Movie Review - Double Dragon

Double Dragon is a movie based on a game, and as we all know, movies based on games are known for their pure awesomeness. The Double Dragon movie was released in 1994, wheres the original game was released in 1987. If being released seven years after the original game isn't a recipe for awesomeness, I have no idea what is. Anyway, let's kick this pig!

We start the movie off somewhere in China with subtitles that literally tell us "Somewhere in China". This deeply descriptive location is a village, where a couple of ninjas are attacking monks. One of the ninjas is using a whip, because whips are stereotypical ninja weapons as we all know. This ninja is deadly, merciless, and... a somewhat hot blond chick? Alright, this movie's looking pretty good so far. She ends up in some temple and takes a medallion.

We then cut to the post-apocalyptic New Angeles in the year 2007. I'm sure we all remember the great disaster in 2004 where Los Angeles was destroyed by a series of tornadoes...wait, that was "The Day After Tomorrow", never mind. OK, so they picked a random year that turned out to be very inaccurate. So what? Star Trek said there would be some war in the 1990's with genetically engineered super soldiers, so they were wrong too.

We see a bad guy played by Robert Patrick (T-1000 from Terminator 2). In this movie he's Koga Shuko, and he looks like Vanilla Ice for some reason. He's given the medallion from earlier, but he's upset that it's only half of the Double Dragon medallion. He then squeezes the medallion and somehow goes flat. My question at this moment is, why does he want it so bad when that's all it lets him do?

We then cut to some Asian girl whose holding the other half of the medallion. Way to build up suspense people, show us the other half right after they tell you there's two parts. You know what, I have no idea how I can make this movie look good. It's so bad it's not even funny. This is one of the most un-entertaining movies I've ever seen, and I'm only about 10 minutes in...this is gonna' be a long one.

Anyway, there are these two guys fighting in this fight club. One of them jumps on the others back and nuggies him. This gets him disqualified for some reason, but I'm wondering why he did this in the first place. His brother scolds him, and then everyone in the club fights pointlessly. I really don't understand this movie, not one bit.

News flash time! We learn that there's some law-enforced curfew, which would really suck. After this news program, we see the two bros and the medallion girl riding in a car. The girl's name is Satori, and the brother's names are Billy and Jimmy. Satori is the bro's adopted mother. They realize it's now after curfew, and the streets are filled with gangsters. These gangsters are doing scary things like...waving their hands at you. At this point, I wanted to play God Of War instead.

Our heroes get ambushed by some mowhawk gang led by a guy named Bo Abobo, I'm not kidding here. These guys move like...actually I'm not sure, birds on speed having seizures? They also laugh at everything; "Ow, I got hurt" ha ha ha...yeah, everything. A chase ensues, where the brothers start throwing random things into some incinerator tube like the DeLorean in "Back to the Future", which I'd much rather be watching at this point. They also throw a map onto the gangster's windshield. Rather than removing the map with their hands like anyone with even a quarter of a brain would, they turn on some camera, take out a joystick, and watch some crappy video game-type screen to drive instead. This is pointless, stupid, and they never stop laughing. I'd rather be playing a racing game right now.

The mowhawk's truck crashes, and their screen says "Game Over." Wow, this movie keeps getting dumber and dumber. The bros are somehow stuck just ahead, so this crash is pretty pointless. We now get some of the most atrocious acting I've ever seen with some of the worst jokes I've ever heard. "I hope he has car insurance," "I'll sweep the floor with your skull," and "He'll need a can opener to get out of there." I'd rather be eating a can of peaches right now.

Before the mowhawks can attack the bros though, another gang pops out from a wall, camouflaged by graffiti coats? This new gang also looks like their skipping grade school, yet this is enough for the mowhawks to back off and leave.

We're more than half an hour in, and we finally get Satori telling us the back story of this medallion. Long story short, put them both together and you become very powerful. Shortly after, Kogo Shuko and his gang bursts in. What follows is the dumbest fight scene I've ever seen. I'm not even going to bother describing this mess. After one of the baddies is knocked out, one of the bros closes some suitcase nearby and says "What a head case." There you go people, one of the worst one liners ever put on film. Satori kicks Kogo Shuko through a painting, but seconds later he bursts through the painting again, meaning that somehow the painting was magically restored between takes. Oh right, two guys were also taken out by a dropping curtain. Too bad that wasn't the curtain being dropped on this movie to end this mess.

Anyway, the boys run out of the building as Satori closes the door behind them, trapping herself in with Kogo Shuko for some reason I really can't figure out. Kogo causes the building to explode and escapes using his special medallion powers while Satori, um...waits inside for the building to explode when she's right by the door. I can't make this stuff up. The original game was simply a girl gets captured and the two bros get her back, and yet here we've watched half of the movie already just to see her die? Believe it or not, I was thinking about watching Garbage Pail Kids at this point.

Oh right, I forgot to mention that Bo Abobo showed up in that fight scene too, as some ridiculous looking mutant...thing. Anyway, the school gang captures him. The movie now tries to have an emotional scene where the bros mope over Satori's death; it fails. Shortly after, they are attacked by what looks like a costume convention. This scene is stupid beyond any possible description. It even has some mailman jumping off a high tower shouting "Special Delivery!" The bros simply move out of the way and watch him fall face first onto the ground. The music even belches in this scene. I'd rather be having a belching contest right now. OK, I promise, no more "I'd rather" jokes.

Billy and Jimmy lock themselves in some shed while the costumed gangsters swap at it like mindless zombies. It takes the bros a full minute to notice that there's a boat in this shed...on water. They crash the boat through the large doors, and start a water chase. How the gangsters had two jet-skis ready I have no frickin idea. These jet-skis also have mounted launch tubes that shoot rockets that are bigger than the tubes.

I now officially hate this movie, so I'm skipping ahead here. They escape the jet skis and they ask the school gang for help. We learn through a news report that the police control the streets at day while the gangs control the streets at night. What? Koga screams "I just want total domination of one major American city!" Wow, aiming high there aren't you. The bros sneak into Koga's headquarters to try to take the other half of the medallion...they fail. Koga um, raises a dead body and possesses it in a fight? What? The cops are lazy and don't want to try to take back the streets. Kogo finds the school gang's hideout, and we have another mess of an action scene.

Eventually, the bros get Koga's half of the medallion, put them together, and are transformed into...themselves. One's now wearing a blue outfit while the other is wearing red. They possess Koga and make him hit himself. Everyone in the movie's laughing while I'm waiting for the movie to end. They make him turn himself into the cops and then un-possess him. He makes the cliche revenge speech with "If you think I'm bad, wait until you meet my lawyers." They drive off and yey, the movie's over!

Yeah, in case you couldn't tell, I hate this movie. I usually enjoy writing these reviews, but even thinking about this movie feels like a chore. It's not as painful as Garbage Pail kids, but it's equally un-entertaining.

My two word review:

Tiresomely bad.