Hops and Box Office Flops: ‘BAYWATCH’

We’re Oceanic

Baywatch is a bad movie. Sorry, Rock, but it’s true. And it’s frankly one of the worst movies based on a TV show. To be fair, that’s a crowded field. Many of them are awful. This just sort of treads water among the filth.

That’s due in large part to the fact that it is rarely funny. It wants so desperately to be 21 Jump Street. That approach makes sense. Jump Street was able to capitalize on its premise, while also satirizing its absurdity.

Baywatch—despite the wealth to be mined from the show’s preposterousness—can’t seem to muster the energy to maintain a 15-minute sketch about lifeguards going far beyond their actual job duties.

It’s a shame. Baywatch is well cast. The Rock (Mitch Buchannon whose mentor is Mitch Buchannon?) and Zac Efron (Matt Brody) have decent chemistry. They’re just not given much to work with. Written by a hodgepodge of people, the film’s issues can all be attributed to its mishmash of a script.

Thus, like a bloated body washed up on the sands of Emerald Bay, Baywatch was dead on arrival. It earned $177.9 million on a budget of $69 million—with only $58 million of that coming domestically. It was also lashed by critics, sitting at 17% on Rotten Tomatoes with 246 reviews.

But, hey, a day at the beach always goes better with a beer. So sit back, bask in the sun with an ice cold Florida Man Double IPA from Cigar City Brewing, and watch out for sand grifters! I, the Thunderous Wizard (@WriterTLK), Capt. Cash, and Chumpzilla are staying ready. Forever and always!

This Week’s Segments:

Introduction/Plot Breakdown – Certainly Baywatch was a silly show, but was the film able to capture its utter lack of self-awareness in any funny ways? (00:00)
Lingering Questions – We tag in The Double Turn Podcast to hit you with a People’s Elbow, and then we discuss why this movie was such a mess. (45:15)
The “Save the Bay” Trivia Challenge – Capt. Cash challenges the field to a series of trivia questions about the movie and the show that inspired it. (56:40)
Recommendations – After a word from our beer buddies at Hop Nation USA, we offer our picks for the week, and next up: We continue our “Hops and Rock Bottom Flops” series with Doom! (1:06:02)

And, as always, hit us up on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram to check out all the interesting factoids—Hasselhoff’s hits 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!