I know.
I know.
I know.
You read the headline of the post and you were like--
He's lost his mind.
First of all, joke's on you. I lost it years ago.
SECOND of all, yes, I do worship at the altar of Mr. The Rock, but nevertheless--
Hobbes and Shaw is one of the greatest summer movie of all time--ever.
Let me break down this masterwork for you.
The movie starts out with a bunch of MI6 agents trying to steal a virus.
Okay, let's stop right there.
This movie belongs to a cinematic universe that was founded on a two-dollar movie about street racing in LA. How did we EVER get to a point where MI6 agents are involved?
Anyone?
ANYone?
Moving on.
Vanessa Kirby is one of the agents and I think she backstabs her team? I can't tell. Oh, by the way, spoiler alert, but, like, you won't be understand anything I'm saying from here on in, and you definitely won't be able to make sense of the movie no matter WHAT so just read on and enjoy.
Vanessa Kirby, or Princess Margaret from The Crown, which is her FULL given name, backstabs her team and then another team shows up with Cyborg Idris Elba as their leader.
I'm not making this up.
Idris Elba is a cyborg in this movie.
This movie whose granddaddy was about Vin Diesel chugging beers, driving fast cars, and pretending to be sexually interested in Michelle Rodriguez has now given birth to CYBORGS.
Robo-Idris kills all of Vanessa's team--or they're working together so she knew he was going to kill the team, but then he wanted to kill her? No idea. The point is--she escapes Terminelba (No? No good? Never mind) and she INJECTS THE HUMANITY-DESTROYING VIRUS INTO HERSELF.
Why does she do this?
No clue.
How does it not kill her immediately?
There's a timer in it.
There's a timer...in the virus.
Or, like, the effects take seventy-two hours to manifest--or something.
But once they do, they go airborne, and the whole world dies, except Small Wonder Idris, and he's into it, because he works for a mysterious organization that wants to purge the world like Thanos does in Endgame, and if you think that's the only similarity between a superhero movie and a film that features The Rock talking to his eight-year-old daughter about her book report on THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA, you are wrong, my friend.
Dead wrong.
So Princess Margaret, loaded up with deadly virus and ready to party, escapes.
Then we do a split screen--very Odd Couple--to reveal Mr. The Rock, the most amazing human being who has ever graced our planet, and Jason Statham, who's, like, fine.
The Rock is supposed to be the healthy, LA-based, crunchy granola one, and Statham is the Bad Boy Brit with a girl in his bed.
Let's take a second here.
If you think.
For one second.
That any character played by Mr. The Rock.
Wouldn't have at least five people in his bed.
At all times.
Of all different ages, body types, and (thoughts and prayers) genders.
Then you are sorely mistaken.
THAT was the most unbelievable part of the movie to me, and this is a movie that is supposed to take place in just a few days, and features the characters going from a steelyard in Russia to F***ING SAMOA.
Anyway.
We establish that Hobbes and Shaw are, in fact, an odd couple who hate each other, but Ryan Reynolds shows up and demands that Mr. The Rock, who he's in love with (and yes, I *would* watch that movie--several times), go to England to find this virus, because I guess Hobbes is, like, James Bond now. Then, Rob Delaney from Catastrophe (I refer to people by their BEST parts, everyone) says the same thing to Jason Statham, and then Reynolds and Delaney have a split screen moment, because I guess people think we all just loved Deadpool 2 so much we need to harken back to it whenever we can. Whatever, I'll live.
Mr. The Rock and Statham meet up, and they're like--
I'm not working with this kween.
And Statham takes off.
--Oh, but wait!
I forgot to tell you about Statham's jailhouse scene with his mother, played by Helen Mirren, who apparently REALLY needs money, or she just got a taste of that franchise life after doing Fast & Furious 37, and now she can't get enough.
We sort of figure out--or we're told? I don't know. I don't care. Don't stop me. I'm having such a good time. I'm having a ball. We figure out that Princess Margaret is Statham's little sister, which means Helen Mirren had her when she was, what? Fifty-eight? I mean, no disrespect to Dame Mirren, she looks f***ing incredible, but the timeline is a little wonky here.
Statham goes to his little sister's apartment and he gets into a fight with a bunch of Short Circuit Idris' goons, and while THAT'S going on, National Treasure Mr. The Rock Johnson has located Princess Margaret, and the two of them fight.
At one point, she wraps her thighs around that giant head of his, and never have I envied another human being more in my entire life.
Mr. The Rock captures the Princess and takes her back to headquarters. Headquarters of what? I couldn't tell you. He was hired by the CIA, this is supposed to be MI6, and Statham was a bad guy two movies ago, but allegedly that was all an act, or a double cross, or who the f*** can tell?
I almost went down a Wikipedia rabbit hole to write this, and honestly, I'm so glad I didn't, because I'm only two episodes into Glow's new season, and that really needs to be where my focus is right now, everybody, so just get over it.
Statham shows up to headquarters and he's like--
Give me my sister.
And Mr. The Rock is like--
F*** off, gurl. My face still smells like her thighs.
THEN Seven-of-Idris shows up and DESTROYS MI6 headquarters, and, like, has a way too easy time of it. How did he know where it was? I think there's a tracker or something? I mean, the whole headquarters is on top of a skyscraper, which, like, not an ideal place to put that kind of operation, you know what I mean?
He takes Princess Margaret and Mr. The Rock and Statham (who I should probably be calling Shaw at this point, but why start using character names now? I'm only 50-50 on who's who, and again, not researching this) give chase DOWN THE SKYSCRAPER, because any chance this movie gets to rip off Mission: Impossible, you better believe they're going to f***ing do it.
But wait, wait, wait.
There is a moment--once they've landed on the ground--where Man of the Century Mr. Dwayne The Rock Johnson Adele Miranda and F***-Me-Up-Daddy-Robot Elba come FACE-TO-FACE, and, like, I'm sure that happened in the trailer as well, but something about seeing it for the FIRST TIME IN CINEMATIC HISTORY IN THE CONTEXT OF THE FILM leveled me out, everybody. I mean, I was done for. These two eye-f***** the **** out of each other for a good FIVE SECONDS, and then there was fisticuffs, but at that point, I was already passed out and pre-ordering the DVD on Amazon.
Then, there was a car chase--like, thirty minutes into a film that belongs to a franchise that's supposed to be ALL ABOUT CAR CHASES--and, like, the car chase isn't even that good, but Princess Margaret, Mr. The Rock, and Statham all manage to get away from Rosie Elba Jetson.
But it doesn't really matter, because once they get Vanessa Kirby alone, she's like--
Guys, there's a virus in me and it's going to blow so you should probably just kill me.
And the two of them are like--
No, it's okay, we don't need to sacrifice one life to save all of humanity. There must be a way to fix this.
So they find this doctor who knows all about the virus because he made it and it would have been such a good part for Danny DeVito back in the 80's, but instead it's this other guy, and he's like--
There's this lab in Russia, and there's a machine there, and if you go, you can get the virus out, but it's guarded by Idris Elba Bishop from Alien so you'll probably die if you go there.
And they're like--
We're going there.
And if you're wondering--
How long is this movie?
The answer is--
Too f***ing long and I loved every minute of the eleven hours I spent watching it.
And if you're also wondering--
Does it have a clear-to-the-point-of-being-moronic-three-act-structure-that-even-a-toddler-could-pinpoint?
The answer is another question and that question is--
Does it rain the blood of angels every time Mr. The Rock is sad?
So there you go.
The trio (Or quartert? The doctor goes too? I think?) go to Russia and they fight a bunch of bad guys in the lab after Princess Margaret allows herself (I think) to be captured so she can get the virus out, but it doesn't work, but she steals the machine that could get it out of her, and then they blow up the entire facility, and they all escape again, after Mr. The Rock and Statham fight Idris Watson from Jeopardy! on a moving truck.
Idris actually says at one point--
I'M BLACK SUPERMAN!
And you have to wonder if they didn't offer Denzel Washington every dollar on earth to play this part and make lines like that one work. I mean, I love Daddy Idris, and lord knows he does his best, but this script was written by seventy-three people and none of them were ever in the same room, so it's...it's rough, everybody. I won't lie to you. It's rough.
Once the gang escapes Russia (the doctor is killed, I think), they have to find somewhere else to go and someone who can fix the machine Princess Margaret stole, because they still won't kill her, and I get it, she's Statham's sister, and at this point, Mr. The Rock is, like, really into her, but time is ticking.
Oh, there's also a scene on an airplane (yes, they take an airplane, and it's very weird, because you realize that NOBODY EVER FLIES COACH IN THE MOVIES), and there's a Kevin Hart cameo because Kevin Hart is to Mr. The Rock what Arsenio Hall was to Eddie Murphy is the early 90's. Like, it's not that we don't like him, but it's clear that Mr. The Rock likes him A LOT MORE than the rest of us.
Mr. The Rock takes his new friends to Samoa, because there was probably some cross-promotional opportunity for Mr. The Rock to talk about how HE'S ACTUALLY FROM SAMOA on his Instagram a thousand times if they worked it into the story, and so work it in they did.
His family is cold to him when he arrives, because--I don't know. He ratted someone out? Can't tell you. All I can say is that I was READY for an entire family of men who look like Mr. The Rock and I was SORELY disappointed (aside from this one guy who IMDB rudely didn't identify for me even after I typed in 'Mr. The Rock's Hot Brother from Hobbes and Shaw'), but the woman playing Mr. The Rock's mother pretty much steals the entire movie with the most stereotypical-to-the-point-of-problematic performance you could possibly dream up.
The Samoans--wait for it--DON'T HAVE GUNS. And apparently, even though Samoa is a part of the United States, you just can't get guns anywhere so yes, I am now moving to Samoa.
That means they have to fight Skynet Elba WITHOUT guns, so they go the 1970's Disney route and do it with BOOBY TRAPS after Mr. The Rock's brother fixes the virus-sucking machine and they STRAP IT ONTO VANESSA KIRBY'S BACK LIKE SHE'S DORA THE F***ING EXPLORER.
Are you wondering if there's a countdown clock going during the big battle scene letting you know how much time they have before the virus kills her and enters the atmosphere?
F*** YEAH THERE IS.
And--and this always drives me nuts in movies--the time doesn't quite line up.
I know that's a weird thing to quibble with in a movie like this, but the countdown clock says 'Ten minutes' and forty minutes later, it's at '9:21.'
Uh....does this take place in a world where time moves slower?
Idris...uh...okay, forget the nicknames, we're running out of time, unlike Princess Margaret--who Idris grabs and puts on a helicopter leading to a helicopter chase where Mr. The Rock chains a truck to a helicopter and then a bunch of other trucks and then they almost go off a cliff but then they don't but then they do and then Idris, Mr. The Rock, and Statham all fight UNDER A WATERFALL before Princess Margaret gets all the virus out of her system and Idris is defeated and then falls off a cliff into the pale blue waters of Samoa and a detached voice promises The Rock that soon the franchise will expand beyond anyone's wildest dreams.
And then it just...ends.
With like, a kind of somber musical score and not 'Why Can't We Be Friends?' from the trailer, which seems way more appropriate.
But if any of that makes it sound like I didn't enjoy the movie--
Oh, I can assure you. I had the time of my f***ing life.
They do not make movies like that anymore.
Probably because they cost the GDP of a small country and asking humans to suspend logic for that long is tricky even in 2019, but still--
It was a RIDE.
No, literally, they're probably making a Hobbes and Shaw ride as we speak at Universal's new park Testosterone Land.
And I, for one, can't wait to get in line.
I know.
I know.
You read the headline of the post and you were like--
He's lost his mind.
First of all, joke's on you. I lost it years ago.
SECOND of all, yes, I do worship at the altar of Mr. The Rock, but nevertheless--
Hobbes and Shaw is one of the greatest summer movie of all time--ever.
Let me break down this masterwork for you.
The movie starts out with a bunch of MI6 agents trying to steal a virus.
Okay, let's stop right there.
This movie belongs to a cinematic universe that was founded on a two-dollar movie about street racing in LA. How did we EVER get to a point where MI6 agents are involved?
Anyone?
ANYone?
Moving on.
Vanessa Kirby is one of the agents and I think she backstabs her team? I can't tell. Oh, by the way, spoiler alert, but, like, you won't be understand anything I'm saying from here on in, and you definitely won't be able to make sense of the movie no matter WHAT so just read on and enjoy.
Vanessa Kirby, or Princess Margaret from The Crown, which is her FULL given name, backstabs her team and then another team shows up with Cyborg Idris Elba as their leader.
I'm not making this up.
Idris Elba is a cyborg in this movie.
This movie whose granddaddy was about Vin Diesel chugging beers, driving fast cars, and pretending to be sexually interested in Michelle Rodriguez has now given birth to CYBORGS.
Robo-Idris kills all of Vanessa's team--or they're working together so she knew he was going to kill the team, but then he wanted to kill her? No idea. The point is--she escapes Terminelba (No? No good? Never mind) and she INJECTS THE HUMANITY-DESTROYING VIRUS INTO HERSELF.
Why does she do this?
No clue.
How does it not kill her immediately?
There's a timer in it.
There's a timer...in the virus.
Or, like, the effects take seventy-two hours to manifest--or something.
But once they do, they go airborne, and the whole world dies, except Small Wonder Idris, and he's into it, because he works for a mysterious organization that wants to purge the world like Thanos does in Endgame, and if you think that's the only similarity between a superhero movie and a film that features The Rock talking to his eight-year-old daughter about her book report on THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA, you are wrong, my friend.
Dead wrong.
So Princess Margaret, loaded up with deadly virus and ready to party, escapes.
Then we do a split screen--very Odd Couple--to reveal Mr. The Rock, the most amazing human being who has ever graced our planet, and Jason Statham, who's, like, fine.
The Rock is supposed to be the healthy, LA-based, crunchy granola one, and Statham is the Bad Boy Brit with a girl in his bed.
Let's take a second here.
If you think.
For one second.
That any character played by Mr. The Rock.
Wouldn't have at least five people in his bed.
At all times.
Of all different ages, body types, and (thoughts and prayers) genders.
Then you are sorely mistaken.
THAT was the most unbelievable part of the movie to me, and this is a movie that is supposed to take place in just a few days, and features the characters going from a steelyard in Russia to F***ING SAMOA.
Anyway.
We establish that Hobbes and Shaw are, in fact, an odd couple who hate each other, but Ryan Reynolds shows up and demands that Mr. The Rock, who he's in love with (and yes, I *would* watch that movie--several times), go to England to find this virus, because I guess Hobbes is, like, James Bond now. Then, Rob Delaney from Catastrophe (I refer to people by their BEST parts, everyone) says the same thing to Jason Statham, and then Reynolds and Delaney have a split screen moment, because I guess people think we all just loved Deadpool 2 so much we need to harken back to it whenever we can. Whatever, I'll live.
Mr. The Rock and Statham meet up, and they're like--
I'm not working with this kween.
And Statham takes off.
--Oh, but wait!
I forgot to tell you about Statham's jailhouse scene with his mother, played by Helen Mirren, who apparently REALLY needs money, or she just got a taste of that franchise life after doing Fast & Furious 37, and now she can't get enough.
We sort of figure out--or we're told? I don't know. I don't care. Don't stop me. I'm having such a good time. I'm having a ball. We figure out that Princess Margaret is Statham's little sister, which means Helen Mirren had her when she was, what? Fifty-eight? I mean, no disrespect to Dame Mirren, she looks f***ing incredible, but the timeline is a little wonky here.
Statham goes to his little sister's apartment and he gets into a fight with a bunch of Short Circuit Idris' goons, and while THAT'S going on, National Treasure Mr. The Rock Johnson has located Princess Margaret, and the two of them fight.
At one point, she wraps her thighs around that giant head of his, and never have I envied another human being more in my entire life.
Mr. The Rock captures the Princess and takes her back to headquarters. Headquarters of what? I couldn't tell you. He was hired by the CIA, this is supposed to be MI6, and Statham was a bad guy two movies ago, but allegedly that was all an act, or a double cross, or who the f*** can tell?
I almost went down a Wikipedia rabbit hole to write this, and honestly, I'm so glad I didn't, because I'm only two episodes into Glow's new season, and that really needs to be where my focus is right now, everybody, so just get over it.
Statham shows up to headquarters and he's like--
Give me my sister.
And Mr. The Rock is like--
F*** off, gurl. My face still smells like her thighs.
THEN Seven-of-Idris shows up and DESTROYS MI6 headquarters, and, like, has a way too easy time of it. How did he know where it was? I think there's a tracker or something? I mean, the whole headquarters is on top of a skyscraper, which, like, not an ideal place to put that kind of operation, you know what I mean?
He takes Princess Margaret and Mr. The Rock and Statham (who I should probably be calling Shaw at this point, but why start using character names now? I'm only 50-50 on who's who, and again, not researching this) give chase DOWN THE SKYSCRAPER, because any chance this movie gets to rip off Mission: Impossible, you better believe they're going to f***ing do it.
But wait, wait, wait.
There is a moment--once they've landed on the ground--where Man of the Century Mr. Dwayne The Rock Johnson Adele Miranda and F***-Me-Up-Daddy-Robot Elba come FACE-TO-FACE, and, like, I'm sure that happened in the trailer as well, but something about seeing it for the FIRST TIME IN CINEMATIC HISTORY IN THE CONTEXT OF THE FILM leveled me out, everybody. I mean, I was done for. These two eye-f***** the **** out of each other for a good FIVE SECONDS, and then there was fisticuffs, but at that point, I was already passed out and pre-ordering the DVD on Amazon.
Then, there was a car chase--like, thirty minutes into a film that belongs to a franchise that's supposed to be ALL ABOUT CAR CHASES--and, like, the car chase isn't even that good, but Princess Margaret, Mr. The Rock, and Statham all manage to get away from Rosie Elba Jetson.
But it doesn't really matter, because once they get Vanessa Kirby alone, she's like--
Guys, there's a virus in me and it's going to blow so you should probably just kill me.
And the two of them are like--
No, it's okay, we don't need to sacrifice one life to save all of humanity. There must be a way to fix this.
So they find this doctor who knows all about the virus because he made it and it would have been such a good part for Danny DeVito back in the 80's, but instead it's this other guy, and he's like--
There's this lab in Russia, and there's a machine there, and if you go, you can get the virus out, but it's guarded by Idris Elba Bishop from Alien so you'll probably die if you go there.
And they're like--
We're going there.
And if you're wondering--
How long is this movie?
The answer is--
Too f***ing long and I loved every minute of the eleven hours I spent watching it.
And if you're also wondering--
Does it have a clear-to-the-point-of-being-moronic-three-act-structure-that-even-a-toddler-could-pinpoint?
The answer is another question and that question is--
Does it rain the blood of angels every time Mr. The Rock is sad?
So there you go.
The trio (Or quartert? The doctor goes too? I think?) go to Russia and they fight a bunch of bad guys in the lab after Princess Margaret allows herself (I think) to be captured so she can get the virus out, but it doesn't work, but she steals the machine that could get it out of her, and then they blow up the entire facility, and they all escape again, after Mr. The Rock and Statham fight Idris Watson from Jeopardy! on a moving truck.
Idris actually says at one point--
I'M BLACK SUPERMAN!
And you have to wonder if they didn't offer Denzel Washington every dollar on earth to play this part and make lines like that one work. I mean, I love Daddy Idris, and lord knows he does his best, but this script was written by seventy-three people and none of them were ever in the same room, so it's...it's rough, everybody. I won't lie to you. It's rough.
Once the gang escapes Russia (the doctor is killed, I think), they have to find somewhere else to go and someone who can fix the machine Princess Margaret stole, because they still won't kill her, and I get it, she's Statham's sister, and at this point, Mr. The Rock is, like, really into her, but time is ticking.
Oh, there's also a scene on an airplane (yes, they take an airplane, and it's very weird, because you realize that NOBODY EVER FLIES COACH IN THE MOVIES), and there's a Kevin Hart cameo because Kevin Hart is to Mr. The Rock what Arsenio Hall was to Eddie Murphy is the early 90's. Like, it's not that we don't like him, but it's clear that Mr. The Rock likes him A LOT MORE than the rest of us.
Mr. The Rock takes his new friends to Samoa, because there was probably some cross-promotional opportunity for Mr. The Rock to talk about how HE'S ACTUALLY FROM SAMOA on his Instagram a thousand times if they worked it into the story, and so work it in they did.
His family is cold to him when he arrives, because--I don't know. He ratted someone out? Can't tell you. All I can say is that I was READY for an entire family of men who look like Mr. The Rock and I was SORELY disappointed (aside from this one guy who IMDB rudely didn't identify for me even after I typed in 'Mr. The Rock's Hot Brother from Hobbes and Shaw'), but the woman playing Mr. The Rock's mother pretty much steals the entire movie with the most stereotypical-to-the-point-of-problematic performance you could possibly dream up.
The Samoans--wait for it--DON'T HAVE GUNS. And apparently, even though Samoa is a part of the United States, you just can't get guns anywhere so yes, I am now moving to Samoa.
That means they have to fight Skynet Elba WITHOUT guns, so they go the 1970's Disney route and do it with BOOBY TRAPS after Mr. The Rock's brother fixes the virus-sucking machine and they STRAP IT ONTO VANESSA KIRBY'S BACK LIKE SHE'S DORA THE F***ING EXPLORER.
Are you wondering if there's a countdown clock going during the big battle scene letting you know how much time they have before the virus kills her and enters the atmosphere?
F*** YEAH THERE IS.
And--and this always drives me nuts in movies--the time doesn't quite line up.
I know that's a weird thing to quibble with in a movie like this, but the countdown clock says 'Ten minutes' and forty minutes later, it's at '9:21.'
Uh....does this take place in a world where time moves slower?
Idris...uh...okay, forget the nicknames, we're running out of time, unlike Princess Margaret--who Idris grabs and puts on a helicopter leading to a helicopter chase where Mr. The Rock chains a truck to a helicopter and then a bunch of other trucks and then they almost go off a cliff but then they don't but then they do and then Idris, Mr. The Rock, and Statham all fight UNDER A WATERFALL before Princess Margaret gets all the virus out of her system and Idris is defeated and then falls off a cliff into the pale blue waters of Samoa and a detached voice promises The Rock that soon the franchise will expand beyond anyone's wildest dreams.
And then it just...ends.
With like, a kind of somber musical score and not 'Why Can't We Be Friends?' from the trailer, which seems way more appropriate.
But if any of that makes it sound like I didn't enjoy the movie--
Oh, I can assure you. I had the time of my f***ing life.
They do not make movies like that anymore.
Probably because they cost the GDP of a small country and asking humans to suspend logic for that long is tricky even in 2019, but still--
It was a RIDE.
No, literally, they're probably making a Hobbes and Shaw ride as we speak at Universal's new park Testosterone Land.
And I, for one, can't wait to get in line.
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