You know what that sound means? It's another
episode of Game for a Movie where we ask, are
you game for a movie? My name is Mike. I will
be your host tonight. I have a brand new movie
that I saw in theaters to talk about. It is technically
a bad movie. We'll get into why it's technically
a bad movie in a little bit. But first, we've
got to talk about what we are drinking. Today
is actually going to be a chill day for me. Normally,
I am drinking, but I thought I'd take it a little
easy today. I've got a Sprite Chill. It's cherry
lime. It's delicious. If you've not had it before,
I actually, like, I'm addicted to Coca -Cola.
Like, really addicted to it. And usually, Coca
-Cola is in the house always. I went with the
Sprite Chill this week instead of Coca -Cola.
Because of how much I like this drink. It's very
good if you've not had it before. But yeah, so
it's a chill Friday where we are sipping on a
Sprite Chill. And enjoying talking about a bad
movie that came out today of all days. So this
bad movie is Borderlands. Borderlands is written
by Eli Roth. That's an important little stat
there because the guy who actually wrote it.
Asked for his name to be pulled off of the writing
credits. If that is something to go by to start
everything off, yeah, that's not a good start.
So the script has been in development hell for
a little while. The Last of Us creator Craig
Mazin, I hope I'm pronouncing that right, was
originally the writer on this. Basically, this
script was selling like hotcakes, like everybody
wanted a piece of it. It was something that everybody
knew was going to be a hit, especially with the
script he wrote. And then the changes happened
and the studio interference and the official
writer of this movie is now Eli Roth and Joe
Abercrombie. Depending on your opinions of Eli
Roth. That's going to have a lot of input on
what you think of this movie. He's given us some
pretty decent horror movies in the past and everything
like that. This is a little strange for him to
be directing slash writing, but, you know, that's
what he decided he wanted to do. So let's go
to why this is technically a bad movie and technically
not. So usually when we're selecting a bad movie,
for me anyway, I like to go with something...
That is under 40 % on both audience and critic
score for Rotten Tomatoes. When I went and saw
this movie, the critic score was a 3%. Now, as
of recording, it is up to 5%, and the audience
score is 51%. So technically, yes, it is not
qualifying as a bad movie by my standards. However,
this was a bad movie. I think it's a little cruel
to give it a 5%. I will say that. I don't think
it's that bad. I've seen a lot worse, especially
for the show. But just in general, even if I
hadn't seen all these bad movies, I don't think
I would have given it a 5%. I'm currently in
the range of like 30%. I still think it's a bad
movie, no matter what you say about it. And I'll
have more thoughts as we expand on it. But truthfully,
I don't think... The critic score is fair. I
also don't think, however, for the same price,
that the audience score is fair, because some
of these reviews are things like, it's not as
good as Bucky Larson Born to Be a Star, five
stars. You know, so there's definitely some people
that are messing with the scores on this one.
I think it truly counts as a bad movie. Hey,
you can argue with me all you want about it,
because at the end of the day, it is sitting
at a 51 % audience score. It may not count. I
still think it does. I saw it and I'm going to
review it anyway as if it did. But we can have
that conversation at our X slash Twitter or Instagram.
Technically, we're still on Facebook, even though
I deleted mine. So I can't really talk to you
on there. So don't reach out to us there. So
the first thing we got to talk about with this
movie is the cast. The cast is interesting because
you're looking at the cast going. This is heavy
hitters. Like, these are big names. How does
this movie get all these big names? And then
you realize the characters they're trying to
play, especially if you're a fan of the games.
I've never played the games. I'm going to say
that straight up. I know a lot about them. A
lot. Because I have been interested in the lore.
I just never actually picked up the game and
played. And I'm sure I would love it if I did.
I just haven't done so. But I know enough about
the lore to know who these characters are supposed
to be. And I'm seeing some of them going, that
doesn't really make sense. I'll give it in this
movie. The weirdest casting I saw was Kevin Hart
as Roland. Truthfully, I didn't mind his portrayal
of Roland. It wasn't your normal, typical Kevin
Hart goofiness. So am I a fan of it? No. But
for the most part, he wasn't too bad on a scale.
Then we've got people like Jamie Lee Curtis as
Tannis. She was very strange in that role. I
don't know why she needed to take this one. And
I'll also say we want a Borderlands movie that
has Handsome Jack, right? That's what we want.
I don't know how we didn't get even like a teaser
of it or anything like that. We got nothing of
even relating to Handsome Jack. Instead, we got
this character Atlas played by Edgar Ramirez.
Which he was fine, but he also was nothing special.
I think if you were to count a bad guy performance
from this year, it's definitely going to be on
the lower end. Just thinking about some of the
villains we've seen this year. But yeah, as we
dive into this movie, this cast is definitely
something that we're going to be coming back
to. Let's dive into the details though of the
actual movie itself. This is spoiler filled.
So if you have not seen it and you want to see
it. Go see it, then come back. If you don't want
to see it or you've seen it already, I'm going
to spoil pretty much everything. So, spoiler
alert right now, here is the entirety of the
Borderlands movie. First off, the movie starts
with some narration. We know because we know
who Cate Blanchett is that it's Cate Blanchett's
voice and she's talking about Pandora. Pandora
is a planet that has been taken over by psychos.
I'll also say treasure hunters that are looking
for this vault. This vault was put there by the
Iridiums. The Iridiums, basically, you need to
have a child of Iridia to open the vault. Everybody's
trying to figure out how to open this vault on
Pandora. It's made it so that there's a ton of
people called psychos that are killing people.
There's the treasure hunters that have taken
over. And basically, it's been bad for the people
who live in Pandora, this whole vault hunt. That
is the narration that gets us started. And then
we end up in a prison -like satellite that's
floating around and everything like that, where
Roland tries to break out Tina. Roland is played
by Kevin Hart. Tina is played by Ariana Greenblatt.
There's a couple short jokes about the fact that
Roland is played by Kevin Hart. Short, obviously.
And there's a couple sarcastic jokes back at
her expense. Roland is trying to break her out
of the prison -like place. We don't know why
at this point. But we think it's just she's been
captured and he wants to do the right thing and
break her out. They do get attacked by the Lance
Soldiers. So Lance is the corporation that works
for Atlas. We don't know this at this time, but
I'm just going to try to make it easier for everybody
involved. And one of the Lance Soldiers is this
girl Knox, who has a disagreement with Kevin
Hart, Roland. And you can tell there's kind of
a would -they -won't -they by the end of this
movie. While they are fighting the Lance Soldiers,
one of the psychos escapes from the... prison
ship as well. He is played by Florian Montinu.
He is Victor Drago in the Creed movies. He plays
Krieg in this movie, a psycho that really is
just there to protect Tina. And so Roland is
able to come to an agreement with him that he
is protecting her and wants to help her escape.
So Krieg is happy to follow along as well. Then
we get a title card showing that we are now 50
light years away and we are introducing Cate
Blanchett's character of Lilith. Lilith is a
bounty hunter and we are introduced to her as
she is trying to get this bounty. She sits down
at a bar, basically knocks the guy out so she
can drink before turning him in for the money.
Three guys approach Lilith at the bar, two of
which are the muscle, one is like the smooth
talker kind of thing. Lilith, done talking with
them, flips around and shoots the two muscle
guys and then holds the one guy at gunpoint.
Everybody leaves the bar and she's left alone
with that guy. And then another guy who is Atlas.
It's not really Atlas. It's Atlas's face on a
regular guy. And Lilith, not wanting to hear
what he has to say, shoots him immediately. So
this innocent guy. I'm assuming innocent. Maybe
not. Maybe he does work for the organization
or whatever. But this innocent guy is now dead
just because Atlas wanted to use his face. Or
use his body, really. Atlas makes the smooth
talker wear the device on his face so Atlas can
talk to her and not get shot. Obviously, he does
these kind of deals and knows how dangerous it
can be and everything like that. And he offers
Lilith a ton of money to go to Pandora and...
rescue his kidnapped daughter tina lila sees
how much money she could end up getting and she
agrees to do so this is going to take her back
to her home planet pandora when she first gets
to pandora she knows she needs a ride so she
goes and takes a tour bus kind of thing for treasure
hunters led by this guy marcus marcus is kind
of annoying but you know he's just this big loud
salesman that's trying to like Make a quick buck
off of these treasure hunters running tours and
everything. Really, she doesn't want to be on
this bus. It's just the quickest way to get to
Firestone where Tina was last seen. So after
listening to the long tour video and getting
to Firestone, this is where the treasure hunt
is supposed to begin. Even though she's not a
treasure hunter, she's a bounty hunter. Marcus
knows that she's going to end up looking for
the treasure. She gets the Firestone and she
starts sensing that something's following her
and she doesn't exactly know what. And when it
finally pops its head out, she shoots him straight
in the face. And that was Claptrap. Claptrap
is a robot played by Jack Black. He's been asleep
for 35 years, we learned, but for whatever reason,
when she got to the planet, he got reactivated.
And he doesn't know who he works for. He doesn't
know why he got reactivated. He just knows he
got reactivated because she set foot on the planet
again. After shooting him more than once, Lilith
is finally talking with Claptrap and realizes
how annoying he is, but he can be of some use.
She shows him a picture. He's able to connect
to the... which is the satellite system across
the entire planet of Pandora, and he's able to
find where she was last seen based on the picture
she gives him. He ends up seeing her at this,
like, big ship clearing that crashed on the planet,
and they decide that they're going to go in the
morning and try to find her and take her home
to her father. One of the things they need to
do in order to do so is steal some wheels, which
happens a little too easy from some psychos and
also the Lance soldiers. Lilith is able to figure
out that they're working together. She doesn't
understand why, but she can see that they're
working together somehow, including capturing
children, which is a little strange to me. They
don't really go into detail about that, but that
did happen. The scavenger children, for whatever
reason, were kidnapped and put in these cages.
Lilith kind of shows that she has a heart because
she frees the kids first and then takes out the
psycho and steals his car in order for her and
Claptrap to get to where Tina was last seen.
Lilith goes into the ship where she thinks that
Tina might be staying and sees all of these stuffed
animals on the wall and on the bed and everything
like that. You know, she figures it's a kid.
This kid loves her stuffed animals and everything
like that. So she's kind of talking to nobody,
but she kind of senses that Tina might be listening.
Tina might be there. And she was saying that
she wants to bring her to her father, rescue
her and bring her to Atlas. And at first, Tina
seems really excited. And so she asks Lilith
to grab her bunny on the bed and bring it with.
And so Lilith grabs the stuffed animal and all
of a sudden it starts lighting up. It turns out
it's a bomb. So Lilith is able to escape to where
Tina is. Tina had climbed up the ship face and
is now above her and has the high ground. And
she just starts chucking stuffed animal bombs
at her. After a while, it seems like she runs
out of ammunition or is just like done throwing
stuff at her and goes, well. At least I still
have my protector. Hey, Krieg. And Krieg breaks
in and starts attacking Lilith. Obviously, this
big battle and all of these explosions and everything,
they kind of draw some attention to them. So
the Lance soldiers hear the explosions and they
know where to find Tina. Knox is in the lead
and is just leading this army over to her and
says that they're going to bring her back and
everything like that. Lilith, outsmarting Krieg,
gets sent up to the top of the ship face and
is basically like, okay, I didn't realize that
Atlas sent more than one person. This is my bounty.
I'm taking it home with me. Tina, not wanting
to be caught by either of them, throws another
explosive towards Nox's direction and it blows
up the ship and it starts to fall. So Tina and
Lilith end up on the ground now with Krieg. And
they're kind of stuck. There's nobody around
or anything like that. And this army is coming
after them. Until Roland comes around in his
big old souped up SUV. And everybody hops in,
including Claptrap. There's a whole little skirmish
about who's going to drive, who's going to shoot
at the army and everything like that. And they
get slowed down because somehow Claptrap ends
up being the one driving and is not doing a very
good job about it. So they get wrapped up by
a bunch of other SUVs. It's kind of like a convoy
now and they think they're stuck. Well, Roland
figures out, hey, I know a shortcut. I can get
us out of here. He swings his SUV left and they
go to the piss swamp. I wish I was joking about
that. It is literally a piss swamp and it is.
overseen by this thing called a thresher, which
is like a giant worm with tentacles and everything
like that. Basically, one of the things that
happens is Tina's just like, what's that smell
trying to open the window so she can get the
smell out? And they all get splashed with urine.
But as Claptrap says, it's not just urine. It's
also like 16 % fecal matter. So, you know, poop,
piss jokes. Yeah, that's what we're on. This
is the level of humor we have for this movie.
They're trying to get through the piss swamp
and all of the tentacles that are attacking them
from the thresher. And then they get to the end
of the road where the thresher is waiting for
them and realize they're kind of stuck. So Roland
hits the reverse and they're being followed by
the Lance soldiers as well. So either way, they're
kind of stuck there between a rock and a hard
place. Well, Roland has an idea and decides that
he's going to step on the gas. hit a jump, throw
a grenade that goes into the Thresher's mouth,
perfectly explodes, and they go through the Thresher's
mouth, through his neck, and land on the other
side while the Thresher dies. This gives them
just enough time to get away from it, and basically
they don't have to worry about the army for a
little bit, and the Thresher's dead. This takes
us to our first night of camping out. Where basically
a whole conversation starts about the fact that
they don't think they can trust Lilith or Claptrap.
I almost said Craptrap. But honestly, with his
character, even though it's played by the wonderful
Jack Black, Craptrap might be a better name for
him. Because, I don't know, the humor in this
movie I feel like never really hit. They think
they're a lot funnier than they actually are.
And that's part of the problem. Plus, I know
somebody like Claptrap, he's supposed to be funny,
but he's also supposed to be annoying. And there's
a fine line that you need to balance. And even
though it is Jack Black and we all love him and
everything like that, it just doesn't quite hit.
It's more annoying than it is funny. I definitely
felt towards the end that he was grading on me
a lot. So Lilith is able to convince him to trust
her and Claptrap to show like, hey, we fired
on the Lance crew. We're obviously like doing
this job, but really we're here now to protect
the girl. So their next plan is they're going
to find Roland's contact, the scientist. They
don't say what the scientist's name is, but they
are looking for the scientist. So they head to
Sanctuary City and they have like these masks
that they wear so they can blend in. These masks
are like light masks, like it's made out of light.
So it like hides your face, but it's just kind
of cooler looking, I guess. There's no real point
to it. Marcus is at the Sanctuary City. He was
the guy that did the tour and everything like
that. And he immediately recognizes Lilith. So
it makes me wonder, are these masks even any
good? Because he recognized her right off the
bat. They go to a place called Moxie's. Moxie
is played by Gina Gershon. She lets them all
in. She gets a milkshake for Tina and then drinks
for the rest. And they're going to talk for a
little bit. And she's going to be able to show
them where the scientist is, is the idea. Meanwhile,
there is a guy named Larry who is an off -duty
Lance soldier that recognize Roland. And they
apparently have some history and they're really
close friends. So Roland's just like, I'm going
to handle this. You get the information from
Moxie. Roland learns from Larry that the bounty
on him has gone up. Instead of 100 ,000 credits,
it's now 150 ,000 credits. And Moxie tells Lilith.
That she knew her and her mother when she was
younger. And that her mother loved her and knew
that she was special. And Lilith is just like,
no, I didn't come to deal with this. I just want
to know where the scientist is. So Moxie shows
her where the scientist should be. It's this
stairway. And you have to say the password echo.
And that's going to get you up the stairway to
the scientist. Larry is all of a sudden getting
a little trigger happy. He wants that bounty
on Roland. He now knows if he captures him, he
gets 150 ,000 credits. And because it's gone
up even more so, now he wants to take him out.
Before Larry, played by Bobby Lee, by the way,
before he's able to get his weapon, Moxie is
able to tase him. And so he's subdued, and basically
he convinces the Lance soldiers that he drank
too much. And Bobby Lee's just like, no, she
tased me. I didn't drink too much. You know I
can handle my liquor. But she's able to hide
that and get them out the back door. While Larry
is stunned, though, he does hear Claptrap and
realizes he's part of their group. They're able
to sneak out the back door and they get to the
stairway. And I say stairway, but really it's
an elevator. And they did say it was a stairway.
I don't understand why. They said stairway when
it was really an elevator. She says the password
echo, it doesn't work. Then Tina goes echo, echo,
echo, and it works. And they're able to get up
to the scientist who is above Sanctuary City.
The scientist, her name is Tannis, and she is
played by Jamie Lee Curtis. We learn right off
the bat that Tannis and Lilith have a little
bit of a history. I don't think it came out now,
but it really doesn't matter that much to the
story at this point. Basically, when Lilith's
mother died, she had given up Lilith to Tannis
to watch over. And Tannis didn't do a very good
job watching over her. She kind of put herself
into her science stuff and not into raising a
child. So Lilith is kind of upset that they're
dealing with Tannis. And she goes and sits out
on the balcony and just kind of watches over
the city. And who comes out to join her but Tina.
Tina is kind of like talking about all about
her dad and everything like that. And that she's
she's not really biological child of Atlas. She
basically he found the first key and on that
key was iridium blood. And so he was able to
create clones because he knows he needs a child
of the iridium to open the vault. So she's basically
been an experiment. She's been captive in this
prison ship and everything like that just to
get experiments done on her. And she knows she's
not the first of the experiments. But she also
knows that because she is Iridium, she is going
to be special. Lilith kind of connects with her.
And she's willing to drop her differences with
Tannis to work together to find this vault. they
know if they find this vault they can get out
scot -free and not have to worry about atlas
chasing after tina anymore and lilith has kind
of found that's what she wants she wants uh she
wants tina to be on her own and maybe the group
will stay together maybe not maybe they'll stay
together who knows she just sees a little bit
of herself and tina and wants to protect this
child so tanis lays the plan they are going to
find the second key which they know is in this
thought to be abandoned mine. They don't know
exactly where, but they know that they need to
get into this mine. And in order to do so, they
need to go in this tunnel that has like this
chemical, this corrosive chemical. So they make
this plan that they're going to do and everything
like that. They're going to sleep it off for
the night. And for whatever reason, Claptrap
goes down to the city and just like takes a field
trip. There's no reason for it. He just does.
And he gets noticed by Larry. And so Larry's
like following him and they know they need to
get out of there now. They need to hightail it.
The Lance soldiers that now know they're in the
city start looking at everybody, including people
wearing masks because they want to find these
guys and capture them. So these guys get away
in a trash truck. They escape in a trash truck.
My thing is they are checking almost every person.
why wouldn't you check like trucks and stuff
that are leaving the city especially one that
definitely is big enough to hide six people right
nope they don't do it i don't know it's whatever
so our crew gets to the mine and the tunnel that
leads in they talk about the corrosive chemical
and how basically eats through anything except
for the minerals in the cave i have a problem
with this because later they you see this chemical
is being transported by pipes and like that isn't
made out of the mineral of the cave or these
pipes normal pipes and it just isn't getting
eaten through i don't know that's just what my
thought was at this point tina is ready to lead
the way so she jumps on the grates above the
chemical and basically she's like i did it because
i'm the lightest so we wanted to see and make
sure this works and then she starts jumping up
and down on it because she thinks oh this is
fine i'm special i'm supposed to be alive, and
she falls. Krieg somehow ends up there and saves
her life, and they all plan to go down this grate
but take it slow and everything like that. She
showed them how dangerous it can be. They also
send Claptrap an alternate way to open up the
door at the end. Basically, he just goes through
a sewer pipe that doesn't have any of this chemical
or anything like that, and he's going to connect
with the echo net in order to open the door.
They get to the end of the tunnel and they see
this plant. It's like a beautiful plant that
is growing in between the cracks in this tunnel.
And Tina's talking about the fact that, oh, beauty
even in the place of hopelessness and everything.
And then Claptrap comes down. He's like, I opened
the door and jumps right on the planet on the
plant and like start squishing it back and forth
because he's so excited that we're going and
everything like that again. Just a joke that
you can see coming a mile away and yet they still
went for it. They look through the door because
now they can see in and they see that there are
a group of psychos in this mine. And not just
any psychos. These are the, I think they call
them blood spots. I didn't write down the name,
but I think they're blood spots. And basically
these are like psychos on steroids. Like they're
even worse than normal psychos. So after doing
like a quick scan and stuff, Lilith and Roland
both decide that there are too many to go on
head on. They're not going to fight them. They're
going to try to sneak around them. So they come
up with the idea because Claptrap is basically
indestructible to bullets. They're going to send
him to be a distraction. So he wheels his way
through, gets to the front and starts like talking
to them and everything. And the blood spots.
Yeah, they go crazy and they just start shooting
at him, unloading on him. And so he's taking
all of them and basically the crew is able to
sneak behind them and get into the mine. This
mine is full of a shit ton of boxes. And they
know the key is supposed to be in one of them,
but they're like, this is going to take a while.
Unless somebody, I'm not going to name names,
but somebody. has a unique ability to be able
to sense the keys that they never knew about
before, and they look in one box and find it
immediately. So they've got two of the three
keys. This is great. This is good news, because
now they can work on getting that third key and
then get to the vault, right? Well, they all
of a sudden hear something, and it sounds like
metal dropping, and they're wondering what the
hell that is, and they're being quiet and everything.
And it's Claptrap, and he is essentially pooping
out the bullets. That's the best way I got for
it, because he releases his back door and just
literally squeezes out these bullets. And he
says he's getting rid of the unnecessary iron
in his system because of all these bullets. But
you know that noise, it draws the blood spots.
They hear it, and they start going crazy, and
they start piling into the mines. And even though
they agreed that they couldn't take them all
on, well, They're going to go and try to take
them all on. So they start shooting at them.
They start blowing them up. There's a spot where
Tina stabs one of them, and you can tell she
gets a little bloodlusty. And basically, they're
just going through all of them with the trope
of, like, there's multiple tropes at this point.
There's no reloading at all. We never see any
of that. There's unlimited bullets, essentially.
And bad guys miss every shot that they take.
There's just six of them. They should have been
defeated at this point, in my opinion, because
you've got. Maybe 200, 300 like blood hungry
psychos that are trying to kill anything that
moves in there and. They just can't. They get
out of the chamber with all the boxes and they
get to an elevator that needs fixing. So Tannis
and Claptrap are going to try to restart it and
get the cables working and everything like that.
At first they fix it. They think it are good.
They get everybody to come back because Krieg,
Krieg and Roland go to the main like hallway
that they're coming down and start shooting and
taking out all of them. And Krieg is like battling
all of them. And this is a part where they shoot
the pipes and the corrosive chemical like kind
of melts the blood spots. That's when I was talking
about the fact that this corrosive metal or this
corrosive chemical can just like sit in metal
and it's just fine. Didn't understand that at
all, but basically some of these psychos are
getting absolutely destroyed by this corrosive
chemical. At the same time, Tina and Lilith are
trying to block off another way that the psychos
are trying to come through. And basically, Tina
is able to help secure the door as they're pushing
and they can try to like, you can see the screws
are like. pushing and everything everything's
moving and they're going to break through any
second they need to get this elevator up and
running tannis and claptrap finally think they
got it working so they get everybody to go to
the elevator they close the door and they press
the up button nothing works tannis looks outside
the elevator and sees that one of the wires needs
to be connected and somebody needs to connect
it for them so someone needs to stay behind and
that is Roland. Roland decides he's going to
sacrifice himself for the good of the group to
get this wire connected and try to take out as
many of these blood spots as possible. Tina hands
him a bunny bomb called Bob so that he has a
fighting chance, and he goes out, connects the
wire, they hit the elevator, and they fly up
towards freedom, essentially. So here's my thing.
For the most part, movies when somebody sacrifices
themselves you can usually guess it's either
going to actually be a sacrifice or they're going
to be safe somehow and that kind of thing even
if he wasn't going to be safe which I totally
thought he was Roland was kind of boring and
I would have been okay if he actually sacrificed
himself I actually think that would have helped
his character a little more Unfortunately, that's
not how that goes. He did survive, and it's mostly
because of Bob and because of his unlimited bull
attack that he somehow had. So he's able to take
out all of the blood spots and had told them
that he would meet them at the vault. The rest
get away, and they end up in this destroyed town,
and this is where they're going to camp out for
the night. Tanis puts together the two keys and
it creates this map that shows a phoenix, which
is the god that protects the planet, and also
where the vault should be. So Lilith recognizes
it and knows where they're going to go and everything
like that. Lilith also says to Tanis, like, okay,
where do we get the third key? And Tanis goes,
the girl is the third key. I don't know what's
going to happen to her. And Lilith's just kind
of like, you're just going to let her die for,
like, treasure and everything like that? and
Tanis is basically like, I don't know what else
to do. Everybody's trying to get this vault.
They're going to use her one way or the other.
Lilith, of course, isn't happy with that answer,
and so she walks away from the group while they're
all getting ready to camp for the night. She
had a beacon that she was supposed to press when
she found the girl, so Atlas and his Lance soldiers
could find the girl and take her, and then Lilith
would get paid all this money. Lilith is full
send now, and she decides she's going to smash
the beacon. So she smashes it, and all of a sudden
this thing comes in. It's a little drone kind
of flying thing, and Atlas appears in an R2 -D2
-esque projector screen thing. Basically, it
wasn't a beacon. It was a tracker to watch where
they're going and everything like that so he
could figure out when they had the keys, everything
like that. Even though I think that Lilith was
not going to turn her in, she says she was. And
I think it's just she was saying whatever to
get out of that situation where it's like, I
just I'll tell you what you want to hear kind
of thing. But of course, because it's a movie
and movies have to movie, Tina sneaks around
and heard it and basically is hurt that she thinks
Lilith is going to turn her in. Even though,
again, like I said, I don't think she actually
was. I think she was just saying what she could
to get out of that situation. Well, Tina, of
course, because she needs to react this way,
throws an explosive at Lilith. And I don't think
it's to kill her, but maybe it is. And it knocks
her out. And she's unconscious for a while. It's
the next day when Lilith wakes up because there's
light shining and everything like that. The rest
of the group is gone except for Claptrap, who
is celebrating because he thinks that Lilith
is dead and he no longer has to follow her around.
And he's so excited and then realizes she's still
alive. Damn it. So you think that at this point,
Lilith and Claptrap are going to go to the vault
right away because they know that that's where
the group is going. You think, right? No, they
decide they're just going to walk the town, this
abandoned town, and Lilith doesn't seem to recognize
that it's her own town that she was born in.
She says she doesn't know her mother very much
because she was eight when she died. I don't
have the best memories from when I was eight.
I don't remember every last thing that happened,
but I think I would remember my town or what
my house looked like or that. I would even remember
my mother. I think I would at that point. I don't
know. Maybe I'm wrong. I don't know anything
about the human memory. I'm a guy who watches
movies for a living and bad movies at that. So
it's not like I know everything about the human
mind and memory. But I think I would recognize
my house even if it was destroyed. I'd recognize
something about it. She doesn't recognize it
at all. And then Claptrap sees a drawing. in
one of the houses and all of a sudden he just
like flips backwards and becomes the r2d2 projector
with a message for lilith it was her mother that
was telling her how special she is and that she
didn't want to let her go and that she misses
and loves her and that um claptrap would be waiting
for her when she got to the planet and she would
he would find her and take her to find her home
find her belonging everything like that you know
just bumbo jumbo about you belong you you're
special that kind of stuff um because it happens
in all of like 10 seconds it doesn't feel very
emotional it doesn't feel like the turning point
of the movie that i think they're trying to make
it be but it gives her this little boost and
she decides she's going to go and save tina after
all Meanwhile, Tina is there with Tannis and
Krieg and they have found the vault entrance.
Krieg actually does. And after a while of them
not listening to him, he finally like smashes
something and goes, this is where it is. You
know, like, haha, this is funny because they
weren't listening to him about the vault, but
he knew where the vault was. Again, the humor
in this movie is not great. So Tannis gives the
two keys together. to tina she places them where
they're supposed to go and it creates like these
footsteps like footprint spots that the child
of the iridium needs to stand on in order to
open the vault so tina does so and this is finally
it this is the moment she knows she's special
this is finally the moment where it's going to
be like great i stepped here i opened the vault
i am the special one Unfortunately, the vault
does not open. And Tina is very disappointed.
You can see it in her face that she just realizes
she's not as special as she thought she was.
And then, to make matters worse, Atlas and their
army show up. And Atlas is happy they found the
two keys, happy they found the vault, but...
also realizes he has to go back to the drawing
board. So he tells Knox, the leader of his army,
she needs to collect the child, not kill her,
and scrape her organs because we're going to
start from scratch again with her iridium blood
to make another clone. Basically, at this point,
not so fast because Roland shows up and is there
to help protect them. And this is one of the
things that bugs me about this movie. Nobody
knows where this vault is. They have an idea
where it is, but they don't actually know where
it is. When they put the two keys together, they
got a map and they got to see where it was. Except
for one big piece of movie plot that plot hole
is what I'll say. One big plot hole. When they
found that those keys put them together and saw
where the treasure and vault were supposed to
be. Roland was in the tube shooting at all these
blood spots. He didn't see this map ever and
he just knows exactly where to show up. He just
shows up and he's there and just so happens to
be on time to try to protect Tina. Also, him
and Knox had some kind of like former chemistry,
that kind of thing. Well, Knox, who sees that
Roland is willing to put his life on the line
for this little girl, basically says she doesn't
want to kill the kid. So she stands with the
crew as well. And you're expecting this big showdown.
Well, Atlas vaporizes her immediately. Nox, gone.
See ya. We don't need you anymore. They see those
guns and they're a little more like, oh, we're
outmatched. We're in trouble. But guess who shows
up? Lilith and Claptrap. Yay! They have two more
people to help them against this army. This should
help, right? Basically, Lilith says to Atlas
that she can get him in the vault. He just needs
to let them go. That's all he wants. And Atlas
says, done. If you can get me in the vault, fine.
So Lilith goes, puts the key down and steps on
the two foot pads. And all of a sudden things
start happening. And she becomes the goddess
protector of the planet. She has like these glowy
light. wings and she can shoot like light phasers
and everything like that it's very like captain
marvel -esque in that just to give you an idea
of like this light power kind of thing um and
so at this point i've called her bird person
essentially um she is able to get the vault arch
open she doesn't exactly open the vault but she
gets the arch open that she can open and like
get them through But for now, she instead decides
that she's going to fight this army and try to
like knock it down. And she's able to like send
these light beams to protect her friends in this
like light force field kind of thing. So like
Roland's able to shoot through it, but they can't
shoot him. Tina is able. She's like floating
and she's able to toss these bombs and like kill
a bunch of them. Krieg is going nuts and fighting
this one that kind of looks like Batman only
on like. 50 million different steroids it's like
a bane batman hybrid and at first one of the
things um i forgot that tina was just like i'm
not special when she saw that lilith was able
to like open the vault and everything like that
and she looks at tina and goes tina you are special
just not in the way you thought and you know
it's the it's a team boost it feels good yes
oh friendship that kind of thing we've got the
power of friendship we can take down everything
um like i said i called her bird person at this
point because that's what she kind of looked
like and then um atlas has like this ship that's
firing lasers at this is what he killed nox with
lilith gets downed by these things but she's
able to get back up so that's when i'm like it's
phoenix person Uh, just cause I knew that it
was going to come to something like that where
she gets downed and like you're the Batman creature
is winning the battle against Krieg breaks half
his mask. So you see kind of part of his eye.
And so when she's downed, Atlas is able to grab
Tina and like hold her at like knife point. And
he also has like these deflector shield things.
And like take him out. And save Tina. So. Atlas
is just like no. You need to open the vault.
And you need to. Get me what's inside of there.
Otherwise Tina dies. And so. Lilith opens the
vault. The army stopped fighting. Everything
like that. Lilith opens the vault. Takes Tina
Atlas and herself inside. And basically it's
like this black chasm. It's not really like a.
treasure vault in my mind. There's like floaty
things that are kind of like grayish silvery,
but there's nothing really in it. It's just like
this expanse and everything like that. But Atlas
is convinced it's going to give him this power
and everything that he has this vault open. When
in the vault, Lilith is able to disappear and
kind of go back and forth and everything like
that. So she's there, but she can't be seen.
and she sneaks behind and like grabs the deflector
shield thing from atlas and then finally like
shows herself in front of him and just kind of
like you know okay atlas you won you've got the
vault and everything and then reveals it and
it's like are you missing something and tina
is able to like kick and get away from him and
she sends him flying in the vault and it just
so happens that happens to be guarded by these
threshers and so this thresher is like grabbing
him And he's just like, but what about the vault?
What about the power inside? And Lilith says,
that's the problem, Atlas. You like excess when
really you should just be happy with enough.
And her and Tina walk out of the vault. The door
closes and you see Atlas kind of being taken
under by the Thresher. So he's dead. And Lilith
is a Phoenix person. That doesn't go away just
because she. open the vault and now it's gone
and everything like that she remains a phoenix
person including the planet basically she does
they they start clearing the planet of like the
psychos and stuff and gain their planet back
and it's a town of peace now you know like sanctuary
city is peaceful and they have fireworks and
the end of the movie lilith launches herself
into the sky and like explodes as a firework
of the phoenix and that's it That is the end
of Borderlands. And hopefully the series. Because
I'm sure they probably left themselves out somehow
to make another movie eventually. And God, I
hope not. I just, I really hope not. Because,
like I said at the beginning of this, I think
5 % is cruel. I think 5 % is a little low. to
be about this movie it's not good and that is
the thing i'll say that this is not a good movie
i'm not recommending it for anybody i wrote a
review and gave it um because you can only do
half or one star i gave it one star um my rating
probably probably out of five would be that like
one star or one um one thresher piss ball out
of five um that seems like the best way i can
describe it because it the cast is incredible
but they have no chemistry with each other and
a lot of the times they seem like they're walking
through it one of the things i think they actually
did well was the fact that kevin hart wasn't
his kevin hardiest um but it also makes it kind
of bland for roland I think he could have been
a lot more. I don't know. With the right casting,
I think he could have definitely been better.
I don't think Kevin Hart was the right casting
at all because I think Roland could have been
the right amount of funny, the right amount of
heroic, the right amount of whatever with him.
With Kevin Hart, you never felt the heroism.
And because he's not being like Kevin Hart goofy
and. jokey haha and everything like that you
also are kind of losing a lot of the character
because he's just not he's that's not his strength
is what I'll say and it's not anything about
Kevin Hart he's done some movies that I've enjoyed
him in he's done some movies I've hated him in
it's not his fault in this situation because
he definitely saw this movie and thought this
is a great thing for me to star in that kind
of thing but it just wasn't his strength it wasn't
his his good role for him I've already talked
about Jamie Lee Curtis. I don't think she needed
to be in this at all. I think Tanis as a character
could have probably been forgotten because she
was truly on the back burner for a lot of it.
For more than half the movie, she wasn't even
in it. And then the other half, she was just
doing things like fixing the wiring or putting
the keys together. And I think you could have
easily done that with one of the other characters
already established. I feel like she was definitely
an afterthought and they just needed to get her
involved somehow. the chemistry between Lilith
and Tina was all right. I think that was probably
one of the better parts of the chemistry for
the team. And if that, that was supposed to be
the drawing effect of it, the drawing charm,
everything like that. So as much as I say, that's
probably the better of the chemistries. that
doesn't mean necessarily that it was great i
i think they definitely had some moments that
was like great and then some moments where it's
just like why why are you doing this you you
don't even seem to like each other so why are
you doing this and especially the part where
tina feels like she's being betrayed by lilith
tina has shown that she didn't really act on
impulse for some of this stuff some of it definitely
i mean she's a kid she's going to act on impulse
I think in that situation, she wouldn't have
acted an impulse. She wouldn't have tried to
blow up Lilith. I think she would have tried
to talk to her, maybe, and they could have had
a conversation where she said, even, I'm just
telling him what he wants to hear. I want to
help you. I want to get to the vault. You are
special to me. That kind of thing. Maybe I'm
wrong, and maybe I'm reading into this movie,
because, truthfully, I feel like I'm at a high
school reading level of a... first grade writing
project you know like i'm trying to read into
this and see like oh the door is blue because
of sadness and the feelings he's feeling no the
door was just blue because i made it fucking
blue um that that's what it feels like this movie
it feels like it thinks it's smarter than it
is but it feels as well like it's written at
an elementary school level i would be intrigued
to read the first script that everybody was going
bananas for I think this is definitely a lot
of studio interference. I think this is definitely
a lot of Eli Roth. The fact that the one guy
asked for his name to be taken off the script
says a lot to me. At the end of the day, he didn't
feel like enough of his script was in there to
even warrant leaving his name on for the eighth
of a percent of what was maybe left over. That's
what's crazy to me with some of this stuff is.
At the end of the day, you have not only one,
but three pretty great games to build lore off
of, to use, and to create a fun story. And I
don't think they did that. I think this was a
very basic understanding of the characters. And
again, I didn't play these games. I know enough
about them, but I didn't play these games. So
I'm like speaking of these characters as if I
know them pretty well. I think I know these characters
well enough to know that they weren't done right
by this movie. And I wish that somebody would
have taken more time to flesh out these characters
or whatever. And that's the problem too. Especially
the end. I feel like we got to the end. We got
to the vault. And I think in the games themselves,
it's a long journey. That's what's tough about
adapting a video game to a movie is you're trying
to squeeze in these two hours. That's not what's
going to happen with a movie like this. You have
to establish the characters, and maybe you could
have split it up a little more. I hate that idea
of we're going to make three movies out of the
Hobbit book, but with something like this, I
think you could have expanded on it a little
more and made it a little more fun, given the
characters a little more depth. And just made
it a little more bombastic and fun. That's another
issue I had with this movie. I don't think any
of it was bombastic and fun. I think the one
mind scene where they're going off and shooting
all the blood spots was the one time they could
have gone a little crazier. And Jill said it
in our discussion best that it feels like Diet
Guardians of the Galaxy. But Guardians of the
Galaxy found fun ways to do color or music and
that kind of thing. into the storyline to make
the battles a little more fun when they're actually
having these battles. I feel like that mind scene,
they could have done a lot more fun with it and
made it stand out a little more. I will say,
however, bringing up sound design, this soundtrack
was very good. I did enjoy the soundtrack a lot.
I would probably listen to the soundtrack again.
So I would give the movie one star, but I'd give
the soundtrack probably a four or five. They
definitely had some good hits that I was a big
fan of, including closing in a Black Keys song.
I'm a big Black Keys fan. So even more so, I
was very happy for that. And that kind of felt
like the reward at the end of this movie where
it was like, oh, God, it's finally over. And
we get a Black Keys song. This is amazing. Oh,
my God. I'm so happy. So, yeah. Ways I would
have fixed this movie, I would have made the
characters. I would have given them more depth.
I would have made some of the characters. Either
I would have taken them out or I would have tried
to give them more to do. Because a lot of these
characters felt like they just didn't have a
lot to do. You made the main character Lilith.
And though she has some good moments and everything
like that, I think each of these characters should
have had more moments individually. Because I
feel like all of the moments were on Lilith's
side, not on anybody else's side, except for
the one Tina where she's like, I'm not special.
We get that moment of, no, you are special, just
not in the way you thought. I think that was
a good moment that could have been better, too.
I don't think they laid that out perfectly, but
I do think that was a better part than I thought
it would be. But all of the moments seemed to
happen to Lilith, and we never had any growth
from anybody else because we didn't see much
of anything from anybody else. So I would have...
Giving more moments to characters to flesh them
out a little more or something to do or getting
rid of some of the characters when they just
didn't have anything to do. I would have made
it more fun, tried to make the battle scene stand
out a little more and not just be, okay, we're
firing a bunch of bullets at some unnamed army
people, you know. Giving each character to kind
of shine in their battle and everything like
that. I think that would have been fun. And then,
truthfully, once we got to the vault. we wrapped
it up in like five minutes. Like it was a quick
wrap up where it was cool. We're going to have
this big showdown with Atlas and these army people
and everything like that. It's a few pew, pew,
pews, few Phoenix person stuff. And then finally,
when it was just Atlas, Lilith and Tina, they
were able to dispatch them really quickly and
kick them to a thresher of all things to destroy
him. Uh, plus it wasn't handsome Jack. And that's
another thing we want in these games and this
movie. I think all of this should be building,
even if it wasn't in the first one, even if it
wasn't in the first one, I think that they should
have at least given some kind of hint that Handsome
Jack was around or even just a throwaway, like,
wanted poster with Handsome Jack or something
fun. I don't know. But that's what it comes down
to. That's what it is. So yeah, Borderlands.
Not very good. Again, I think that 5%, 8 % is
a little harsh. I would give it more like a 30
to 32 range. But overall, I still think this
was a bad movie and I still count it as a bad
movie even though some of the positive... reviews
on Rotten Tomatoes are making it above a 40 %
for the audience score. I still think that's
way too high. So yeah, that was Borderlands.
Don't go see this movie. Don't do it. Especially
if you're a fan of the games and everything like
that. Don't waste time on this. Don't ruin your
expectations of this. I was kind of excited about
it when I saw they announced it, but then seeing
who was landed to direct it, And then some of
the names of the people that were going to be
in it. I was kind of, huh, are we sure? Does
that really make sense? But here we are. They
released the movie. It happened. And yeah, it's
a one Thresher piss bomb out of five for me.
So, well, that'll do it for this episode of Game
for a Movie, where we ask, are you game for a
movie? If you have some bad movies you think
we should cover on the show, please feel free
to reach out to us at GameForAMovie on X and
Instagram and TikTok. I will say no longer on
Facebook as much. But yeah, that's what happens,
you know. Thank you guys very much for listening.
And we will see you next time on GameForAMovie.
I've been your host, Mike. And we'll see you
next time on GameForAMovie.