Worst Trailers: "Alpha and Omega"

Ok lets face it, there a lot of crap coming out right now. Like, pretty much everything. I've seen three good movies this year. And it's August. Thank God for Edgar Wright or I would have had a very crappy birthday movie month. We blamed the crap assaulting us on the writers strike for a while, but can we really use that excuse anymore or have they just completely stopped trying? The evidence points to B. So what can we do? Not go to the movies anymore? Well I work there so please don't do that. If Harkins goes under, I'll be the first to get cut. I'm just Poster Guy™ (official job title and registered super-hero name.) Yes if I lost my job, the desperation would probably bring out the best writing of my career, but without constant movie knowledge streaming through my head I'd probably just write about death and depression and black birds and stuff. Not the kind of blog you all signed up for I know. So since avoiding the theater like the plague as you perhaps should is out of the question, what can you do? Cope. I bet you thought I was going to write something super eloquent and inspiring there huh? Fooled ya! Hahaha! Guess you don't know all of my tricks do you? But seriously all we can do at this point is cope and wait for the one good movie a month that comes out. (And thats one good movie a month in summer, just wait until, say, September - November *shudder*.) How do we cope, you ask? Assassinate the cast of Grown Ups! Read this blog! Glean wisdom and discernment. That way when you inevitably find yourself seated in a movie that's going drain your intelligence at a stupefying pace, you can make it out alive. The trailer currently draining my intelligence at a stupefying pace whenever if plays is another awful animated kids movie: Alpha and Omega.




Now I'm not going to go on another rant about how the people who make these movies are killing our countries prospects at any kind of intellectual future. And I'm not going to make another awesome graph proving this theory. I'm just going to point out the ironic fact that if we keep subjecting our kids to kids movies that aren't WALL*E, they will end up looking and acting a lot like the humans in WALL*E. Just saying. Lets take a detailed look at this trailer.


First of all I have to mention that this is one of the worst edited trailers I've ever seen. Dialogue and video is dropped in out of context at random places sometimes to try and make sense of the mess, but mostly as a cheap attempt at humor. I'll point this out to you as I notices it.  


And right out of the gate we have Annoying Trailer Narrator Guy (ATNG, Official Title). Since this movie has no plot, he has to pretend it does and inform us with just what we need to get through the trailer with some semblance of understanding. I will attempt to make the obvious even more obvious sans the winky wolf allusions, and replacing them with something we can all understand; High School social statuses. Kate is the straight A's head cheer leader. Humphrey is the socially awkward chess nerd presumably with some inner beauty or some shit like that. Notice how the ATNG says, "Humphrey is at the bottom of the heap," and then all the other wolves heap on top of him. Hahahahaha! It's already clever! "Get your butt out of my face!" Humphrey cries. Then he spits. Can wolves spit? I'm going to hope that you can figure that one out for yourself. If you can, you're already smarter than the hundreds of people that worked on this movie. Cue the obtrusive guitar music as Kate giggles at the whole butt-spitting interchange. This annoys me because it sets up the kind of 'humor' that is going to run through this whole trailer and, presumably, movie. P.S. Don't forget the butt thing! It comes back later!


If my likening this movie to a cliche High School comedy needed any substantiation, we just got it as the gaggle of awkward teen boy-wolves ogle Kate as she flips her hair in slow motion. Could this movie get any more contrived? Let me reaffirm that this is their sense of humor. Heaven help us. Then, the law gets laid down. "Humphrey you know the rules. She's an Alpha. You're an Omega." Oh no! Forbidden love! We haven't seen this plot point in absolutely everything for the last 500 years! I wonder how it will come out in the end! Could she possibly get over her superior breeding and stoop to this homely goof's level and find true love?! Of course! Because the stupid unattractive person always get the hot popular one in the movies! It keeps us in real life dreaming and chasing after people who are too good for us and then morosely wondering why we stay single. Ah, America.


"We can eat together, but we can't... you know... howl together." Sex joke. In a kids movie. About wolves. Awesome. Is that supposed to appeal the parents in the audience? As the proud brother of an 11 year old and the proud parent of several deceased cats and one deceased bamboo plant named Franklin, I can tell you that I don't find that enticing at all.


Then ATNG teamed with some really bad wolf voice acting we get a pseudo witty super plot download. Kate and Humphrey are far from home! Idaho! To Repopulate! (Sex joke # 2 ensues). This movie gets originality points for one thing; it's not often you see a plot where people or animals want to escape back to Canada. Kudos.


They jump in a rusty bed of a truck and we get a classic interchange where Humphrey "has to go." "Can't you hold it?" "No! I can't!" he says with all the over dramatics and bad acting of a jr. high school girl. Then they run into a bunch of bears and Humphrey shakingly declares that he "just went." Notice it never shows his mouth as he's saying this. Because this bit of dialogue was added in from another part of the movie as an attempt to make a joke. These are the kinds of comic geniuses we're dealing with here!


I'm not going to even address the awfulness of that whole "grab my tail scene" except for the AWFUL voice acting on Justin Long's part. A bunch of more nonsensical stuff follows involving trains, flirtation dialogue and giggling wolves. I swear if that wolf giggles one more time I'm going to throw a snowball at it... Oh... Humphrey just did that. Wait... how did he pick up the snow or form the ball without fingers and opposable thumbs? I guess we shouldn't focus on every flaw in there or this post will turn into War and Peace (originally titled War! What is it Good For? btw). I'll just hit a couple more points.

• The awful stoner wolf calling Humphrey 'that sly dog.' Get it? Because wolves are related to dogs!
• 'New breed of adventure!' Get it? Because they're wolves not... whatever they think the normal breed of adventure refers to.
• "Do you trust me?" Yes that is a very overused cliche. Yes it was awesomely romantic in Titanic, Aladdin, and Epic Fletcher. No it's not awesome here. It's awful. And seriously what's up with the horrible voice acting?!
• The wolf grabbing onto the goose's feet and using its apparently sufficient strength to water-ski. What's he grabbing on with? His paws? I don't know either. And doesn't it take something as powerful as a boat to get enough speed and momentum to keep one suspended above water? Then then of course the goose flies the wolf into a moose's butt. Cue the obviously out of place "Oh! Again with the butts!" and the even more out of place shot of Kate looking awkward. It says a lot about your comedy prowess if you make it look that hard to just crack one joke about asses.
• The shamelessly blatant advertisement for 3D at the end of the trailer with a goose hitting a golf ball at the audience. "Watch this." It's like they're not even trying to be clever. Or maybe that is them trying. *Shudder*.

I do like one tiny little thing about the trailer and that's the foreign goose's voice at the end. No, I don't like anything he says or does, but his accent is cool. I want that goose's accent to read books to me and stuff. But besides one case of not-horrible voice casting this movie has nothing going for it. At all.

If there ever was a movie to skip bringing the fam to, this is it.

Soupy Twist.

Worst Trailers:" Just Wright"

This is the first original Worst Trailer's post on this blog which is ironic because it was the Worst Trailers facebook notes and people's positive reactions to them that inspired the blog in the first place. So this is a little like returning home for me. And what better to return home to than a Queen Latifa rom com. Before we even get into this, I'm going to guess the moral of the story; Girls! It's OK if you're plus sized! The super hot, super rich, man of your dreams will still choose you over that prissy hot chick. Now I'm not saying all of this is a bad message. I'm just saying we already learned it. In Shrek. Four times. Because those Dreamworks geniuses really know how to hammer home a point. Or maybe they just have no idea how to evolve a storyline. Yeah, that's it. Ten bucks says Kung Fu Panda 2 will still be about how Panda is fat and sloppy and hungry but because he's the chosen one he's the best. "Hey kids! Don't exercise! Just be the chosen one of something and your crusty old master will teach you the five point palm exploding heart technique!" It's just like Penelope, which was supposed to be a film about inner beauty and loving you for who you are and not what you look like. But notice James McAvoy couldn't kiss her without throwing up until after she got her pig nose removed or magicked off or whatever. Now I'm a firm believer in inner beauty. I think who you are is far more important than looks. I just hate the hypocrisy of Hollywood's view of inner beauty. Because you know that once someone finally finds their inner beauty and is okay with themselves, they immediately turn into a beauty (Beauty and the Beast, Beastly, The Princess and the Frog, Shrek 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, & 8, Penelope and every other freaking movie ever with an 'ugly' protagonist.) But  I'm a little off base here. As far as I know Queen Latifa unfortunately doesn't turn into Zoe Saldana at the end of this movie. Anyway, here's the trailer:



Starting out, Ms. Latifa goes on a date that didn't end so well. He just wanted to be friends. We are told that this is because she acted like herself around him. "You are not supposed to show him your regular self until you've been married for five years," says the only hot girl in the entire cast of Precious: Based on the Novel Push By Sapphire (worst ever title for any movie of all time ever by the way. And yes, I'm including Bangkok Dangerous in that.) I hate this idea of relationship by the way. This is why there are so many divorces because people are too scared and stupid to be themselves around their significant other. They lie for years and then when all the passion and sex fizzles out and they're left with this other person who they don't even know and realize they don't love anymore. You never loved them to begin with genius. You can't love someone you don't even know.  People are so stupid.

Next the Queen gets scolded for not dressing up like an expensive whore to go to a basketball game (she wears trendy jeans and a jersey.) It's a mark of how bad these film makers are that they have to make people act like absolute senseless caricatures just so they have a moral to drive home at the end of the movie. Also they don't think Queen has anything to offer anyone since the first encounter with hot, famous basketball player she has to help him open up the gas tank. Really? Because a grown man can't figure that out.

After that we get super movie plot download. Because apparently we need to know the entire movie by the end of the preview. The 'important' part is that super hot basketball player gets hurt (oooh! conflict) and Queen Latifa is the only physical therapist his expensive prostitute wife will trust with him (set up for possible romance!).  "You really think you can get me back [playin']?" he asks. "Yeah, but chu gonna hate me by the time I tru wit chu," she responds (future referencing irony!). *Cue inspirational black person music as the training montage begins.* Meanwhile, expensive whore wife leaves because he's not no playa' no mo' (setting the stage for the coup de Queen L!)

Inspirational montage continues as we see him worked back into shape and finally back into the game where he scores a super sweet shot. Cut to him and QL reliving the victory and fighting over cookies while seated at a piano (a piano?! wtf?! were they jammin' to some show tunes?) *Cue the wildly over dramatic romantic-look-into-my-eyes scene where we know somethin' hot is aboutst to go down. Then whore wife comes back (dun dun DUN!) She wants him back because she made a mistake (which is girl for 'you're famous again!') You know he'll go back to her just until right before the chick music starts playing and QL is about to board an airplane or something. Then they'll live happily ever after. (Sigh) Which of course you know they will. This is, after all, Queen Latifa's Kate Hudson movie.

Other small annoyances:

When the hot basketball player asks QL out for dinner, she tells the muli-million dollar basketball super star that his wallet better be full because she "... ain't one of those salad eatin' chicks." I GET IT! QUEEN LATIFA IS NOT A SIZE 0! But is that any reason to make her say things like she's the cookie monster or Jenna Maroney when she was fat?! "Me want food!" This movie is pure BS. It tries to say that just because she's not a anorexic beauty, she can still get the man, but it makes her say ridiculous crap like this all the time. Queen Latifa is a beautiful woman. Why do we constantly have to draw attention to the fact that she weighs more than 90 lbs? There's more to her than her weight. That's all I'm trying to say. I guess this was a big annoyance.

The hot basketball player is played by rapper Common. Appropriate names since common also describes his acting ability.

Last but not least, the title; Just Wright. I had a hunch about this, so I looked it up and I was right; QL's name in the movie is Leslie Wright. This means that the title of this film is a self referential pun. They must think they're so clever.

Worst Trailers 2: The Squeakquel!

This is the last repost. Everything from here on out will be completely new and original. Enjoy compadres!

So I hadn't imagined this to be a running column or anything. I wrote the first one to vent. However since so many people enjoyed it, and since I so enjoyed writing it, and since since then I've noticed so many terrible trailers going unpunished I've decided to write another. I have been planning this one for a while and many trailers have at one time inhabited this list. The terribly unoriginal Did You Hear About the Morgans was #6 on the last list and pretty close to making this one. Though, since I procrastinate worse than a fat eighth grade boy in PE, that movie already came out before I got around to writing this. There were some horrendous trailers to some pretty decent movies mostly involving those terribly cliched trailer man voice overs. You know the type. The ones that are so blatantly obvious about the plot you'd think you were watching a foreign film. Man: Hi I'm Robert DeNiro. I'm going on a road trip to see my kids." Narrator: "Robert is a old man, going on a road trip to see his kids. But he meets... unexpected things on the way. Sometimes when you're going on a journey, you have to pack... some luggage." (That was supposed to be read in that deep over dramatic trailer man voice). See Everybody's Fine or the second trailer for Brothers to witness this at its worst. The Kristen Bell vehicle, When in Rome also deserves a mention. I'd say that's the #6 honorary loser on this list. But the five I did settle on, I'm pretty happy with.

#5 Death at a Funeral

Now you may be watching this trailer and think, "Hey I don't know what that old, cynical Radcliff is talking about. This trailer is really funny! It's clever and original." If you're thinking that raise your hand right now. No, i don't care that I can't see you. Raise it! Ok to all of you who are raising your hand, you're an ignorant slut. Sorry it's true. Want to know why? Because this movie isn't clever or original. This movie is actually a remake. And I'm not talking about a remake of a 100 year old Japanese film with subtitles at a samurai funeral or something. No, I'm talking about a film from England. In English. By the exact same title. From 2007. All you math whizzes out there will be scratching your head saying, "But Radcliff, wasn't that just three years ago?" YES IT WAS JUST THREE BLOODY YEARS AGO AND THAT DEATH AT THE FUNERAL ISN'T EVEN COLD YET!!!!! That's why I'm so pissed that this movie exists. They grave robbed a very funny British film and instead of having respect for the humor of it, and trying to bring it to a wider audience so more Americans could appreciate it, they decided instead to completely steal absolutely everything from that film and remake it. They did change one thing. Instead of English, lots of this one is in Ebonics. Despite that, everything in this trailer is nearly word for word from the original. Except less funny. Because no one speaking any of the lines is British. And I really really really really hope that no one reading this thinks that Martin Lawrence 's humor is funnier than British humor. Here just take a look at the trailer for the original:



See. Much funnier. Much dryer. Much better. It pains me to think the amount of Americans who will watch this and think that Chris Rock (Pootie Tang) Martin Lawrence (Big Mama's House 2) or Danny Glover (Saw) are funny again. Like they wrote/chose a good script. No the fucking didn't! They stole a great script and ruined it by being a part of it. Things that further annoy me about this movie: 1. Zoe Saldana is in it. She has had a GREAT year between Avatar and Star Trek and I really like her. Though honestly I think she may have the funniest delivery in the whole thing. 2. Tracy Morgan. Now I'm a big fan of 30 Rock and I'm even a fan of him in 30 Rock but that's because he's playing an illiterate moron. It suits him. To see him in this trying to use adult words like "uncle", "dead fish", and "coffin" is painful. 3. Martin Lawrence lustily telling Chris Rock that it's ok if that hot chick is in 12th grade because she has a very nice behind. Daaaaaaaaaamn. (That was mean to be read in Ebonics.) So classy. 4. Peter Dinklage playing the same part in both films. What?! Why would he agree to star in the remake of a perfectly fine film that he played in two years earlier? Paycheck maybe? 5. James Marsden playing the white drugged out naked guy. Ok actually this is one bright spot. He looks pretty funny. But he's nothing compared to the comic genius that the terrific Alan Tudyk is in the first. Sorry Cyclops, you missed the boat. Anyway I hope you all skip this winner for most unnecessary remake of all time. The new remake of the terrific Swedish vampire film, Let the Right One In, called Let Me In comes close to taking said prize but at least the original for that one is in another language and the remake is starring some very good actors. What excuse does this crap heap have? Nothing! Rent the original.

#4 The Prince of Persia: Sands of Time

I thought about starting this one by naming all the successful, well made video game adaptations. Until I realized there are none. I mean you have crap like Resident Evil 2, House of the Dead, and Alone in the Dark in this category. And these are the "good" ones. (Shudder). So its safe to say that no matter how bad this movie is, it'll still be better than most of the rest. That doesn't, however, stop it from being one of the worst trailers out there now and, mark my words, it will be one of the worst films of next year. This is what the production meeting sounded like I think.

Disney boss man: We need another Pirates of the Caribbean. A rip roaring, fun, slightly supernatural family adventure. What have you got?

Other guy who has a 13 year old boy: My son likes this game about this Arab guy who can like defy gravity and turn back time and stuff.

Disney bm: Brilliant! Who should we get to play him? Anyone you know look Arab?

Third guy: That gay cowboy is pretty popular. (shocked looks) No! (chuckling) not the dead one! (Relieved chuckles all around)

Disney bm: (wiping his eyes from the chuckling) Alright. Slap a tan on Donnie and get him ready to go. Somebody... you, glasses, you look smart. Write a screenplay. Alright! Good work everybody, lets get drunk.

The result is this travesty posing as entertainment. I love how they tried to be all clever and coy with the dialogue between bad accented and super tanned Jake and weird accented princess girl. I will count down the worst lines in the trailer.

4. The whole entire freaking opening monologue by weird accented princess girl talking all mystically about some dagger which culminates in her saying, "The only way to stop this Armageddon is to take the dagger to the secret guardian temple." She then makes her point by saying with the next breath, "We must take it there!" Wow good stuff. I love that the official title for the place that they need to hide the sacred artifact that will destroy man kind if it fall into the wrong hands is The Secret Guardian Temple. If I were a bad guy, i think that's the first place I would raid. Just personally speaking. I also HATE when movies take place in other times and countries before English was even a language and still have everyone speaking English but think if they throw on some phony accents we'll forget everything we ever learned in world history class. Like Valkyrie for instance. That was a decent movie but lets just face it, having Tom Cruise play a one eyed German is kinda like getting Cameron Diaz to star in a biopic about Tokyo Rose. I know they do this to make it more commercial so fat rednecks won't have to read the movie between between shovelfuls of over buttered popcorn but it still annoys the hell out of me. Sorry for not being an idiot. I also like that they used the word Armageddon here. Pretty sure that word is from the ancient Greek language and was first used in the book or Revelation. This wouldn't be know by these Persians since the "Persian Empire" collapsed 400 years before the New Testament was even written. I know! I know! I'm being to harsh on glasses guy. He shouldn't have to do his homework AND think of all the clever dialog we're about to hear come out of these characters mouths.

3. Tanned Jake: Oh you really enjoy telling me what to do don't you?
Princess: Only because you're so good at following orders.
Tanned Jake: Don't press your luck.

What does this even mean?!?!?! Its like they were trying to be suggestively flirty but had no idea what they were suggesting. It's like when someone makes an idiotic "That's what she said" joke. You know who I'm talking about. Those people who aren't funny, but try to be by saying "That's what she said" after everything you say. And just to humor them and try to make the joke work, you have to stretch your logic so far it's almost to the breaking point. Such as:

"Toss me that ball."
"That's what she said!"
"???"

This is what that feels like. I know that Glasses has probably never had a girlfriend and probably never even flirted with anyone successfully in his life so how could he know what it looks like but stilll! Moving on.

2. Princess: Where's the dagger?
Tanned Jake: You're welcome to search me for it.... You'd have to be very thorough.

Again, WHAT?!?!?!? Where is he hiding it that she'd have to be super thorough to find it? Lady, check his sheath for the dagger! That's what she said. Seriously though I can not wrap my mind around this. Maybe I'm ignorant or maybe I don't get nonsensical flirting. Or maybe I'm irritated by how witless this whole exchange is. I don't know, but it's stupid.

1. Princess: Such a noble prince, leaping to assist the fallen beauty.
Tanned Jake: Who said you were a beauty.
Princess: There must a reason you can't take your eyes off me.
(Pause)
Tanned Jake: Inane mumbling.

Wow. Do i even need to walk you through how terrible this is? I hope not because I don't feel like I can stoop that low right now. But it's bad. Like, the worst thing I've ever heard bad. I love that she calls herself a beauty straight up, THEN he denies it! She responds by pointing out that he can't stop staring at her. What charmers these pair. Is there anyone that actually finds this interchange funny? I think that's how they mean it, comic relief but it's the opposite of relief to me. It gives me gas.

The rest of the trailer is a hodgepodge of crazy epic actiony things with bad enough graphics to make Tanned Jake actually look like he's in the Prince of Persia video game. Please don't want this movie. Please. Because if you do, they will make more.

#3 From Paris With Love

First of all who ever thought it would be a good idea to cast John Travolta as a bad ass, trigger happy, slightly crazy hit man? Second of all who heard that idea and then convinced others that he should do all of that while being bald and having a goatee? By the way, nice ear rings, bad ass hit man. Travolta made number one on my last list so I'm being kind to him here but really?!?!?! So we meet Jonathan Rhys-Meyers striving for a new career low. He is a driver and they want him to drive for aforementioned crazy J Trav. He's not special ops certified, but in movie world what does that matter? All he's doing is driving him around! But if you know anything about bad writing, you know that that's not all he going to be doing. The trailer pulls no punches with this by showing us Travolta with a rocket launcher hanging out the window telling him to get closer. Yeah Baldvolta, you're in a car chase going close to the triple digits in speed and you're aiming problem with that rocket launcher is because he's not close enough. Rhys-Meyers is told that if he can handle this, he can "consider yourself a member of the club." Good. Now that "character" has "motivation". Didn't know special ops certification was a club though. Do you guys smoke cigars in dinner jackets? Or is it more like 4H? Something else the trailer pulls no punches on? Trying to make it look like this movie will have any plot. It just jumps straight into a chase scene. No set up. Just running. I like its candor. Then they start car chase scene. But WAIT!!!!! "My prints are all over that car!" R-M says, struggling WAY too hard to do a convincing American accent. R-M wants to go back and do the logical this by wiping away the incriminating evidence. But Baldvolta won't have any of this! After quickly summing up what "my prints are all over that car" means in context he puts the car in reverse, crashes it and causes the car with the prints to promptly explode. Naturally! "Work for ya?!" he says essentially winking at the camera.

The next few bits are my favorite. "From the director of Taken." I'm sorry, have I been asleep? Is that something to brag about? "And the producer of The Transporter!" Ok now I'm being punk'd right? That's like making a Wolfman trailer and proudly declaring "From the guy who brought you Jurassic Park 3!" THOSE MOVIES ARE NOT AN ACCOMPLISHMENT! Ugh. The next scene is also great. Really classy. Baldvolta and R-M sit down in a Chinese restaurant. Someone says some drivel about Baldy's methods not being regulation which leads into him telling the Chinese waiter that he wants to order off the menu. This is apparently some kind of code or something because everyone starts shooting at them. This continues for a while until R-M asks amid bullet riddled Chinese rubble "How many do you think there are?" "My senses," Baldvolta replies, "about a billion." Oooo clever. Then Baldvolta beats up a gang, more cars explode, stuff gets shot, people unnecessarily make out while stripping clothes off each other, and cars chase... other cars I guess. Basically formula of an action movie. The tag line for this film is: Two Agents. One City. No Merci. They thought they were being clever by making a play on the word Mercy. However they must have ate a lot of paint chips when they were a kid because roughly translated that comes out to: Two Agents. One City. No Thank You. Which is kind of how I feel about this movie as a whole. No Thank You.

#2 The Tooth Fairy*

Ok this was a really hard decision as to which trailer to place at number one. Both of the final two trailers are so terrible you wonder how the people who made them can sleep at night. Is everyone in this really that terminally mentally retarded or just so desperate that they will sell their dignity for a very low price. I mean, lets face it, none of us ever expected much out of The Rock. I would like to take this opportunity to nominate him as the worst actor of all time. But what about Ashley Judd, Julie Andrews, Billy Crystal, and Steven Merchant. They are all very talented in their own respect. I think someone must have kidnapped their children, or small pets. Something to logically explain their involvement in something so wholly wretched. And don't give me the "Its for their kids" argument. If you read my last post, you know how I feel about us making things idiotic for children. It's my biggest pet peeve. Its like we have no faith in them what so ever. That's kind of the thing these days with kids though isn't it? "No honey, you don't have to read a book or anything complicated like that. Just play your video games and don't bother mommy while she's sexting." Well I'm making a stand against this crap. I will NEVER let my kids watch something so void of intelligence, talent, or humor. "It's different when you have kids," some may argue. No it's not. I don't care. I would sooner take my (theoretical) 7 year old son to Inglourious Basterds. Why? Because Quentin Tarantino is not an idiot. But that's exactly what all the parents who pay for their kids to watch this chont are. I don't feel the need to fully dissect this trailer and point out what's so horrible about it. It does a good enough job of that on its own. I'll hit some highlights though.

-I like that the whole message of this film is: "Lie to your kids. Let them believe whatever they want, no matter how irrational, and crucify anyone who gets in your way of doing this." Think about it. The Rock tells the scrawny kid he's probably never going to be a professional Hockey Player. The parents get pissed about this but let me just say something, he's probably not. Then he tries to tell Ashley Judd's kid that there is no tooth fairy. She gets pissed about this. Let me tell you something else and this one may be hard to hear... THERE IS NO TOOTH FAIRY!!!!!!!!! The Rock was being honest. The rest of the film is him getting punished for that. Never tell your kids the truth. Never be honest with them. Now I'm not saying be an over realist like that kid in Miracle on 34th St. because we all know how that turns out. Tooth Fair is one thing but no one fucks with Santa. I'm also not saying not to teach your kids those holiday fables, but do we really need another film about an unbeliever who gets punished for unbelieving by having to become the thing he/she/it unbelieved in? If I had know this was coming out I would have skipped Santa Clause 3.

- The Rock gets a glowing summons under his pillow and is told that he is guilty of "Killing Dreams". Then he sprouts wings that look like they were designed by a 5 year old Martha Stewart with no artistic talent. The look on The Rocks face is priceless. Worst. Acting. Ever.

- The Rock is in flying school and gets hit in the testis by the tennis balls that black assistant fairy throws at him.

- The Rock decked out in his Goalie Tooth Fairy outfit saying with apparent pride "I'm the Tooth Fairy. Oh yeah!" Then he jumps off a balcony and screams like a girl and falls like a rock. (Mind the pun) Then it cuts to him with a dog hanging off his wing.

I also really like that everything I've noted that's wrong with this movie starts with 'The Rock'. The amnesia dust interchange is absolutely, maddeningly bad and kind of drives home every point I made in this article. Don't watch this. I'm warning you.

#1 The Spy Next Door*

< Ok here's my number one. Watch the trailer. It's atrociously bad. Also, if you'll notice, trailer voice over man is back making a terrible trailer into what truly is The Worst Trailer. Old Jackie Chan answers the phone "This is Bob Ho" and immediately annoying narrator guy says "Secret Agent Bob Ho has... blah blah blah." During this it shows secret agent bob ho blah blah blahing. Who thought this was a good idea? Was this trailer made for blind people?! (No offense to blind people... actually offense to blind people. They can't read this anyway.) Why do they feel the need to narrate EVERYTHING that's happening while it's happening? It's absurdly annoying. And Bob Ho? Really? It's like they took the idea from Shanghai Noon about Jackie Chan's Chinese name sounding like a famous person, in that case Chon Wang, and made it totally unfunny and pointless. The narrator continues and after some crap about how he's an international spy and super and stuff and finishes by saying very ominously, "...but he's about to face is toughest assignment yet..." Then it cuts to him in the car with a bunch of bratty kids arguing. Awesome. So this is The Pacifier, only somehow worse. No, I didn't think it could be done either but here we are. The annoying boy kid makes some smart remark about how he'd rather be in juvenile hall or foster care than be babysat by Jackie Chan. I would have punched him in the face right there. Shown him who's boss, but i guess Jackie doesn't have experience with kids yet. Then there is a montage of Jackie doing stupid stuff while trying to cook. What the hell international spy can't cook oatmeal or doesn't know that metal coming out of the oven is too hot to touch. What were these people thinking?! Oh right. They weren't. This leads to the narrator informing us unnecessarily that "He's deep undercover." Then it cuts to Jackie with his gangsta hands starts saying "It's rad, it's awesome." OH HELL NAW!!!!! He did NOT just use my name in vain. Not going to lie, that's one of the main reasons along with the terrible narration that led me to put this in the number one spot. Moving on Billy Ray Cyrus shows up to tell Jackie that "Spying is easy, babysitting is hard." Yeah that's why 12 year old girls do one and highly trained special operatives do the other. This is the stupidest thing I've ever heard, but I know why they put it in here. In a world for any of this pathetic excuse for a story to work, that sentence would have to be absolute truth. And I will say this. I had some Team Leader shifts where I felt I wasn't so much Team Leading as I was Team Babysitting. Babysitting is hard. But that's not the point right now. The next montage is Jackie, using his high tech spying equipment to succeed at babysitting. A little snaky wire comes out of a pen, grabs a little girl, lifts her off the ground and carries her back to Jackie. What did this little wire grab onto? Her skin? Looks like it. One more thing that was thoroughly thought through. He cooks breakfast with a flame thrower, because that's easier for a spy than using an oven or a frying pan. Things get even worse when they try to involve a plot. Some crap about oil reserves and the narrator telling us things are "getting complicated." Shut up. A teenage boy attacks them with a knife at an Asian restaurant. (Geez what is it with terrible films and Asian restaurant battles tonight?!) Of course at some point during this movie and trailer the 6 year old child helps the international spy fight off dangerous and evil cronies bent on all their destruction. The mom tells the stupid emo daughter "I don't want you playing with fire" right before the stupid emo daughter makes a 9 foot flame in the house to kill a man. This is apparently acceptable to the mom (modern parents are awesome) because she says "Well maybe just this once." Then the three year old shoots a weapon at the huge bald hit man (not Baldvolta, but probably a friend) that is powerful enough to make him fly through the air and crash through a wall. Does anyone else see anything wrong and slightly disturbing about that? Then the little girl who is basically there to be "cute" says in a very "cute" naive way, "Mommy, that man can fly." Stupid. Not cute. Sorry. More crap happens and we get to our stars. Jackie Chan. Sure, though this movie makes me want to forget that he was ever a star. I like that Amber Valletta is listed next as if anyone knows who she is or even cares that she exists. Then you have Billy Ray Cyrus and George Lopez. I will admit, I'm not really surprised either of those two are in this because this is pretty much a step up for both of their careers. The trailer ends with one of the stupidest things ever. The little three year old girl is strong enough to keep International Super spy Jackie Chan from putting a nighty on her. What does he do to this? Throw her thirty feet in the air and catch her in the nighty with all her extremities in the right holes. Wow. 'Can your Mommy do that?" he asks. What, toss their child into the air to a dangerous height and barely catch them? Best. Baby Sitter. Ever. That little girls face annoys me so bad too because it's almost worst acting that The Rock. I'm going to break this down for you, this is what happened. That little girl was such a bad actress she was incapable of making a surprised face. After many takes and many annoyed crew members at her inability the director opened his mouth to an o shape and said, "Do this and shake your head." Its one of the most forced, stupid looking things on all of these trailers and that's saying something. Now I know some of you are like, "She's just a kid! Cut her some slack!" No! Because she's in a movie and I know I'm old fashioned and everything but if you're in a movie, I believe you should be able to act. I know, I know this rule doesn't apply anymore what with Dane Cook and T Pain stinking up screens but I guess I'm just a purist. Actors should be able to act. Even children ones. Well I hope you enjoyed this and have added many new movies to the "Do not see under any circumstances" list. I know I'm more of a jerk this time. You can tell me that all you want, but I'll probably just delete it because I don't care and it's taking up comment space. Love, Rad *I know these movies already came out but they suck so bad i had to keep them in here.

Worst Trailers

Another repost from Facebook, but since this kind of inspired the whole thing i figured it'd be very appropriate to post. Enjoy.


The last couple shifts at work, I have been working door. That means I basically just stand there, take tickets, and watch looping movie trailers on the big screen in the lobby when we're dead (which on weekday nights is often). So I've gotten the enduring pleasures of the Arcade Fire drawing me into the sublime Where the Wild Things Are trailer. The incredibly stylish and catchy Nine trailer never fails to have me singing "Be Italian" for the next 26 minutes. Toy Story 3 gets me excited for next year and even harmless fair like The Lovely Bones and A Christmas Carol can be a welcome distraction. There are some, however that are far past cringe worthy. These are the most popular ones too. The ones that customers stop in the middle of the lobby, holding up traffic to watch and say with voices full of annoying ignorance, "That looks funny! We should see that! After all I loved Wild Hogs!" And these aren't the rare gem trailers that play once or twice over the two hour trailer loop. No, these are the ones that play over and over, back to back. Like they're taunting me. I've complied a list of the worst of them. They are as follows:
(these are trailers to films that have not yet come out. I'm not counting any horrible trailers from earlier this year)

#5 2012

Trailer 1

Trailer 2

The first trailer starts out good enough with an ominous subtitle that reads "Man kinds oldest civilization warned us this day would come." Awesome. Oldest Civilization on earth. I'm hooked. Oh, wait, the Mayan's weren't the first civilization? Oh! The first civilization actually beat this one by over 1,000 years and started in this little place we call "The Cradle of Civilization" which basically means 'where civilization started'. Well awesome, so at least the guys behind 2012 know what they're talking about. Moving on. Chaos reigns! The monotone guy on the the fake newscast is skipping like a record player telling us the world is going to end this year whilst the screen flashes scenes of the world ending and people looking scared. Also birds are flying away which, if you've seen the director, Roland Emmerich's previous "The World is Going to Destroy Itself and Humans Have No Hope" film, The Day After Tomorrow, you know that's BAD! Cut to John Cusack with his voodoo hands saying "What are the odds?" while driving his (presumably) daughter and son through the country in an RV. The odds apparently are that you're about to be attacked by hundreds of giant flying meteors. You'll be ok though! There are many more disasters awaiting for you throughout the trailer. Have fun. Then subsequently California starts to be destroyed. Firemen looks scared. Rome starts to be destroyed. The Pope looks scared. A giant building collapses on a bunch of people I guess, but it looks more like a movie of a giant building is collapsing and a bunch of people are running out of the theater. Maybe because that movie is 2012 and it's just that bad. Or worse, it could be 10,000 B.C.! (also Roland Emmerich). Destruction ensues for the next several seconds. Then suddenly hope dawns on the horizon! "The government is building these ships." Woo! There's hope for humanity. Hold on a sec though, let me make sure i heard you right, SHIPS?! As in space ships? "Oh sure! We can live in space! We've seen Wall*E! Don't worry! We're packing a giraffe!" What are they going to do when they get up there?! How do they sustain food? Water? Energy? Oh well, I guess they can just figure out all that stuff later. Directly after that we have the worst line of the whole trailer given by the usually very good Chiwetel Ejiofor (yes that's his real name). "Isn't it decided that people have the right to fight for their lives?!" He delivers it all with righteous fury and indigestion or whatever. Save it for the stand Tom Jane. Ok, well they definitely don't want to let the actors talk too much because they have to make people still want to see this movie. More action and destruction ensues for the entire minute that's left of the trailer. Cusack and his on screen family consists of divorced wife, Amanda Peet, boy who plays young Shawn in Psyche, and girl who I've never seen or heard of. Together they go through so much disaster, the only logical movie response would be for it to draw them together. The trailers ends, after the white house gets destroyed (AGIAN!?!!?!), with them hugging in life jackets claiming they'll always stay together! Whatever happens! I can't wait to see them try.

I basically just posted Trailer 2 to point out the part where they out run the effing world falling apart. Good thing no one's on the streets in California ever because that would make this whole escaping natures fury thing a little more difficult.

#4 The Twilight Saga: New Moon

Ugh this trailer is so emo! Bella's famous red truck pulls up. Edward and Bella show up on screen. It's Bella's birthday and all she wants is a kiss from her prudey vampire lover. Now for the record, I think Kristen Stewart is a very good actress and could have a great career ahead of her, but when she's asks for her kiss she does this weird cocked eyebrow thing that's more off putting than anything. Is that your sexy face bella? No wonder he's prudey. Moving on. "I love you" she says. "You're my only reason to stay..." pause for a quick and abrupt camera angle change and then fade in just in time to hear him say with all the teenage angst he can manage "...alive... if that's what i am." Stop being such a depressive emo girl Edward! Gosh. Then the birthday scene. While opening presents, Bella gets a little cut on her finger. This is apparently enough to make the weakest of the Cullens run at her like Seabiscuit. To protect her, Edward throws her into a glass table ripping open her arm. None of the other Cullens react to the copious amount of blood that draws. Thank God for continuity. Also props to Edward for beating down his woman and making it look like he was protecting her. Anyway, this scenario was just too dramatic for Edward so he takes Bella into the middle of the forest alone and dumps her. "I will never put you through anything like this ever again" he whines. "This is the last time you will ever see me." Hold on a sec. I can't help the emotions. Their love is just so right. Why can't he see that through this, and even through 3 more painfully bad books, their love will still prosper! Why?! Why?! You see! He's breaking up with her and leaving her BECAUSE he loves her! It's just so beautiful. I need a moment. I'm going to read the end of Breaking Dawn again just to settle my breaking heart!

Back guys. I ended up just reading all the books all over again. Works a little pissed I missed four days, but they have a Twilight amendment in the rule book so they can do nothing if i need me some Edward action! Moving on. Uh oh. Jamaican-y vampire is back and apparently he's a bad guy this time! He's going to eat Bella! Oh no! Edward where are you?!?!?!?!?!? But wait! Who's that shirtless guy who just popped up out of no where? Jake! What's he going to do? Run the other way Jake! That's a f***ing vampire! (awed pause) ... holy crap! He's a werewolf?! A good one? Well he can't be a bad one because all the bad guys in this series have red eyes and want to eat Bella for some reason. Wow. November can't come fast enough.

#3 Planet 51

There is a much longer, much worse trailer out there now and i do have to put up with all day too, but i don't have the energy to dissect everything terrible in that one so i'm doing this one. I love that whoever made this movie think they're so clever for making a movie about aliens who live just like us in the 50s only they look different! They're green! And there are, like circles everywhere! That's unique. But they all dress in American 50s fashion, speak english with american accents, and have things like barbecues and alien dogs that pee on stuff and it melts. I get it. The dog is the alien from Alien. The alien from Alien had acid blood. But don't you think that if dog's urine melted whatever you made street lights out of, you'd stop making street lights out of that?! Do they give any thought that the history of english is complex and intricate- that it evolved over hundreds of years to get to what we now understand as english. That that evolution was entirely influenced by our individual history of the human race and what cultures and people merged with others. No. These aliens are JUST THE SAME AS US. It takes any need for any kind of thought out of the whole process really. So that's good. Then something wild happens. A space ship lands. A man gets out. He thinks he's on the moon based on how he's unnecessarily hopping. He plants the american flag and then and only then decides to open his eyes. He didn't notice the last 60 seconds that he was surrounded by an unimaginatively reinvented suburban America. He had to step on the slightly distorted rubber ducky first! I get it! Then he runs away screaming. Hilarious. The character is voiced by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and when has he never done something bad? I know kids will love this movie. Why? Because we think kids are idiots and so we dumb down movies to the lowest common denominator so they can enjoy it. The result is that we turn them into idiots. All except Pixar who consistently creates quality and intelligent art. You know what? Kids still love it. Because despite our efforts, they are not yet dumb enough to ignore greatness. Anyway blah. This trailer really annoys me.

#2 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel.

I don't know how they do it, but they manage to make this 30 second long trailer the most annoying 30 seconds of my life. I mean I could have just told you the title and left it there. I'll elaborate a little bit more though. At least it's better (slightly) than the teaser trailer for the first one where one rodent eats the other rodents poop to cover for him. Hysterical. Once again, can we stop (figuratively) feeding crap to our kids and have a little faith in their intelligence. These are the people who are going to be paying my social security out of their tax money people. If we make them too dumb to work, I'm going to be mad pissed.

#1 Old Dogs

This is by far one of the worst things I've ever seen. And it plays like every five minutes at the theater. Not exaggerating. What annoys me most is that I know, like the talentless director's terrible previous film- Wild Hogs, this will probably do really well. This is what i'm talking about people! You keep making kids dumber, they're going to turn into adults that think this chont is comedy. Lets go through this trailer one step at a time. First we get to "Meet Dan and Charlie" played by Robin Williams and John Travolta. The very next scene is Dan accidentally kicking a soccer ball into a kids face. If you're too smart to get it, that is hysterical! The kid gets mad at him and he feels awkward. I'm sure the kid could have moved, but then we wouldn't get to see Robin Williams hit a kid in the face with a soccer ball. What's a movie without that?! This is also supposed to tell us that Dan is not good with kids. Ok, i'll bite, but i have a feeling that concept is going to pop back up later on in the trailer... Charlie then hits on a waitress. This supposedly means he has other interests. Other interests than what? Oh. Sorry. I'll stop. I just got told off for using my brain. Moving on. "Vicky is back in town." We don't know who Vicky is but charlie tells us that Dan hasn't seen her in exactly seven years. Also we see a cropped black and white photo of Dan and Vicky kissing which apparently means that they were a couple seven years ago. Ok. I'm with you so far and no! I'm not using my brain yet. It's turning into jelly just like they want. Anyway Vicky "doesn't know where to start, Dan." Uh oh, that can never be good for our swinging bachelor protagonist. Sure enough not even a second later, two little goons run in yelling "daddy." Dan sputters, "I have kids?!", laughs real hard, and then promptly passes out in his food. The natural man's response. Now lets dissect this for a second. Dan was with this woman. He got her pregnant. They broke up and she left town, never telling Dan he was a daddy to be. So then she had new born twins. Never contacted Dan for child support or help with the babies. Twins can't be that expensive or hard to take care of alone right? She couldn't have told him! I mean, if she had we never would have got to see him pass out in his food! No, it was definitely better not to tell.

If you don't know exactly where this plot is going by now, you're either asleep or someone who would probably like this movie. (That's not a compliment.) Dan of course has to take the kids even though we found out by the whole kicking the soccer ball to the kid thing, 'Dan's not good with kids'. What happens next? Presumably hilarity ensues. There's some drivel about a ultimate frisbee game where Dan and Charlie get beat up by the younger stronger people on the team. Ultimate frisbee is not a full contact sport just for the record. Why is it in this movie? Because then we can see Dan and Charlie get beat up! Ha ha ha ha ha ha! So genius. Remember that time Dan hurt his arm?! I couldn't stop laughing for weeks! That Matt Dillion is one tough ultimate frisbee player. And while i'm here, let me appeal to you, Matt Dillion. Why? Was it for the money? You've obviously smart enough to know this wasn't a good career move. Aren't you? On second thought, don't answer that. You did do Herbie Fully Loaded.

Then Dan has pills where the side effect is 'sudden loss of depth perception'. Guess what happens. Dan has sudden loss of depth perception. Loss of depth perception? Really? Is that a real thing or something they just came up with so they could make the camera look funny and so Robin Williams can run into things and get too close to an asian person? I'm betting you already know the answer. Sometime during all this fun, Seth Green gets hit in the balls and makes a noise like a woman. You know, Seth Green, I didn't know how your career could possibly go up after the Austin Powers films. You sure showed me didn't you?

The rest of the trailer all consists of one sequence. Apparently Dan's kids are in the zoo. But the zoo is closed. Now the kids could have been escorted out with the rest of the civilians when the zoo closed. But probably not. They must still be in there. Locked in. With no way out. Dan must rescue them. So they break into the zoo. Where do they end up? Of course the gorilla pen when the gorilla shows up and attacks. Charlie's hit with a tire hurled by the ape, Dan and Charlie jump over the side into water, and Seth Green makes more girl sounds (keep it up man, you're a genius). Dan and Charlie find themselves in the penguin tank. This is apparently a bad thing since the penguins start attacking them. Does that make any sense to anyone with half a brain? No. Moving on. Seth green make more girl sounds. The End. I wonder if it's too early to stand in line.

The thing that annoys me most about this is that Robin Williams is in it. C'mon man! Were you drunk when you said yes to this? You're a smart guy. I've seen your stand up. You're also very funny. It doesn't make sense to me why you would read this script and think, "Yes! that's what I need! A movie with John Travolta to boost my career!" But i think just thinking about that is more thinking that you ever did about this film. You're a great actor man! How about more Good Will Hunting type projects. Stuff where you're not required to pass out like a twilight fan meeting Robert Patterson. Anyway i'll stop now. I've written way too much but hopefully it's been entertaining enough not to want to kill yourself.

Rad

P.S. A good relatively painless way to die is to watch these trailers over and over in a loop. You're brain will think you've given up on life and just shut down.