Hello, kitties.
It's your old pal John Kaseer, the voice
of the Cryptkeeper
and you're listening to
the bottom shelf.
Oh, gosh.
Ugh. Gross.
Dallas?
John? You sound like crap, bro. Oh, man.
I'm sick all of a sudden. I'm not
sure what's going on. Yeah. We all have
been sick. Like, me and Tasha have just
gotten out of it after about six weeks
of having us. Why we haven't been recording,
bro? Oh, I hate that.
Who's
who's Tasha? You know, Tasha, my wife, the
person I'm married to. Yeah. Yeah. Wait. You're
married?
Hello, everybody.
Boys and girls, men of all ages, I
don't know what I'm saying, but if you
like movies or hate them, we are here
for you because this is the bottom shelf
where every movie has a place. I am
your
cohost
of cohosts.
My name
is John Harju, and I am here with
the sick one,
sick Obi Wan,
Captain Dallas, panda Marshall Mora.
What's going on, folks? Glad to have everybody
here with us today as we talk about
some terrible movies. Hopefully, it'll be medicinal for
me today. And we also,
not to ignore the elephant in the room,
but we haven't been around again for a
minute because
we've been sick, folk. It's been a while.
You can hear Dallas is
going into his second round of whatever
because I think you had it earlier in
February.
Maybe. Maybe. I can't remember it. It's all
blurry right now. Yeah. Like, I'm I'm running
a 100 degree fever at the moment. So,
ladies and gentlemen,
disclaimer. I don't know what I'm gonna say
today.
Welcome to the mucus.
We got fun and games.
Anyway,
as you can tell, I'm not completely over
it either.
What do we got today, Dallas? We got
movie time. We do.
We are watching some movies, and that's why
I'm trying to fumble through my note. Dig
through the box here. And it looks like
we're gonna watch.
Let's see here. What's this blue thing?
Oh. Is that the Tesseract, bro?
It's glowing like it. No. It's the one,
dude. The one ring? Are we gonna watch
Lord of the Rings? Is No. Did did
they throw away Lord of the Rings?
If we do Lord of the Rings on
this show, Celeste may riot. Just tell you
that right now. She will riot if that
ends up on the show.
Oh, no, man. This is a Jet Li
movie from, like, 2001
directed by Lee's made a bad movie?
Apparently.
Perish the thought. Alright. So,
why don't you, read the back of that
box and, Let's see here. In the back
of the box is this. Imagine that you
are in a parallel u that there are
parallel universes. Alright. I'm there. Imagine that someone
has escaped one and is roaming the streets
of your city. Of my city? Yes. Your
city. Okay. Imagine
that he has come to eliminate
you. But why me?
Imagine that he looks exactly like you.
Legas?
From the director of Final Destination
comes a wild action packed trip to the
future starring international superstar Jet Li from Romeo
must die in Lethal Weapon four in an
incredible dual
dual role
as a police. I feel like that guy
from dual dual role real.
Is a incredible dual role as a police
officer in a fight for his life in
a universe hopping assassin obsessed
with terminating
it. Also starring
Delroy Lindo, Gone in 60, Carla Giugino from
Spy Kids, and Jason Statham from Snatched.
And loaded with explosive action and jaw dropping
effects,
Your beyond
or jaw dropping effects beyond your wildest dreams.
Alright.
Now let's,
let's see what the old Googleplex
has to say
about this movie.
In 2001,
director James Wong, that's w o n g,
not James Wan, w a n, which was
the guy who did the conjuring movies,
decided the only thing better than one Jet
Li
was 125
of them, and thus,
the one was born. That doesn't make sense,
bro. If there is a 125,
then why would the one
They're talking about the movie, the one.
It's called shtick Dallas. Let it ride. Oh.
The script follows Gabriel Yulaw,
a rogue multiverse authority agent who is hopping
between dimensions to take down
his extreme sickness.
What? Oh, I see what you you did
there. To take down his extreme sickness on
the other shelves and become
a literal god.
And standing in his way is the last
remaining good version of himself, an LAPD
deputy named Gabe Law who
has no idea about what is happening,
much less the the fact that every other
him in the multiverse has been systematically deleted.
To stop this self inflicted genocide,
the multiverse authority sends two interdimensional
cops,
the Leroy Lindo and a very young
pre stubble
Jason Statham, who was sporting a head of
hair. So distracting, it's a wonder he can
focus on the mission at all. While the
film tries to be a high concept sci
fi epic, it mostly is remembered for its
aggressive 2001
new metal soundtrack, an iconic moment
where Yulaw
uses two motorcycles
as a literal boxing gloves to smash his
enemies
full of flashy bullet time effects, the novelty
of seeing Jet Li perform high
a high five of death against himself,
and the vibes of a PlayStation one action
game. Thanks, everybody. I was live reading that
for the first time.
I'm sure it sounded fantastic.
Oh, man. Alright. Well, let's get into the,
trivia, John. What you got for us? The
trivia.
Alright. So
the, trivia bot here, the compliments of imdb.com.
Go get you some if you wanna look
up some movies.
I was looking through here. This one this
first one here kinda gave me the ick,
and I'm not sure why. Maybe you can
help me. Does this give you the ick,
Dallas?
In the scenes involving Jet Li fighting
himself,
we're we're on your let me back up
and say this again. I'm I'm having problems
talking tonight.
In the scenes involving Jet Li fighting himself,
they were shot using Jet Li and a
stuntman with a similar build to him. And
the stuntman's face was painted green so it
could be digitally replaced with Jet Li's face
later.
Yeah. And I don't know why, but that
gives me the ick. One word, sticky.
Yes.
It's like it I it's like having grease
paint all over your face Mhmm. Or even
worse, sunblock. Oh my god. I hate sunblock,
bro. Like, not even not even joking. That
is why you felt icky.
Okay. The University Medical Center where Gabe goes
to get the MRI is in the North
Hollywood Medical Center
where the popular TV sitcom Scrubs was filmed.
Oh. So if you see that MRI in
there and it looks familiar, it's because it's
in the Basement of Sacred Heart on Scrubs.
Interesting. Yep.
The scene where Yu Law is practicing his
ZINJI.
I can't I I I apologize
to my Chinese
ethnic
brothers and sisters. I am going to slaughter
this. I don't read
Chinese very well. I was trained in Japanese.
So,
again, please give me your utmost of grace.
I acknowledge my faults here. I bow low
to you. So let me try this again.
The sing the scene where Yu Law is
practicing his Jing
Jing Yi
while shackled
and jailed is a reference to the famous
Jing Yi master,
Kuo Yoon Shen, who did the same thing
when he had been jailed.
During the shootout at the beginning of the
film, the LAPD officers in the Anubis universe
were all arms with m four a one
carbine assault rifles fitted with the m 26
modular accessory shotgun system. At the time of
filming, the m 26 was an experimental
shotgun being developed for the United States Army
by the Seymour systems,
and it was not available to the public.
The m 20 sixes used in the film
were prototype versions loaned by the production of
the C More Systems under the promotional agreement
that they were later returned to the company
after filming was
was completed.
So what you're seeing on here was experimental
army tech in this film. That's pretty cool,
actually. For sure.
And this will be the last one that
I'm gonna throw out here because I don't
wanna spend all night, doing this. But when
Dwayne The Rock Johnson
was attached to star, this film was known
as The Rock movie.
When he had left to work on The
Mummy Returns,
for that was slated to release It
was
listed for a short time
under, under the title
of Untitled Sci Fi Project. And then when
Jet Li came aboard,
it became the one. So, like, literally, there
was, like, no name for this. So they
were like, it was The Rock this. So
they were like, it was The Rock movie,
which is kind of funny if you think
about it because
I didn't I can't for some reason, like,
when I think about this movie and when
I saw it, I I keep feeling like
this was, like, '96 for some reason.
Like, I I remember it being earlier than
2001.
Really? Yeah. I I don't know. I'm having,
like, some weird Mandela effect with this. Did
did somebody sit on the randomizer again?
They might have.
Alright. Well, let's get into our our expectations,
John. Since you you were pinpointing it at
in the in the nineties, what were your,
what were your
expectations for us watching it?
What are my expectations for watching this movie?
I'm
like, literally, I haven't watched I like, I've
seen this movie once,
and it it's been over two decades married
to my wife for two decades, Dallas.
And,
Amazing.
What's that? Amazing. Congratulations.
I'm proud of you. No. I've just
wife.
And,
when I saw this, it was before we
were married. So Right. It it it's been
a long minute, and all I remember is
a lot of the color blue
and
and Jet Li fighting Jet Li.
Yes. And a lot of a lot of
new metal.
Mhmm. Which at the time, I was really
into new metal. So I'd I I think
I enjoyed it. But, I mean, to tell
you the truth, I can't I can't remember
going
I can't remember anything going into this movie
about Mhmm.
This movie outside of those three things.
The color blue, Jet Li, Fighting Jet Li,
and Cut My Life into Pieces.
There you go. That works. Alright. How about
you? What are your expectations?
I'm I'm looking forward to it. I've watched
this within the last five years. Okay. And,
I rented it from Hollywood Video when it
first came out back in 2001.
I am a a fan of Jet Li.
Preshow, John and I were talking about Jet
Li movies. And,
I I've I've watched a lot of his
movies, and I'm going through this list and
going, I've seen a lot
of his movies.
So I'm going in going,
this is going to be a fun action
flick, but it's gonna feel very short at
the same time. Okay.
Well, what does everybody else think about this
movie then? What are their expectations?
Leave a comment and let us know.
No. I was trying to segue into the
community
feed. Community outreach.
Dallas has failed.
Alright. Community outreach. Failing at outreach? What? I
know. Right? Alright.
From John. Hey. That's you. That's me.
Oh, I'm on the wrong page.
From John. My first or second time seeing
Jet Li Act, which is astounding to me.
I am genuinely surprised that you never seen
anything like like,
Black Mask or No.
Any other of his movies. Once Upon a
Time in China,
at least. Once Upon a Time in China,
that was Donnie Yen, I thought. That was
Jet Li. That was Jet Li? Mhmm. Now
I did see Once Upon a Time in
China, but I'm pretty certain it was
either this or Kiss of the Dragon
before I saw those. Mhmm.
Mhmm. Yep. Yeah. Well, about the same time
frame. Alright. You wanna tag him? Oh, right.
I didn't have my notes up because I
was looking at other factoids for later because
I have the stupid tonight,
and I'm at the bottom of the list.
Hold on. Maybe I have so much to
edit. Alright. So we have here
Smink.
He says
enjoyable multiverse Highlander Kung Fu film.
That's pretty pretty accurate. That Shout out to
Smink. Love that guy so much. That is
a lot to digest in such a small
container right there. I I feel like that
is 17 pounds of baloney jammed into a
five pound package.
Ex expertly put on display, and I'm afraid
to touch it because it might explode. It
might.
Francisco,
our friend from Retro Rewind, he says,
many Jet Li's are on a mission to
remake Highlander as a kung fu brawl across
the multiverse.
Alright. And then Branson,
used his inter
inter multi his inter universal
his no. His pan universal
communications
to comment on this because
in our lore,
he doesn't live here except for when he
occasionally can force ghost in.
Says,
an adventure in the multiverse before MCU overused
the concept.
That's that's a fact.
Wait. What what studio
what studio did this film? Like, what what
major what major distributor was behind this? Let
me look it up.
Because if it was a subsidiary of Disney,
I'm calling Balderdash.
You're calling Balderdash?
Let's see here. It was
Revolution Studio. Are they open by are they
owned by Disney?
I don't know.
Google it. Does Disney own
Revolution Studios?
According to Google, no. Disney does not own
Revolution Studios. It is an independent film and
television library,
currently owned by the investment firm Content Partners.
It was acquired in 2017
while,
founded by former Disney studio head, Joe Roth,
in 2000.
That's funny. Alright.
Yep. Yep. Yep. We just we just made
a connection. We found our multiverse connection there.
We did. Alright. Cool beans.
Alright.
Well You ready for this ride?
I mean, I I'm trying to I'm getting
my mind ready to be melted with all
these multiversal
infinite multiversal
ideas. Because, I mean, if there's a if
there's a multiverse, I mean, obviously, it has
to be infinite. Right? Oh, it's only a
125.
Wait. What? Only a 125.
Just watch the movie.
Dear listeners,
this is your opportunity to escape. Our crew
has just entered into the media projection chamber.
What horrors and madness that they consume are
unknown?
Their mental state upon their return is
unknown.
You have been warned.
Well,
certainly was a movie.
Sorry.
Every time I watch one of these movies,
I just wanna go do kung fu stuff.
I mean,
maybe? I'm sorry. Is it just me or
I have things to say.
Mhmm. But I can't say it on this
side of the spoiler warning. Okay. Well, let's
get into the spoiler free section. Let's do
that. The spoiler free section brought to you
by Charleston Chew,
the great taste of Charleston Chew that sometimes
cuts your mouth like hardened fiberglass.
Oh my gosh. Alright. I'm gonna get my
first I'm in a mood tonight, guys. I'm
sorry. I'm gonna get my first thoughts. And
now that I know who James Wong is,
now that I've looked him up, it makes
sense. Well, the entire time we're watching this,
the color grade
was so blue
and purple.
And
the the way that the future scenes were
really interesting as far as they were, like,
this weird, like, metallic gray, super,
I forgot what you call it. There's there's
a term for the futuristic
cyber,
you know, liquid metal
that was popular back then. Right? Yeah. But
I looked up James Wong's,
history of what he's done. Right? This dude
has done nothing but TV stuff up to
this point. He did Space Above and Beyond.
Great series, by the way. He did Millennium,
another great series. I think you'd like Millennium.
He did The Others, which was okay.
Is that are you talking about the Kim
Not Kim Basinger. Are you talking about that
movie with Tom Cruise's ex wife in it?
No. No. This is a TV series. Oh,
never mind. Yeah. I was saying this is
like, the one was, like, his first real
big movie. Nicole Kidman. That was the name
I was looking for. Everything says TV.
And looking at the the grain and the
color grading of everything, so that's why I
was watching. We're like, it almost feels like
a made for Fox TV
movie,
just the way that the grain and the
color was out. And now I realized, ever
to this point, everything this dude would did
was television.
It makes a lot of sense for me.
Okay. Yeah, dude. The entire time when I
was watching this movie,
you know, I don't know if you noticed
my head kinda bobbing to the side, like,
at night at the Roxbury.
But the entire time in my head, I'm
just like, I'm blue.
Shout out Eiffel sixty five that your Europop
album was a life changer for me. But,
yeah, dude. This movie was so blue. It
was so blue. So blue.
Like and I and I'm into, like, color
tinted movies like that, like, if they have,
like, a color theme to them. Mhmm. But,
I mean, like, this was
blue on blue on blue,
and the soundtrack was just, you don't understand
me, mom.
The music choices were interesting. I think it's
been a while since I watched a movie
that had lyrics
for the score. Right. And so It's because
they're trying to sell a soundtrack as well
as the movie. Yeah. Yeah. I was like,
man, that's that took me back to an
era of filmmaking.
It really did.
Yeah. That that that
to compliment
what you just said there, that was another
thought that kept going through my head that
I can say was spoiler free is it
has been
such a long,
long
time
since I have seen a movie that felt
so
of a time period as this movie did.
Mhmm. Like, this movie
literally felt
like we pulled it out of a time
capsule.
Like,
I remember this movie
feeling cool and sleek when I you saw
advertised on TV. Oh, yeah. You know what
you know what I mean? Just watching it
now, it feels
so
outdated.
I
I half expected to I I wanna go
back. I wanna see if there's music videos
based on this, kinda like,
with, the Godzilla from '99
with kiss of a rose.
Like Oh, kiss of a rose came kiss
of a rose was on, Batman Forever. That's
right. That's right. What was the one,
oh, gosh. It's in my head. And let
me and let me tell you, let me
tell you, sir,
Batman Forever soundtrack was a straight
end to end banger. It was a real
I defy
anybody
to find a bad song on that soundtrack.
The album came free with the comic version
of the movie. And and if you
if you email us and tell me which
song is a bad song on there, I
will delete you from my friend list because
you are a liar.
Pellegrino.
Oh my gosh. But, but, yeah, man, just
kind of an era of, like like, they
put these lyrics with the like, they're trying
to sell music videos and stuff like that
time. Yeah. At the same time, this is
the era where Jet Li was doing stuff.
Like, we talked about earlier, he did a
movie with,
who was it? I can't remember now. It
was a rapper.
DMX.
Yeah. DMX. Cradle to his grave. Yep. And
so it was that era where he was
doing that kind of stuff regularly. I mean
must
die. And,
bro,
he
does wire work like a champ. Oh gosh.
Jet Li, like, he came out at a
time. It was post it was post crouching
chicken hidden nugget.
I try to respond to that.
What's that? I try to respond to that
statement.
No. Don't get me wrong. Don't don't don't
don't get me don't get me wrong. I
love Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, but it kind
of insists on itself a little bit. I
mean, it there there's a little bit pretentious.
There's a little bit of pretension there, Dallas.
Come on. I mean Come on. Chiyo and
Fat was a and and Michelle, you they
were they are great actors and actresses.
No. I'm I'm not I have an artistic
piece. It was an artistic piece. That
let me let me let me tell you
something. Let me tell you something. If that
I can do have nothing but respect for
a movie
that started
a trend
in movies that lasted
so flipping long that it became
so grating to see
fifteen
years later with the magical kung fu swims
through the air wire work.
But that was a trope in in those
movies anyways. Like No. I I I get
it. I get it. And I and I'm
I'm building up my annoyance
for a fact here. Perfect. I gotcha. The
the the point the point I'm making is
in this we're it's it's great we're talking
about the Crouching Tiger instead of the movie
we're actually watched. But,
the point I'm trying to make here is
Crouching Tiger did something so well the first
time out of the gate that everybody
that tried to do it afterwards just made
it seem cheap. I gotcha. And so I've
seen it done so cheap I've seen it
done so
incorrectly
for so long
that it cheapened the effect for on on
future watches going into it. Right. But I
can tip my hat at how original it
was in bringing that to the western culture.
Oh, yeah. Definitely. But, like, even far back,
like, '91 is when he did once upon
a time in China, the first movie. And
they had a wire work in that. They
had it in Black Mask. And he
is just
it is magical to watch him work. Mhmm.
And, what I liked, though, about the wire
work is
the fantastical aspect of the wire work made
sense because of the storyline of this movie.
Oh, for sure. For sure. Like, the storyline
made the fantastical
flying around so much more reasonable because of
what was taking place. And
I think one thing being I'm I'm starting
to find a lot of ways to talk
about things that kinda poke me a little
bit without spoiling it. So this is great,
you know, that we're kinda working through it
like therapy. This is be therapy. That's what
this show was.
But, no.
I just lost my train of thought now
because I was trying to do that that
bit there. Right. That makes me mad. I
gotcha. Gotcha. I'll say this. One of the
things I'll point out while you're thinking about
it is I can't help but wonder if
this era because in this era, all the
sci fi movies made the future look kinda
the same. It was these slate gray walls
with metal and stuff like that. And are
you familiar with the term millennial gray? Sounds
familiar, but I don't think I could put
my finger on an actual definition. It is
this idea
that,
that if you go into the households
of millennials that have been able to go
and paint their houses or paint their businesses,
They're all this gray color. And as I'm
watching the scenes, I'm going,
are we coded for this because of the
how we viewed sci fi back in the
day? Like, again, that liquid metal style and
everything else? Mhmm. Mhmm. Okay. I remembered what
I was saying now. The other thing that
kinda graded on me on this movie and
this is this is gonna be a hot
take. Okay? So if there's somebody out there
who disagrees with what I'm about to say
or possibly could be offended by what I'm
about to say, hey. You know what? I'm
sorry.
Make your own podcast about how terrible I
have of a take about this movie.
But what I'm what I'm gonna say is
that for me, I have a hard time
watching kung fu mixed with sci fi.
Really? It's you you know how there's some
people who can't do sweet and salty
together? Like, they're they they'll say that it
it doesn't go together? Or there's some weirdos
that I used to do a podcast with
that claim that mint and chocolate don't go
together?
Who said that?
Half the cast on playing games with strangers.
Those poor people.
I know it. Well, for me, sci fi
and kung fu just they don't go together.
Like, it's like seeing the color blue and
the color red directly next to each other.
I can't focus well on either.
Right.
And, like, it it Kung Fu feels without
context in a futuristic setting for me. So
with that, like, what were your thoughts on,
like, the matrix?
I had similar thing. Well, no. I I
will I will retract on that because the
context within
the matrix
made sense because it was some it was
a a computer program. It wasn't
do you see what I'm saying? Because for
me, kung fu is something you spend a
lifetime
you know, I I understand the dance systems
and how they work
and things like that.
I also understand that a lot of traditional
kung fu's really aren't that great for personal
defense and are more for show. Fuck.
Hey. I have a sci fi,
I mean I I I want I want
I I wanna interject that out there one
more time. That that's just my opinion.
Kung fu feels
more natural to me in a more traditional
setting.
Mhmm. And
maybe that's just me being an idiot white
man, and I'm totally okay
admitting that.
I
know very little about
Chinese culture and Chinese tradition because like I
said, I
kinda leaned into Japanese culture and tradition
art.
Right. So I I have a kung fu
sci fi movie that we need to do
later. Okay. Timecop.
It was Jean Claude Van Damme. For why?
I Right on the heels of him ruining
Street Fighter. No.
I have fam.
Fam. For real. For real. Like, since we
did the time cop episode, and I'm not
like, I'm okay. Stepping outside of like, I'm
I I'm here. Watch. I'm gonna cut a
hole in the multiverse right now, and I'm
gonna step outside of the fabric of to
this of this show into the real world
to say, I have had no joking now.
I have had the hardest time
watching
Jean Claude Van Damme in anything
after after we did our show on Timecop.
Right.
In in in
reading about how he acted.
I'm not I'm not not Timecop. I'm sorry.
Streetfighter.
Yeah.
In in how he acted on the set
of that while Raul Julia
was there dying
to give
a great performance
on something he knew was shtick
for his son before he knew he was
going to pass away.
Right. And
Jean Claude Van Damme
sir.
Once I know a person's
character, it's hard for me to see past
that when they act. I get that. I
totally get that. Well, should we jump into
I'm sorry. I didn't mean I didn't mean
to to get that power going
going into the next section. Yes. Let's go
ahead and get into the spoilers.
Ladies and gentlemen,
the spoiler section.
Okay. Some spoiler stuff that we got to
one. First off,
the teleportation scene tripped me out at first
where they where they hopped back to the
other dimension. You mean where they cut their
life into pieces
to get back to their resort?
Exactly.
The, it reminded me and I I bet
you it's the same studio who worked on
it of the way that,
Spawn did their teleportation scenes.
I think that's that. Spawn came out, like,
right about the same, about a year beforehand,
two years beforehand. I could see that, but
you know what it kind of reminded me
of? And I'm gonna step back a little
bit further back into the nineties when I
Mhmm. When I felt I oh, yeah. Something
else we were talking about before the show.
I was I'm having some Mandela effect because
I remembered seeing this movie, like, in the
late nineties, not in the February.
So,
but
it it what it reminded me of was,
two two other movies. One, lawnmower man. Oh,
yeah. And then two,
it was that Russell Crowe movie.
Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe.
I think it was called
Virtuosity
where Russell Crowe was a virtual serial killer
inside a,
computer program trying to get out because he
was a training program for Was that virtuosity?
Something like that. I know what you're talking
about. You know which movie I'm talking about?
That was virtuosity was yeah. Russ Crowe and
then the Washington. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I
remember this movie. Man, I thought I thought
it would be in a hot minute.
And first thing, I'm talking about repository of
useless information. That's the reason why we have
the show and and why I'm on it
is because I know a whole bunch of
crap that can't profit me anything in life.
Oh, man. I thought you're talking about, Johnny
Monica first.
Oh, no.
Isn't that also on our list our to
do list for this year? Probably.
Or have the DVD somewhere. I've never seen
it. Oh, man, dude. I am a fan
of Keanu Reeves, though. For some reason, I
just find him endearing.
Right. Maybe it's because he still plays in
a garage band and believes in the dream.
Possibly. Possibly.
Alright. So,
so, yeah, the the teleportation scene was interesting.
The movie is so fast paced. Like, we
jump into it, and we are going
hard,
from the word go. Like, it's crazy. But
I appreciate it in the front end where
they have the the two scenes where you
they have where they're they're arresting you law
or the they're they're going through this jail,
and they are,
trying to act, to
escort one of the one of the Jet
Li characters, Lawless.
And then they flash forward to the other
universe,
and it's, Jet Li's character other character who's
escorting a different prisoner. But there's those little
little details they have. Like, on the TV,
you have Al Gore as president,
and then you have another TV where, Bush
is laying out universal health care for everybody.
So I appreciate it. Like, they were they
were really working to make sure that you
had those small touches of differences of the
universe outside the fact of because sometimes you
have those those weird
other universes things, and it's like, we're gonna
make it so, like, the dressing the way
they dress is completely weird and different all
of a sudden. You know?
That was one thought that I did have
in this movie was that I wish they
would have put a little bit more
emphasis on the differences
of of the universes that they were showing.
Mhmm. Because,
I mean, I'm not I'm not talking about,
like, demolition man style of dressing or anything.
That was another movie I thought about while
watching this. It felt like demolition man at
times. I mean, they're birds of a feather.
But,
like, I would have liked to have seen,
you know, just some minor things, like some
Easter eggs in the background, like, where if
you weren't looking for it, you would have
missed it. Mhmm. Like, maybe a Burger King
with golden arches on it. Right. You know?
Or, you know, make up some brands that
don't exist.
Yeah. Yeah. Like like, Quentin Tarantino does that
all the time in his movies. Like, you
you have you've seen the Kill Bill movies.
Right? Mhmm. Like, the Apple brand cigarettes that
have rum coming out of them with it's
just
it's just really weird
Yeah. Yeah. Nuanced things just to throw in
the background to see if anyone's paying attention
to other things. You know? Definitely. Definitely. I
would have liked to have seen that. But,
I mean, I I think that would have
had required a writer who had a little
bit more creativity
than what was put on display for this
movie. Not to say that this movie wasn't
creative in its core theme.
Mhmm.
But I think that the
director and or writer was so focused on
the central
on the central
narrative that
the surrounding
world was kind
of afterthought
or just there to serve the purpose of
the central story and thing else.
Part of me wonders if it's a level
of inexperience with doing movies. I'm looking back
at the IMDB. The the other guy who
worked on it,
besides James Wong, was a guy named Glenn
Morgan. He was the other writer. And he
also did almost exclusively TV things
up until he's the one that actually did
Final Destination.
And I'm wondering if that's that's the problem
is
they're used to having,
like, huge, long, you know,
multi episodes to lay out a world and
build some stuff up here. And so they're
on their first outing, they're doing a movie.
They're like, we gotta throw stuff in there
quickly. I mean, maybe.
So I got a trivia thing for you.
Okay. So you know the opening scene where,
Jet Li is, like, kicking all the guards
around in that,
that little car bay?
Which universe? The first universe or the second
one? The first universe of Lawless.
Okay. Yeah. Alright. So when Yulong was doing
all that, there was a clip that was
released
early as a promotional piece for this movie,
and they screwed up because this clip was
not supposed to go out because the CGI
had not been done at all on it.
What you saw was
a scene where Jet Li
is, like, kicking these tennis balls or hanging
from the ceiling. Like, there's tennis balls everywhere.
And he's kicking all these tennis balls around.
And and everyone's going, oh, wow. This must
be some sort of training special, like, some
sort of training specialized training he's doing in
the movie. Well, when they watched it, they
were like, this wasn't in there. It's because
if they
that was the scene that they it was,
marking out where he's supposed to kick for
the, CGI kicking all the soldiers around. It's
crazy. Now that was that was some that
was some other things I noticed about this
movie. Like, I remember this movie being, like,
supposed to be when it when it came
out, it was supposed to be this big
visual feast. You know what I mean? Like
Yeah. Yeah. That that was kinda
the style of the time. Right. Because every
movie had to have so much visual
splash across the screen at any given moment
that it was enough to send somebody who
had ADHD
into
epileptic shock.
Right.
But the point being
that there was so much
it it was such it was such a
spectacle. It was supposed to be so cool.
And then now coming back to it twenty
five years later oh god. I feel
old. I'm looking at it, and I'm I'm
thinking to myself, wow. Green screen has come
a long way. Go Hollywood.
So far. Wow. CGI
has come a long way. Go
Hollywood.
It's gotten so much better since those days.
I
and and then the final one was, wow.
Wire stunts have come such a fun because
there was a couple times where it just
felt like a giant jump instead of someone
getting thrown backwards from something. It was just
like, oh, no. This does not look natural.
Yeah.
It was
stylized for sure. But but the the thing
about it is is you didn't notice it
at the time when the movie first came
out. And
I and I think a lot of those
dated visual effects in conjunction
with
the
very dated soundtrack,
is why this movie feels
so
locked into the time period that it's from
because, like,
this movie in in fact, this movie is
so
of its era that I
had
I had secondhand cringe at moments watching it
because it was so of its era. Like,
it it's it's like when your parents come
out wearing bell bottoms thinking that they're in
again.
Right. You know what I mean? And it's
just like, oh, no. Don't no. Don't do
that. Oh my gosh. That's so funny. Oh,
man.
Let's see here. So one of the things
that Celeste had issues with was the fight
scene with the MRI because the MRI was
still running. But they're
shooting bullets and all kinds of stuff, and
the magnetic pull of the MRI didn't really
seem to have an effect until they needed
it to. That's true.
That that's a little bit stupid. I don't
even know how a bullet would react in
an MRI if the pull of the magnet
would counter the bolt the
bullet's force
trajectory force,
that that'd be something I'd be interested in
sending the Mythbusters if they were still a
thing. Right. But I'm a tell you something
that was so cool about this movie because,
again, stepping out of the stepping out of
the podcast into the real world again. When
we watched the when I watched this movie,
I was watching it on my PlayStation with
my headphones in. Uh-huh.
Did you watch this movie with headphones in?
No. No. We watched it on our TV.
Oh my goodness, dude.
The MRI scene with headphones in Uh-huh. When
it was making that repeated
kind of knock sound that an MRI does.
Really? Each time each time it did it,
it would it would ping pong each ear
to so you'd have a semi hypnotic effect
going through your head with the knocking of
the MRI.
I'm like, that is such
an ASMR
effect for me right now. Like, it made
my skin
tingle, and I'm like, I could fall I
need, like, a a five hour loop of
this to fall asleep to at night just
in my headphones.
That's so funny. That's also, like, that's the
that's one thing you miss out when you
don't have, like,
huge surround sound systems or everything like that.
Like Yeah. They definitely they they put the
work into this to be a a genuine,
like, blockbuster film where they have good sound
effects. They have good,
soundscapes and stuff like that.
So I like how we haven't talked about
Jason Statham once this entire time. I'm a
I'm a tell you, talking about Jason Statham
for me is kind of an afterthought
just like he felt in this movie Yeah.
An afterthought. Like, he didn't really bring anything
into this except for the stand around and
say, hi. I'm Jason Statham. Like, he definitely
felt like a character that was simply there
for the sake of explaining the story Mhmm.
Like, to to Gittley. Like, that that was
it.
And to be perfectly honest, I would have
rather had the other agent instead of Jason
Statham. I think he had a bit more
character than Statham did. Mhmm. But, you know,
Statham's was Statham was the up and coming
new guy at the time.
Mhmm. I'm looking at Zayendv. He put out
the Ghost of Mars before this.
Statham?
Mhmm. I haven't seen the Ghost of Mars
yet. So
I think you like that. Was that the
was that the John Carpenter movie?
Yes.
Yeah. I it that's on my to to
watch list. I always just haven't well,
for some reason, my wife doesn't wanna watch
it. And watching movies when she's not home
is difficult for me because there's other things
I'd rather be doing, like playing video games.
I get that. It also has Ice Cube
and Pam Grier in it, by the way.
I'm into Ice Cube, but that's a topic
for a different time. I'm more into his
music.
But getting back to what you were saying,
how how they put time and and resources
into this movie. This movie did for in
in $2,001
now, mind you. So
this is post 09/11,
same year.
Mhmm.
This movie was budgeted at $49,000,000,
which is a high Wow. Which is a
high dollar
price tag.
Right. And and at the end of box
office
gross worldwide,
they they it came in at 79,000,000.
So
Yeah.
Kind of successful.
Kind of?
It made money, not much. Yeah. Because what
they don't tell you in that budget
what's not in that budget is the,
promotional.
And boy, was this movie promoted.
Oh, man. How many standees and or posters
did you see that year?
Mhmm. Tons. So much blue.
Crazy stuff. So I wanna give one last
spoiler thing that I really appreciated, and that
was the final site fight between,
the two Jetlys.
Makes you wonder which one had the green
face.
Ew. Like, I genuinely
appreciated the way that Jetly was like, hey.
We're gonna do two different fighting styles for
it. And he had you law fighting in
that very
boxer aggressive style, whereas Gabe Law was doing
the whole very, like,
circular
flowing with emotion type of thing to kinda
highlight the differences in their in their mindsets
and who they were. Like, I thought that
was a nice touch within that fight scene.
Oh my god. Oh my god. I just
I just had the best idea for a
sequel to this movie. Oh goodness.
Hear me out. Hear me out. Hear me
out. Mhmm.
What if
what if
Jet Li becomes
a a multiverse
cop? Right? Like, they he decides to enlist
into that multiverse
institution. They're like and they're like, yeah. We're
gonna take him on because he's got all
these rad superpowers
now. But then all of a sudden, there's,
like, other
he finds out they find out, like, there's
others in the institution that had similar stories
to them. Right? And then Jackie Chan comes
out as an older
like like, an older
person who's gone through a Jet Li's and,
like and so he has all those superpowers
too, and he understands,
you know, the whole the one concept as
well. And they're talking to each other. But
Jackie Chan's talking to him with a Scottish
accent, and they call him the Spaniard
for the sequel.
Oh my gosh.
That's wild.
That would be absolutely wild. Somewhere out there,
there's five people laughing who know what I
just did there. Mhmm. Mhmm. That that that'll
be a little deep cut, little Easter egg
for people who are willing to do the
work and the mental gymnastics of what I
just made Dallas go through.
Oh my gosh. It was the calling him
the Spaniard. I was like
I wasn't sure how how on the nose
I should get with the reference before I
You just bloodied the nose. What are you
talking about?
I just punched you right into it. You
know?
Oh my gosh.
Alright. No. Do we have any final go
ahead. I was I was asking if you
have any final thoughts on it. I don't
have any final thoughts. Do you have any
final thoughts?
I don't think so. Alright. Well, let's, rate
the movie,
Oh, Captain, My Captain. Let's do it. Alright.
Well, here on the final here on the
final shelf gosh. That sound that sounds ominous.
Let's try that again. Here on the bottom
shelf, we have a rating system that is
composed of four different ratings.
First is the top shelf, which you could
be kinda described as
I need to own this movie. I need
to buy a physical copy and
so I can watch this whenever I should
feel the urge.
Middle shelf is I'd watch it if it
was streaming.
You know, I don't think I would own
it, but I wouldn't turn it off if
it was on TV or something.
Bottom shelf is I probably won't watch it
again. I'm not gonna go out of my
way to watch it, but I'm not gonna
go out of my way to tell other
people not to. And the dumpster fire is
I will
make for certain that people in my friends'
friend groups are not hurt by this movie
the same way I was, and we're going
to strike it from existence.
So, captain, my captain,
give me your rating.
My rating
excuse me. My rating is
middle shelf. Like, I enjoy the movie. It's
fun. It's locked. It's definitely locked into a
time frame, but it's entertaining. So if it
was streaming, if it's something that somebody was
watching when I came in, I'd definitely sit
down and watch it. And because, again, I
again, I am a legitimate fan of Jet
Li, though. I enjoy his movies. And so,
it's not one that I'm just like, I
need to go buy this right now, but
I like it. I can dig it. I'm
kinda right there with you if I'm being
completely honest.
Like, this isn't a movie that I'm like,
I need to own this. I want to
have it. You know?
This is a movie that's very much of
its time. And if it was on streaming,
I would watch this on a Sunday afternoon
after coming home from church while I'm
eating some ramen that I just made for
lunch.
Yeah. You know, just kinda watching the TV
in half paying attention to it. That's a
fair assessment.
And if I was actually gonna pay full
attention to it, I would probably enjoy it
for all the wrong reasons.
But, you know, I wouldn't I wouldn't be
like, turn that garbage off if someone had
it on or anything like that. It it's
a very
this movie is as satisfying
as chewing on Play Doh.
What?
It seems like it's gonna be tastier than
what it is. You know what I mean?
It it looks fantastic,
but then once you really
swirl it around on your palate, it's a
big old nothing burger. You know what I
mean? I mean, that's fair. Like, I'm gonna
I'm gonna walk away from this, and it's
gonna be like a fart and a fan
storm. It's a fan story. It's just gonna
be it's gonna be lost, and I'm gonna
be like, what was that movie about? It
was blue,
Jet Li fighting Jet Li,
and a lot of
new metal.
A lot of new metal. Alright. Cool. Well,
ladies and gentlemen, it is a unanimous
middle shelf for us here at the bottom
shelf. Love to hear from you guys. What
do you guys think of it? If you're
on the YouTube side, leave a comment in
the comment section.
Talk to us in the Discord channel. And,
yeah. Well, John, are we ready for something
special? Are you talking about are you talking
about the the,
weak connection section?
Yeah. Before we get there, I had a
question when I was watching this movie. And
as a pastor, I'm gonna rely on your
moral compass to answer it. Oh my goodness.
So the Jet Li that was going through
the multiverse
killing all the other Jet Li's,
was he committing homicide or suicide?
Homicide. There were two distinct individuals.
Fair enough.
Also, a touch of genocide.
I mean, he was technically only killing one
person. So, I mean, is it It's a
whole group of individuals.
But it's just one person. It's the same
person.
Same person, but it's one one distinct group
of people. That's what genocide is. The eradication
of a complete group of individuals.
So wait. Then would that make Jesus dying
on the cross a genocide?
No. No. It would not. Hit the bumper.
This is a We Connection.
Oh, hello. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the
weak connections where we watch a movie and
try to bring out something spiritual, something, encouraging,
something to point you back to some hope,
love, and Jesus. And today,
John, do you have one?
I have some observations, but nothing super solid.
So I have I have a super weak
connection if you wanna put it in there.
I gotcha. Well, for mine, I was looking
at the, the scene where,
Gabe is talking with Jason Statham's character,
and
he's talking about how,
you know,
him and, the other Yulaw, they're they're the
same person, but they're different.
And
Gabe said that he's different because of of
his wife who is now dead. That he
is not the same person as the other
guy because of her influence. And there that
is a whole aspect where the influence of
people's people in your lives does affect who
you are and who you become.
I think about Proverbs twenty seven seventeen, as
iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.
And that's,
you know, I'm simplifying this really. But
you and I, you know, we encourage each
other. We challenge each other. You know, the
things that you have there are things you've
influenced me with. There are things I've influenced
you with. That's how we're supposed to do
things as a community. And I wanna encourage
those who are listening.
Don't second guess guess your influence in the
lives of people. There are people in your
lives who,
you
matter in some fashion. And the way you
treat them, the way you speak to them,
they will affect them both for the positive
and for the negative.
And, even if the it doesn't seem like
they're paying attention, they are. They do see
it. And
your responsibility is simply just to be steady
as best you can as you encourage people
to become what they're called to be. And
that's my weak connection.
Alright.
So my observation kinda stems from the whole
concept of this movie where,
you kill your other selves in the other
multiverse and the energy that connects all the
yous across the, apparently, a 124
multiverses.
So 125.
Oh, yeah. I keep forgetting about the one
with
the actual agency.
Right. But I digress.
That that you absorb that in in that
made me kinda think of
kind of along the lines of,
I'm trying to remember what Galatians five twenty
four,
which is for those who belong to Christ
Jesus have nailed our own sinful
selves on the cross, our sinful
desires are now dead. And it kind of
brought into line the whole concept
of killing your flesh to become a new
creation
Yeah. And become empowered in the spirit.
And,
this is a weak connection in the purest
form in how it relates to the original
the original idea that Ben Avery was doing,
with,
over on Strangers and Aliens,
in that, it really
doesn't. It's a super huge reach as far
as as far as
what I'm saying in in the movie. But
in the same sense, in the in the
Christian mind when I was watching this movie,
that's really something that stuck out to me
was this whole idea
of how it kinda parallels
in sort of a parable for a parabolic
form Yeah. Where,
you know, you you're murdering
you're murdering this other nature of yourself to
be reborn
by energy
from the spirit, if that makes sense. Yeah.
Yeah. So it it's just kind of a
weird wrap around to be like, hey. This
this is an illustration for that. But it
works much in the same
about just as well as all the,
analogies that youth pastors made about,
about the matrix back in the nineties when
those came out. So
All the human videos.
So
well, everybody,
it's been a ride. It's been fun.
I think we're at the end of the
episode. Did am I missing anything, Dallas? We've
been gone for a long minute. No. Just
I wanna encourage you guys to check out
our social media. We're on Facebook and Instagram.
Look for the bottom shelf. Hang out with
us at Geek Devotions. Geekdevotions.com
where,
you'll find articles. You'll find links to our
other podcast show, the weekly YouTube show for
Geek Devotions.
And,
that's that's mostly it.
Yeah. I think that's it, bud. Alright. Well,
if you like what you're hearing,
go check us out on those Discords like
Dallas said. I wanna hear from people out
there. I love interacting with you guys.
You're gonna start seeing our upload rate go
up,
going forward now that I'm not on death's
door with being sick and all my house
trauma is behind me, and I'll might get
into that's a mother point. But Right.
Wanna thank everybody for being so patient and
waiting for our comeback.
And stay tuned because we already have another
movie locked and loaded. So We do indeed.
Alright. Until next time. Stay devoted. Here's some
love. Bye bye.