Hops and Box Office Flops

MacGruber , which is a riff on the old jack-of-all trades television character MacGyver, is one of the more perplexing Saturday Night Live adaptations. I don't say that in a bad way. It's more because it takes a truncated skit (generally 30 seconds) and turns it into an unabashed, hard R, gross out gag, lowbrow yuck fest. That conceit can be a lot when stretched over 90 minutes. If that sounds ter...

Blues Brothers 2000  should have never happened. Period. It's an uninspired rehash of one of the great 80s comedies. There is nothing new here; thus, there was no reason for revisiting the titular brothers. Oh, and lest we forget that one of them—John Belushi—tragically passed away in 1982. Without his oversized and all-consuming personality, there is an undeniable void that's never filled. The ma...

New Year's Eve  sucks. I'm sorry, but it's the truth. Like the holiday itself, it's an exercise in excess—boasting an A-list cast, yet giving them nothing to do. It's mind-numbingly stupid and obscenely scripted. The fact that it expects you to like these characters is, in itself, anger-inducing. You will hate these people. All of them, but especially Bon Jovi—who inexplicably doesn't play himself...

It's a Wonderful Life  is a legitimate classic. It's aired every year around the holidays, and its message is as inspiring now as it was when it was released in 1946. It's a timeless tale of a man who feels his life has been unfulfilled. He's missed out on the world travels he swore he'd take; he's missed out on college to bailout his father's fledgling savings and loan; and he was unable to serve...

Santa's Slay  is exactly what the title implies. Santa Claus—played by WCW and WWE's Bill Goldberg—is big, angry, and not very keen on spreading Christmas cheer. Rather, he opts to spend the holidays igniting "Yuletide fear." That's the movie. Literally, that's it. Santa Claus is an asshole, who's hell bent on revenge. Why? Well, he was only nice because he lost in a game of chance to an angel who...

The Nutcracker and the Four Realms  is everything wrong with modern-day cinema. It takes a classic property—in this case, both a beloved ballet and story—and turns it into a paint-by-numbers adventure tale. Folks, this is a literal CGI-invested hellscape of banal ideas and idiotic plot. Worse, it's essentially a template that Disney has beaten to death—think Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland or The...

Tango & Cash is a the cinematic manifestation of all the 80s muscle-bound mayhem rolled into one messy package. It's a part serious, part satirical, part nonsensical tale of dueling cops forced into an uneasy partnership. And as much as it clearly doesn't work, it somehow is a hell of a lot of fun. Pairing two of the decade's iconic stars, Sylvester Stallone and Kurt Russell, as the titular duo, T...

Bullet to the Head  is a throwback to a simpler time; an era when men were men, off-color jokes were plentiful, and the amount of heroic quips was only surpassed by the body count. Serving as Sylvester Stallone's late mid-life crisis, Bullet to the Head is an unapologetic homage to the action films of yesteryear. This makes all the more sense when you consider that director Walter Hill perfected t...

Judge Dredd —which is based on the character from 2000 AD, a weekly British comic—is a sadly generic action film that fails to grasp the subversive nature of its character.  The titular judge—and the system in which he serves—is written as a commentary on the overly aggressive tactics of American law enforcement. The movie, despite nailing the look and feel of Mega-City One and its characters, pla...

Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot is Sylvester Stallone's attempt at an action comedy. Suffice to say, it's firing blanks. Co-starring Estelle Getty (Sophia on Golden Girls), it was a spin on the overused trope of mismatched/buddy cops. The conceit is a Hollywood staple, but rarely has it been used to such disastrous effect. Stop! is a Saturday Night Live skit exhaustively stretched to fill an hour and a...

Over the Top  is an 80s treasure. Set amidst the backdrop of long-haul trucking and arm wrestling, it's a patently absurd film about a father reuniting with his son. More important, though, it's oozing with machismo and righteous tunes. It's honestly all the best things about the decade rolled into one undersized, sweat-infused, cut-off shirt. And it must be seen. Produced by the legendary B-movie...

Much of our "Flops that Go Bump in the Night" series has been dedicated to adaptations of the great Stephen King's work. Those films have varied in quality, but none have attained the utter madness of the four films we chose for our last installment. For this final horror-inspired episode, we stared down rampaging machinery, fueled by an all AC/DC soundtrack and a hefty amount of sugar boogers, wi...

The Mist  is an experience that will stick with you. Though it is small in scale, primarily set inside a supermarket in a remote Maine town, there are huge emotional stakes. Thus, it is another fine interpretation of Stephen King's writing. Directed by Frank Darabont—who'd previously helmed King's The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile—the pedigree of this one was all but assured. And, like t...

As we referenced on our last pod— Dreamcatcher —adaptations of Stephen King novels range wildly in their quality.  Doctor Sleep , fortunately, continues their recent upward trend. As a sequel to The Shining , Stanley Kubrick's beloved 1980 film, as well as a translation of King's source, it had big shoes to film. It does so more than admirably. Credit to director Mike Flanagan  for that seamless c...

Dreamcatcher  is based on a novel by Stephen King. King is indisputably this generation's most prolific writer of horror. Unfortunately, for too long, the film's based on his novels weren't up to snuff. Dreamcatcher certainly falls into that category. It's filled with laughable dialogue, slapstick scares, and a near nonsensical plot. In short, it's a mess. But it shouldn't have been. Its cast is e...

Wes Craven's New Nightmare  came only a decade after the original, yet somehow—in that short span—it missed the height of the character's popularity. Freddy Krueger, for a time, transcended the screen. Toys, a TV show, and halloween costumes flooded the marketplace. Yes, Freddy Krueger, the burned, sadistic child molester, was even on a children's bubble gum . So, quite unfortunately, by the time...

The Dukes of Hazzard  was one of many TV shows to be adapted in the early and mid-2000s. Some were good, most were not. Dukes falls into the latter category. But it shouldn't have. Helmed by Broken Lizard's Jay Chandrasekhar and starring Johnny Knoxville, Sean Williams Scott, Burt Reynolds, and Jessica Simpson (amongst many other notable names), the ingredients were there. Yet despite its talented...

Idiocracy  presents us with a glimpse of a fairly dismal future—one full of idiots and societal decay. That may sound depressing on the surface, but Idiocracy was written and directed by Mike Judge (creator of Beavis and Butt-Head, King of the Hill, and writer/director of Office Space). Thus, it is a satirical look at a not-so-bright America in the year 2505. As Judge's follow up to Office Space,...

Oh Wild Wild West , how did it go so wrong? Will Smith was literally crushing it in the years leading up to the epic Western misfire. He'd embodied the cool renegade cop with Bad Boys; he'd conquered invading lifeforms twice with Independence Day and Men in Black (MIB); and he'd even bested corrupt federal agents in Enemy of the State. Wild Wild West was meant to be yet another high in his meteori...

Mallrats  is a cult classic. Kevin Smith's second big screen movie—a follow up to the indie darling Clerks—it was afforded the perks of its successors' accolades. Those mainly being a bigger budget and a studio push. That unfortunately did not translate into receipts. With $6 million at his disposal, Smith certainly does make use of the funds. His movie just didn't earn them back. Its total haul w...

Hackers  is the 1990s personified. From its aesthetic to its central narrative, everything in it screams the decade that it's rooted in. This is both a good and a bad thing. In terms of nostalgia, there is certainly plenty. And like most high school films of its era, it features a young, attractive cast of up and comers — Johnny Lee Miller, Angelina Jolie, and Matthew Lillard, to name a few.   The...

The Big Lebowski —as shocking as it may seem today—was not a smash hit upon its release in March of 1998. Far from it, in fact. On a budget of $15 million, it grossed barely over $17 million domestically. Its worldwide cume was a shade over $46. Written and directed by the Coen Brothers, The Big Lebowski's box office struggles are sort of surprising. After all, it was their follow up to Best Pictu...

Warcraft  is a peculiar study. For one, it’s the highest grossing video game film of all-time. It did cost $160 million, but, regardless, it made over $439 million. That sum would seem like a win, yet according to reporting, it needed over $450 million to break even. Though close, it apparently wasn’t close enough. Plans for a sequel have been scuttled—an outcome that further hurts an already weak...

Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li somehow manages to be the worst big screen adaptation of the franchise. The 1994 film starring Jean-Claude Van Damme wasn't a huge hit and was most certainly not critically beloved. Thus, Chun-Li had a low bar to clear, but it still could not do it. It made less money—$12.8 million vs $99.4 million—and couldn't even cross the 10% threshold critics set for 94's...

Uwe Boll is infamous for his poor video game adaptations. To date, he has made over 10 of them—including BloodRayne and its sequels, as well as House of the Dead and Alone in the Dark. Postal  is his magnum opus. It's a giant middle finger to the critics who've lambasted his work throughout his career, and it pulls zero punches. From an opening that pokes fun at 9/11 to Verne Troyer meeting his ma...