Hops and Box Office Flops: BALLISTIC ECKS VS SEVER – Moaning Techno and Explosions

Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever is bad. Like truly awful. Its plot is convoluted; its action is often nonsensical and unimaginative; and it does little to capitalize on its star power. Antonio Banderas literally has nothing to do. This guy was El Mariachi in Desperado, for Pete’s sake. Let him do more than smoke cigarettes and drink.

Anyway, there is a boat load of slow motion, if you’re into that. Most of it is wholly unnecessary, but it’s there; and it probably adds 10 minutes to the runtime—a portion of your life you will never get back.

Lucy Liu as Sever and Antonio Banderas as Ecks in Ballistic: Ecks vs Sever

There’s also a lot of sulking and staring. There’s an abundance of Ray Park in a turtleneck. Yep, Darth Maul loves sweaters, but he doesn’t love fighting because he only does it once. Like the rest of the movie, that scene sucks.

If you are noticing a trend, you should. We hated this movie. Critics also hated it. And audiences thoroughly despised it. It is one of our most egregious flops to date, earning barely above $20 million on a budget of $70 million.

You have been forewarned. So, sit back, slug a few H.A.Z.Y. IPAs from Sweetwater Brewing Co., and throw on your best “Tactleneck“! I, the Thunderous Wizard (@WriterTLK), Capt. Cash, Chumpzilla, and Mayor McCheese are stepping on land mines and running for cover!

This Week’s Segments:

Introduction/Plot Breakdown – Well, there’s a lot of dumb stuff that happens in this movie. (00:00)
Lingering Questions – Could any of us decipher a way to polish this turd? (29:30)
The “Ballistic:”Trivia Challenge – After a word from our pals at Hop Nation USA, Chumpzilla challenges the field to a host of Ballistic-related trivia. (55:07)
Recommendations – We offer our picks for the week; and next up: We close our “Hops and 00-Flops,” series with Top Secret! (1:04:33)

And, as always, hit us up on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram to check out all the interesting factoids—the Game Boy Advance game and more—from this week’s episode!

You can find this episode of Hops and Box Office Flops on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, Podbean, Spotify, Acast, TuneIn, iHeartRadio, Vurbl, and Amazon Music!