Like many of you, I look forward to Wednesday nights for AEW Dynamite. My fiance and I love watching the show weekly—even if she’s asleep by the end of the first match most nights.
Since this is weekly appointment television for me, we typically watch an episode or two of shows she likes to watch between eating dinner and 8pm EST. Sometimes, those shows end without enough time to start another episode before Dynamite starts. When this happens, we typically throw on TNT. Because of this, we have seen the last 15-30 minutes of some true GEMS of cinema and also The Accountant.
There are a few legitimately good movies that I have seen before like Gladiator, Hellboy 2: The Golden Army, and Ready Player One. There are also some random whackadoo movies that probably look great in HD and on drugs and also The Accountant.
I am going to try to summarize these glorious spectacles of pre-Dynamite cinema and also The Accountant. God help us all.
The Legend of Tarzan
This one is pretty self-explanatory. It’s the 6000th retelling of Tarzan, a man left alone with and raised by apes. This time the story is set in early 1900’s Africa? In this case, he becomes a tall, lanky, and shredded guy with digitally enhanced abs. I mean the abs are the star of this show, glistening perfectly in the camera light as Tarzan swings through trees, runs with gazelles, and swims with sharks. You really can’t stop looking at them. We are talking 1988 Rick Rude but with the benefits of high definition. And this movie has Margot Robbie in it as Jane.
I usually pick this up as Tarzan realizes Jane is in trouble by the big baddie, played delightfully by Christoph Waltz. This dude plays basically the same character in every movie he’s in and it somehow works in very different ways. He’s a damn good actor, but this had to be a paycheck job. They are in what looks like Cairo from The Mummy, but decidedly less Brendan Fraiser (who once played George of the Jungle, Tarzan’s kayfabe nephew). The entire animal kingdom is descending upon this town, with Tarzan leading the way. There’s a big fight between Tarzan and Christoph, with water and animals and chaos surrounding them. Eventually, Christoph finds himself as crocodile food and Jane watches as the boat explodes, thinking her washboard abdominaled, shredded ape-man has exploded with it. He then sneaks up behind her on a dock, exciting her enough that they have a child in a hut with natives dancing. That kid will be more ripped and athletic and good-looking than the Gargano baby for sure. If nothing else, he will definitely be taller. Chances I’ll ever watch this entire movie: The day I have the kind of perfect, dinner roll abs as Tarzan has, I will look this up.
Godzilla: King of the Monsters
TNT loves them some kaiju action! We will get to his (or her?) ape companion later, but this one is all about Godzilla wrecking some Lovecraftian monsters. This one usually gets picked up around the time Eleven from Stranger Things is saved from the evil clutches of King Ghidorah (the three-headed flying dragon) by Godzilla. Apparently, Eleven is the daughter of the dude who squints from Lost and Vera Farmiga, which I can actually kind of see. There’s some family strife, because at one point the two famous parents argue about losing their daughter, and a random soldier in the backseat yells, “Hell if y’all were my parents, I’d run away too!” Like many of these modern kaiju movies, the human stories are vapid and weightless, to the point you hope they are all crushed and eaten during awesome monster fights.
Ghidorrah is whooping Godzilla’s ass, even disintegrating Mothra, whose essence falls into a fallen Godzilla and really does nothing to help the situation. Vera, for whatever reason, ends up giving her life to help Godzilla, only to be burned, melted, and disintegrated by Volcano Godzilla, who now for some reason I can’t catch, now is a walking Hellfire Lizard. There is no explained reason for her to do this in this time period and she could have easily gotten into the chopper with her miserable family. My guess is she was tired of being judged by squinty Lost guy. Godzilla then disintegrates Ghidorah, a bomb explodes after the fact, leaving whatever city they are in (the sports field looked maybe like St. Louis?) a crater in the earth. Eleven forgets her mom is dead because Godzilla reigns supreme, and squinty Lost dad stares trying to see what has happened. Chances I’ll ever watch this entire movie: Definitely greater than zero, as I like a good monster fight. When does Stranger Things Season 3 come out?
Kong: Skull Island
KING KONG RULES. This is by far the best wrestling name of all these movies, confirmed by Wrestlemania II main eventer King Kong Bundy. There are SO MANY great actors in this. Brie Larson, freaking Loki, Samuel L Jackson as the angry soldier villain who yells, Dr. Steve Brule (John C Reilly for you non Adult Swim folks) as the down-to-earth comic relief, and probably a few more I am missing. The earliest I have seen of this Loki and Captain Marvel are face to face with Kong on a ledge. I’m guessing that kind of romance would cripple the Marvel multiverse worse than Strange is about to, but she’s clearly more into the giant ape than the trickster.
Sam Jackson lures Kong into a trap with an explosion. They have the ape dead to rights, before Loki and Marvel start talking sense into Nick Fury (enough of the Marvel, fine). Suddenly, after some light old-timey advice from Reilly, the guns turn on Jackson. Another tripod Cloverfield-like monster pops up and everyone runs. Sam is now eye to eye with Kong and just before he can detonate his bomb and utter a “MUTHUH F…,” Kong smashes him. Amazing.
We now get to my favorite part of the movie. The leads and a bunch of random soldiers are running through a swamp from this tripod monster, when the old head soldier decides, “I’m going to take one for the team.” The younger soldiers are distraught, but they are dragged on. The guy pulls the pin on the grenades as he’s face to face with the beast. Triumphant music plays. Then the beast tail whips him like he’s Luchasaurus into the nearby mountain. You can hear him screaming as the grenades go off into the mountain. HIGH comedy. I’m sure there’s quite the emotional bomb leading up to this, but I don’t know that so every time I laugh my ass off. One night, the TNT app skipped right at the tail whip scene and looped back after the soldier hit the mountain. You couldn’t ask for a better jif.
After this, we get a brutal final fight between Kong and the tripod, where Kong saves a drowning Brie Larson and rips the tripod’s jaw in half at the same time. Real fatality kind of stuff. We then see during the credits that John C Reilly goes back home for the first time in seemingly 15-20 years to a wife and grown boy. They laugh and eat dinner, then he assumes his role as a beer-drinking, baseball, watching boomer while his family drops everything to accept him back into their lives after not hearing from him and probably thinking he’s dead. He got nominated for an Oscar in Chicago though! Chances I’ll ever watch this entire movie: Probably pretty high. This is easily the most enjoyable 30ish minutes of all this trash.
Pacific Rim
I have to admit, the two or three times I’ve caught this movie, it was the last 5-10 minutes of it. Outside of some kind of space robots with lots of red, purple, and orange colors flying by at lightning speed, I have no idea what this movie is even about. This seems like what an acid trip might be like? And I’m always amazed that Guillermo del Toro directed this movie. So that’s a plus? Chances I’ll ever watch this entire movie: Due to the Guillermo del Toro factor, I can never say never. But unless my chocolate milk gets laced with LSD, I don’t know how enjoyable it’ll be.
Central Intelligence
I am not a Kevin Hart fan, though his on-screen chemistry with The Rock is undeniable. If he’s not the main focus of a movie, I can tolerate him. I remember thinking this could be funny when it came out in theaters years ago. My only knowledge of this plot is that The Rock used to be fat (I remember the trailer of fat Rock singing in the shower), now he’s a jacked FBI agent, Kevin Hart is his high school friend, and hilarity ensues. My guess is there’s probably not much else to know.
I always catch this one when everyone is at the high school reunion. The Rock gets on stage in front of all his poor, unhealthy, unhappy, lower-middle-class classmates and announces that he’s proud of being the super successful, charismatic, jacked and handsome man he is like he’s had some sort of epiphany, and strips naked. Now, having seen TONS of dumb comedies, I’m sure the whole arc is that he had no confidence as a fat guy, and now he wants to show how far h’s come leading to this empowering moment. Well, I can’t say that because I can only comment on what I’ve seen, and that Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson stripping down to reveal the People’s Strudel to all. He then jumps down to have a tender moment with Melissa McCarthy, who was probably in his corner since he was fat. He takes her glasses off and her eyes go every which way because she’s Melissa McCarthy. But The Rock lays a big ol’ People’s smooch on her because IT’S WHAT’S ON THE INSIDE THAT COUNTS. SEE? GET IT?
There’s a scene at the end with a truck and jokes, but after Dwayne reveals his Johnson and seemingly goes to make sweet passionate love to wiggly eyed Melissa McCarthey, who could possibly care? I think Kevin Hart is an agent now? At least he’ll bring the height average back to normal. Chances I’ll ever watch this entire movie: I love me some Rock, and these two are great in the Jumanji movies, but I would like to keep my brain cells, so no thanks.
The Equalizer
Denzel is a loner who murders fire and is a brooding badass. I have just described the last 15 minutes of this movie and also, half of his filmography. In no way is any of this a bad thing. Denzel is right up there with Morgan Freeman and Bruce Willis as “oh he’s in this? I’ll leave it on,” movie guys.
This always starts for me with Denzel walking in slow motion in the rain, shooting the supposed bad guy in the neck as the rain adds to the ambiance. The best part of this, other than Denzel being Denzel, is there’s a cop in a room who I think is wounded that looks almost exactly like Guillermo from What We Do In The Shadows and it makes me smile.
We cut to a Russian(?) guy showering, when the lights go out. Denzel now has his Palpatine after slaying the Vader. Denzel leaves his gun and the room, confusing this tattooed fellow. Denzel has also left the sink overflowing. This confuses the big baddie until he notices some exposed wires. We hear a scream and the lights flicker as Denzel pimp walks down the steps around the deep bodies he’s taken out off-screen one by one, CUZ KING KONG AINT GOT NOTHIN ON HIM.
We then get Chloe Grace Moritz admitting she’s been stalking Denzel as he’s getting groceries. She tells him she’s been reading and got a real job, which probably has “this kid is finally growing up” meaning, but out of context sounds super weird. He kind of blows her off awkwardly so he can go to a beach and stare at the ocean while emo tunes play in the background. He then answers a plea for help on his laptop, which will be filmed for another major motion picture coming near you. Chances I’ll ever watch this entire movie: If I am ever at my dad’s house for the night, this is 100% the kind of movie he will seek out and throw on as we hang out. It’s probably on his DVR.
The Accountant
This is the mothership of pre-AEW Dynamite cinema. This must have been played at least 10-15 times before Dynamite, and I still have no clue what this movie is about. Every time I pick this movie up with JK Simmons sitting in a room looking dejected. He’s some kind of government official and there’s a lady he’s with and they both seem defeated, as he gives his old man life advice. We then cut to Ben Affleck storming John Lithgow’s hideout, mowing through minions until he gets to Jake Bernthal, the underboss in this case, who happens to be his brother. They sort out their daddy issues and at one point, Ben shoots Lithgow in the head nonchalantly, which I assume is a big deal to the plot but couldn’t mean less in this context.
Smash cut to a house with young children/special needs children? There’s a young boy walking around with his parents and an older girl on a computer that could “hack into the Pentagon,” which also seems like it’s probably important.
Smash cut to JK Simmons standing in front of a press conference. There’s an official who gives JK Simmons’ partner lady the credit, but he looks surprised? Then proud? I have no clue why this is happening as it seems like Ben Affleck did all the work.
We then cut to Anna Kendrick cleaning her apartment. She has not been seen or mentioned at all in the last quarter of this movie. But there’s apparently a connection with Affleck, because as she receives a painting that takes her breath away as she does the “blank Anna Kendrick stare” (you know EXACTLY what I mean), we see Affleck driving a camper up a backwoods roads with a shit-eating grin on his face. Roll credits. For some reason completely unknown to me, this movie is called THE ACCOUNTANT. Chances I’ll ever watch this entire movie: You’d have to pay me.
