R Rating Ep2 - Highlander Franchise

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Mongoolie's movie madness. It's a sight to behold. Mongoolie's passion for films never close up. From classics to new releases. He's in the. [00:00:16] Speaker B: No. [00:00:17] Speaker A: Mongoli's movies. Let's start the show. [00:00:32] Speaker C: Hello, everybody, and welcome back to our rating the show, where me and two of my friends talk about an entire movie franchise. We're gonna break it down by movie, give it an overall score, and then place it on the board and see where it lands on the list of franchises. Now, this is only episode two, so it's only gonna have one other thing to compare to, but over time, that board is going to get pretty full, and it'll be pretty interesting to see where things land. I'm going to introduce you guys to Will and Brian. All right? Now, today, we're taking the audience's choice and going with the Highlander franchise. Now, we're not going to do the entire franchise because, my God, there is so here to take over, and I just don't have that much time in my life. So we're only going to talk about the four movies that were theatrically released. Now, there is a video game, a TV show, comic book, animes. There is a lot in this franchise which is baffling. But the only thing we're going to Discuss is those four movies. Highlander 1 comes out in 1986. Now, this is a movie with a budget of $16 million, and I believe that that is adjusted for. Adjusted for inflations. But I'm not 100 on that, because details about this movie are a little bit spotty to find, but it makes only a 5.9 million return at the home theater. Now, my understanding this is probably a bit of a cult classic, but that's a pretty major loss to start a franchise. It's impressive to me that they even got a sequel, let alone everything else that came after this one. But it sounds like this movie is pretty well beloved by audiences, at least at the time in the mid-80s, if not by, you know, the audiences in the 2000s and 2000s that we're living in currently. Do you hear much about this movie ever? Like, does this come up in any conversations other than the one classic line? There can be only one. [00:02:10] Speaker B: I mean, who Wants to Live Forever is also pretty classic. [00:02:19] Speaker C: I'm not going to lie. I completely forgot that song. Head words. I just remember the tune, the melody to it, and as soon as you started singing, I was like, oh, my God, that's absolutely right. I forgot about that. [00:02:30] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. [00:02:31] Speaker C: I Mean, it's shocking how close that brought back PTSD just recently. [00:02:36] Speaker B: You're not supposed to show your hand, Dan. [00:02:38] Speaker C: I know, I'm sorry. [00:02:40] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't think. I think maybe people are age ish who grew up and maybe saw this younger and was like, wow, this is awesome. Like immortals battling to the death with swords. Pretty cool concept for an action movie when you're, you know, whatever, 10, 12 years old. So I think maybe people our age ish around that time probably reminisce about this movie a little bit time to time. But I don't know how many are re watching this movie. [00:03:12] Speaker A: It. It definitely probably caught the attention of the 80s hair band genre kind of thing. Like there's lots of tie ins, especially for the first three movies with that, the music, the hair. A lot of the feel of these movies feel. Felt like it was trying to capture some of that, that, that fire, if you will, from the late the 80s. [00:03:36] Speaker B: Cheese ball wonderment, you know, like a spectacle, I guess is the word. It's a spectacle. [00:03:45] Speaker C: Yeah. Now, it started off as a book franchise or at least a book, and then it was transferred over to movie screenshots. And I have to say, like from a plot perspective, just from the idea of it, it is actually a pretty fun idea. Like just the idea that there are mortals living among us hosting their own little wars that we don't really know anything about, all vying for the championship or the prize as it is revealed. But describe what the prize is and nobody seems to be going for it all that hard. Like when we meet Conor McGregor, he's just sitting in a wrestling match for some reason because he definitely looks like he wants to be there. [00:04:20] Speaker B: Can I stop you? Yeah. It is Connor McLeod of the McLeod. [00:04:25] Speaker A: Oh, what did I say? [00:04:25] Speaker B: Not. Not McGregor or whatever you just said. [00:04:29] Speaker A: Oh, I think he's getting. [00:04:33] Speaker B: This. [00:04:34] Speaker C: Fair enough. My bad, my bad. Two hours of sleep, we're going with it. All right. Connor McLeod. I should have that somewhere on my screen because I can remember it. We first find him at a wrestling match for some reason because again, he doesn't look like he really wants to be there and ends up getting pulled out aside and gets into a sword fight with another. They're not Highlanders. Right, because he's the Highlanders. They're just immortals. Do they have a term for them? [00:04:58] Speaker A: Immortals is the term that. [00:04:59] Speaker B: Yeah, I believe in some of the other content that has been made. They do classify some of the others in different ways, but he specifically is of a Highlander immortal. [00:05:11] Speaker C: Gotcha. They they fight to the death. And of course the only way that you can kill a Highlander is to actually remove their head from the body. Now some of the stories talk about you can destroy the head as well, but it sounds like there was one of the, the TV shows does explore that where like they cut the head down like lengthwise and the person does regenerate from that. So I don't know, there's playing pretty hard and loose with those rules. But decapitation seems to be the one way that like guarantees you don't come back. And then the Highlander who did the killing was will gain the power of the Highlander that they killed, making them stronger, giving them the quickening, if you will. All of this in theory could be a really interesting, really well done movie or at least a storyline as we said, maybe fitting TV shows better than movies because it could be more of like a week to week kind of a thing, but from just a storyline perspective. That doesn't sound bad to me. [00:06:04] Speaker A: Yeah, no, it's not horrible. My problem with it was the initial setup for this movie kind of dictates that it's a one and done movie. And of course there's five films, two TV shows, there's a web series, there's an anime, there's many comics, manga books, all kinds of stuff. So they change the rules as they go. The rules start to evolve and change and by the fifth movie they change. Just completely ignore the rules, completely disavow even the meaning of there can be only one to. I, I, I really didn't like it. But they tried to fix the problem with they can't make content for this because of the rule that there can be only one. And every movie tries to dictate who that one is. And and so they have to evolve that. But this idea of immortals working amongst us was a really cool idea and I think they probably got to that the best in I think probably getting some of them mixed up. It would be number four, the rule set that they had and the numbers of immortals that were milling about throughout society and the world. Like there were a lot in number four, hundreds if not thousands of immortals amongst us playing the game as they started calling it then. And I liked that rule set better than the original rule set where it felt like there was like five or six maybe and you don't even get to see hardly any of them. And they get to the end what felt like really quickly and it was over with. [00:07:44] Speaker B: Well, I believe because the movie was set to be a one and done right. Like that's the feel you get. So it. And we. I, I actually don't mind the way the movie is set up. I like how they go from the past to the present and you get to little bits and you learn how the game works and what they. Their lives are about as movie unfolds. But I had the feeling that it was set at the gathering time, which is the big finale when all the immortals die, one is crowned. [00:08:18] Speaker C: They're all drawn to this one. [00:08:20] Speaker B: It made sense that there was only three or four immortals at that time for that movie. And, and, and it concluded in a proper way. I suppose. It's just when, you know, Hollywood, we're trying really hard. Yeah. When Hollywood goes in and says, okay, people like this, which I don't know who decided that. Let's make more. That's when problems arise. Right. Because it's a fixed one and done story that you then have to expand out in some way. [00:08:55] Speaker C: Yeah. Well. And they do an interesting thing, which is in the second one, we're jumping ahead just a tiny bit. Where in the second one, it starts off where he did actually win the prize in the first movie. [00:09:05] Speaker A: Right, Right. Like he does gain the knowledge of all men or whatever. [00:09:08] Speaker B: Like, like, yeah. [00:09:09] Speaker C: Well, they kind of changed what the prizes, I think, number of times. [00:09:13] Speaker B: And. [00:09:13] Speaker A: Yeah, I think that's kind of why he helped build the. The shield in number two, because he had this wisdom of how to solve that problem. [00:09:22] Speaker B: Okay. Okay. Can I guide us into going movie to movie here a little bit just to. Just to kind of get us because we're kind of all over the place. [00:09:34] Speaker A: I want to hear your take on how this plays out. [00:09:36] Speaker B: I'm curious just because I want to start by saying, let's focus on Highlander and I'll have Brian start. Can you let us know what are the rules? What. What do you feel the rules are? What. What the immortals are doing and how the whole game works. [00:09:58] Speaker A: So I have no idea why they exist. [00:10:02] Speaker B: Fair. [00:10:03] Speaker A: No idea why the immortals exist or how they come about. And keep in mind, I'm focusing on Highlander 1 because rules change and evolve as the series goes on. We either get answers or some idea or whatever. But. But in Highlander 1, there's no explanation as to why or when a. An immortal is born and no reasoning as to why. Sean Connery wants to help Connor. [00:10:33] Speaker C: Yep. [00:10:33] Speaker A: McLeod. Right. Conor McLeod. Ramirez wants to help McLeod. There's. There's no reasoning for that. He just wants to be a nice guy. There's no explanation of why they can, like, feel each other's presence or how they find each other. They know that they're supposed to be drawn to each other in a final match at the end. We don't know where or why that's. And then the prize is not really explained until toward the end of the movie where it's basically stated that it'll be the wisdom. You'll. You'll be able to encompass the wisdom of all of man. Like, like, you'll be able to get everybody. Like, like, not straight up read minds, but understand all the wisdom there is. [00:11:17] Speaker B: I think, I think more than that, you can actually influence the mind of men. [00:11:23] Speaker A: Okay, I didn't get that myself, but I'm not going to go against it because it was very ambiguous waters we were wading through. Now, one thing that I wasn't under, wasn't sure of was would they lose their immortality once they became the one? I believe that was never stated in the first movie. [00:11:43] Speaker B: It's not stated. [00:11:44] Speaker A: I don't believe it's not in the second movie. It was. Yeah, and of course that was muddy too. Let's try to hear. But that's kind of what I got it. Bunch of people out of nowhere are born with immortality and. And as they go about, they start to figure out they can't be killed and that they start being drawn to each other for some unknown reason and they need to cut each other's heads off. [00:12:07] Speaker C: Yeah, I will step there. One, one second. It's not that they can't be killed. It's when they're killed, that's when they become the immortal or whatever it is. Like, like that's when their, their power awakens within them. [00:12:18] Speaker A: So they need to be. Oh, I missed that. [00:12:20] Speaker B: Yeah, they need that. They need to. [00:12:22] Speaker C: Because you see him die on the battlefield and he wakes up and you're like, why? What's going on? How am I here? [00:12:25] Speaker B: What is happening? [00:12:27] Speaker C: I don't know that they explain it super well in the first movie, but that is, even if it's not explained until later on in the franchise, it doesn't break canon in the way that they do it like most other things in the franchise do. [00:12:40] Speaker B: Okay. Was there anything you wanted else you wanted to add, Dan, to what you believe, the rules, or how they work in, in the Highlander first movie. [00:12:50] Speaker C: Are you leading this down a path because you actually know? [00:12:52] Speaker B: No, I just wanted to see knowledge. I just wanted to see how clear or unclear it was. And on top of that, after, I just want to ask Was that enough for this movie? Did they give you enough for this movie to be like, okay, yeah, you can make a movie out of this. [00:13:10] Speaker C: Fair enough. So if you're walking into this completely blind in 1986, I don't know that there's. Is there narration? I don't remember. Is there narration at the very beginning saying anything, or do you literally just get thrown into that wrestling match? [00:13:21] Speaker A: It's Sean Connery, and he, like, reads a little quote, and that's it. [00:13:25] Speaker C: Okay, okay. You do get something before the first battle with swords for no reason. Excuse me. I think Brian touched on most of it pretty well. I do agree. Like, I ran into a bunch of the same issues he did, where I'm like, as soon as Ramirez shows up, I'm like, why are they. If he has to kill him? Because there can be only one. Why is he training him how to be a better warrior before he inevitably kills? Like, does he want the challenge of it? Does he. Is he so bored? He doesn't care about the prize so much as he just wants somebody to live through the ages with. Like, what is his motivation? And the movie never really gives us anything on that that I'm aware of. Right. He just kind of shows up one day and is like, hey, I'm a Spaniard with a Scottish accent who lives in Egypt. And you're like, none of this makes sense. [00:14:10] Speaker A: I think that's why so many of the other movies, like, they try to explore some of the reasoning to these seeds of questions that we had from the first one. They try to, like, give reasoning to it later on. We have what? Not the Citadel, the sanctuary, which is like, hey, this is why people might be friends, you know, and we can get to that later. But. But, yeah, I think to say that there was there enough for me walking into this in 1986. Bunch of dudes fighting sword fights and stuff, to rule the world with some rock music. Yeah. Okay. [00:14:45] Speaker C: All right. I do like the fact that you're not allowed to fight on. On hollowed ground or on holy ground. [00:14:51] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:14:51] Speaker C: Holy land. Although I wish that they'd actually done that, because it feels like they break that a couple of times and there's no consequences for it whatsoever. But what I would have liked even more is the Gathering. Instead of it being like, oh, this is the end time for the immortals. If the Gathering had been more like a. No. Every five years, we're drawn to each other, and we have to kill. But then. Then, like, in the meantime, no bueno. And that would kind of Give you a good reason for why there is this gap where you're not attacking people. Because even in the first movie, Clancy Brown's character, whose name I'm blanking on, is it crawling? Kurgan attacks the McLeod castle, kills Ramirez. Spoilers for a 40 year old movie. Looks like he's gonna kidnap Mrs. McLeod. And then you just cut to like a little bit later and they're like Connor and his wife. For some reason she's still alive. I don't really understand that. And they're still living in the same location. So like it's not like they had to run away from, from Clancy Brown or whatever. Like they're still living the exact same spot. You can see the castle in the background. She's alive. And you're just like, I don't understand any of this. Like, why did he not just wait around for him to show up if his goal is to kill him? And now he's. [00:16:01] Speaker B: So he's stronger. [00:16:01] Speaker A: Plot holes like this. Yes. [00:16:03] Speaker C: Oh, for sure. But like I would have thought with. [00:16:05] Speaker A: Regular old plot holes where stuff just doesn't make sense in a, in a moment to moment basis. [00:16:09] Speaker C: Oh, I totally get it. But I would have thought he'd be like, okay, cool, like I'm going to take you and run away now because I want you to, to survive. And instead they're just like, now we're just going to chill here. Like, we're good. [00:16:17] Speaker A: Well, his now, his wife didn't mention to McLeod her husband. She didn't mention to her husband that she was raped by Kurgan. She never mentioned that to him. So maybe he didn't quite understand what happened. I don't know. Maybe she gave him a different story. We weren't really told that. We were just told that she was raped and she didn't say anything to him. [00:16:37] Speaker B: So yeah, I think a lot of this is from what I understand when this, this movie was made, it was based on a gentleman who wrote this script story in college. It's like one of his first scripts. So again like early development writing. So to me, I felt Sean Connery's whole purpose, which didn't make sense because immortals are supposed to be off in each other's heads, was to further explain what immortals are and how everything works. That's he's simply a plot device for this very minimal plot carrying absolutely the. [00:17:17] Speaker A: Way that plot device carried the movie. He was the, the redeeming quality of the film. For me though, he didn't make any sense. I am so glad he was there because I Was entertained by him. [00:17:27] Speaker B: Absolutely. A lovable, lovable character. Well played with. Who knows why he ever agreed to it. [00:17:37] Speaker C: But I mean, that's exactly what I. [00:17:39] Speaker B: Was about to say. [00:17:40] Speaker C: Like, did he lose a bet? Was he hard up for money? Like, the IRS been calling, like, what's going on? [00:17:44] Speaker B: I felt similar to Connor's wife that was just like, you know, she didn't tell him anything. So that later he has more reason to win this fight at the end of the movie. Right. Another plot device kind of reveal. [00:18:02] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:18:04] Speaker B: Okay, so the movie's kind of a mess. Is that what we're feeling? But yeah, as a. [00:18:11] Speaker A: The franchise is kind of as a. [00:18:14] Speaker B: Fantastical 80s action rocker movie. [00:18:20] Speaker A: Let's. [00:18:21] Speaker B: Can we tell a little bit about what we loved about this movie? [00:18:28] Speaker C: It'll be a short show. [00:18:29] Speaker B: That's fine. And then we can get to the ratings and maybe what you didn't like and why you're rating it is what it is. [00:18:37] Speaker C: Go for it. If you. If you got something positive to say, that'll be. [00:18:40] Speaker B: I think we already mentioned Sean Connery was a standout in this movie. The moment he enters the screen in his amazing outfit, you just instantly are drawn to this character and want to. [00:18:52] Speaker A: Know that bright red regalia that he has, like, it just accentuated his vibrant character. Right. Like he. He came out and was completely contrasted to this movie with his vibrance and lovely. [00:19:07] Speaker B: And I believe, like, partly his character warranted, but it just felt like he didn't care what this movie's about. He was just having fun with that character and it just happened. That's what that character was. Right. So I feel like he was a highlight. And I feel like Queen doing music for this movie is an absolute highlight. And it's apparent because it comes back time and time again throughout the franchise. I just love that a band as amazing as Queen would sit down and write songs for this wild idea of a movie. So that's. That's. That's what I thought was good, aside. And then aside from that, I think it hits the mark when it comes to action movies. You know, there's sword fights throughout. Are they good? Maybe not. [00:20:14] Speaker C: But. [00:20:14] Speaker B: Okay, okay, let me. I'll tell you. [00:20:16] Speaker C: I'll tell you a little. [00:20:16] Speaker B: I don't know if you guys know this or not. This movie came out in 86, as Dan mentioned. And another movie which, you know, has been renowned for great sword fights, the Princess Bride, came out in 9:87, one year later. Now, the sword master and stunt coordinator were one in the same for Both movies. [00:20:45] Speaker C: Interesting. [00:20:46] Speaker B: Their names are Peter diamond was the stunts and Bob Anderson. And they have worked on an incredible list of movies. Star Wars, Indiana Jones, the Mask of Zorro, Lord of the Rings, Princess Bride, Highlander. Like they know what they're doing. And, and I'm guessing you both agree that Princess Bride has some pretty fantastic sword fighting in it. [00:21:08] Speaker A: Excellent. [00:21:08] Speaker B: So here's the rub. Why is Highlander sword fights just not up to par? Christopher Lambert is extremely near sighted, almost legally blind. [00:21:26] Speaker A: So lenses, thick lenses and he can't wear contact lenses. [00:21:32] Speaker B: So he had to learn all the fights very different than any normal person. And I think it took away greatly from the action in this movie. [00:21:45] Speaker A: Yes. So they covered it with terrible cinematography too. You have a person swinging their sword going, and then they cut to another person being flung away from the attack. You never see the sword strikes ever. Unless they're doing the, the most basic little tang tang the garbage. It was really horrible. We get these super duper close up scenes and then somebody flying away and that is carried out through every single one that Christopher Lambert is a part of. Until we get to 4 and 5 where you have a new protagonist who can sort of fight. And it's. They still carry it a little bit in four, but we, we move away from that. [00:22:27] Speaker B: We'll get there. Yeah. So that, that's the reason why the idea of the action movie, the idea of these immortals, you know, fighting throughout time, there can only be one is all very cool and makes for a great idea for a movie. But when you cast somebody who is almost legally blind to do the sword fights, it really kind of falls flat in a bad way. [00:22:53] Speaker C: So the problem I have with that she was actually raises more questions for me in this franchise that I already have. So many questions. Number one would be why would you hire Christopher Lambert, whatever his name, Christopher Lambert, when he can't act, he's not Scottish, he can't sword fight, he's legally. [00:23:11] Speaker A: Blind at the time. [00:23:12] Speaker C: Like what, what is the draw to this character? Because like again, what Brian just said, like you've got somebody like Arnold Schwarzenegger who can also barely speak English in the first couple movies he did, but is so charismatic that you don't really care that much. [00:23:25] Speaker A: They can't. As a robot in one of his first movies. [00:23:28] Speaker B: Sure. [00:23:28] Speaker C: But you know what I'm saying, like, you know, it works to some extent. Like at no point did, did Christopher work for me in these movies and now you're saying he's also, you know, there's, there's Reasons the movie are as bad and most of them are based on him. Why. Why would they go with like is he somebody's. [00:23:45] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:23:46] Speaker C: Cousin or nephew or something? [00:23:47] Speaker A: I think they had like 12 choices at the time. [00:23:49] Speaker C: I think, I mean they got shot. [00:23:51] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:23:51] Speaker C: They had some budget. [00:23:52] Speaker A: From what I remember, from what I. [00:23:54] Speaker B: Remember reading is that the producers saw him in or the director saw him in Tarzan and he's quite. He was quite physically fit and. And could move very well and thought he had a great look for the character. And they didn't know that he won. Spoke little to no English. He had to learn English for this role, I believe. And that he didn't. He wasn't able to see but they like wanted him desperately. So they cast him before ever even knowing. [00:24:26] Speaker A: I have to interject here. I do not find. And I'm not a great judge of what men look like, but I don't find Christopher Lambert to be that attractive of a male lead. And yet they put him. And in the first two movies. I swear to God those movies are one step away from a Cinemax porno. Even the sets look like that cheesy like low budget porn scene. And. And he's in a bunch of sex scenes. Especially in the third movie. He's banging it out all the time. Never takes his shirt off. Did. Was he afraid of sit ups or something? I just thought Christopher Lambert was a terrible drag on the entire franchise and I think his name was propelled to epic heights for no reason. I think Sean Connery pushed him up a mountain single handedly. [00:25:17] Speaker C: I feel like there are scenes where he doesn't have a shirt on. Maybe not the sex scenes, but I feel like there is like a scene where he's walking around with like a kilt and like something over his shoulders but not a shirt on. But I. Maybe I'm misremembering that or remembering like promotional material. [00:25:28] Speaker A: Either way was unmemorable. Just goes to show that he doesn't have a rock and bod. And I, and I just. It was like for as many times as people were getting naked and. And laying out some hot chicks, they should have cast somebody who was a little bit more spicy in front of the camera. [00:25:43] Speaker C: I love. [00:25:44] Speaker A: I could have done without those scenes myself, but it was the 80s for sure. [00:25:48] Speaker C: I loved however, that for all three of the first movies that he's in, he's got a very like. [00:25:53] Speaker A: He. [00:25:53] Speaker C: He uses the exact same move on all three of the women which is to tell them that he's immortal and instantly. [00:26:01] Speaker A: In number two, he's like, he's like a 90 year old dude. Gets, gets the quickening, stands up and he's like, I'm immortal. And bangs around in the alley. [00:26:11] Speaker C: In the alley. [00:26:14] Speaker A: It was that fast. [00:26:17] Speaker C: I loved it. I just. When you realize that's his move, you're like, all right, somebody's had 500 years to perfect this. [00:26:22] Speaker B: He knows what works. I mean, I'll counter a little bit. I think he was in good shape when he did Tarzan. I think, you know, what we consider a masculine man to look like was different in mid-80s than it is now. So I think he was a physically able person. But yeah, I mean, it is what it is. There is a lot of maybe missteps that. But I also think that's what led this to be a cult classic. Because a lot of people enjoy this movie because of how bad it is. And the other movies got made and watched. Yeah, it got made and watched, you know, the franchises because of the badness of them. Right? The bad and Scottish accents, the, the, the just furrowed brow. For 99% of the movies, there's all these like elements that people just loved. And, and I fall victim to that as well. I don't know, call it victim, but I fall into loving those things as well. Because there's a, there's a fine line for me of a bad movie that's unwatchable and a bad movie that is hilarious to watch and, and, and enjoy. [00:27:37] Speaker A: You know, speaking, speaking of bad, that was hilarious to watch. Clancy Brown's performance as Kurgan was bad. And I enjoyed. [00:27:45] Speaker B: He went, he committed as well, especially. [00:27:48] Speaker A: When he shaves his head. I was like, this is gold right here. This is so terrible. I'm now enjoying it. That was a positive for me. I don't think it was intentionally meant to be that bad, but I did, I did kind of get a kick out of his character as a villain. And you can see that they tried to mimic that same villain type throughout the next two movies after they copied it, you know, almost identically. [00:28:15] Speaker B: Okay, so I spoke about what I enjoyed. You might not have anything that you enjoyed. Maybe we should maybe get to rating this. And if you want to poke more at this movie, that's totally fun too. [00:28:26] Speaker C: Before we move on too far, there's one scene in particular that I just have to touch on. I mean, not like, okay, a. The training montages I thought were absolutely hilarious because nothing they're doing would help you in a sword fight, whatsoever. Including like Krueger at one point has like, he's sitting with his arms out, and he's like, rolling the sword between his arms. I'm like, what? When is that going to help you in any way, shape, or form? Like, what is going on right now? But it was just like, whatever. It brought a smile to my face. [00:28:53] Speaker A: Together. That's not gonna work in a sword fight. You know, you don't stick them together like Legos. [00:28:58] Speaker C: But it looks cool. [00:28:59] Speaker B: It looked badass. [00:29:03] Speaker C: The other scene that I just. I. It just blew my mind a little bit is right after he meets. I think his name's Brenda. She's walking home down an alley, and he pulls her into a construction site. Do you know what I'm talking about here? And he pulls her and he's like, oh, you're in danger. And my brain's like, kruger has no idea who this chick is. Like, there's no way in heck that she's in any danger whatsoever. And by pulling her in, you've actually put her in danger. Then they get attacked, and within like, eight seconds of the fight starting, there's a police helicopter above them with the light beam on them, just checking in, like, what's going on? I'm like, that guy deserves a goddamn medal. That guy was on the scene instantly. [00:29:39] Speaker A: That's law enforcement for you, right? [00:29:42] Speaker C: Like, the rest of the response team on this one is insane. And it was just one of those, like. I'm gonna call it a fun scene because, like, my brain is just exploding with, like, what is happening right now. [00:29:52] Speaker B: It's just kind of like your lights. Right now. Your lights are going crazy. [00:29:56] Speaker C: Yeah. Thank you. Bad guy or bed guy? Sorry for following. So appreciate you. [00:30:00] Speaker A: One. One thing that I. I needed to bring up, and I don't. I don't know if I like this or hate it, but it was the early aerial shot. Now, keep in mind, they did not have drones. They have drone cameras back in this. But in the wrestling one, I'm told they literally brought a helicopter into that stadium for that shot. Is that true? Yeah, because. [00:30:23] Speaker B: No, no, no, I don't believe so. [00:30:25] Speaker A: That's. [00:30:25] Speaker B: I believe they actually had a rig system that they invented for this that they. [00:30:31] Speaker A: Okay. Because it was. [00:30:32] Speaker B: It was amazing. [00:30:33] Speaker A: It was amazing to have that kind of an aerial shot swinging over the heads and zoom in on Christopher Lambert sitting up in the nosebleed section. That was. I was watching that, and I was like, when was this made? That's incredible that they can pull this shot off and then they do more of it and more of it and more of it. But it's the open scenes where they're out on the Scottish hillsides and they're going by the. The cliffs and they do it to death. And then to get worse, they continue to do it in every single movie afterwards. And in number four, they're doing it in high scene speed. It's like the helicopters on cracks zipping around. I'm like, this doesn't even look cool. This is terrible. [00:31:16] Speaker B: With that. [00:31:17] Speaker A: Yeah, it was. It was a great opener. And then they should have been done with it. [00:31:22] Speaker C: It's a great. Because I hit on the same thing where I'm just like, wow, this is a pretty good shot for what we're doing here, because right. There's no drones back then. But also, again, I have no idea why we're at the wrestling match, let alone why they're, like, creating camera works to make this amazing scene just to show him looking bored. And somehow. Now, here's a question I've got for, like, the overall series as a whole. Are they just carrying swords around everywhere they go? Like, do they just 100 have a sword on them? Is that why they're entrenched? [00:31:47] Speaker A: Yeah, until four, when they bring in other useful weapons. [00:31:50] Speaker C: Yeah, because, like, there's just no security anywhere back in the 80s, pretty much. [00:31:55] Speaker B: But yeah, they. [00:31:56] Speaker A: Well, with a police force that can respond as fast as they did. He got in his car and couldn't make it out of the parking garage before half of the NYPD surrounded him. Okay, they don't need security, man. They're responding fast. [00:32:10] Speaker C: The helicopter, the police. No, that's the other note that I had at that point. What did the police think they're responding to? Because there's nobody else in the parking lot. They get there and they arrest this guy for, like, he's. He's taking. He's going very fast out of what. He's probably insane, so. I understand, but what do they think they're arresting him for? Because there's no way they know somebody was murdered up there. [00:32:30] Speaker A: I don't know. They. Yeah, that was totally out of context. And so was the police dialogue. And then the interrogation scene. All also right. When they push him up against his car, he says, don't move. Don't even breathe. And I'm like, no one says. And that took me out of the film so fast. I was like, who's writing this script? Then they get into the interrogation scene and. And the one cop is like, all right, Connor, tell me what you know. And he's like, I don't know anything. And he's like, all right, we found this guy in his sword down below. What do you know about that? He's like, I don't know anything. It's a really old story. Like he's just telling him everything. It felt like Christopher Lloyd or Christopher Lambert was interrogating the police force. It was ridiculous. Then he punches the deputy in the face and they're like, yeah, let him go. Yeah, it would have made no sense. It was ridiculous. [00:33:23] Speaker C: Okay, so other than like. Because I feel like he gets interest for Brenda and Brenda works with the police force. So other than that aspect. And I, I apologize as we'll get into like. I. I struggled with the ending of this movie. Does the police storyline go anywhere or do they just eventually just peter out of the movie? Because I feel like there's a lot of scenes with the police early on. You had a couple of detectives, you. Scenes with detectives that don't have Brenda or Connor in them. It's just the two cops going back and forth about how they're going to track Connor down. And then I don't remember any resolution to that storyline whatsoever. [00:33:56] Speaker B: I don't. [00:33:56] Speaker C: Did I just. [00:33:56] Speaker B: No, I don't think it really resolves. I think they. Brenda helps move it away from Connor and onto probably Kurgan or something. But like, again, I feel like it's just a plot device to get Brenda in the sack. [00:34:12] Speaker C: Okay. [00:34:13] Speaker A: Oh, they're blowing up the rooftop and there's not a police officer in sight at the end. You're absolutely right. They waited all the cops at the beginning and then they're just like, yeah, we ran out of cop budget for this movie, so we're just gonna let them flood this rooftop, knock this giant sign down, which reappears in the fourth movie, by the way. And then, you know, fall through the windows and blow all the windows out of this building. No police helicopter in sight, Nothing. It was. Yeah. Complete. Yeah, it was. It was. It was terrible. [00:34:42] Speaker C: All right, so we've talked about the first movie for quite some time and I feel like it's probably for good reason, but nonetheless, we should probably rate this thing and move on to the second one. What do you think? [00:34:50] Speaker B: Absolutely. Okay, I'll go last. [00:34:53] Speaker A: Want me to start real quick? [00:34:54] Speaker C: Sure, go for it. [00:34:55] Speaker A: Okay, so I went with cinematography, which this movie was real poor. I get out of a hundred. I gave this a 19. What? It was. It was wonderful with that opening sequence. And then they did it to death. We talked about that. And then these up close shots trying to cover the fact that they did not have any good choreography with the sword fights at all, and that was terrible. So I really didn't like the cinematography. It was hard for me to watch because I wanted to see what was happening and I couldn't. Then I had scoring and audio. They had some cool songs. Everybody's mentioning, like, Queen in chat here. And there were some cool songs, but it was just loud, like, rock music for me. And it felt like, okay, they're just trying to catch this kind of brand theme for the film. It wasn't well placed, and the. The sound effects and the audio of them screaming or the lightning and stuff just sounded really bad. Even for the time, it didn't fit very well. So I gave that a low score as well. Acting and dialogue was absolutely atrocious all around. Sean Connery was the redeeming quality of this. Of this film. That's why I gave it 12 points out of 100. That's all Sean Connery. Sean Connery had all 12 of those points out of 100. Everything. [00:36:11] Speaker C: Oh, my God. [00:36:12] Speaker A: Atrocious. [00:36:13] Speaker B: Okay. [00:36:14] Speaker C: I thought my score was bad, and. [00:36:16] Speaker A: Unfortunately, they gave him some pretty dumb lines too. So that was. That was unfortunate. The plot, however, for the 80s out of the Gates, I liked this idea, right? And I did like how they went back and forth. So you had, like, multiple timelines running simultaneously as you had character development. It was okay. I gave this 40 out of 100, which is pretty generous, but it's better than anything else in the entire franchise, actually. And I felt it kind of moved along and it was. It was okay. The ideas were okay. They just weren't very well developed. I think as a first attempt at this style of movie and this kind of theme, it was. It was pretty good. It was. But it still. There could have been so much. So much more to it. And then, of course, the actual plot holes that we have discussed, which are. It's riddled throughout this entire movie. My overall enjoyment started out high. And then when I saw Fazel back flip away from Christopher Lambert, I threw my notepad in the air and I said, forget this movie. And I was so upset with it, and I could not enjoy the rest of it. And he just. From then on, I was just watching how much I hated this movie until Sean Connery came by and went, that's okay. [00:37:36] Speaker B: That's it. [00:37:37] Speaker A: So out of 100, averaging those scores, I gave this movie a 22 out of 100. [00:37:43] Speaker C: Okay. Okay. I thought the 12 was your total. [00:37:45] Speaker A: No, no, no, no. That was. That was just for the acting. And dialogue. [00:37:49] Speaker C: Gotcha. Okay, okay, okay. [00:37:50] Speaker A: 22 for my total. [00:37:52] Speaker C: Fair enough. So I'm going to go next. And I broke this down similarly by category for the music. I kind of am trying to figure out how I want to score music just in general. I think what I'm going to start doing is kind of giving the soundtrack like, a 50 to start, and then if it either is good, it'll go up, or if it, like, takes me out of the movie, it'll go down kind of a thing. Does that make any sense? Because, like, there are some times where, like, you can get through an entire movie and not remember the soundtrack at all, but be like, but that's kind of okay, right? Like, that was kind of the issue we were running into with Mad Max is, like, if you don't come across the soundtrack as being overly negative, that's actually kind of a positive for the movie because that means it was just kind of working in the background. Unfortunately, a lot of the music in this, like, I am not an 80s hair metal kind of guy. And so a lot of times, like, they get in the car and like, you say it's just loud, and it's like, it's not good. It's just loud, and it's like, well, now I'm focusing on this instead of whatever is going on on screen. So it did kind of take me out a little bit. As much as I loved do you want to live forever? It's way more of a meme than a good song. So, like, it's kind of classic. And I honestly, I'm thinking about putting as a channel Redemption point in for my channel. So it's kind of like that. That might happen, but I didn't love it that much. So I gave music a40. So it's like, it's okay. Like, it's serviceable, but it's not good. The cinematography, I agree with you. They're trying some things. Some of it worked out okay. The wide shots didn't bother me as much as they bothered you by the end of the movie. What bothered me is how many times you get the exact same shot nine times from just a slightly different angle. Like when the glass breaks at the end and you watch the glass break 47 times in a row because they're so impressed with what they did. Just felt masturbatory instead of actually good. And I'm just like, okay, guys, we got it. We saw the lightning. [00:39:33] Speaker B: We're good. [00:39:34] Speaker C: Like, move on. The graphics probably were fine for 1986, but are really hard now, like, they're really bad by today's standards. So I gave this a pretty low score as well. The acting, I like Sean Connery. And this movie had me questioning if Sean Connery is actually a good actor or if I just really like Indiana Jones. You know what I mean? Like, am I just bringing a lot of goodwill to this character or is he actually good and he didn't give. [00:40:00] Speaker A: Great lines in this. They didn't, unfortunately, no. [00:40:02] Speaker C: And the thing is, Sean Connery, like, this is the first movie in a franchise you're not bound by anything. Technically. There's a book. Nobody's read it. Who cares? You can do whatever you want with this. Why the crap don't you just make him a Scottish person? And then he just sounds right? Why does he have to be a Spaniard? Why is he living in Egypt? None of these are explained. None of it makes any sense. Like, change the name Ramirez to McGregor. Now he lives down the street. Makes sense for why they would meet as opposed to he sought him out just to train him. It doesn't make a lick of sense to me that you have a Scottish person playing a Spaniard when you've got a British. I don't even know where Lambert is. [00:40:37] Speaker B: From playing a Scottish Lambert. [00:40:40] Speaker C: None of it makes any sense to me whatsoever. So the acting, I gave, like, a 15. And again, all of that is Sean Connery. The plot. I actually kind of like the idea of this movie. Again, like, from a concept perspective, not necessarily an execution perspective, but from a concept perspective. It's kind of a fun idea. It could very well. Like, I. I saw a lot of stuff when researching this or looking this over about them reviving this franchise, like, from the ground up with Henry CAVILL As. As McLeod. And a part of my brain is like, that's got potential. Like, that could work. I like him. He's a better actor. I don't know if he can do a Scottish accent, but, like, it can't be worse. So, like, all of that is, like, okay. The plot's actually kind of okay. I gave that a bit of a pass. Huge holes. So it's not like I got a high score, but I get a 40, which is like, the highest I could give this movie entertainment value. As I mentioned, I watched this movie, like, a year ago, and I don't remember the ending. So I either turned it off and walked away and completely forgot that I'd done that, or I fell asleep during it, but either way, I don't remember the ending. Watching it this time, I swear To God, the amount of times I had to rewind this movie because I kept falling asleep. And so when I told you, like, I don't remember that police plot line went somewhere or not, because I legitimately might have just forgotten to rewind at some point. I honestly don't know. The entertainment on this one is super low. I gave it a 10. I. I did not enjoy this movie. I have no desire to go back to this one. I'm shocked. I watched it one and a half times in my life. Overall, I gave this a 28. [00:42:15] Speaker B: Nice. All right, well, bringing in the ringer. We know I always raise the bar or plummet the score. So what is it going to be today? I mean, I talked. [00:42:28] Speaker A: I don't know how much lower. [00:42:29] Speaker B: I know, I know. [00:42:30] Speaker C: So what do you think? [00:42:34] Speaker B: Is this a good movie? No. Is this an entertaining movie? I think so. I think there's a reason why there's so many movies, tv, there's so much media made about this. And I think you guys are right. It's one of the best elements is like the core story of these eternals, you know, fighting almost endlessly, it seems. And these just like an interesting premise that you just can't not enjoy. So I think there's so many, like, elements of potential in this movie. And when I look through the lens of an 80s cheeseball action, massive practical effects, massive bad CGI effects, and then just like how it became this cult classic, there's merit to that some way. Is that making a good movie? No. Does it let me raise the bar of it a little bit? I think so. And I always tend to give the benefit of the doubt a little bit to the first of a franchise because it's the one that sparked something to allow it to continue and grow into something beautiful or something horrendous. I feel our last episode with Mad Max, it bloomed into something beautiful in the end. And this, not so much. Maybe. [00:44:05] Speaker A: We'Ll see if Cavill takes the role. [00:44:07] Speaker B: I don't know. Maybe. Well, yeah, yeah, sure. There's always time. And I think there was good elements along the way that may have been better than this, but there's also a lot of not so much. Anyway, let me say just at the end, wrap it up with a score kind of between genre, acting, writing direction, and if it holds up or did it entertain. I gave it a 35. I gave it a 35 in the end, which is, you know, still a horrible score. [00:44:36] Speaker A: Of those of those things, what was the high point for you of those of Those things listed. What was the hype? [00:44:41] Speaker B: I think. I think if I think genre, it really fits in, like the core story of. It really fits into action really beautifully. Was the action executed well? There's elements like the practical explosions and crazy stuff that's going on in the movie. [00:44:57] Speaker A: Is the cars entertaining in the underground? Yeah. Parking lot was. Was pretty. [00:45:02] Speaker B: The dude flipping down the parkade. You may have hated it and it took you out, but for me, that is action. It's bad, but it's hilarious. [00:45:12] Speaker C: It technically is actually hilarious. [00:45:14] Speaker B: And so that's. [00:45:15] Speaker A: And it's. [00:45:16] Speaker B: And that's maybe why it's a little higher rated for me is because it definitely dipped into the line of, this is a bad movie, but it's hilariously bad. And so that, like, makes me enjoy it. And I can't help that. It's just who I am. I love bad movies. So those kind of things that maybe took other people out I kind of enjoyed. And was the writing great? No, not overly. Right? Like the dialogue. Not great. [00:45:41] Speaker A: Not at all. [00:45:42] Speaker C: No. [00:45:43] Speaker B: Yes. Yes. [00:45:44] Speaker C: You're trying so hard to be nice. I appreciate you. [00:45:46] Speaker B: Because again, the core concept of the story is there. That was written. Right. Like the Immortals Highlander, like his. His love of Scotland and. And the aerial shots, although overdone, were kind of beautiful. [00:46:02] Speaker A: Right. And. [00:46:03] Speaker B: And like, just like him reliving and. And the cuts back and forth through time to tell the story. I kind of enjoyed that. And I thought it really gave bones to something that could be good. I just don't think it held up. It's. It just didn't. Didn't help. Didn't hold up at all. So I. I gave it a. A very nice 35. A very giving 35. [00:46:27] Speaker A: All right, are we on to number two? [00:46:29] Speaker C: We are on to number two, I guess. Before we move on, I will just let you guys know. The first move has an IMDb score of 7, and we gave it a total of 28. So pretty far from the mark on that one. And I want to say that's a series high on IMDb. [00:46:46] Speaker B: I think part of that is because. [00:46:48] Speaker C: Buckle in, kiddos. [00:46:49] Speaker B: Partly because it's a cult classic, so a lot of audience are going to go out of their way to rate that on IMBD if they enjoyed it. Right? [00:46:58] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:46:58] Speaker B: Yeah, that happens. [00:47:00] Speaker C: All right, so Will, you kind of just gave us a little bit of a rundown, but I'm gonna let you take the lead on this one because it sounds like you have a better understanding of both parts of the second movie. And which one's which and what's going on there. So if you want to lead us off on this one. [00:47:12] Speaker B: Thank you, Dan. I would love to. Now, I'm not sure how much Brian knows about this, but there are two versions of Highlander 2. And I went out of my way to watch both of them because I'm crazy. One and two. I was. I was. No, not that. Just genuinely interested in the difference. So the theatrical release was called Highlander the Quickening. And the major difference, if you are questioning if you watch the right one or not, Dan, is are immortals aliens from the planet Zeist? [00:47:50] Speaker C: I don't remember them having a name to the planet, but we definitely saw them in. Were they in the future and they went back in time or in the past? They went forward. [00:47:58] Speaker B: So they were in the past and went forward in time. In the movie you watched, they were on a different. [00:48:03] Speaker C: Okay. [00:48:04] Speaker B: They were on a different planet called Planet Zeist that was futuristic and they had guns. They were shooting. There were spaceships. If you didn't see any of that. [00:48:16] Speaker C: Okay, you. No, none of that rings. [00:48:18] Speaker A: Your planet was also dying, right, Their futuristic planet, wasn't it also. [00:48:23] Speaker B: Yeah, it was kind of in a revolution. They were trying to overthrow the power to be. Because they were kind of. Kind of an insane, enslaving people and things like that. But anyway, so the theatrical release, people hated. And part of the reason why it turned out the way it did was the movie went over budget. So the producers took over and they finished the movie. And then once the audiences just razzed on it and hated that the Highlanders were aliens, and that's the reason. And they were sent to Earth as a punishment. And there is no. The prize at the end is if you are the last immortal, you can come back to the planet Zeist if you choose to. Those are all things that were in this that weren't in the Renegade version that we were required to watch. And anyway, so the director, once all this hate came in for the theatrical release, went in and recut, trying to remove all elements of the aliens and that portion of explaining what the immortals are, which everybody wanted to know from the first one. So, come on, you guys. You asked for this. [00:49:41] Speaker C: Did not ask for. [00:49:42] Speaker B: No, they asked for answers, and they didn't like the answers. That's a difference. But anyway, so that's why Renegade came to be and is, I guess, favored as the official movie. But let's be honest, the rest of the franchise ignores it's ever existed. So it doesn't matter. Right. It doesn't matter that they re edited. It doesn't matter that they were aliens because the whole movie's erased from the rest of the franchise. [00:50:13] Speaker A: Another glaring difference from Highlander 2, from the rest of all of the movies and franchise, is the shield and the ozone layer. Now remember that in. In 1996. Was it 96? It was 86 in 1986 was kind of the beginning of the culmination of the destruction of the ozone in. In reality. And in 87 and 88 it kind of was the peaking. People genuinely thought we were going to die because we were opening up this hole in the ozone layer. It was a very important thing going on in society. And so they brought this element into the movie. And I don't know why, other than it was a hot topic prior to, like when they started filming this, when they wrote this script. It was a hot topic, but that's it. Otherwise it has nothing to do with the content of Highlander. Like it was, you know, completely outlandish. It made it more sensitive science fiction than just a fantasy fiction. [00:51:16] Speaker B: So I think Dan probably loved this movie. He loves sci fi. [00:51:19] Speaker A: It felt a bit unnecessary for the film other than to put them in a futuristic state which didn't feel like it was just a slummy cityscape was all they really did with it. [00:51:32] Speaker C: So I'll agree with you, at the time I was watching it, I was thinking that. But you brought up a good point when we were talking about the last movie, which is that he actually gains the wisdom of all man, or whatever you want to call it, and so this actually does a decent way. Well, I was wondering if this is a way of showing that he actually is legitimately a good person who's using it for the benefit of mankind. Right. You jump a horde a little bit. What are you going to do with this immense power that you were given? I'm going to help save everybody. Now it's used negatively, unfortunately, but that wasn't his intention with it. He wasn't part of the company that was hurting people. He was trying to save people. So maybe that was the intention is just showing like. No, like all these other immortals are using it for or want to get the prize for their own nefarious reasons. He legitimately wants to help people. It's just showing that he is actually a good person. Now do they need to go that far to do it? Probably not. But you said it was a hot topic back then, that people thought they were going to die from this. Let's have the immortals. [00:52:25] Speaker B: Yeah. It makes it feel more real. [00:52:28] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:52:29] Speaker A: This evil corporation, because. Okay, so Ramirez comes back. We don't really know why Ramirez comes back. And why he dies is another mystery. Maybe you guys can explain this to me, too. He suddenly gains the force and then evaporates. But Ramirez comes back and joins him and the girl on this quest of righteousness and goodness or whatever to save humanity and bring down the shield which he generated in the first place. But it was for good reasons. And then the bad guy. What's the evil guy's name in this? I forget. He joins the evil corporation, and that's his team for the movie, which he ends up killing him anyway. Why did they need the evil corporation? [00:53:17] Speaker B: Why? [00:53:18] Speaker A: There were so many unnecessary things in this movie to generate some sort of a story. It seemed unnecessary and it seemed lazy to me. [00:53:28] Speaker B: You're missing the whole alien aspect. Run. They trimmed it for you. [00:53:35] Speaker A: But they just cut it out. I mean, the. Yeah, it. [00:53:40] Speaker C: So going along the topic of, like, just unnecessary. Why is this even happening? And maybe this is explained better in the version where we know that they're aliens and what's going on there. But for. The version I watched is Michael Ironside is from the past. And they're kind of watching what this guy's doing with his thing. He's aging now, because that's what you do when you're the last immortal left on Earth. And they decide, you know what, even though he's aging and gonna die, we should go and kill him. And by doing that, they actually trigger the entire movie happening. If they just sat back in the Lazy Boys, right? Like, I'm immortal. I'm fine. I'm just gonna hang out here for another 20 years. You're aging pretty quick. [00:54:15] Speaker B: So that is a plot hole. Because in the Alien version original, I guess, if you win the game or whatever they call it the Gathering, you can choose to go back to Planet Zeist and have your name cleared of all horrendous things you're, you know. [00:54:39] Speaker C: Accused. [00:54:40] Speaker B: Of, or you can choose to live your life as a mortal on Earth. And that's what he chose. [00:54:50] Speaker A: But they also positioned it that he forgot that he forgot where he came from. Right? And, like, Ramirez is like, remember me? Or whatever. And there's, again, so many just weird plot holes. This one was a disaster. And I understand why most of the other movies and series ignore it. It was such a hot, steaming mess that they're just like, yeah, let's just kind of not. Let's pretend that one didn't happen. [00:55:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:55:18] Speaker C: Yeah. I loved even, like, from the very beginning of this one. Again, we start off with him having tickets to an event that he clearly doesn't want to be there for. And I'm just like, is this just his go to. He just goes to things he hates. I don't understand this character. And we start off with the opera singer, who I swear to God is lip syncing, and I'm just like, oh, cool. So we didn't hire actors for this one either. Cool. That's. That's all right. And it just, like, starts the entire movie off on this tone where I'm just like, oh, this is gonna be a rap. [00:55:43] Speaker B: To be fair, in most movies and tv, they lip sync because they need better audio quality for recordings. [00:55:52] Speaker C: Fair. But it doesn't usually punch you in the. [00:55:53] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:55:54] Speaker B: Whether it's a good lip sync or bad one is. Yeah. Very, very much makes or breaks it. So. [00:56:03] Speaker A: Yeah. So can you guys explain to me how they brought Ramirez back? [00:56:10] Speaker C: Just say his name and he'll come back. That. That's. [00:56:13] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. It's in the movie, right? It's in the. [00:56:17] Speaker C: They do mention that, like. Like, Sean Connery does say at one point, like, just. Just say my name and I'll be there. I'll come for you. No matter when, no matter where. Like, they. [00:56:26] Speaker B: They still have the Quickening ceremony. Right? Like, he and Ramirez. Connor and Ramirez. [00:56:34] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:56:34] Speaker B: Have, like, a weird, glowy gunk, and they call it the Quickening. And that connects them. [00:56:41] Speaker A: Oh, they're, like, holding the. The. The sword handler, whatever. Yeah, yeah. He's, like, touching. I remember, in the beginning. [00:56:47] Speaker C: Okay. [00:56:48] Speaker A: In the beginning. [00:56:48] Speaker B: That's what connects them. And then he says, say my name and I. I will appear. [00:56:55] Speaker C: That's very possible. I don't remember that whatsoever. I thought the Quickening was, like, after you kill somebody, that, like, surge of power, you get a. Okay. [00:57:05] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:57:06] Speaker A: This is another adjustment to the rules here also, as. As the big fan is going to chop their heads down. The most elaborate way to trap and kill someone. I haven't seen something like this in a long time. They lure them into this, like, maze of a prison cell, and they get into this room where the doors slam shut. Keep in mind, the doors lock shut. And this fan starts coming down to chop them into bits. And Ramirez holds it up, like, not touching it, like, using the force, and just holds it up, and he's like, go. And then the doors just open, and they go. And then he disappears into a sparkle of mist. [00:57:50] Speaker B: Yeah, it was awesome. [00:57:53] Speaker A: I Don't get it. [00:57:55] Speaker C: He came back as a spirit, and he used up all of his ghostliness, and then he was evaporated. [00:58:01] Speaker A: I don't think, honestly, that's. That's actually the best description I've ever heard so far. Dan, thank you. [00:58:08] Speaker C: I mean, I have to say, like, as much as, like, sorry, go ahead. [00:58:12] Speaker B: Use a spinning fan room. Otherwise, how are you gonna kill that immortal? Right? So that's why the fan was there. [00:58:20] Speaker A: But. But, like, the people who built this place didn't. [00:58:23] Speaker C: I know, I know. [00:58:26] Speaker A: And why do the doors just open. [00:58:28] Speaker B: Up all of a sudden? [00:58:31] Speaker A: Why is there a fan that lowers? Who builds a room like that? [00:58:35] Speaker C: Something to do with future corporations. Have you not seen any James Bond movies? [00:58:39] Speaker A: Here's a. Here's another. Here's another. [00:58:41] Speaker C: He's James Bond, and that's how you kill him. [00:58:43] Speaker A: When they're escaping Alcatraz in the Rock, and there's, like, flames shooting out of the ground for no reason at all, and they gotta roll through them. Why are these rooms in existence? [00:58:53] Speaker B: Awesome? [00:58:54] Speaker A: They take me away from a movie in any of the. Other than maybe an Indiana Jones movie. They take me out of the film. [00:59:00] Speaker B: That's fair. With Indiana Jones, it makes sense because there are traps. No one happened. [00:59:04] Speaker A: It's a temple. It's full of booby traps. [00:59:06] Speaker B: Right. [00:59:06] Speaker A: Not a prison runner or something. I don't know. But not this. Not a power station in, like, the Himalayas or wherever the heck they were. [00:59:16] Speaker C: I have to say, as much as it didn't make any sense bringing Sean Connery back and I don't know how they tricked him to do two of these movies. He was. Is easily my favorite part of this movie. Like, as much as I questioned him in the first movie, he was just a joy in this one. Like, every scene with him. Well, the first couple scenes with him in it where he's, like, figuring out where he's in. I mean, like. Like, not immortals can get caught up with the time they're in very quickly because he comes from, like, the 1700s or something to the 2100s and is just, like, cool planes. I got. [00:59:47] Speaker B: I've got a pass. [00:59:48] Speaker C: Everything he did here's, like, fine, right? Like, don't mind me. [00:59:52] Speaker A: I'm just gonna get on this earring. I've got a wardrobe and a limousine. Hey, I'm certain. That video was amazing. He's watching the. The emergency flight video on the plane, and it's just showing, like, the worst things that could happen on the plane. That was hilarious to me and his Charm with his female companion in the sea. I was like, oh, yeah, that's classic Connery. So, yeah, again, I enjoyed Ramirez. I just hated what they did with his character. Again, it was just. It was. [01:00:25] Speaker C: I. I don't disagree with that, but he was just the most entertaining part of this movie. Like, I. I was actually laughing for a couple scenes. Like, that was just a good time. The passport aside. And, you know, the fact that not. Not the fact that the pearl was worth a lot of money, I can understand that. It was the fact that the guy at the shop knew how much it was worth. Like, he just looked and was like, oh, you can clearly buy a suit in a limo with this. [01:00:46] Speaker A: Like, yeah, that's. I have no idea. Like, that could have been like a Cracker Jack toy. I don't know. But, yeah, so that was in. [01:00:54] Speaker B: I think, Dan, you are questioning. What were you questioning? You were questioning something. [01:01:00] Speaker C: Oh, so many things. [01:01:02] Speaker B: No, now I can't. I can't pick what I was gonna say about it. Oh, the reason. No, no, the reason why Sean Connery in this movie, period. [01:01:13] Speaker C: Oh, like, Like. Like the actor, not the fault. [01:01:16] Speaker B: Actually, I believe I read a few things, but one of the reasons this movie got made is that Christopher Lambert and Sean Connery enjoyed working together so much that they wanted to do it again. Really? [01:01:30] Speaker C: Okay. [01:01:32] Speaker A: And it also explains why Ramirez would want to befriend him in the first movie. If they were time travelers or aliens from a distant planet and they went. They would. Depending on the version you watch, they would want. Like, he would want to help out his buddy, and it would kind of explain the first movie. Although he doesn't clue him in in the first movie about them being aliens or time travelers or whatever, obviously. So, yeah, another glaring hole. I. I don't want to spend too much time on this one. This was not a great film for me. It frustrated me, and I don't have. I think. I think I've covered everything I want to say about you guys. Have anything more? You want to go into number two? [01:02:14] Speaker C: Oh, my. I do have to touch on the train scene for a second. As much as the. [01:02:18] Speaker A: Oh, that's right. [01:02:19] Speaker C: Airplane video got your fancy. The train scene just absolutely did it for me. And what on earth is happening right now? There is a scene for me who's not seen it, where, like, the villain gets onto a train, a public transit subway, I guess, and it's just like, let's see how fast this thing can go. And apparently it can go light speed. [01:02:38] Speaker A: 607 miles per hour, which apparently is 10 g's of acceleration because they were flying to the back of the train. Did you catch? Yeah, yeah, guys. [01:02:49] Speaker C: Yeah. Did you see? Literally ripping skin off of people. The mocks were so high. And he's just laughing, having a great. [01:02:54] Speaker A: Time on that train. That was vicious. There were babies. [01:02:58] Speaker B: Businessman. Well. [01:03:03] Speaker A: What? One, two, three. I can't remember if they do it in four, but there's a scene where they scare somebody. They get in a car, they take a hostage or hostages, and they drive really fast because they can't die and they want to scare the crap out of somebody and they do it. In all of the movies there was a car scene with the Kruger. There's the train scene in number two. Then in the Sorcerer, they take the kid who for a car ride on the tarmac with magical planes or something. Like, they always do this scene in every movie. And this one was dumb. I agree, Dan. It was. It was terrible. [01:03:38] Speaker C: It was terrible. But I was pretty entertained for that, like 45 seconds or whatever it was. I'm just like, what is happening? [01:03:43] Speaker A: How did they film that? Did they film it like they turned the car on its end and just let people fall to the back to show that massive acceleration? [01:03:51] Speaker B: Yeah, probably. [01:03:52] Speaker A: Which me, me, as a lover of science and physics, that offended me. I was like, it's not 10 GS of acceleration and it's not going 647 miles per hour like this. And then he drives it through a wall and it just kind of like pops out the other side. [01:04:10] Speaker C: Stops. [01:04:12] Speaker A: Yeah. What? [01:04:14] Speaker C: No. Yeah, the entire thing was just, like, mind boggling. I'm like, I don't understand how any of this works. But other than that, I'm. I'm pretty okay to move on. [01:04:22] Speaker B: Yeah, that's fair. I'm good to rate this pad. Bad boy. [01:04:27] Speaker C: Well, you went last. [01:04:28] Speaker B: Yeah, sure, I can go first. I'll probably still have the highest score. This one fell a little short compared to the first one because, one, the original idea is kind of played. And two, there's aliens if you watch that one and not if you didn't. And it. It really bothered me watching because I watched Renegade first. I didn't watch a theatrical first because everybody said Renegade's the superior and somewhat fit continuity. But there's like, times in the movie when they're talking about things from the theatrical release that are left in and you just can't get out of because you're trying to work with fully edited movie. Right. And so that really bothered me in this movie because it. It was so lopsided of like, what is happening. The edits, the scene to scene. Didn't make sense. After Connor just like beds that woman immediately the morning after, they're talking about how he's an alien. That's what they're talking about. It's not even close to, oh, this is what immortals are. It's like, no, I. I'm here because I'm an alien. That's what they say without saying the word alien. So it's like really rough and they just left that in. But I have to come back to it super fast. Trains killing people and over the top, like, silliness jumps into my. This is hilariously bad. [01:05:59] Speaker A: So there was the bird twins. The bird twins. [01:06:02] Speaker C: And that's again like the green Goblin twin. [01:06:04] Speaker B: Futuristic and alien. It's like, what? It only works that they're aliens, not that they're these crazy Highlanders with technology that's way beyond what is in the world. It's so funny to me, but Queen still there, so I love it. Sean Connery was like the best part of this movie. His little montage of getting his suit on and just living his best life, just happy to be alive for six some unknown reason and just knowing exactly where Connor is and how to get there. Afraid of on the plane, how he ever got on it, who knows? Like, so funny. So funny in all the wrong reasons. But that, like, brings me into the movie where it does the exact opposite for Brian. It feels like. So overall, with all that said, 25. That's the score. It was. It was bad. [01:06:59] Speaker A: So that went down 10 points. [01:07:01] Speaker B: 10 points from the other movie. Yeah. [01:07:03] Speaker A: Yeah, okay. [01:07:04] Speaker C: Brian doesn't even have 10 points to go down. [01:07:10] Speaker A: So for me, the cinematography was about the same. Maybe the slightest of upticks here, but it felt like it was. It was the same. Too close a shot. I couldn't see. The fight sequences, which I probably didn't want to see because what I could see and they were. They were terrible. It was the exact same for the scoring of the audio and the sound effects and everything. It wasn't amazing. I liked the music. I didn't like the way it was used. It felt very loud. Just like the train scene. They just jacked up this rock music to blow you away. Once again, acting and dialogue was atrocious. Absolutely atrocious. The plot on this one, though, they attempted to be more intricate and explain things from the previous movie failed epically. It was a total disaster to the point where they had to chop it up and Spit it back out. And that made it even worse. So the plot just went way down. For me, enjoyment was about the same as the first one. I didn't very much enjoy this. I kind of just kept watching it because I wanted to see some of the bits that I had seen as a kid. Like, I'd seen pieces of it. I just wanted to put the whole thing together primarily. Wouldn't. Wouldn't have otherwise sat through this movie. I regret having to have paid money to rent the film. This one came out at a total of 18 points out of 100 for me. [01:08:42] Speaker C: All right, so for me, I'm just gonna start off by saying Will was not wrong. It was sci fi. It did hit me a little bit better. So we're just gonna start there. The music in this one was. I kind of like that. They did bring back some of the tracks from the original one. It was pretty forgettable overall, but it didn't have that, like, loud rock music that took me out quite as much as the first one did. So I did give this a bit of a higher score. Not much, only a 55. Cinematography. All the sci fi elements were very, very basic, and a lot of this movie was very blue. But it was serviceable. Like, it was okay for what it was. Like you kind of got the point across, what they're trying to do, considering this is, what, 91. Now, obviously you can look at other bigger budget movies in 91 or, like, around that time. I get like, Total Recall and Terminator 2 and stuff like that, but you're like, the budgets are nowhere close, so comparing those two is a little bit harsh. So I thought the cinematography was. Was again, serviceable. At 45, the acting was atrocious. I loved Sean Connory in this movie way more than I liked him in the first movie. But he's really the only thing carrying this movie. The dialogue is, oh, my God, so rough. There's a scene that I literally wrote it down. Say goodbye, Highlander. Why are you going somewhere? And I just, like, I could have seen my own brain. How hard I rolled my eyes. Like, it was just so incredible. I love it, so. Yeah, of course you do. I gave that, like, 25 and, like, 24 of those points are Sean Connery in his scene where he's like. Yeah, the montage of him getting his suit and all that stuff was legitimately fun for me. The plot on this one, they took the initial super basic concept, which I really liked in the first one, and over complicated the crap out of it for absolutely no reason. It doesn't add anything positive to this experience. They're just making it so incredibly ridiculous. And the fact that the entire movie could have been avoided if the villain had just, like, not done anything, but, like, the entire movie just doesn't happen because, like, as you mentioned, he forgot that he was a. He wanted to say hi. He forgot that he was an immortal. He wasn't chasing it. He was just living his best life at the opera and having sex with people much younger than him. Like, just leave it alone and let him just die. And then you're like, cool, we won. Ta da. But they just had to push that instrument entertainment wise. I don't know. Maybe it's just because this one was like. Maybe this one did hit that mark for me that you had in the first one where it was so bad that I did enjoy it, but I found myself actually entertained by this one. Like, not. Not highly entertained by any stretch, but more so than the first one. I wasn't falling asleep during this one, so I gave it a 25. So this is not a good movie overall. No, but it's higher than either of you and like, of the franchise. This is the one where I'm kind of like. They're actually scenes I enjoy. Wow. Not a good movie by any stretch of the imagination, but higher than the two of you. [01:11:28] Speaker B: Sorry, what was the final score? [01:11:30] Speaker C: 34. That's. [01:11:33] Speaker B: That's a banger. [01:11:36] Speaker A: Yeah, banger. [01:11:37] Speaker B: That's a banger for sure. [01:11:40] Speaker C: So that gives our total score 26 for Renegade, the Quickening. [01:11:46] Speaker B: Yes. [01:11:46] Speaker A: Okay. [01:11:48] Speaker C: All right, moving on to Highlander number three, which also has multiple titles. Now, do you know why this one is named multiple things? This is either the Sorcerer or the Final Dimension, depending on where. [01:11:58] Speaker B: Yeah. So again, it was theatrical cut versus DVD release. And I feel that it was just for rating of the movie. [01:12:08] Speaker A: Not. [01:12:09] Speaker B: Not theatrical to dvd, but theatrical in Europe compared to theatrical in us. That's the difference. They cut out a couple. [01:12:16] Speaker A: The title rated higher. [01:12:18] Speaker B: Yeah, they just made it slight changes to change the rating and thought that it would play better in America, but not like an overarching. This is horrible. We need to try to fix it. [01:12:32] Speaker A: I mean, there wasn't but like 12 minutes of. Of different footage in the two. Two versions. Right. It was mostly. They changed the poster and the name was the Big. [01:12:41] Speaker B: Yeah, I think the sex scene was different as well. And there was something else. I can't remember, but not a lot is not a lot. Not like. Not a notable amount. Not like Highlander 2 when at the End of the movie, they float off into space to go to Planet Zeiss. That's not in the Renegade Cabinet. [01:13:03] Speaker A: Now a quick note in between Highlander 2 the Quickening and Highlander 3 the Sorcerer. The final dimension is when Highlander the series started and that had Duncan McLeod as the lead role in that series. That's when the first season started. And I did check out some glimpse like Cliff Notes of this. And I have to agree with Cleaning Agent. The first season was rough. But they did get to some better character development in later seasons and actually had like multi dimensional characters. Though I wouldn't ever watch the show for the time and the theme, it was acceptable. But we don't have to go into the series. That's just. Just to give you guys some chronological. It came in between those two films. [01:13:48] Speaker C: Now, I do have a question for Chat slash, you guys, if you know is because I know the show, I'm assuming focuses on Duncan, not on Connor. [01:13:56] Speaker A: Yes. [01:13:57] Speaker C: Does Connor have a son in the TV show? Because he made no sense in this movie. [01:14:03] Speaker B: Oh, okay. He does not mention his son in this, but it's pri, I think because the series is before this movie. So yes. [01:14:15] Speaker C: And Raven is saying no. [01:14:18] Speaker B: I watched the first, first episode, which is the only episode Connor McLeod is in, and in it we find out that Adrian Paul, who is Duncan McLeod, is like 50 years old, younger than Connor, but from the Connor, you know, household, from McLeod. And so similar vibe. He's like the Sean Connery to Duncan that he finds him and like, hey, this is what immortals are. Welcome to the club. And so you get a little bit of that back and forth of time, past to present in the first episode. But it's more just kind of introducing who Adrian Paul is. But again, the first season is a little wishy washy. It was like the whole series, the whole movie franchise, they were like trying to sell this to multiple countries in multiple ways. Like, I think in Japan or something, it was supposed to be like a rock and roll superhero show. In Europe, it was something else. In America was something else. It was all very different. And so they had trouble juggling that. And it kind of became like a monster of the week kind of TV show where every week they faced a new immortal. And one day somehow. But then after that, like Brian said, they kind of got more into developing characters and questioning what immortals wanted out of this game and how it kind of worked and, and further that they. [01:15:53] Speaker A: Started judging morality too. Like, they started showcasing why people are doing things and, and giving. Giving the. The viewers like, hey, there's not bad guys and good guys. There's people who are trying to accomplish what they feel is theirs. [01:16:05] Speaker B: Although they do talk about bad, good and bad a little bit and kind of warrant. The whole reason why Sean Connery took Conor McLeod under his wing in the first movie is that when you quicken, when you take the life of immortal, depending on that immortal's outtake, you take in that trait. So if they're kind of like a vengeful immortal trying to rule the world in a diabolical way, if you take enough of those heads, you will start thinking that way and becoming diabolical. And so it's like a balance of, like. [01:16:43] Speaker A: Which is kind of weird to me. [01:16:44] Speaker B: Because then, like, do you have to off good Highlanders along the way too, just to keep your neutrality? Kind of funny. But question that and be like, hey. [01:16:53] Speaker A: Hey, Paul, I need to balance the scales, buddy. I'm gonna kill you. I'm sorry, buddy, I'm feeling really bad today and I need some of your goodness. [01:17:01] Speaker C: Yeah, it's fine. I'll say your name. You'll come right back. No, no, that's erased. That's erased. [01:17:06] Speaker B: That's. So anyway, Connor is just in the first episode to, like, introduce Adrian, Paul's character, and then we follow him from then on out. Yeah. [01:17:16] Speaker C: Okay. Does it play any impact in the third movie whatsoever? I know it does in the fourth movie. [01:17:21] Speaker A: Just. It's just chronological order. Duncan doesn't make an appearance. [01:17:24] Speaker C: Well, yeah, I knew that, but I wasn't sure. [01:17:26] Speaker B: I mean, I mean, maybe because, like. [01:17:28] Speaker C: The fourth movie has a lot of stuff, I'm assuming from the TV show. [01:17:31] Speaker A: They pitch number three as a prequel to number two to, like, erase number two, kind of rewrite some things and erase it a little bit. They don't necessarily say that, but it kind of like. Like, doesn't. Don't they say, like, takes place 10 years later? Or maybe. I'm thinking number four. [01:17:47] Speaker B: I can't. [01:17:47] Speaker A: They're starting to blend together here. [01:17:49] Speaker C: I want to say the third one takes place. Like, they show stuff from 10 years ago. Oh, no, sorry. The fourth one shows stuff from 10 years ago and then goes back to present day. [01:17:58] Speaker A: Right. [01:17:58] Speaker C: Which made no sense to me because then it's showing stuff before three that clearly happened after three. The whole timeline is messing pretty loosey goosey. [01:18:07] Speaker A: So number three, the cane, the enemy, the bad guy, Kane, is captured inside a cave after taking the head of the good sorcerer, who is kind of like a Ramirez character, to McLeod, who is teaching him some Skills and how to be a good dude. And he says, you know, McLeod, get out of here. I'll fight this guy. He fights the guy knowing he's going to lose, but he tricks him and the cave collapses and entombs him. And two other immortal dudes, like lesser immortal guys, with him for 400 years. Then McLeod goes and does his thing from the Highlander one and thinks that he's the last immortal. And that's when Cain emerges and he's not the last immortal. And now he's going to fight. [01:18:50] Speaker B: Yeah, three or four. [01:18:51] Speaker A: That's kind of how I kind of got that, right. [01:18:54] Speaker B: Yes. [01:18:54] Speaker C: So if he's not the last immortal, how did he get the prize in the second one? [01:18:57] Speaker B: Exactly. There's still plot holes because again, this should be a TV series, never a franchise of movies. But that's okay. That's absolutely. I think that's. That's pretty much it. Oh, you forgot to mention. So the sorcerer guy in wherever they were, he's the one that gave Ramirez his sword. That's where they got the katanas from. That's who Ramirez was trained by. And he also was a sorcerer and able to conjure images and different things. [01:19:30] Speaker A: So when Kane. [01:19:32] Speaker B: Yeah. Beheaded him. He absorbs those powers and is able to do all kinds of magic. Funness for fun. [01:19:39] Speaker A: So, I mean, really, the sorcerer should have been like, McLeod, take my head quick. [01:19:43] Speaker C: Exactly. [01:19:44] Speaker A: That's what he should balance it. Yeah, balance. [01:19:47] Speaker C: That's a fair point, actually. [01:19:50] Speaker A: Yeah. And so. And then. So Kane does use his sorcerer powers when he kidnaps McLeod's illegitimate son. Not illegitimate. It's not his biological son. There we go. Adopted son. And he uses his magical powers in that stupid chase scene where he's gonna scare the crap out of kid and he makes it look like a plane's gonna hit him as they're running down the tarmac, giving the same scary scene that we saw in the first. [01:20:13] Speaker B: Also, is it in this movie that we learn that immortals cannot have children? [01:20:22] Speaker A: Yeah, they cannot have children. [01:20:25] Speaker C: It's in the first movie. Yeah. [01:20:29] Speaker A: Yeah, you're right. And. But they really double down on it in this one because he has a son, but it's not his. And they want. [01:20:35] Speaker B: That's why he. That's. They kind of play up on that a little bit. Obviously he's missing that in his life. [01:20:41] Speaker A: Building of the relationship with his son at all. Like his son was just a character that they needed. [01:20:46] Speaker B: Did progress the story. [01:20:51] Speaker A: They didn't need a son in it. [01:20:52] Speaker C: That was one of my main points. Is like the sun does nothing to the movie. They introduce the fact that he's there. He disappears for most of the movie. He shows up just long enough to get captured, but by the time he gets captured, he's already got a girlfriend. You could have captured her. And then he gets rescued at the end and disappears again. That's why I was wanting, like, car. [01:21:10] Speaker A: As they ride off into the sunset. It was so pointless. [01:21:12] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [01:21:13] Speaker C: That's why I was wondering if he was in the TV show. So they kind of like, oh, well, we have to put him in here, because otherwise people will be confused. No, no, you did the opposite. You put them in there. [01:21:20] Speaker A: No, this one doesn't really touch on the TV show. [01:21:22] Speaker B: No, this one doesn't really. I think it might touch on, like, some of the rules they implement in the TV show, but very loosely and discardably. I think the real only reason that the adopted child is in here is that it's a way for. And this is pretty weak. It's a way to explore, like, how an immortal who cannot have children cannot experience having. Being a parent. You know, this great joy. That's how he's finding his happiness right now. [01:21:56] Speaker C: If you're immortal, would you ever adopt a kid knowing you're gonna have to sit there and watch him get old and die? [01:22:03] Speaker A: Well, that's. [01:22:03] Speaker B: That's the thing. I think that's what they are. That's what they're trying to, you know, bring up being like. And that's the whole song. Who wants to live Forever? It's like, it's. It's a blessing and a curse. And so it's like, oh, so that's why they're like, don't get married. It's not going to turn out well. And. But as a. As a human, as a person, as a mortal, you want to experience these things. And if you're watching people do this over 400 years, wouldn't you want to experience it too? Wouldn't you want to have a wife and. And live a life with somebody? Wouldn't you want to raise a child to put somebody out in the world that you made to help make the world better? So it's like, I think that's the idea behind it. Is it implemented well? No leap. [01:22:53] Speaker C: That. [01:22:55] Speaker B: So, like. And so that's. [01:22:57] Speaker A: I. [01:22:58] Speaker B: Maybe it's just me trying to pull more than what is actually there out of these movies, but that's how I justified it, I guess. Did they know it didn't work at all? Was he unnecessary? Abso freaking Lutely. But I think they want to try to explore those things, but obviously don't know how to write to actually do it well. [01:23:22] Speaker A: And let's not forget, this isn't the first kid he adopted. He adopted the little girl from World War II when he was fighting Nazis, which would have made him way cooler. Highlander movie. Right. Highlander fights the Nazis or something. [01:23:33] Speaker B: But that's only in the fourth one. Right. [01:23:37] Speaker A: She's in. She's in a couple of movies because they kill her off in the fourth one. Rachel, I believe, becomes Rachel. [01:23:45] Speaker C: She dies in the fourth one. And then you kind of get her backstory. Right. I forgot. [01:23:48] Speaker B: I don't know if it's interesting. [01:23:49] Speaker C: She's the secretary. I'm not sure. [01:23:52] Speaker A: I think you get introduced to Rachel. [01:23:54] Speaker B: In the first one. Right. You don't know who she is. Because later. Yeah. [01:23:57] Speaker C: Until. Just a secretary. [01:24:00] Speaker A: Yeah. And so. But. Yeah, so it's not the first kid that. He's. Right. [01:24:05] Speaker B: But it's the first instance of us knowing it, which is a little bit different. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so how do you want to talk about this winner? [01:24:16] Speaker A: For me, the number three was kind of just a sad repeat of number one without Sean, I think. [01:24:22] Speaker B: Let's see what I wrote. [01:24:23] Speaker C: This is easily the most forgettable for me. I'm not gonna lie. Like, I was trying hard to remember what this was when I was writing, and I'm like, I don't remember most of the set pieces. I don't remember most of the story. I don't remember most of the music. Like, most of this is just like. Yeah. [01:24:36] Speaker A: It felt like they were trying to recover from number two by stepping back to the original formula, and they stepped too hard into the original formula, and it just didn't really go anywhere or do anything. All the cast members were very forgettable. I didn't like the. The. [01:24:53] Speaker C: The. [01:24:54] Speaker A: The Kane character. He was just creepy and weird, you know? [01:24:59] Speaker B: Oh, I think they also changed. [01:25:00] Speaker C: You didn't like his armor with the. [01:25:01] Speaker A: Nipple rings or his real nipple rings. [01:25:05] Speaker B: The prostitution scene, they changed that as well. Between the Europe and the U.S. okay. [01:25:10] Speaker C: The prostitution was terrible also. [01:25:13] Speaker A: Like. And that was one thing. Every single time they were indoors talking about something, I was looking at the set going, this is a Cinemax porn set that they're on. Right. Like, you're just looking around. You see, like, the muted colors and the dark lighting and everything, and. And nothing looked real. It all looked like a very, very fake set. And it was. It was very disturbing. There was a lot more sex Scenes in this one, in my opinion, were just unnecessary. That was an 80s thing. They didn't need to do that in this one. None of it. It didn't add to the film at all. This one? Yeah, this one got worse for me, other than they tried to get back to the original recipe and they just kind of overcooked it. [01:25:57] Speaker C: Yeah, the. The movie. One of the things I noticed was very blue. Pretty much everything they went, everywhere they went, it was blue. And like, in the second one, you kind of get away with that because they got the shield so they can't see sunlight. But in this one, like, he's walking inside, it's blue, outside it's blue. Like, everything has this, like, weird tinge to it. And even to the point where he's walking around his apartment once he goes back to his. His antique shop or whatever, everything is blue. Every light is off. He's doing everything he can in the darkness. To the point where I'm like, okay, maybe, like, the power isn't working because he wasn't there for so long. But then he goes and turns on a light and you're like, oh, color. Okay. No, no, this works perfectly. He's just doing everything he can in the dark. For reasons past, understand, he's having full conversations with this woman in the dark. And I think, is this the movie where he's, like, trying to describe to her what immortals are? And she's sounding super confused and like, they don't actually explain it very well. You just. You kind of get this little second where she's like, wait, so you're immortal except you do this, but then you can do that? And then. [01:26:50] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:26:52] Speaker C: At least it's completely. [01:26:53] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:26:53] Speaker B: They almost made a joke because then. Then Connor says something like that. Yeah. So they. They even pointed out how kind of un. [01:27:03] Speaker C: Nonsense. [01:27:05] Speaker B: Undefined this whole thing is, which was kind of like, okay, is that. That's supposed to be a joke or. I'm not sure. [01:27:11] Speaker A: I think my head might have still been reeling from the trampoline and trapeze fight that they had cinematography where the camera's panning in on, like, their feet hitting the trampoline and their arms swinging on the trapeze. And then every time they'd swing by, they would just clang swords. They weren't going for each other or anything. They were just playing Thunderdome. [01:27:30] Speaker B: Doesn't seem so bad anymore, does it? [01:27:34] Speaker C: Absolutely. Reminded me of Thunderdome. [01:27:36] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:27:38] Speaker C: Oh, my God. As soon as I saw that scene, I was like, oh, wow. How do we get two of These franchises in a row, what are the odds? I, I so one of the things I had with that scene, other than just how incredibly bad it was, Although now that you're saying that he had barely any eyesight, if he was actually didn't have a stage man, that would have been a hard scene to fight or a hard scene to film. So a little bit of props there, but they probably just would probably have an actor in that scene because it's all dark anyways in that scene. Sorry, you're saying Kang is the bad guy's name. [01:28:09] Speaker A: Kane K A N E breaks Connor's. [01:28:13] Speaker C: Sword, sees something, and then runs away. What is sword break? [01:28:19] Speaker A: They're on holy ground, right? They're on holy ground. But Carter was making a defensive maneuver and Kane was attacking him. If it had anything to do with holy ground, Cain's sword should have broken. Connor's sword was the sword that was folded over a thousand times by a Japanese sorcerer from a bajillion years ago and was mystically imbued or whatever. And he just shatters it. And I was like, why did his sword break? Oh, because they need a reason to travel around and make a new sword. That's. [01:28:52] Speaker C: And then the female finds that little brick and travels halfway across the world on a hunch that he might need it for some reason. She just, like, brings him this block, like, I found this. And he's like, oh, perfect. That's exactly what I need. Thank you so much. [01:29:04] Speaker A: It's like she wanted to do a madman, right? [01:29:07] Speaker B: It's immortal. It's immortal. [01:29:11] Speaker A: And, and it was the whole series. Was that one there? They really went for it on that one. Christopher Lambert, still wearing a shirt the whole time, running around in sweatpants and this heavy long sleeve shirt like the whole movie. Doesn't even take his clothes off to get with his chick. But fine with me. She was gorgeous. [01:29:29] Speaker C: When you can tell a woman that you're immortal and she believes it, you can wear sweatpants all day long. You're still gonna be just fine. Three out of three women like immortal men. If this franchise has told me anything. [01:29:40] Speaker A: Yeah, man, if I'd have known that line in my 20s. [01:29:44] Speaker B: All right, I'm a highlander. All right, let's go. [01:29:47] Speaker C: Somebody do research on this. I, I think we're all married men here, but somebody out there do research for us. See if that works. Please go to a bar, just tell somebody, like, whisker, like, I'm immortal. I can't die. [01:29:57] Speaker B: Oh, my goodness. [01:29:58] Speaker C: Oh, my goodness. Okay, okay. So at one Point, we've got him in Paris, I believe it is. And we run into another Highlander who's choosing to die. Somehow tricks the guards into killing him instead of McGregor. The guards leave the gates wide open because of course you do. And they behead this other Highlander to no fanfare whatsoever. Like, no lightning, no nothing. I was expecting them to be like, oh, what's going on? [01:30:27] Speaker A: This is what killed my proximity idea. I was wondering if you could like cut like an immortal's head off and then just like push the guy out of the way and take his place. And you get the Quickening sauce or whatever it is, right? But they chop this dude's head off and nothing happens. That I was like, okay, so it's gotta be an immortal that does the deed to get. I think explain that at some point. [01:30:53] Speaker B: But I don't know when and where. It's. They're all muddled. [01:30:56] Speaker A: I. I might have been walking to the refrigerator, completely ignoring. [01:30:59] Speaker B: And the other thing is a hard time with these Highlanders can only battle one versus one. One issues a challenge. And they are the only two that can battle. That's one of the rules. But it wasn't talked about really that much because they're all groupies now, it seems. I don't know. It's weird. [01:31:14] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:31:16] Speaker B: Well. [01:31:16] Speaker C: And again, we got another one of these scenes where like, the immortals are helping the immortals and even the bad guy immortals are helping the bad guy immortals, which I'm okay with. But like, they. They got trapped in that ice bridge or the ice area for what, like 400ish years? 300 years. And the first thing they do when they get free is he kills his friends. [01:31:34] Speaker B: Power get some Quickening juice in them. [01:31:37] Speaker C: Yeah, but it's just like, why did you wait this long? I don't understand. Okay. Just weird decisions. [01:31:44] Speaker B: He's addicted to the sauce and it's 400 years. I think they do go into that again a little bit more in the TV show that the good and bad. So they kind of stick together and things like that. So that's kind of explainable maybe, but not really. [01:32:01] Speaker A: And in numbers four or in. In number four, it's a straight up numbers game. They explain that it's all. You gotta have the numbers there. [01:32:08] Speaker C: Don't you worry. We are getting to that. [01:32:11] Speaker B: Should we rate this bad play? [01:32:12] Speaker C: I like, I'm gonna say I did like the bad guys were helping each other as well. It wasn't just a good guy thing. Like, if your paths are aligned, you will work together. I didn't hate that. I just thought it was weird that, like, at the. Like, not even an opportune moment, he's just like, oh, we're free. Slice. Like, okay. Anyways. Yes. Let's get to rating this one. I think you guys have both gone first, so I guess this is me to go first on this one. All right. [01:32:41] Speaker B: Wow. [01:32:42] Speaker C: All right. So Highlander 3, the first dimension. IMDb gives it a score of 4.5, and I'm gonna say that's generous. The music in this one is really hard to rate because I legitimately don't remember it whatsoever, has none of the returning music that I could think of. Like, it doesn't have that. The. Do you want to live forever or nothing. [01:32:59] Speaker B: They couldn't afford it. [01:33:01] Speaker C: So there's no. It's there anyways. There's no negative, but there's no positive. And as I was saying, like, I'm gonna try and put music at, like, a 50 and see where it goes. So, like, that gets a pretty high score. But honestly, it couldn't have been that bad. If it doesn't stand out to me one way or the other. Is that the best way to do the ratings for. I have no idea. We're still figuring this out. This is only episode two for cinematography. This bothered me so goddamn much because this is one of the ones where you're talking about where you get those sweeping shots, but they're way too fast and the camera's really jerky, and you're just like. Like, it almost feels like you're in a jet plane that's, like, doing Top Gun maneuvers as you're just jumping around. And it's just like, this doesn't feel right. This doesn't feel sweeping. It just feels weird. I legitimately hated all of the scenes where they're like, you get the swords clang, and then, like, it changed color as it did it again and again. Like, almost like it was going to, like, a negative or something. And it's just like, what is happening and why the movie is called the Sorcerer again in certain locations or for certain reasons. And they really should have leaned away from that because most of that CG looks absolutely atrocious. Like, when the sword turns into a snake or something at the very beginning, some of the things that are happening. At one point, he turns around and his glasses are glowing yellow. Like, all of it was just unexcusably bad. The one scene I was watching a trailer for this one just literally to try and remind me what this movie was. And it has a Scene where, like the little kid turns into Kane. And watching that like three times in a row back to back, I was like, it's not great, but it is really creepy. So I'm gonna give it a little bit of points for that because it does kind of get the point across. Like, this is messed up, but it's not. It's not well done. The acting in this is absolutely atrocious. There's no Sean Connery to save this one. At this point, I have to assume they're purposefully finding bad actors because you would find a decent actor by, like law of averages at this point, if you've got three different movies. So they must be just like, this is where we can save a budget. There's no saving grace in this one as far as the acting goes, unfortunately. And then for plot, razor thin, like, non existent. Like, it's not even as fun as the first one. It's not as silly as the second one. It is just a guy gets free and is going after him. Like, there's no gathering in this one. The kid is completely just a plot point. He doesn't exist in any way, shape or form. Like, like there's no reason for this movie to exist. And then entertainment wise, like, I, I honestly, my note was like, non existent. This was just homework. Like, I, I have no redeeming qualities in this movie whatsoever. I'm giving it a 20. [01:35:31] Speaker B: Wow, that's pretty high. [01:35:33] Speaker C: The music. The music brought it really high up. So I have to change that. [01:35:36] Speaker B: I think you can make an exception, Dan. [01:35:40] Speaker C: I mean, maybe I should. I don't know. [01:35:43] Speaker A: That's fine. [01:35:44] Speaker B: Okay, I'll go next. That's so funny. [01:35:48] Speaker A: Yes. [01:35:49] Speaker B: So somebody in chat asked, I thought the title was Final Dimension. It's both called the Sorcerer for the European release and Final Dimension for the American release. I believe is the way it went. Now. Okay. I only wrote very little here and it kind of parallels run seven. But what he's already said. I tried to find something good about this movie because it's pretty easy to find the bad. I'd say the best part of this movie is when Connor is back in Scotland building his sword. There's like something about him just like working in the, in the fires and banging the metal. And it was like, okay, this is kind of. This is kind of a nice breath of fresh air of Scotland air in this mess of a movie that's just a disaster. At least it was like, like it was just somewhat peaceful and, you know, it was filmed nice enough and you have the beautiful greenery of Scotland. It was like the only redeeming thing about this movie. The only other thing I wrote was this seemed like a bad remake of the first film, negating the second film entirely. No Connery, no Queen. I'm out. I gave this a 10. [01:37:07] Speaker A: Yeah. I didn't think that the sword mending scene was that amazing. [01:37:14] Speaker B: I mean, comparatively. I'm saying comparatively. [01:37:17] Speaker A: Yeah, I guess it was so predicted. As soon as his sword broke, I was like, oh, okay, this is a quest to fix the sword. And it was kind of lame how he came across the type of metal and she brought it to him all the way across the world. [01:37:32] Speaker C: I don't know. [01:37:33] Speaker A: I. I had no real redeeming qualities. Everything in this movie took a dive, especially the music because once again, it was just loud rock music. But this time they didn't even have notable bands. It was like anonymous stuff. So that, that even. Even took a dive for me. And I'm, I'm coming through. My overall score is actually an 11. I don't know how I got hired cleaning agent on this, but. But yeah, just over. This was. This was just terribly boring and painful to get through. The only redeeming quality was that it didn't have such a sloppy attempt at the plot. They, they, they tried to just stay true to its roots. Even though, like, like I said it was. It was a terrible attempt at its true roots. But they just, they kept actually, that. [01:38:17] Speaker B: Actually made it worse for me because. And maybe, maybe that's why your score was higher. That actually took me away because at least in the second movie, they tried something new and tried to further. Yeah, this was like just a bad remake of the first one and, and far, far inferior. So it, it just fell so hard for me. So I, I couldn't, I couldn't get into this. And like the other ones are like serious to like a fault. Like they are taking this serious. I'm scowling throughout the movie. And this one doesn't even do that, you know, it doesn't even do bad. Good. So I just hated it. [01:38:53] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:38:54] Speaker B: All right, let's. [01:38:55] Speaker C: Overall, beautiful. [01:38:57] Speaker B: Beautiful. I mean, rightly so. [01:38:59] Speaker C: I don't know if there's gonna be another franchise that's gonna touch this one. This one might be at the bottom of the list for a very long. [01:39:04] Speaker B: Bring to the table. [01:39:06] Speaker C: Unless we get much harsher. [01:39:08] Speaker B: Should we get to into some end game action? [01:39:12] Speaker A: Oh, let's do this. [01:39:14] Speaker B: All right. Highlander endgame. I don't even know what this is about. Oh, right. This is the coming together of the TV series and the movies in one beautiful spectacle. Because the fans would love a little more Connor McLeod. And it's bad. Is that a pretty good recap? [01:39:39] Speaker C: I have. I have to say, for the first couple of minutes of this movie, I legitimately had hope that they actually started taking this seriously. Like, there was A good maybe 15 minutes, maybe. That's generous. Where I was like, this actually looks decent. Like, the camera work has improved significantly. It looks like it's actually made in the 20th century. Like, everything about this has actually got production quality. You can't really do anything with his acting ability that's just gonna. Writing Duncan, I thought, was a better actor. Duncan is the explosion at the very beginning where they kill off the. The secretary. You're just kind of like, okay, they're kind of starting to go somewhere with this. [01:40:17] Speaker B: Maybe. [01:40:18] Speaker C: Maybe this will be a high point for the franchise or at least, like, a return to its roots. And then it kind of took a pretty big nosedive after a few minutes, I think. Maybe, like, when they introduced the Sanctuary, I was like, maybe not. But for the first little bit, this looks like a real movie. [01:40:34] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:40:35] Speaker C: Which is such a lame, like, compliment for this franchise. Like, this one actually looks like a real movie. Good job, guys. [01:40:41] Speaker B: Do bring in a lot more. More of the TV series elements into this with, like, more watchers. Sanctuary. These are all things. Like, in the first movie, no human knew about these immortals. Now there's humans that are all about watching and actions. [01:40:59] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:41:00] Speaker B: Separated and making sure that the gathering never finishes. [01:41:05] Speaker A: Right. [01:41:05] Speaker B: The game never ends. And so it's like, there's so much more to that, which is. Whatever. [01:41:13] Speaker A: I had a completely different experience in the introduction. I watched Christopher Lambert and Adrian Paul walking and talking. And when Conor McGregor looks at him and he's like, some people change or whatever, his acting in that scene was so utterly atrocious. I was like, oh, God, please, guys, don't make me watch this. Like, it was so bad. I was like, I already paid $4. It was so. That opening scene, absolutely just. I was like, this is gonna be so absolutely horrible. [01:41:47] Speaker C: And, you know, numb to his acting by then. I don't know. [01:41:50] Speaker A: For me. No, no. For me, it was really terrible. I was like, who is this Duncan McLeod guy? Because I hadn't done my research. I didn't know about this TV series at this point. I was like, who is this Duncan McLeod guy? And the movie just kept following and kept following him, and it never really followed Connor. And I was like, what's Going on. I'm not really opposed to it because Connor's acting is so horrible. And then. And then, guys, the saving grace makes his appearance. Yes. [01:42:20] Speaker C: I was going to say to the. [01:42:22] Speaker A: Scene, and I lost it. I was like, oh, my God. They're not going to cut away from a fight scene. They're going to let them throw punches at each other. There's actual choreography. This is amazing. Oh, my God. Absolutely saved this movie for me. Not that this movie succeeded. It was still an epic failure overall. But Donnie Yen carried this film for me. [01:42:46] Speaker B: Yes. And for those of you don't know, Iron Monkey, Ip Man, Blade 2, John Wick, Donnie Yen's been in a lot of martial arts movies, things like that. [01:42:56] Speaker C: Rogue One. [01:42:57] Speaker B: Yeah, one of the Star Wars. [01:42:59] Speaker A: That's right. Yeah. And he came in and I was like, oh, my gosh. One of the biggest flaws for this film is that horrible cinematography to account for Christopher Lambert's inability to swing a sword without hitting himself in the face. And so when they. I mean, it's a metal conditional martial arts in this. And they had. They had guns, which was like, yeah, it might not permanently kill them, but you can knock them on their ass and then chop their head off with an ax. You know, that's what you can do. And they. They do try. Like, that's a tactic. They. When, like, Sanctuary people were trying to take out immortals if they had to. And so, like, they started bringing in, like, a realistic approach to what would happen. I liked the Sanctuary idea, this. Prolonging the inevitable by just putting them under. Like, hey, there's an alternative to them just fighting to the end. And we had the introduction of massive amounts of immortals instead of, like a handful of people fighting their way to the end. There were hundreds and hundreds in this epic game that is going on for a long time with lots of moving parts, and they. They increased all the things and aspects about the show. Now, was it a drastic change from the original? Hell, yeah. But it made more to go on. And maybe that's because they built off of the TV series, but they made more to go on and there was more for me to get involved in. And I appreciated that. Now, let's talk about. Did they pull off any of these. Would you guys like to step in here? [01:44:34] Speaker C: So, okay, I'll go back a second because I also, like, I knew that a TV show existed, but I didn't realize this movie was going to be pulling from that. So they introduce Duncan at the very beginning, and I had no idea what was going on. And for large chunks of this movie, I'm just like, I, I don't know what's happening. I kind of clued in after a while, like, oh, I. This is probably tying into the TV show because they're not explaining anything. It is just like, here you go. Like you already know what's going on because this is like the most popular franchise in the world, clearly. And you're just like, what is going okay, no, this is just me. For the people who like the TV show, maybe this is amazing. But for the people who like are struggling through the movies, not so much. So I did like that they tried to bring the world, make the world bigger. Like, I like the fact there's a lot of immortals. I like the fact that there's like, like a group watching them, even though they don't really explain what's going on there. At one point, one of the watchers kills another one. And I feel like you're supposed to have like severe reverence for that scene. And I just didn't know what was going on. The fact they're bringing guns in I think is actually really smart because we've seen in multiple movies you can hurt the immortals, you just can't kill them. So like, if I can use a shotgun and put you down, well, then I can walk up and slice your throat and we're good to go. Right? Like, I liked that aspect of it that they actually were like, oh, let's think about that and actually do something other than just trying to decapitate you from the get go. Again, I'm not saying any of this actually worked all that well, but at least they are trying something that felt like they were taking the original material and building off of it instead of taking the original and throwing it out and starting again or copy and pasting it like this. Felt like it was actually taking the next logical step, which I did. I like the swing that they took, even though they didn't really hit the ball right I. The TV actors. Again, maybe I was just so numb because I watched these movies in fairly quick succession. Felt like they were doing a better job than like some of the actual actor, actual actors in the franchise head. [01:46:31] Speaker B: What a jab at television actors. Unbelievable. May I just say. [01:46:37] Speaker C: But you know what I'm saying, Like. [01:46:38] Speaker B: You know, TV is now pulling huge movie star names now. [01:46:44] Speaker C: It is. It wasn't in 92 to 99. [01:46:49] Speaker B: They were lesser quality actors though. [01:46:52] Speaker C: I was making fun of the movie. [01:46:54] Speaker A: Maybe, but not lesser quality. [01:46:55] Speaker B: You were making fun of everybody. [01:46:57] Speaker C: I was thinking maybe that didn't come across right. I was thinking for the actors in Highlander 1, 2, and 3, I was not making fun of the TV actors, but maybe that didn't come across quite properly. [01:47:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:47:08] Speaker C: I don't know, man. This. This movie, I like that it tried something. I wish it had landed it. And a part of my brain was just trying to give it that. Like, maybe if you watch the TV show, this makes a whole lot of sense, and maybe this is like the epic season finale to the TV show that, like, a lot of people were looking for. Because the thing that I don't understand about this movie, like, we're on the fourth one now. Every single one of these movies flopped hard at the box office. Us. Like, the fact that they made a second one is baffling. The fact they got to four and a TV series. I have no idea what's going on. [01:47:37] Speaker A: Five movies. [01:47:39] Speaker C: That one just came out straight on DVD. But, like, this movie lost $12.5 million. The second one lost 14 million. Third one, sorry, lost $14 million. The second one lost $15 million. The first one lost $10 million. Like, the studio making this, assuming it's the same studio, is out something like $53 million to make these movies, and yet they're still like, yep, let's reboot it. I don't understand. I have no idea where the thought process is on this one. [01:48:05] Speaker B: Sold the rights to a few different places throughout. [01:48:09] Speaker C: Okay. [01:48:10] Speaker B: But that being said, it's a cult classic, which means it was much more popular outside of theatrical release. So I'm guessing there was money made back and there was enough of an appeal. Again, the second one just happened because Sean Connery liked working with Christopher Lambert and whoever, like, let's do another one. But somewhere along the way, there has to be somebody's making money or it's not going to be made at all. Right. [01:48:35] Speaker C: I. I have to assume. Like, I have to hope, but, like, the. The money is not there on paper. So I don't know who's doing back alley deals to get these things made. [01:48:44] Speaker B: But okay, I agree with a lot of what you guys are saying. The creative points is there because they are trying to expand this world of what the immortals are and how the game works and delve into more about the questioning of, like, oh, I'm just gonna break the rules. I'm gonna gang up of immortals so we can all always overpower who we want to take out next. Like, that was interesting. And the Sanctuary is an interesting idea. Did they hit on any of it? I think, I think the action was slightly better in this movie. And again, because it wasn't just Connor McLeod. Donnie made a huge impact and Adrian Paul is much better sword fighter than Lambert or whatever it was. [01:49:31] Speaker A: Than a blind guy. [01:49:32] Speaker B: Exactly. [01:49:33] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:49:33] Speaker B: So that says a lot. And so I think those. You might be the only things that maybe were better than and maybe touch base or even got close to making. Making a gain in this movie over some of the others. [01:49:53] Speaker C: Yeah. So this movie introduced a cons. Introduces a concept that I was kind of wondering about the whole way along, but I don't think they actually make it make any sense whatsoever. And that is when you kill another highlander, you gain their power. Like this one explicitly talks about it. There's even a scene where they're like, oh, you're. You're a 168 and you're a 142. This guy's a 675. And they're. Somehow their math works out with like he's a 675. We're only a 300 put together. You should kill me and then you'll be a 290something. [01:50:26] Speaker B: You might, you might have a chance. [01:50:27] Speaker C: 640. Like, why wouldn't you take two on one seriously? Right? Like I would do two on one before I try. Like, oh, let's. Let's have you fight up that much. [01:50:36] Speaker A: Like if you need a bunch of. [01:50:38] Speaker C: But then either right before or right after that, the. The bad guy ends up killing his entire crew. [01:50:45] Speaker B: Power up. [01:50:46] Speaker C: So. So either. Let's say he's a 650. Either he becomes a 654 because he killed his four friends, but does he gain all of the power of all of them? Like they're each level 100. Let's say does he go to like 900 or does he go to like 654? They don't really explain. But it. [01:51:02] Speaker B: If. [01:51:03] Speaker C: If all you do is gain one, then it makes even less sense that the, the. The McLeods would kill each other. Because he's like, I'm a 148, you're a 162. You should go to a 149, then you'll do it. So if they actually do gain all of the power from their souls, then the bad guy just got exponentially more powerful. So how does it. Like, why, why introduce this concept if it makes no sense whatsoever? And then you bring up the other one quick second. Because this one baffled me. You also got the concept of like, you can bring people back by saying their name. So either a, no, Connor. And then bring him back by saying his name. That's. [01:51:37] Speaker B: The second one's erased. [01:51:38] Speaker C: But it's part of the franchise, you. [01:51:41] Speaker B: Know, it is erased. [01:51:43] Speaker C: Say his name, bring him back. And then you got two people fighting for you again. [01:51:48] Speaker A: But also double the money. Right. [01:51:50] Speaker C: Well, that's where I'm going. Like, if you can kill somebody and, like, gain all their power, if they come back, do they gain their power back or do they start at one again? [01:51:58] Speaker A: You can't kill them. They just disappear after utilizing. Using the force. That's how it works the second time around. [01:52:04] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. They have one force use before they dissipate. Okay, okay. [01:52:10] Speaker C: Okay. [01:52:11] Speaker B: Here's what I noticed. This is the first theatrical story that actually has a female immortal. [01:52:23] Speaker C: Yep. [01:52:24] Speaker A: Lisa B. As the wife of Duncan McLeod, Kate McLeod, aka Faith, whose only claim to fame in cinema is that she plays a succubus who tries to kill a guy by having sex with him to death. And then she played in this movie. So, you know, why they brought her into this film wasn't because of her acting skills. [01:52:48] Speaker B: Right. But that's not what I was worried about or concerned with. But I was more concerned with, like, why is it all just men? And I know the answer, because it was the 80s and it's all testosterone city. But I just. [01:53:04] Speaker C: There actually might be a real answer to that one, though. [01:53:06] Speaker B: No. [01:53:07] Speaker C: Because the only way you can become a Highland, or. Sorry, the only way you realize you're an immortal is if you die a horrendous. [01:53:13] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:53:14] Speaker C: So if most women are either dying natural causes, like, say, childbirth or old age, then you wouldn't have that happen. [01:53:21] Speaker B: We saw throughout the Highland, maybe movies and burned at the stake happened in this one. [01:53:28] Speaker A: There was some. [01:53:29] Speaker B: There was some pillaging, and there was definitely some violent deaths going on with men, lady and children. Right? [01:53:36] Speaker C: Sure. But not everybody who dies. Like, you have to be in a moment. I know already. And there'd be a few. [01:53:41] Speaker B: You know, there'd be a handful. [01:53:43] Speaker C: This is the first movie we see more than two periods, and I believe. [01:53:47] Speaker B: There was a handful of female immortals in the television series. I just felt like, talk about underrepresentation. And, like, that's just, like, a part of the time. [01:54:00] Speaker A: I just. [01:54:01] Speaker B: It just stood out to me in the time we're living in now that it took four theatrical movies before there was one female Highlander or immortal, and. [01:54:12] Speaker A: And, yeah, now the TV series had a couple of female immortals, and one of them became a spin off was the Raven, the short blonde haired girl who was a thief. And she dealt with issues of morality because she was like a bad person, but she tries to be a good person as she. Yeah, good at heart kind of story, which was pretty boring or whatever and really terrible overall series. But maybe they explored the reasoning for that, you know, in the, in the storyline. I don't know. I didn't sit through that. I doubt it. I, I mean, realistically, it is. It was. Because the 80s, it was all machismo there. [01:54:51] Speaker C: Sure. [01:54:51] Speaker A: So. [01:54:55] Speaker C: I honestly, I don't have too much more to say about this movie. [01:54:57] Speaker B: Yeah, I like that there was a female immortal. I didn't like that she was pretty much just a piece of meat, but at least she was immortal. And she, and I like the story element of like, Duncan was selfish and made her an immortal without asking. Just straight up killed her. And I love that she just was like, no, F you. You a hole. How dare you do this. Take away my chances of. You know, they're talking about these, these same very cool, interesting concepts of morality versus immortality, not being able to have children. And, and I thought that was very cool that they put that into this movie and the way they did it. Was it overall executed well? Not really, obviously. But I like the idea being in the movie. [01:55:53] Speaker C: I like the idea of it. I wish they'd explored it more, but I agree with you on that. [01:55:57] Speaker B: All right, that's. That's about all I have to say about this movie. [01:56:00] Speaker C: All right. Okay. Brian, do you want to start us off? [01:56:07] Speaker A: Yeah. This one, the music was even worse. Took another step down. The cinematography was both better and worse in this because we finally got some action sequences that I got to enjoy. They stepped back and we got to see that happening. But it was still this kind of jerky footage. Whenever it. That was happening, it was like every. Everything else now sucked. And the fight scenes were the only thing that were plausible, like, like doable. It was. [01:56:40] Speaker B: Thanks, Donnie. [01:56:41] Speaker A: So I was like, okay. I just. You flip flopped on me now. The acting and dialogue was just the. Probably some of the worst. I, I would say it is the worst in the franchise, except I watched the fifth movie or most of it. So of the four movies that you guys watched, this was the worst acting and dialogue and the plot was. I give them props for trying some new things and trying to grow it, but this is too little too late. They did this in the fourth movie. This is what should have happened in the second movie to try and grow it instead of this weird alien Crap that got edited out. You know, they should have done this and grew the whole thing a little bit better. I'm sure they could have found ways to just talk about it instead of what they did. So the plot was. Was both a nice attempt, but really poorly executed and kind of convoluted. And they didn't feel like they knew which way they wanted to go. They just wanted to shore some things up and they had some ideas from the TV show. And then finally my enjoyment of it was much better. May. I might have actually enjoyed this one probably the second most. I don't know. It was right up there with 1 and 2. But it was mostly because I was watching Donnie Yen in the fight scenes. I really like the choreography in those fight scenes. Those were amazing. Those are just really good choreographed fight scenes and I enjoy that. I think those are challenging to pull off and those really long ones where it doesn't look like they're throwing punches or anything. Those are. Those are tough scenes to make. And they had a couple of those in this one and I really appreciated that. So that brought up my overall score. This one I gave 20 out of a hundred. So we're back up from the brink of me just turning it off in the middle of the movie. And this is something that was. Still hated the experience overall, but it did reprieve itself for some attempts in this franchise. [01:58:36] Speaker C: Totally fair. Will, what do you think? [01:58:38] Speaker B: I'm in the similar boat. I enjoyed the action. I felt as far as action was concerned, this movie stepped up a lot. And these are, as far as I know, action movies, kind of fantasy sci fi action movies at their heart. So that was good. And I did appreciate the. The greater detail to the story. [01:59:04] Speaker A: They. [01:59:05] Speaker B: They did try something new. It wasn't coming off of the third one, which was just such garbage remake of trying to get the magic of the first one and failing this. This felt better. So I actually bang on same score. [01:59:19] Speaker A: 20. [01:59:21] Speaker C: Okay. I. All right, here we are. [01:59:28] Speaker B: Hey, at least we're coming to an end. Okay. [01:59:31] Speaker C: No, for sure, for sure, for sure. I just. I did not anticipate that I'd be the high mark on these franchises, but here we are. Okay. So as far as the music goes, I really have no notes. It was. I like the third one. Like it's completely non memorable whatsoever. There's got another returning music. It's just bland. It's. Maybe I need to really rework how I. I score the music in these things because I. This is giving it way too high of a score. The Cinematography in this one, I agree with Brian. It really did step up. It's not great, but it definitely is. They're trying and succeeding a little bit more in showing the fight scenes. I hated that they kept speeding them up. I wish they just left them alone. I don't think that added to them in any way. It didn't make them feel more impactful. It just kind of takes you out of it a second ago or it takes you out of it a little bit. But overall I think that they were an improvement. The actual, like, you see a bit more of history in this one as you kind of see Connor and Duncan's journeys. And I feel like they did a good job in those regards. Like, the history looked better. Not only the set pieces there, but like the costumes there and stuff like that. Like, it looks like they spent a little bit of money on that to make that feel, I'm gonna say more accurate, but at least not as standoutishly bad. The acting in this, I think, was a mild improvement. It's not good. And obviously Christopher Lambert, we've. We've said what we're going to say about him. I didn't mind Duncan as much. I thought he was okay, and if the franchise decided to go with him for it or maybe with the TV show, that might have been less painful. So I gave that a little bit. A little bit of a boost. It's not as good as Sean Connery, but it's definitely better than number two. [02:01:05] Speaker B: 3. [02:01:06] Speaker C: The plot to this one, I. I gave a fairly low score despite the fact that I liked a lot of things they were trying to do because I feel like while I loved the swings they were taking, so many of them didn't connect or needed explaining because I didn't watch the TV show. And they really took for granted that I was going to watch the TV show before I saw this movie. So maybe that's on me. But as a person who loves movies and doesn't have time to watch nine seasons of, I'm assuming, an hour long TV show, there's so much in this movie they did not explain or even attempt to explain. They're just like, here's a concept. You're like, oh, all right, sure. The. The watchers were just. I had no idea what was going on. Like, you can kind of put together that it's part of the TV show, but from a movie perspective, they just showed up and you're like, all right, this is happening. I guess entertainment wise, I feel like while I was watching it, I wanted it to end so badly. But looking back at it, I feel like this might have been one of the higher entertainment values of the franchise. Again, low bar, but there might have been. I feel like they were close to having something there on this one, kind of like the first one. The actual idea of it is put it's got potential. I just don't feel like it was well executed. If they are doing a remake with Henry Cavill and they want to go this route but explain what some of these things are, I wouldn't necessarily be opposed to that. I like the world they introduced in this one more so than the world they introduced in any of the ones previous to this. That being said, this still does get a pretty paltry 31, which is higher than you guys gave it. But still a very big fan, right? [02:02:40] Speaker A: I would say if. If someone is looking to watch a movie that has this idea of. Of battling for power to become supreme, to become the one, I would check out. Gentlemen, I thought that movie had a great idea that was kind of based in the highlander ideals, and it was much better executed, much better quality all around is something you should go for. Would you guys like me to cover number five? [02:03:06] Speaker B: Why don't. Why don't we get Dan's score for this movie then? You cover five? Oh, I thought I did. Oh, did you give us the Overall score, though? 31 for all three of us. [02:03:17] Speaker C: Oh, I apologize. I apologize. [02:03:18] Speaker A: Yeah. [02:03:18] Speaker C: Okay. 24 is the overall score. [02:03:21] Speaker B: So if you want to give us the full average after Brian gives us a rundown of number five, that would be awesome. [02:03:28] Speaker C: Sure. [02:03:28] Speaker A: Okay. So for number five, it continues with the story of Duncan. Christopher Lambert makes no appearance whatsoever because. [02:03:35] Speaker B: He'S dead and absorbed. [02:03:36] Speaker A: And that's right. The thing is, this one takes the only thing that this franchise. Well, one of the few things that this franchise is known for, which is the slogan their can be only one. And it takes an absolute hot, steaming dump on that. And instead of them vying to be the last remaining immortal, it has to do with this mystical power that can only be contained by one person. And that's it. So it's not about being the last remaining eternal anymore. And they bring in this guardian character villain, who's kind of like. Like Zoom from the Flash. He's, like, really fast and he's a bad guy and he's got two swords and he, you know, runs around and beats people up at high speeds and he's got, like, albino skin and a weird helmet. I don't know. He's. He's kind of a cross between Zoom and something from Dune. It's really a weird character that they didn't develop or explain very well. Duncan gets a team of people and goes out to try and find this one power source. That's why they call it the Source. That's the name. It's. It's Highlander 5 the source. And they're trying to go find this source. And for me, this movie was so bad, when I get to a movie that gets down under a 10, I turn it off. I can't do that. I'm not gonna sit. I don't care how good it is, how bad it is, how great the franchise is, its source material, actors, redeeming plots, or anybody that recommends you got to see this one scene. I don't care if it hits a certain point. I turn it off this movie. I did. I turned off the movie and I just went and I watched some, some like videos covering clips of it. So I kind of got the gist of it and it. It was just really, really atrocious. This was a straight to DVD film. There were no redeeming qualities about it. Cinematography had a mixture of close up scenes where because they're doing bad sword fights and a few elements of martial arts. But Donnie Yen's not any. They don't really have anybody good other than Adrian Paul. And he. This was not his best attempt. It was mostly him wandering around looking confused for. For much of the movie, the sound was atrocious. There was no good songs in it. They kind of didn't have much. They didn't even really follow the rock theme at all in this one. Acting and dialogue was horrible. [02:06:09] Speaker B: Just appalling. [02:06:11] Speaker A: The plot. They completely changed everything about this. They took everything about the Highlander franchise and just said, no, we're going to just erase all that and go a completely different direction with it. And it's going to be all about questing for this source energy thing and this guardian guy who's protecting it and kind of hunting down immortals to make sure that they can't ever get to it. And at the end, Duncan ends up burying him in the ground up to his neck. Like you didn't even beat him in a sword fight, dude. Like you ran around and buried him in the dirt. It was so dumb. 0 Entertainment or enjoyment factor. I turned it. It was horrible. This movie got a 6 out of 100 and that's why I didn't even finish it. It was really terrible. I see why it just went straight to dvd. So you guys are lucky that you didn't. [02:07:06] Speaker B: Yeah, sorry. [02:07:07] Speaker C: We should have been clearer on that one. [02:07:10] Speaker A: And I get this trash is what I go for, the extended movie here. [02:07:15] Speaker C: Yeah. So for the Highlander franchise, at least the four theatrically released movies, that gives our rating a score of 23. 3 out of 100. Putting this right at the bottom of the list. And I have to assume it's going to live there for a very, very long time. All right, I want to thank everybody for watching our rating. Did we get the video right? Do you think that this was the right score? Was a little too high, a little too low? Let us know down in the comments below. And hey, if you made it this far in the video, you probably liked it. Might as well hit that like button as it does actually help this channel out quite a bit. If you want more great content like this, hit subscribe. So you can see in the future when we make new videos, we record these videos live over at Twitch TV themongoolieshow. So head over there and hit the follow button so you can hang out with us live and get your questions out on the air. Now. I also want to give a big shout out to Brian and Will, better known as Run7 and Cleaning Agent. I'll leave links to their Twitch and YouTube channels down below. So if you want to check out those guys and hang out with them more, you can absolutely do that. I also want to give a huge shout out to Jacob over at JBD Homes Productions, who edits these videos. We do our best to make the show fun for you guys and he does his best to make it look good for you. You. So if you have any editing needs, reach out to him, let him know. I'm sure he'll be able to help you out with whatever your project is. Until next time, stay safe. Stay well. Good night, everybody.