrow: Another Special Episode of Walker, with Haley Joel Osmet.
-Jason

CHUCK NORRIS!!!! Month: Walker, Texas Ranger: Episode 1

I figure if I'm gonna be doing all things Chuck Norris, I might as well do one of his most famous bodies of work: Episodes of "Walker, Texas Ranger", the CBS show that ran for 8 years. Yes, 8 years of Chuck Norris beating up bad guys every week. I'm as surprised as you are.

Hell, it seemed like the writers were surprised too. The first episode is an hour and a half long and has a million stories going on, it's like "Well, we have all these neat ideas for Walker, but what if the show doesn't get picked up? We'll just put them all in the first episode.

Well, here's what you need to know before getting into the episode and any episode that's gonna be covered this week. Chuck Norris is Cordell "Cord" Walker, Texas Ranger. He lives with his Indian Uncle Ray. Walker is half Indian. Walker actually discusses his bloodline in this episode which I'll get to later cause it's crutial to one of the stories.

Walker also has a friend named C.D who use to be a ranger, now he runs a bar, which serves as our hang out spot when Walker isn't home or at the office. C.D is the one that gets Walker in comical situations.

Texas Rangers, especially Walker, don't play by the rules. There, I think I covered the main stuff. Some other info will pop up later in this episode.

This episode is titled "One Riot, One Ranger" and it actually is said at one point. Just to get it out of the way now, supposedly it's the motto for the Texas Rangers but I have no idea what that means so I have my doubts.

When the episode starts, there's action already happening. In fact we missed something. Some dude is shot on the ground, a truck is on fire, and some other dude is holding shot dude. There are four guys with guns taking money from the truck on fire and talking about going to Mexico.

The credits roll and we clearly see a non-bearded white guy driving through them. I wonder who he is. It's not Chuck Norris. He has a beard. And is only half white. Oh well. The credits end and we find Non-Chuck Norris in Mexico. He stops at a bar where the four robbers are celebrating when the doors open and...Chuck Norris is standing there.

The fuck? Was the white dude DRIVING Walker there? It's CLEARLY a white dude driving. Oh well. Anyway, Walker steps into the bar and tells the robbers they're under arrest. The robbers laugh this off cause they're in Mexico and Walker doesn't have jurisdiction there. Clearly, they never seen a Chuck Norris movie. He's like The Goddamn Batman, he has no jurisdiction.



Walker fights them, which knocks them out and he drags them back to Texas. Now that we got the exposition stuff out of the way, onto our story. There's a bank robbery (another robbery? Does each episode have a theme to it's crime? Next week: kidnapping!) and there's clearly a fake blind guy in the crowd. I say it's clear cause the fake beard he has on isn't that convincing. The robbers steal the money but take too long. At one point a teller set off the silent alarm and the only Ranger to answer is this young guy named Mogley who is Walker's best buddy. You just know he's gonna live a full long life.

Mogley arrives at the bank as the robbers are leaving and Mogley shoots one, but the fake blind dude walks out and shoots Mogley. Aw dang. He was gonna propose to his girlfriend too. So now that Walker heard about his friend's death, he's taking this case personally!

Onto plot 2! This chick who isn't given a name asks Walker if he can take in some circus performers. I know, probably the most random thing to ask somebody. I should ask someone I work with if they'll take in some circus performers and see how that goes.

Well, the reason for this is a young female trapeeze artist was raped by some hicks and they keep bugging her cause she's...female? A trapeeze artist? She's clearly not speaking in any weird accent so I don't know what their problem is with her but they want her to leave the state. No-Name Gal wants to arrest the rapists but they got away the first time somehow. Yeah, this doesn't make sense now that I'm typing it all out. I guess No-Name Gal knew they would try again. Oops, I ruined the surprise.

Story three involves Walker's new partner, named Trivette. From what I can tell he's a major character throughout the series so this was his introduction to the show. He's this atheletic black dude who use to play football but he threw his shoulder out so he joined law enforcement cause that's what Shaq does. Now he's a Texas Ranger. And Walker's new partner.

For some reason, Walker finds Trivette weird even though he's just a typical skinny black dude. Everybody in this episode/show has some weird underlying issues that are never dealt with.



Walker returns home to find the circus performers there and Trapeeze Artist Chick is quiet. Walker realizes she's hurt from being raped and decides to cheer her up...by talking about his his parents was BRUTALLY MURDERED WHEN HE WAS 12! Holy crap, maybe Walker is The Goddamn Batman!

So his parents were murdered cause his dad was full blooded Cherokee and his mom was full blooded white. They had Cordell and things were good until they went to a carnival one night and Walker had fun until it was time to go. Then some typical racists came up and gave Papa Walker some shit and since he fathered Chuck Norris, he's an even bigger bad ass and tried to kick some ass. But it didn't work so well and he was stabbed. Then they cut open Mama Walker's stomach and she died.

Believe it or not this opens up Trapeeze Artist and she starts crying and somehow feels better. So next time your life sucks remember, Walker's parents died. Feel better now?

Our main villian this week is some Bruce Campbell wanna be who is planning the perfect heist. He's interviewing wackos for the job and need explosives. He talks to one guy named Colt, who's a bit off. Fake Bruce isn't too happy with Colt and beats him up and look for another guy, who makes bombs that look like giant flies. I'm serious.

Walker and Trivette manage to track down Colt and it's discovered that Colt and Trivette have a history together. No, not like that, regardless of what that last picture says. Colt is afraid of Trivette for some reason and squeals like a canary...or something.

When they're not working, Walker keeps asking Trivette all these annoying questions about his life like why be a ranger and why drink juice and why wear glasses and ugh shut up and kick some ass!

Thankfully, the rapists show up at Walker's place and is about to do their thing when Walker returns home and takes care of them. It's a great scene actually and kinda funny. He breaks one dude's nose, then fixes it, then says "Nah it looked better before" and RE-BREAKS it! Oh wow!!

With the closure of one storyline brings in another. C.D told somebody that Walker will ride a bull for chariaty but without Walker's permission. Walker is like "WHAT? Oh you wacky best friend you!" and happy music plays.

Back to our bad guy, his plan is to knock over four banks at the same time. Who's this dude, Danny Ocean? Actually, it's almost like "Ocean's 11", with a billion people involved and all of them having a part in the robbery. The robbery itself is a bit involved so I'll have to break it down.

1. They send a fly bomb to a totally different bank nowhere near their bank. When this fly bomb goes off, all the cops think that bank is being robbed, even though blown up shit and robberies are two different things.
2. One team goes into one bank dressed like ambulance drives.
3. Another team goes into another bank dressed like Mexicans driving a lunch truck.
4. A guy drives a truck full of gas, which he blows up with a bomb, maybe a fly bomb. I thought since all the gas was being spilled all over the road, the entire city was gonna blow up but only the truck did. This seemed pointless.

Of course, since Walker is there, only 1 thing went right and that was the truck full of gas part. Walker either shot or kicked all the robbers save for Fake Bruce Ocean, who he ran after for 10 seconds, then handed his ass to him. I forget this was made for TV so they couldn't have a big 20 minute fight scene. With Bruce Ocean in jail, it's time to solve the final plot: bull riding!

Hilariously, it's obvious Chuck Norris is riding some plastic things on a studio somewhere and not on a bull. They might as well has the stunt double on the bull be a 3 foot tall overweight ballerina.

Well this was just the first episode. Next episode I'm gonna take a look at will be somewhere in the middle of the series. And Devon is gonna have some recaps of some episodes too. So stay tuned for that all week long.
-Jason