Doom (2005) - The Rock, Schlock, and Two Smoking Barrels

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"Rip and tear your way out of the theater, before the lights go down!"

Being a visual medium, video games are chock-a-block with movie references, inspirations, and sometimes downright theft. At some point, movies were due to return the favor. Super Mario Bros. (1993) was a rough start to that relationship - like having a first date at your colonoscopy - but Mortal Kombat (1995) saw Paul W.S. Anderson direct the first hit video game movie, making several times it's budget. The turn of the Willennium saw a rising trend; Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001) was the biggest hit at Paramount in 2001, with a total gross just behind the original Fast and Furious. (It was also the highest opening debut - 40 million - for a movie headlined by a woman ever at the time). Resident Evil - also by Paul W.S. Anderson, who directs so many movies with his wife, Milla Jovovich, in skintight outfits that it must be a fetish we're all participating in - shot off to a modest start the very next year, and churned out profitable sequels in no time flat. The pump was primed and the timing was perfect for another hit video game adaptation...right?

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Oh hell, he spotted that lazy foreshadowing! Start the car, START THE CAR!
At that point, a Doom movie was...well it had to be inevitable, right? The first-person shooter that made FPS a common phrase (after we stopped saying "Doom Clone", that is), Doom was an American hit franchise that borrowed liberally from Aliens (1982). Guns, guitars, and big-ass monsters; they'd need a budget, but it had to seem like a safe bet. It wasn't even a new idea, a Doom movie had been floated around in the late 90's - with no less than Arnold Schwarzenegger as the lead, the Doom Guy! - but Columbine made that a dicey proposition at the time. After years of terrible scripts and false starts however, Doom finally moved into production. A big action movie demands a big star, and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson was taking off. The Rundown (2003) had even featured a brief cameo from Schwarzenegger to "pass the torch" to the WWF superstar, heir apparent to the Action Throne. There was plenty of precedent for wrestlers making the jump to movies, but no one before or since stuck that landing like The Rock.

A Brief(?) Aside About Wrestlers In Movies​

Today we know Dwayne Johnson as one of the biggest stars in movies, being able to charge a cool million to show up for three seconds in Fast X. He's had some recent setbacks, and going over the ups and downs of his career...well, this article isn't solely about The Rock, another time perhaps. He has competition though, with John Cena and Dave Bautista having followed in his footsteps to make their own multimedia careers. Of the three, I actually think Cena may be the better actor, willing to get weird and vulnerable in ways that Johnson hasn't attempted in years. (He's easily the funniest.) Bautista is pretty beloved by cinephiles, but he hasn't had a real strong starring role in anything but ensembles like Guardians of the Galaxy, where he's sharing screen time with a host of other actors.

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He changed the game for big guys with tiny glasses though.
There were forerunners for these guys though, clear analogues in some of the biggest stars of the 80's wrestling circuits: Hulk Hogan, André The Giant, and "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. (Honorable mention to Jesse "The Body" Ventura for his lines in Predator, "I ain't got time to bleed.", and "This stuff will make you a goddamned sexual Tyrannosaurus, like me!")

Hogan was the best known, easily, but I'll get this out of the way now: The guy was a *terrible* actor, just a dogshit thespian. Professional wrestling demands just as much dramatic flair as it does biceps the size of a truck, but Hogan spent his golden years as America's Superhero; the good guy, vibing on the audience's cheers til he reached Terminal Hulkamania and dominated, like a pressure cooker with steroid-induced flop sweats. He never really had to prove he had range, and his film career didn't show off any hidden depths lurking beneath the cocaine-dusted surface. After a cameo in Rocky III made Hogan "The big guy from Rocky III", he became sorta familiar to most audiences and nearly a god to Italian-Americans. Naturally, he used that foot in the door to star in in terrible flicks like No Holds Barred, Suburban Commando, and 3 Ninjas: High Noon at Mega Mountain. (There was also a more recent movie with him and Bubba The Love Sponge's wife, maybe you've heard of it.)

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There was also Mr. Nanny (1993). Here it is looking like a mad lib come to life; "So far we have: Hulk Hogan and The Husband From The Jeffersons are at Their Mom's Retirement Home In Florida while training for a Ballet Recital."
Ironically, while the Hulkster got to triumph over them in the ring, his rivals were the real winners on the big screen. André the Giant featured in no less than The Princess Bride (1987), as the muscle of a trio of hoodlums for hire. He's the charming best friend of a scoundrel, the gentlest of giants; really, he's a shaved Chewbacca with a French accent. Very endearing, and one of the best movies anyone I mention in this article got to be in. I spent awhile refreshing my memory and reading about his life, and while he played the heel in his day job of Wrestling Monster, André Roussimoff was pretty well beloved in life. That's nothing to do with movies, I just really liked the guy.

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An absolute prince.
Piper, on the other hand, was known for pairing verbal assaults with *actual* assaults. The guy basically had an interview segment during WWF events to trash his opponents before smacking them around; somebody had to be the bastard, and he was damn good at it. Roddy had a *lot* of forgettable action movies, and even a cult hit with Hell Comes to Frogtown (1988), but 1988 also saw Roddy star in his biggest success: John Carpenter's They Live (1988). A paranoid sci-fi actioner about aliens controlling the Earth *and* a creative lambasting of the commercial "brainwashing" of Reagan's America, They Live saw Roddy Piper saving the earth and casually dropping the best line Duke Nukem ever ripped off. (Another fun tie to video games is Saints Row IV, with a massive homage to They Live that reunited Piper and his co-star Keith David. Y'all know Saints Row IV is better than every Grand Theft Auto, right?)

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Hail to the king, baby.

Back to Doom...I know, I'm not happy about it either.​

Shockingly, The Rock passed on being the lead. It's his name first on the marquee, and he's front and center in the marketing, but Dwayne Johnson chose to take the part of the main antagonist - initially a friend before a face heel turn - after joining the cast. The lead role of "John Grimm" went to Karl Urban instead, best known at the time as a side character in The Lord of The Rings. (He was Eomer, as if you didn't already know, nerd.) Johnson said it seemed like the more interesting part, and on paper, I'm sure that's true. In the movie, though? Well, let's get into it.

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"Sarge, the cellophane! It's not holding, they're breaking thr-!"
In 2026 (just next year!), dorks looking for dinosaur bones or something in Nevada find a portal instead, to Mars of all places. There were humans on the red planet once, and they built a door to Earth, dubbed "The Ark" by archaeologists. An obligatory Weyland-Yutani knockoff corporation - UAC, just like in the video games - sends research teams to the other side of this cosmic fast-travel point, finding an ancient city on Mars the movie calls Olduvai. (Named for the gorge in Tanzania, where some of the oldest fossils and tools used by early humans were found; y'all ever just lose a few hours clicking around Wikipedia?) Flash-forward twenty years, and the UAC research base is under quarantine and requesting military intervention. A small squad of elite Marines find out their R&R just got cut short, and they hop a ride through The Ark to investigate whatever terror lurks on Mars.

The Rock plays team leader "Sarge", a bizarre choice of name given that U.S. Marines *hate* that phrase. The most generous thing I can say is that he does what the part calls for; barking orders while showing concern for the team, until it's time to choose between them or the mission. He's not too crude, not too nice, "professional" is the best word for it. The little bit of character he gets is his child-like glee at handling the BFG, which apparently Johnson made sure to take home with him after making the movie. It would be several years before he discovered the secret to making a character like this work in Fast Five (2011): Call everyone "Boy" and sweat *profusely*.

His right-hand man is Karl Urban's John "Reaper" Grimm, and I'm guessing he's damned thankful the boys didn't name him "Fairy Tale" instead. I can't say much about Urban's acting, his characters only defining trait is "Protagonist", he could practically be silent and the movie wouldn't change. Anyways, Reaper is our Doom Guy, more or less; he's been given a backstory tied to the plot, having grown up the child of researchers on Olduvai. They perished in an accident, and John leaves his younger sister Samantha to go enlist. She grows up and follows the family track instead, becoming a UAC scientist herself. Played by Rosamund Pike in the very early days of her career, Sam Grimm is the team's contact on Mars, saddled with explaining technical jargon and telling the audience what's going on with clunky exposition. It's a thankless role, and Pike reads off most of her boring lines like she's going over a receipt to figure out if the cashier flubbed her change.

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Urban and Pike, pictured here sharing the same thought: "Please, don't let this be the one they remember me for."
Does everyone die? Yeah, of course. Does Reaper blast a bunch of demons? Not till the end...wait, *are* they demons though?

That's something nerds hated when the movie released; the monsters are all people changed by genetic testing. Apparently, Martian folks loved them some gene therapy, and started handing out extra chromosomes to spice up games of Twister or something. Some of them became superhuman, others turned into nightmares. Why the difference?

EVIL—no, really. Sam mentions genetic dispositions for violence and instability, Reaper asks if genes can be evil, and Rosamund Pike *with a straight face* says "10 percent of the human genome hasn't been mapped, they say it might be the soul." I don't understand why they had to use eugenics to replace any religious implications, it was 2005. The games had been around for over a decade, and America especially was gripped with Da Vinci Code fever; being sacrilegious was the hot ticket, yet the guys making the gory action movie were seemingly hoping church groups would buy out a private screening for their congregations.

No hellish incursions or brimstone labyrinths, then; just a by-the-numbers Aliens clone with a BFG. The Rock fingers some monkey blood and monsters out, the proper reward for just *touching shit* in a sci-fi movie. (That's not actually how the genetic tampering spreads, but come on, there's a quarantine in effect, man!) The rest of the team gets wasted by the transformed researchers, including one memorable murder in a bathroom stall. After a few close encounters, Reaper is left bleeding out; Sam injects her brother with Martian how-do-you-do and wouldn't you know it? He's the kind of genetically good person who has a positive reaction. Of course he does, he's *Karl Urban*, baby! After getting his Protagonist Booster Shot, Reaper depopulates Mars in a first-person sequence that's fun but brief. It's the highlight of the movie, but we're talking five minutes right at the end. Then he just has to win a boss fight with The Rock (The Brimstone?), which manages to be a pretty boring fist fight with some clumsy wire-work like a halfhearted wuxia movie. It was the 2000's, the Matrix series was making money, we just did that back then.

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If they had just *combined* the wuxia stuntwork with chainsaws, we'd be watching Doom 9: Hurt Me Plenty right now.
One of the stranger choices of the movie was how long it played Monster Peek-a-Boo, which is what I call horror/slashers teasing the moment when danger strikes early on.
You know what I mean, the bits where the teenagers have just arrived at the cabin, when suddenly! A rattle by the door, what fell dread does this portend?! IS THIS—no, sorry, it was a cat, you guys, I'm just a little jumpy. It's a way for the movie to keep you on your toes without breaking the "normalcy" of the setting, the screaming hasn't started yet. Doom stretches that shit out for days, the pacing and reveals come slowly, then all at once in a rush that requires Sarge to have a *dramatic* change in temperament. They can't even blame it on the monster genes, he isn't "turned" until the end. Who wrote this?

A brief aside on writer David Callaham.​

Fuck David Callaham.


Oh.​

Yeah...anyways the director is a more disappointing story, one Andrzej Bartkowiak. The cinematographer for the legendary Sidney Lumet in his later years, Bartkowiak shot classic drama and action, like Terms of Endearment (1983) and Speed (1994). Cinematographers and directors of photography often make a leap to directing, but Andrzej landed weird and broke a leg. I'll admit to liking Romeo Must Die (2000), but the rest of his directorial efforts are a pit of despair. Special note for this website, he also directed Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun LI (2009), a movie so terrible that it would bring out the nastiest side of me to write about. (Genuinely, if you ever see that review go up, assume I'm having the worst day of my life.) His work here is underwhelming, with an aesthetic that's mostly dark corridors covered in brown and gray, and blue lighting strewn about to add a little texture to the shadows. It's a horror movie with too little dread and atmosphere to be scary, and an action movie that's light on excitement and only features one solid set-piece in the third act. It's not especially interesting science-fiction either, since questions like "Are we saying humanity originally came from Mars?" actually go completely unexplored.

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We're just not touching that, Movie? Not even a *little* curious?

Does any of this junk work?​

Some of it! The most impressive part of Doom was the FPS sequence, which took two weeks to shoot and three months to plan out in advance. John Farhat was the visual effects lead and director for the scene, and the DVD release had a great interview with him about the challenges of making it work. A really interesting note was about the aspect ratio of games at the time - 4:3 - and how that allows room to see over your weapon, whereas a widescreen movie - 2.40:1 usually - doesn't have the space for. It *does* mean you have a huge increase in peripheral vision, so they could have more fun with monsters creeping around Reaper, but they had to have him lower his gun as often as possible for the sake of visual clarity. (Is this interesting? It is to me, for some reason; I once called a family member to tell them the Disney+ version of Oklahoma! (1955) was the Todd-AO 70mm widescreen version running at 30 frames per second, and god help me reader, I was *excited*).

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The DVD extras are pretty fuzzy, but you can see the effect an aspect ratio can have on a shooter here.
They also made an interesting choice to go practical wherever possible, with monsters by the Oscar-winning Stan Winston and his team. These guys made all the fun monsters, from the Xenomorph Queen in Aliens (1986) to the eponymous hunter from Predator (1987). The makeup work and suit designs were elaborate, and while it's not their most iconic work, the tangible effects add some heft to the action and gore.

Is it Doom?​

The whole production is stuffed with easter eggs and references, from the facility being run by a Dr. Carmack to the BFG 3000. There's a lot of cheeky dialogue at the beginning like "Get your game faces on", and ultimately the FPS set piece is probably what fans wanted from a Doom movie in the first place. There's some heavy metal in the soundtrack that's used sparingly, but it's applied at random throughout the movie; one bizarre usage is a few heavy chords played after the squad takes their first casualty. Not for the actual monster attack, just the scene transition from the fallen comrades body. (It's a nitpick, but weird enough it stuck in my head.) Where the Doom games are about a fast-paced experience that leaves you screaming at the powers-that-be—like quaffing cheap energy drinks while running full speed down a flight of stairs with an AMV set to Linkin Park blaring in your headphones—the movie is content to trade adrenaline for a shoddy Aliens imitation. The fan-service and vaguely familiar plot elements are just Doom-scented candles, lit up to lend some stank to the proceedings.

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Also, they called this the Bio Force Gun...Cowards.

Should I watch it?​

Hell no. In the end, the movie is adapting a game that was derivative of several movies, and the results are twice-warmed cinema leftovers. The Thing (1982) and Event Horizon (1997) are both better versions of a sci-fi haunted house story, and if you *need* an underwhelming Alien movie, AVP: Alien Vs. Predator (2004) came out just the year before.

There's one redeeming quality to Doom, and you don't need to watch the rest of the movie to understand or enjoy it.

 
Hell yeah another movie article! This’ll be a fantastic read over some tea. (On an unrelated, it’s a clever idea to review game-related movies. I’ll make sure to credit you once I eventually go along with the idea!)
 
Hell yeah another movie article! This’ll be a fantastic read over some tea. (On an unrelated, it’s a clever idea to review game-related movies. I’ll make sure to credit you once I eventually go along with the idea!)
(I *honestly* thought that's what the movie section was for, otherwise you guys might be drowning in Hitchcock retrospectives.)
Laddie, you are a solar eclipse: doesn't happen often, but goddamn it it is beautiful whenever it does.
Ah, Breakfast King, that means so much to me.
You could say the whole production was.... "DOOMed" from the get-go ?

You know, this article is like the definitive take on the movie, IMO. I dig.
God I need shades to read that line, it's too good. I dunno about definitive, I cut out drier movie details to fit more jokes in because I'm emotionally a child, but I *will* take the compliment, thank you!
It was a fun movie tho, specially the first person sequence near the end, thats when i knew Urban would make a great Dredd as he did.
I started worrying about running on too long after a bit, but I did originally have an intro about how the FPS scene was my only memory after seeing this in theaters back in 2005. The rest of the movie was basically rinsed from my brain by the time I got home.

Shit, I did write down a joke about Karl Urban accepting roles based on how little he has to show his face on screen, between first person in this and the helmet in Dredd, forgot to type it in somewhere.

(Dredd is *such* a great movie, I wish there were four sequels.)
Ah Doom, it taught me to rip and tear. But this movie is ripping and tearing people apart, in classic Doom fashion. What an article though, even though it was doomed from the start, at least it still has it's charm, it's pretty enjoyable
Classy, I should have just hit you up for a tag line for the article.
 
Haha after reading this, I won’t deny I had constant anxiety because I REALLY wanted to look like a helpless nerd by mentioning “They Live”, but I already lost the race before it even begun. So I swallowed my pride and read the article like a, *shudder*, a normal nerd… now how am I supposed to flex my useless wrestling knowledge?!

Good opening paragraph though. I do agree movies based on games suffer from that sense of redundancy. Ironically however it feels almost every failure was reasons besides that!

Nice read!
 
Haha after reading this, I won’t deny I had constant anxiety because I REALLY wanted to look like a helpless nerd by mentioning “They Live”, but I already lost the race before it even begun. So I swallowed my pride and read the article like a, *shudder*, a normal nerd… now how am I supposed to flex my useless wrestling knowledge?!

Good opening paragraph though. I do agree movies based on games suffer from that sense of redundancy. Ironically however it feels almost every failure was reasons besides that!

Nice read!
Suffer, normal nerd.

(...nah, I stopped watching wrestling in high school, flex as you please. You might have noticed I said WWF throughout, I've never seen a "WWE" show.)

The redundancy of movies based on games based on movies is definitely an obstacle, filmmakers need to play to the strengths of the medium to make it worthwhile. Stuff like: acting with more range and emotion than most games can allow, control of the camera and pacing to better convey story and tone, carefully arranged action set pieces that can have more creativity and options than a game with set inputs can allow, that sort of thing.
 
Honestly, though? Even though I had never thought about it, it makes perfect sense that Columbine would be the thing that would push this thing back decades. It'd have been in extremely bad taste to do so after the killers had not only worshipped the game, but planned most of the massacre on a custom-made level that's now lost to time. There's even historical precedent for just how much of a bad idea this was, too... After someone made a Titanic movie starring a PTSD-scarred survivor (whose career fittingly sunk right after) not even two months after that.

Great point, Laddie.
 
This movie is one of my guilty pleasures, its camp and very dumb, but i do find things about it that are enjoyable.

And the "other" Doom movie, makes this one look like Citizen Kane by comparison.

Also, someone said AMV? I have been listening to this ever since the video was uploaded.


Truly a time capsule of the 00s.
 
You're of course indisposed being the writer this time around, so I think I'll take the reins: random ATenderLad style question time!
  • It's all but confirmed that the numerous Anderson/Jovovich movies are a fetish unleashed upon us; can't blame him, I'd do the same. It's something to note that the few movies she's done without him never even got cult status, while all the ones she has have. Anyone even remember the Hellboy reboot with David Harbour with her as the villain? Exactly.
  • The first wrestler turned actor was actually of course the beloved and multi-talented Tor Johnson, the bright shining star of Plan 9 From Outer Space and actually one of the worst movies I've ever seen Beast of Yucca Flats. He garbled lines and knocked over sets so the others could run.
  • Everything I've read about Andre paints him as such a profoundly nice man, which makes the rest of his life around that much more sad. RIP, king.
  • I agree about the John Cena praise, he's hit his stride I think faster than the others and is a much improved actor in that short time. He was phenomenal in Peacemaker, and even his recent schlock has him trying his best performance wise. The Rock took a really long time to become the highest paid Hollywood actor (somehow), and definitely had some longer career lows.
  • I was one of those fanboys who got pissed at the whole 'not actually demons/aliens/dimension travellers/whatever that particular Doom game feels like' thing. It's literally the most basic feature, why even bother if they're not demons, you know?
  • The image of a wuxia Doom 9: Hurt Me Plenty made me laugh enough to almost choke on my poutine, and that's not even a joke being Canadian; I'm actually eating a poutine.
  • Bio-Force Gun, goddamn cowards.
Loved the article, to say the least. Made me actually laugh out loud more than once, and I have a bizarre need to amass strange, esoteric and useless knowledge so that was definitely sated. Give it a solid ?.
 
What a great article. I'm a poor weirdo who ended up watching the movie before playing the game. Yes, I watched it just for The Rock. Years later, when I played Ultimate Doom, I realized that it was a crazy movie that didn't recreate the original at all. Oh my god, you made me want to watch that movie again. Please take responsibility and let me read another interesting article.
 
Honestly, though? Even though I had never thought about it, it makes perfect sense that Columbine would be the thing that would push this thing back decades. It'd have been in extremely bad taste to do so after the killers had not only worshipped the game, but planned most of the massacre on a custom-made level that's now lost to time. There's even historical precedent for just how much of a bad idea this was, too... After someone made a Titanic movie starring a PTSD-scarred survivor (whose career fittingly sunk right after) not even two months after that.

Great point, Laddie.
Yeahhh, it was awkwardly linked to the event for years, it would have been a tough sell even with The Last Action Hero starring in it. I went back and forth on fleshing out that point, but it felt too solemn for *this* jokey article about a movie.

Also man, what a deep cut on that Titanic reference. Jordan Peele's Nope (2022) is partly about sensationalism in film and TV, the way terrible events can serve as fodder for entertainment. If Saved from the Titanic (1912) had any surviving film, it would make a fascinating reference point to pair with that movie...depressing, but fascinating.
This movie is one of my guilty pleasures, its camp and very dumb, but i do find things about it that are enjoyable.

And the "other" Doom movie, makes this one look like Citizen Kane by comparison.

Also, someone said AMV? I have been listening to this ever since the video was uploaded.


Truly a time capsule of the 00s.
Hey, nothing wrong with getting some enjoyment out of it. It doesn't land that way for me, and I hope I explained why, but I also re-watch Road House (1989) a lot so we all have our ghoulish delights.

That video is *exactly* the kind of shit I was thinking of, perfect. Actually, I forgot to mention it, but Nine Inch Nails did contribute a song (You Know What You Are?) but it only plays over the credits. They needed that energy during the actual movie, dammit!
You're of course indisposed being the writer this time around, so I think I'll take the reins: random ATenderLad style question time!
  • It's all but confirmed that the numerous Anderson/Jovovich movies are a fetish unleashed upon us; can't blame him, I'd do the same. It's something to note that the few movies she's done without him never even got cult status, while all the ones she has have. Anyone even remember the Hellboy reboot with David Harbour with her as the villain? Exactly.
  • The first wrestler turned actor was actually of course the beloved and multi-talented Tor Johnson, the bright shining star of Plan 9 From Outer Space and actually one of the worst movies I've ever seen Beast of Yucca Flats. He garbled lines and knocked over sets so the others could run.
  • Everything I've read about Andre paints him as such a profoundly nice man, which makes the rest of his life around that much more sad. RIP, king.
  • I agree about the John Cena praise, he's hit his stride I think faster than the others and is a much improved actor in that short time. He was phenomenal in Peacemaker, and even his recent schlock has him trying his best performance wise. The Rock took a really long time to become the highest paid Hollywood actor (somehow), and definitely had some longer career lows.
  • I was one of those fanboys who got pissed at the whole 'not actually demons/aliens/dimension travellers/whatever that particular Doom game feels like' thing. It's literally the most basic feature, why even bother if they're not demons, you know?
  • The image of a wuxia Doom 9: Hurt Me Plenty made me laugh enough to almost choke on my poutine, and that's not even a joke being Canadian; I'm actually eating a poutine.
  • Bio-Force Gun, goddamn cowards.
Loved the article, to say the least. Made me actually laugh out loud more than once, and I have a bizarre need to amass strange, esoteric and useless knowledge so that was definitely sated. Give it a solid ?.
I'm so flattered, how do people live with their petard hoisted like this?! (I love it.)
  • Exactly, you get it! I do want to amend one thing; The Fifth Element is pretty cult-ish, maybe even mainstream, *but* it's made by Luc Besson. He's definitely French Paul W.S. Anderson, a weird little pervert worshipping the same lady with every camera angle; that's the special sauce for a Milla Jovovich classic.
  • Damn, you're right - I *just* saw Tor Johnson too, he's in a wrestling match on-screen in Shadow of the Thin Man (1941), an old detective series that I adore. I remember Beast of Yucca Flats from Mystery Science Theater 3000, it's so much worse than Plan 9. (I think Seinfeld hyped that one up too much, there are soooo many other terrible movies out there to enjoy.)
  • It's really tragic but inspiring, the way Andre dealt with chronic pain but never let it color how he treated people.
  • Cena is so good in Peacemaker that I'll watch anything he's in, just to give him a shot. It's unreal how much that show gave him to work with, I'm dying for the new season. Conversely, I can't imagine being excited for another movie from The Rock, his collabs with Ryan Reynolds especially are just getting depressing.
  • Seriously, who were they worried about offending? It feels like another of those cynical decisions they make sometimes in movies, such as the Fox Marvel fare; too many people get worried that all this nerd shit would be alien to audiences. You would think in a world where Tim Burton movies inspired the fashion sense of every goth kid at the mall, that would be a distant concern.
  • Good lord that's *extremely* Canadian, terminal even. (I'm so glad someone laughed, my friend who looked over this before I posted it made me re-write that caption seven times before landing on a decent joke.)
  • ....COWARDS!
Glad you enjoyed it, I don't know what cephalopod laughter sounds like but I'm sure it's only a *little* haunting.
What a great article. I'm a poor weirdo who ended up watching the movie before playing the game. Yes, I watched it just for The Rock. Years later, when I played Ultimate Doom, I realized that it was a crazy movie that didn't recreate the original at all. Oh my god, you made me want to watch that movie again. Please take responsibility and let me read another interesting article.
Oh, damn, I made you want to re-watch this? I *do* owe you one, I'll get right to it. (Thank you so much!)
 
This Movie should be called Resident Evil in Space ;)
A Virus that mutates Humans, in Space.

Doom is such a nice Concept, the Future, high Tech, Humans have conquered the Space and are settling on Mars and or its Moons.
But than, the Door to Hell opens, all the Technology useless and an incomprehensible Evil slaughters hundrets, millions of Humans.

They never ever should ground Hell, don't explain what Hell is and don't make it to Aliens or a Virus in the End.
I disliked the Story of Doom Eternal because of it.

Let Hell be something beyond human Comprehension.

Btw. being on Movies to Games, i was buying Groceries today and found a DvD of Tomb Invader lol.
3 Bucks, had to grab it.
 
Beast of Yucca Flats
"Flag on the moon. How'd it get there?" Repeated like 20 times for some reason. Atrocious movie, even by early 60s B-monster movie standards. Nothing happens, the acting and dubbing is of course terrible, it's not even enjoyable as a 'good bad movie'. Was one of the best MST3K episodes, though.
Plan 9. (I think Seinfeld hyped that one up too much, there are soooo many other terrible movies out there to enjoy.)
I agree. Plan 9 needs to be seen to be believed, but it's become entirely overexposed like The Room or Troll 2. It's the ironic Nirvana shirt of good-bad movies. I'm partial to Manos, an absolute classic; it's definitely more interesting than Troll 2 in my opinion, and infinitely more bizarre.

It's really tragic but inspiring, the way Andre dealt with chronic pain but never let it color how he treated people.
He seemed to really like being part of Princess Bride, there's so many stories from it of him being a delightful person. Apparently his favourite thing about it was that "no one looks at me", which is both heartwarming and sad.

Cena is so good in Peacemaker that I'll watch anything he's in, just to give him a shot.
Seriously. He was my favourite character in The Suicide Squad, and I didn't expect much from the show so I was of course utterly blown away by how good it was. It's hilarious, filled with actually amazing character work (mainly with Peacemaker of course) and sometimes even sad. Love the scene early on when he gets home, plays some music and finally starts crying over having killed Rick Flagg while calling himself an asshole. Great acting from Cena, felt really natural and subtle instead of some big overacted scene. And of course, Vigilante; enough said.
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I don't know what cephalopod laughter sounds like but I'm sure it's only a *little* haunting.
I couldn't find out if they laugh, and apparently they make really only very faint chittering noises with their weird tooth, so here's a random gif I found of a cartoon octopus beating the shit out of a shark instead.
Art Shark GIF


Oh, shit I mean- we only make weird chittering noises with our one tooth.
 
Amazing review! I look forward to your future articles ::nyamcoawards

I remember watching this one years ago but the only thing I can remember about it is the FPS scene, probably because it was the only decent scene in the whole movie. I'm glad you pointed out how being wishy-washy with the overall theme (horror vs action) contributed to bringing the whole production down. In my experience, it's far better for a piece of media to evoke strong emotions (even negative ones) than to be bland and forgettable.
 
Btw. being on Movies to Games, i was buying Groceries today and found a DvD of Tomb Invader lol.
3 Bucks, had to grab it.
I had to look that one up, what tax hustle does Asylum use to stay afloat?!
"Flag on the moon. How'd it get there?" Repeated like 20 times for some reason. Atrocious movie, even by early 60s B-monster movie standards. Nothing happens, the acting and dubbing is of course terrible, it's not even enjoyable as a 'good bad movie'. Was one of the best MST3K episodes, though.
Did you like the return on Netflix? I kinda loved Patton Oswalt.
I agree. Plan 9 needs to be seen to be believed, but it's become entirely overexposed like The Room or Troll 2. It's the ironic Nirvana shirt of good-bad movies. I'm partial to Manos, an absolute classic; it's definitely more interesting than Troll 2 in my opinion, and infinitely more bizarre.
Easily, and The Room is so overexposed I can't stand it. The "ironic" screenings drove me crazy, at some point you just have to admit you like this wretched movie!
He seemed to really like being part of Princess Bride, there's so many stories from it of him being a delightful person. Apparently his favourite thing about it was that "no one looks at me", which is both heartwarming and sad.
Arnold Schwarzenegger and Andre used to hang out and get dinner together, and there's some great stories about an argument over paying for a check. Andre insisted, and when Arnold argued too much the Giant lifted him up and carried him out like a handbag, and set him on the roof of a car in the parking lot.
Seriously. He was my favourite character in The Suicide Squad, and I didn't expect much from the show so I was of course utterly blown away by how good it was. It's hilarious, filled with actually amazing character work (mainly with Peacemaker of course) and sometimes even sad. Love the scene early on when he gets home, plays some music and finally starts crying over having killed Rick Flagg while calling himself an asshole. Great acting from Cena, felt really natural and subtle instead of some big overacted scene. And of course, Vigilante; enough said.
He has so many good scenes, like all the ones with his dad, or the moment he plays the piano. The whole cast was great, come to think of it. I also just watched Creature Commandos, and I think James Gunn is just the best around at this comic book thing. He makes the weird bits relatable, without grounding them in drab reality. (He also just has the *best* taste in music.)
I couldn't find out if they laugh, and apparently they make really only very faint chittering noises with their weird tooth, so here's a random gif I found of a cartoon octopus beating the shit out of a shark instead.
Art Shark GIF


Oh, shit I mean- we only make weird chittering noises with our one tooth.
.....I feel 91% sure that's from Challenge of the Super Friends.
Amazing review! I look forward to your future articles ::nyamcoawards

I remember watching this one years ago but the only thing I can remember about it is the FPS scene, probably because it was the only decent scene in the whole movie. I'm glad you pointed out how being wishy-washy with the overall theme (horror vs action) contributed to bringing the whole production down. In my experience, it's far better for a piece of media to evoke strong emotions (even negative ones) than to be bland and forgettable.
Exactly, they didn't take chances or even try that hard to establish a theme. That said, I've seen it pointed out that a good horror director can make a good action movie, since a lot of the dynamics of building and releasing tension translate over nicely. Andrzej Batkowiak seems to prove the opposite isn't true, with the movie struggling to provide any scares. (Then again, it's not particularly good action either.)

The biggest problem is probably the script? I had a longer section about the writer and his goofy career; his name is in the credits for every Expendables movie, "featuring characters created by David Callaham". Characters! In The Expendables! I uh, dropped all of that for the sake of a joke though.
"I gotta take a dump"
Okay, first off? Excellent work.

Secondly, I wrote a whole long section on how that character, Portman, is the worst human being who ever lived. He is a walking filth factory, just weird and gross and the actor is *loving* it. I actually knew the movie was taking a bad turn when he becomes the only person with common sense in the second half, insisting they call for backup. I dropped it when the article was looking too long for a silly movie review, but I should include his best quote.

1739669606376.png
1739669626735.png
1739669709850.png


Everyone gets *one* personality trait, and that's his. Amazing.
 
Tomb Invader
I had to look that one up, what tax hustle does Asylum use to stay afloat?!
They mostly film in places like Estonia or the Phillipines for those sweet foreign tax incentives, but they largely just make money on releasing like 50 movies a year that cost like maybe 50k to make. They may only each make like 200-300k in revenue (and most of that is from selling the movies off to places like tubi or Hulu or whatever) but they make so many movies that they easily clear a couple mill every year and have very little overhead.

Did you like the return on Netflix? I kinda loved Patton Oswalt.
Honestly, haven't watched it. I have nothing against the revival or anything like some weirdos do, but I just can't be bothered at the same time. Maybe I'll get around to it, but instead I'll probably just rewatch the Catalina Caper and Final Sacrifice episodes over again.

Arnold Schwarzenegger and Andre used to hang out and get dinner together, and there's some great stories about an argument over paying for a check. Andre insisted, and when Arnold argued too much the Giant lifted him up and carried him out like a handbag, and set him on the roof of a car in the parking lot.
Hilarious. He apparently had a record of drinking like a hundred beers every night out, which I can't even contemplate; I have one and I almost immediately fall asleep.
Creature Commandos
Heard mixed things about the show, but I'm interested in the premise at least; perhaps I'll give it a go.
 
The biggest problem is probably the script? I had a longer section about the writer and his goofy career; his name is in the credits for every Expendables movie, "featuring characters created by David Callaham". Characters! In The Expendables! I uh, dropped all of that for the sake of a joke though.
Good god, it's like the guy randomly shuffled onto the set looking lost, so the director pitied him and gave him some busy work to keep him calm and quiet.
 
Good god, it's like the guy randomly shuffled onto the set looking lost, so the director pitied him and gave him some busy work to keep him calm and quiet.
It's weird, he started on this movie and then failed up to Expendables. He's also responsible for Mortal Kombat (2021) and Wonder Woman 1984 (2020). I can't say I've caught whatever his style is, but Godzilla (2014) is his only major solo credit...which is pretty decent?

I can't really give Callaham the credit though, that really belongs to the director Gareth Edwards and the phenomenal visuals; I don't think there's another Godzilla movie that conveys the sheer *size* quite so well. Equally good is the sound design, watching that one in the theater made you feel small, like these behemoths might trample you at any moment.

(I kept going for another paragraph into Godzilla before I caught myself, seems to be a night for my mind to wander.)
 
This was great. I never watched the DOOM movie as I expected it to be terrible but always had a morbid curiosity about it, especially after hearing about the FPS scene. I feel like you have saved me 2 hours of my life and I thank you for that.

I eagerly await your Super Mario Bros movie, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter the Movie and Silent Hill reviews. Or if you don't get to them I might piggyback on your idea as I have positive feelings about each one of those movies.
 
This was great. I never watched the DOOM movie as I expected it to be terrible but always had a morbid curiosity about it, especially after hearing about the FPS scene. I feel like you have saved me 2 hours of my life and I thank you for that.

I eagerly await your Super Mario Bros movie, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter the Movie and Silent Hill reviews. Or if you don't get to them I might piggyback on your idea as I have positive feelings about each one of those movies.
Happy to help!

Just to be clear, I do like some of those! Spike covered Mortal Kombat already...not that there's a rule against it, but so far we've all avoided stepping on each others toes.

I'd love to be a *little* more positive than I was here, or god forbid just watch a better movie; Super Mario could be fun, or maybe a collective look at the Resident Evil series. Not as focused on one movie as this, but a look at how the series changed over the ridiculous number of installments. (They owe me *some kind* of enjoyment after I took my brothers to see the midnight release of Resident Evil: Afterlife in 3D. Both of those idiots fell asleep in the theater; it was their idea to go see it in the first place!)
 

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