The Curator of Schlock #34 by Jeffrey Shuster

Double Dragon: Two for One!

I’ve been getting some complaints that I don’t do enough kung fu movies. Well, I’m afraid my kung fu knowledge ends with Kung Fu: The Legend Continues, the greatest television show of all time. There was this one episode where this evil stage magician was killing audience members with evil magic tricks and it was up to Kwai Chang Caine to stop him. That was a great episode. Anyway, this is a movie blog, not a TV blog. I don’t know much about kung fu movies, but I do know a bit about kung fu video games. And I know that movies have been made off of these kung fu video games. So this week’s kung fu extravaganza is none other than 1994s Double Dragon from director James Yukich.

Okay. So there’s this magic medallion that will give the wearer total control over the body and total control of the soul which means you take total control of a major American city. That city is New Angeles, a post-apocalyptic version of Los Angeles. You see, after the great earthquake, the gangs swarmed the remains of the city. I guess Paul Kersey wasn’t around to take care of business and work some overtime. The police brokered a deal with the gangs. They leave the city alone during the day and they can do whatever they want at night. Combating these gangs is a group known as the Power Corp led by Marian Delario (Alyssa Milano).

If the gangs aren’t bad enough, there’s an evil criminal business tycoon by the name of Koga Shuko (Robert Patrick).

He wants the Double Dragon so he can rule over New Angeles. Unfortunately for Shuko, he only owns half of the medallion, the part the controls the soul. The other half of the medallion(the one that controls the body) is in the possession of two brothers, Billy Lee (Scott Wolf) and Jimmy Lee (Mark Dacascos.) Shuko wants that medallion and will stop at nothing to get it. He pumps the head gang leader so full of steroids that he turned into this mutant freak named Bo Abobo.

There’s a scene where Marian is force-feeding him spinach to make him talk. It’s quite disturbing.

Anyway, as hard as Billy and Jimmy fight against Shoku, he eventually gets both medallions. And then bad things start to happen like Shoku sucking all electricity from the city and summoning demon warriors. Will Jimmy and Billie Lee join up with Power Core and fight with them to save the city? You’ll have to watch to find out. Hey, it’s free on Netfiz.

Ten Things I Learned from Double Dragon

1. The 90s did not suck.
2. Scott Wolf acted before Party of Five.
3. When Robert Patrick gets his tips frosted, he goes to the root.
4. Double Dragon did not shed light on my Alyssa Milano dream.
5. Robert Patrick can be surprisingly animated when he’s playing a supervillian.
6. If your name is Abobo, you deserve the worst the world has to offer you.
7. Virtual reality games will be all the rage by 2007.
8. Vanna White makes a swell TV news anchor.
9. It doesn’t do you any good to stare at photos of bikini wearing women when you’re a mutant freak.
10. Super villians shouldn’t wear bathrobes. It’s undignified.

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Jeffrey Shuster (episode 47) is an MFA candidate and instructor at the University of Central Florida.