Oh no! It seems the Prime Minister of Canada was on a flight to a very important U.N. conference when his plane was shot down somewhere over an isolated war-torn location and now he has been kidnapped by Neo-Nazi communist hippy ninjas. We received a message from them demanding that the United Nations deliver Belgium's top-secret nuclear launch codes by May 31 or they will kill the Prime Minister. Oh, it's a catastrophe. Whatever shall we do? If the Prime Minister doesn't make it to the conference in time for his speech and fails to present the contents of his top-secret briefcase it could mean the end of civilization as we know it!
It seems the only thing we can do is find the toughest men and women available and put them together as a ragtag force of crack commandos who can get in there, find the Prime Minister, take out the enemy, and bring him back in time for the conference. Are you a bad enough dude (or dudette) to organize this team and rescue the Prime Minister?
Rules:
- Select a group of 12-15 characters from action movies. They are not required to be military, but they should be tough enough to look after themselves when things inevitably go wrong.
- For each character you choose, include a few words on why you selected him/her and what skills they have that could contribute to saving the Prime Minister of Canada.
- Much like my Voyage to the Stars Blogathon, there must be gender and/or racial diversity. Ideally, I would prefer it if you could manage both but one or the other is acceptable. If possible, national and sexual diversity is also greatly encouraged (but not required). Either way, I do not want to see any all-white, all-male squads. Doing so means an automatic disqualification.
- There are no restrictions regarding the era in which your chosen characters originated or their nationality. You could in theory assign Vazquez from Aliens with Nantz from Battle: Los Angeles and Dutch from Predator.
- You cannot include two or more characters from the same film.
- I would like you to include the above banner in your post. However, if you want, you may design your own provided it contains the title of the blogathon and imagery that fits.
You have until May 31 to rescue the Prime Minister and bring him back safely before the Neo-Nazi communist hippy ninjas kill him. If all goes well, then on June 1, I will post a list of everyone who contributed to saving him and any messages he would like to give you.
Sounds pretty easy. After all, I grew up on a steady diet of action flicks. My squad will have the Prime Minister home safe in no time. May I present to you...
The Ladies and Their Johns
The Ladies
Nikita
La Femme Nikita
For starters, we had to make sure we had one Canadian on our squad. However, that's far from her only qualification. Her biggest? She's an assassin that cannot be traced. Bad guys may never see her coming.
Charly Baltimore
The Long Kiss Goodnight
This CIA operative has had some issues with amnesia. However, she has none when it comes to handling herself. In fact, she just performed a rescue of her own kidnapped daughter.
Christina Sanchez
S.W.A.T.
She might be the most important person here for one simple reason. As a member of LAPD's S.W.A.T., she is actually used to working with a team on a regular basis. Oh, and she kicks ass.
Mallory Kane
Haywire
This former US Marine might be trickiest of the bunch to get to work for us. She's had some problems with previous employers who attempted to cut ties with her in a not so pleasant manner. One of the things she did for them, and did quite well, was extracting hostages.
Their Johns
John Matrix
Commando
This former Delta Force operative is a guy who knows all about rescuing kidnapping victims. He single-handedly took out dozens, if not 100 bad guys to save his daughter. 
John McClane
Die Hard
The guy isn't exactly a boy scout, but he's saved an office building full of hostages as well as an airport full of hostages. He can do this. With attitude.
John Cutter
Passenger 57
He's a former police officer turned head of an anti-terrorism unit. He also happens to train airline employees in self-defense. The Prime Minister shouldn't worry. He should just "Always bet on black."
John J. Rambo
Rambo Franchise
The mono-syllabic Vietnam vet was once recruited by the US government to single-handedly rescue a bunch forgotten POWs. Well, he was really hired for that. It just turned out that way.
John Hatcher
Marked for Death
Hatcher is a DEA agent with off the charts hand-to-hand combat skills. If he says he going to rip your arm off and beat you with it, he might not be exaggerating.
John Shaft
Shaft Franchise
This private dick might be the least qualified of all of our team members. However, he brings a level of cool none of the others could possibly touch. He's a bad mother...shut yo' mouth!. I'm just talkin' bout Shaft, baby.
John Smith
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
He's a highly skilled assassin who works for private corporations. The guy has some marital issues, but I don't think he'll let that distract him.
John Kruger
Eraser
Kruger is a US Marshal who does some highly specialized work for the Witness Protection Program. This means if we need the Prime Minister to lay low for a while, this is the guy that will make it happen. Never mind that he looks just like one of our other team members.
See you soon, Mr. Prime Minister.
Ha! I used to love his old movies back when I was a kid and they first came out. This was and still is my favorite of the bunch. Can't stand anything he's done in this century, save for Machete, but I still have a soft spot for those from the 80s. No argument on him running like a bitch, though.
ReplyDeleteGreat choices for the females, they often get overlooked when discussing action. Some bad-ass characters on your list. I might add Ripley from Alien, Bruce Lee(from Enter the Dragon) and James Bond to the line-up. Can't go wrong with them on your side!
ReplyDeleteThanks. Thought about adding all those characters, but got caught up with the name John, lol.
DeleteWhoaaa!! These are some bad ass guys and gals, I wouldn't want to be in the wrong side of ANY of them!!
ReplyDeleteThat would be a really bad place to be.
DeleteWait, Nikita was Canadian? Oh wow, maybe I should see about trying to watch that film. My experience with Luc Besson has largely been hit and miss but that could be interesting.
ReplyDeleteI had a feeling I'd be seeing Rambo show up at some point, and I can see why. After all, as you said this guy took on an army to save a group of POWs. Admittedly it wasn't a very good army (they could shoot and fatally injure a woman while she's moving through the jungle under cover, but they can't hit a huge man who's standing completely still and behind zero cover at the EXACT SAME RANGE?), but that's beside the point. Of course there is the downside that nobody will be able to understand what he's saying most of the time, but he's not exactly coming along to gather information about the enemy so I guess that won't be a problem. John McClane also seemed like someone I might see pop up sooner or later.
Also, great call on Sanchez, a woman who was tough and managed to survive despite being played by Michelle Rodriguez (she's kinda like the female equivalent of Sean Bean, in that she has a notorious reputation for getting killed off in everything). Even that bullet she took to the shoulder didn't do much more than slow her down.
I wouldn't have thought of Cutter, maybe just because I'm not the biggest fan of Passenger 57. I thought it was started off good, and there are a few things I can definitely give it credit for as far as it being a "Die Hard on a plane" film, particularly the choice to include a black protagonist and being so far one of only two "Die Hard on a something" films I've seen (okay, three if you count the one I wrote) to have a mixed-gender group of villains. I personally just felt like the ending was extremely rushed, and the female lead wasn't used to her full potential. I probably should see Haywire again at some point. I remember watching that one in high school and being confused, but maybe it would make more sense now.
Thanks a lot for taking part in this blogathon. You've certainly got a good team so I think you've got a pretty good chance of rescuing the Prime Minister, though thinking about it now I find myself wondering what will happen when they find out two other teams are also trying to save the Prime Minister.
I loved putting this team together. Thanks for the great idea. To be honest, most of the movies these characters are in are preposterous. I was choosing them based merely on the characters themselves, not the quality of their films. By the same token, I enjoy most of these for the dumb fun they provide. Again, great idea. Looking forward to your next one.
DeleteNikita!!! She owns!
ReplyDeleteLove the diversity in the list. It's perfect. I really need to put my list together.
Thanks. Love to see what you come up with.
DeleteThis may be the best thing I have ever read.
ReplyDeleteThe Johns are essentially the (male) characters of 99% of my action hero fantasies. I was gonna say 'boyhood' fantasies, but I wouldn't lie to you Dell. I still love these guys twenty years later.
Genius.
Wow. Thanks for the compliment. Yeah, I still love these guys, too. Who didn't dream of standing in an open field mowing down bad guys while they sprayed the bullets from their automatic weapons all AROUND YOU.
DeleteLove this list! We need to crack on with our own! :)
ReplyDelete- Allie
Thanks. Love to see what you come up with.
Delete