TOTAL MASSACRE

Time loops! Smarminess! Cool aliens! Comedy deaths! Hot butches! It's EDGE OF TOMORROW, it's TOTAL MASSACRE with Rowan, Carli, and Abby!

In the opening scene of Michael Bay's 2003 hit BAD BOYS 2, Will Smith yells "Blue power!" and it's all downhill from there. Or uphill. It's genuinely hard to say! Rowan, Dylan, and Brian try to puzzle it out as best as possible.

Total Massacre check's out Jackie Chan's nitty-gritty police procedural POLICE STORY, complete with Phoenix Wright-esque courtroom drama, three cakes to the face, bumbling cops who have to be able to break the rules, and the wildest bus stunt you'll ever see!

Perhaps you, like Rowan, Brian, and Dylan, have fond memories of 1998's action comedy hit RUSH HOUR. Jackie Chan holding up a vase! Chris Tucker saying funny things! Both guys singing James Brown! What's not to love? Well.....rewatching the movie gave us a lot of things that weren't those fond memories. Oopsie.

For the first film of Jet & Jackie January TOTAL MASSACRE heads back in time in China for ONCE UPON A TIME IN CHINA, a defining star turn for Jet Li that also influenced action movies for decades to come. Rowan is rejoined by Mike Williams and Brian Smawley to talk about the film which, perhaps more than any other we've covered, is great action scenes and pretty bad connective tissue.

What if Lethal Weapon was mean-spirited? What if pro football was on the verge of collapse from players shooting each other on the field? What if Bruce Willis wasn't charming? What if Shane Black cared about women in any way whatsoever? All the questions and more, answered by Rowan, Jay, and Chuck on the newest episode of TOTAL MASSACRE, on THE LAST BOY SCOUT.

Rowan, Carli, and Kev gather to check out a Patreon-recommended splatterfest, Tokyo Gore Police. It's...a lot. But it's also not enough, as we call it "a quarter of the way to a satire". Look, you're either clicking on a show called "Tokyo Gore Police" or not, I'm not sure what more I can add here.

Rowan, Carli, and Kev finally break the seal and cover....our first MCU movie, SHANG-CHI: LEGEND OF THE ETC ETC. Look, come on, it has Tony Leung, how could we not? He was in Hard Boiled! In the Mood for Love is Rowan's favorite movie! His eyes, man, his fucking eyes! Also there's MCU stuff and a guy with a knife-hand or whatever. Tony Leung!!!!

Rowan is joined by Jay Pullman and new guest Charles "Chuck Friendly" Moran to talk about Lethal Weapon, the buddy cop action movie to start all buddy cop action movies. We talk about the careers of Shane Black and Richard Donner, how good Mel Gibson and Danny Glover are, how evil Mel Gibson has become, the weird combination of copaganda and Vietnam guilt, and just how entertaining it all is.

Rowan felt like doing the sequel to Bourne so....we did it. Spy expert Christy Admiraal, Kev Koeser, and Jay Pullman dive into the Indian Ocean for a CIA thriller that questions whether Americans may be the baddies, provides a respectable fridging, and shakes the camera like it's a moneymaker.

Rowan is joined by Carli, Kev, and Dylan for a raucous late-night examination of Edgar Wright's 2010 cult hit SCOTT PILGRIM VERSUS THE WORLD. That cast! That style! Those jokes! That core romantic plot that doesn't actually work! Stories about our encounters with celebrity! And we also talk about the action occasionally or whatever.

Jean-Claude! John Woo! It's a match made in Hollywood heaven, with Woo's first American film, HARD TARGET. Rowan, Abby, and Dylan head to the Big Easy to talk about motorcycles, mullets, and when it's woke to hunt humans for sport!

Rowan is rejoined by Rob Zacny and Christy Admiraal for a discussion of 2012's SKYFALL. Rowan is very skeptical of James Bond, but loved half of this and hated the other half. See why she calls it the most morally reprehensible film we've covered yet! But also homoerotic spy shenanigans? Like the British Empire, SKYFALL is a land of contrasts.

Rowan, Jay, Kev, and Mike take on John Carpenter's 1986 VHS classic, BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA. It's a movie that shouldn't quite work as well as it does, but Kurt Russell's ability to set the tone, a great Asian-American cast, and Carpenter at the top of his directing games keep it monumentally entertaining throughout.

That's the name of the show! Rowan, Carli, and returning guest Brian Smawley take on Takashi Miike's samurai revenge epic 13 ASSASSINS. We talk about buckets of blood, the film's position in samurai movies and history, the odd supernatural elements, and a truly despicable villain.

Rowan and Kev get into our first-ever Patreon-chosen show on THE ROCKETEER. Timothy Dalton preens, Billy Campbell bumbles, Jennifer Connolly pretties, and Rowan wonders about gender. Normal Show.

Rowan and Kev gather to discuss our first-ever Patreon-suggested flick, 1991's The Rocketeer. It's....pretty good, but it feels so close to being better. We do not blame Timothy Dalton, chewing the scenery into bits, but the romantic leads, well.....

Rowan is rejoined by Naomi, Kev, and Abby to discuss John McTiernan's meta monstronsity Last Action Hero, the final film of Arnie August. We talk about how interesting is better than good, how every film of the early 90s felt like it needed a kid, how Arnie was rebranding for comedy, and more.

Philip K. Dick, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Paul Verhoeven seems like a match made for dreams, but is it? Rowan is skeptical, though Kev and Jay are all in on the fantasy. It's the third installment of Arnie August, and it's one of the key films in Arnold's brand creation, TOTAL RECALL on Total Massacre.

Rowan is rejoined by Carli and Zack and new guest Les Chappell for James Cameron's 1984 breakthrough hit, THE TERMINATOR. We talk fever dreams, character actors, story construction, and god damn that police station scene.

Rowan is joined by new guest Naomi Clark as well as Zack and Dylan to discuss the first installment of Arnie August: CONAN THE BARBARIAN. We talk about sex, violence, and....libertarianism.

Rowan, Jay, Abby W, and Carli form a superteam to examine our first (of very few) superhero movies: Birds of Prey. It's got style, songs, a great cast, and actually good action sequences! But is Birds of Prey also missing something?

Rowan is joined by Rob and Carli to discuss 2011's Indonesian action thriller The Raid: sometimes Redemption. We talk about the the Indonesian martial art of Silat, the shaky-cam era, the split of the superhero from the R-rated action flick, and holy shit that time when that little dude runs up the wall for a knee drop, did you SEE that shit???

It's a stripped down show for a stripped-down action movie, as Rowan and Jay discuss 2002's Bourne Identity. We talk about Matt Damon's baby blues, the director having done Swingers, post-9/11 paranoia, and the best Mini Cooper product placement short of The Italian Job

Rowan is joined by Kev, Zack, and new guest Brian Smawley to talk about Jackie Chan's epic Drunken Master 2, the kung fu movie to end all kung fu movies.