Career Rewind: Liam Neeson

Internet!! Americans!! Citizens of the world, the internet, and the whole of Time and Space! And welcome to a day I’m sure many of you thought would never ever come. A second Liam Neeson Thursday. I know, I know you thought it was all just empty bluster and promises as shallow and meaningless as a green puddle in New York the day after St. Patrick’s day. And yet here I stand upon this day, in this place, and here is another day of: Liam Neeson Thursday.

Career Rewind: Liam Neeson

“Micah… I don’t think the Internet is ready for this…”

So we all know that Liam Neeson has spent the last four or five years punching people in the face in as many locations as possible. But how did he begin this epic quest? What was the first step on this punching quest of punchitude? As with previous entries (or more accurately: previous entry) I’m gonna go through his film career from start to finish, skipping to the more interesting movies due to my lack of desire to be here all day.

1978 – Pilgrim’s Progress – and so began a wonderful journey of face punching. Technically Liam played Pilgrim not the main character (Christian.) But still. Not a bad place to start.

Here it is guys: the least awesome picture of Liam Neeson ever.

1981 – Excalibur – Neeson takes his first steps towards face punching by playing Gawain the Green Knight in Excalibur. I’m not entirely sure of the history here but I’m fairly sure Gawain stood on top of the round table and made threatening phone calls to Morgana.

At this point we’ve got a few year gap while Neeson gives his knuckles a rest to play in “A Woman of Substance” and he played a character (and I’m not making this up) named Blackie O’neal… and a movie called “The Good Mother”… He was in a movie called The Dead Pool, but he played a character named Peter Swan… which counteracts the manliness somewhat.

1990 – Darkman – Neeson plays The DARKMAN!!!! Or his alter ego Peyton Westlake. Regardless, it’s a super hero movie!!! Faces are punched… a lot. And those lots of faces are punched a lot. Now that we’re into movies I’ve actually seen and that were made after the date of my birth I can tell you that you probably shouldn’t actually watch Darkman… It’s weird… people get shot… there’s racism… it’s a weird movie. That said: Liam Neeson is awesome.

And this isn’t even the weird part.

1993 – Schindler’s List – And now we get into the big stuff. Neeson plays Oskar Schindler (because Oscar was apparently too well spelled) and Oskar Schindler punches Nazi!!!!! Or something… I may have blocked out certain finer points of Schindler’s List because it was SAD!!! With sad music and sad stuff… and sad Liam Neeson. I can’t…. I can’t take it.

1996 – Michael Collins – First off: if you haven’t seen Michael Collins you should go watch it now. Michael Collins is the story of the early IRA fighting against Britain and the escalation of the conflict between the two and then there’s Alan Rickman who is awesome and then there’s the SAD sick STUPID green nasty cherry on top that is Julia Roberts MURDERING an irish accent… not that I’m bitter. Seriously though… it’s a great movie.

1998 – Les Miserables – this is still my favorite version of this story. It’s not a musical, it tells a fairly grounded story, it stars Liam Neeson and NOWHERE is there a song of angry men!! It’s a huge win!! Plus Geofrey Rush!! Get on the good train people!

“Go ahead… sing. I dare you.”

1999- Star Wars Episode 1 – probably Liam’s real “big break” though ironically the movie itself is (obviously) not remembered super fondly. Honestly knowing what we know about Liam Neeson now it seems kind of a waste of his awesome Jedi potential… can we somehow bring him back in for Episode 7???

2005 – Kingdom of Heaven – Here’s the thing about Kingdom of Heaven: it’s a movie where Orlando Bloom must defend a city because his father (Liam Neeson) asks him to on his deathbed. The movie really shows exactly how awesome Liam Neeson is because as soon as Liam Neeson dies… that movie sucks. A lot. It’s a line of desuckation and the lines starts right after Liam Neeson closes his eyes.

2005 – Batman Begins – And this is it folks: Liam Neeson TRAINS BATMAN!!! I’m done. I win. Thank you. Goodnight.

2005 – The Chronicles of Narnia – Also: ASLAN!!! Batman. Aslan. Let’s all go home.

2008 – Taken – And this my friends is the continuation and the ultimate proof of the awesomeness of Liam Neeson. Taken. Aslan. Batman.

2008-2014 – I’m just gonna start summarizing here because the awesome is starting to spill out onto the floor. Between 2008 and today we’ve got Batman (again) Taken 2 (less convincing story. Same amount of awesome face punching) Unknown, Wrath of the Titans (wherein he played ZEUS!!) The Lego Movie (hilarious), The Grey (conceptually the saddest thing I have ever watched in my life) and Non-stop.

Liam Neeson everyone. I rest. My case.

Career Rewind: Johnny Depp

Hey everyone, welcome to Thursday and the launch of an exciting, gripping, and probably hilarious feature on Thoughts We Might Have Had. A series so poorly researched that some famous newspaper person whose named I don’t know is probably rolling over in her/his grave. A series that will delve deeply into movie history in a very shallow sort of way. It’s time for… some bold typed font.

Career Rewind: The Life and Movies of Johnny Depp

Cause believe it or not he wasn’t just in pirate movies.

Ah, Johnny. You’ve had highs and lows and have probably been more than a little high for both of those things. It’s important to mention that I am using an IMDB page for this and that is it. So if I haven’t seen a movie I will either A: not mention it at all, or B: Make something up about it. So now that we all understand that, let’s just dive right in shall we?

Holy marmosets!! He’s been in 63 movies??? Man… I have got to start thinking these things through better. This is like when I promised to talk about all the presidents before I remembered that there have been about a million of them (check out that article here). Okay there’s gonna be a lot more skipping here then I thought here would be.

1984- A Nightmare on Elmstreet

Yeah, you forgot Johnny Depp was in this movie didn’t you? A Nightmare on Elm Street is classic horror franchise at its classic-ist! I mean Freddy Kreuger (a man with knives for fingers which makes him terrifying to both people and large, uncut sandwiches) is probably the scariest of all of the “classic” horror villains. Depp played one of his victims and one of the few slightly redeemable characters in the movie. Remember this though because I’m gonna bring it full circle in a couple movies.

1990- Cry Baby

I have no idea what this movie is about but I just skipped six years and felt like I couldn’t go too much further. I can tell you that Johnny Depp shared the spotlight of this film with famed actress… yeah nobody I’ve ever heard of was in this movie. These are the doldrums of Johnny Depp’s career. Where he was in films like “Slow Burn” which may or may not have been about a rebellious toaster slowly burning bread to ruin breakfasts for Americans everywhere. Anyway later in this year Johnny Depp starred in…

1990- Edward Scissorhands

In Johnny Depps first big movie he would become famous for playing a character with knives for hands! This is after making his film debut being murdered by someone with knives for hands!! See that there? That’s called journalism yo!! What WHAT??!?!?!?! *various dance moves*

Okay… what were we doing? Oh yeah. Johnny Depp. Ummm… Edward Scissorhands is a movie about a guy with scissors for hands who has a heart of gold… or something. I watched it once like… five years ago so I’m somewhat sketchy on the details. Something about a dog and an evil scientist which is the plot of ¾ of Tim Burton movies consequently.

1993- What’s Eating Gilbert Grape

Johnny Depp starred in this movie with bitty baby Leonardo Decaprio!! That said, I have no idea what this is about so I’m just gonna assume it has something to do with the secret, cannibalistic lives of a colony of grapes living in downtown Manhattan… And one of them probably has knives for hands.

1999- Sleepy Hollow

Johnny Depp played Ichabod Crane in this film version of the classic tale of a headless horseman who (for reasons that are never entirely clear) uses a pumpkin for his head. I mean why a pumpkin? Why not a watermelon? People like watermelon a lot more then they like pumpkin right? You think you could make a lot more friends with a watermelon for a head then you could with a pumpkin. I mean a headless horseman with a watermelon head would be a whole different story, about peace and acceptance and learning to love people for who they are and how delicious their face may be. Man… someone needs to make that movie.

2003- Pirates of the Caribbean Curse of the Black Pearl

“It’s a bird… no it’s a plane… no… it’s your career arc spiraling downwards. Sorry Orlando.”

Johnny Depp’s official welcome to stardom party, Depp played Jack Sparrow an awesome character bound to carry a franchise that would gradually get worse and worse! I already talked at great length about Pirates of the Caribbean (check out my two part review of the Pirates of the Caribbean series here and here) so I’m gonna skip the other three movies and just say that this is where Jonny Depp took some bread and put a heaping helping of butter on it.

2004- Finding Neverland

Some people would make the case that this is Johnny Depp’s best movie (though not his most interesting role) and I suppose they could be right. It’s all cute and fuzzy and has tiny baby children frolicking through fields of unshorn barley or something. I mean I’ve watched it and enjoyed it but a lot of people talk about this movie like it personally came to their house and gave them steaming hot cookies and freshly squeezed milk… ew. Never typing that again.

2005- Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Couple things here, first off: WEIRD movie. Really REALLY weird. Secondly: Johnny Depp is kind of awesome in it. I mean he’s awesome in a weird/creepy/person I never EVER want to meet sort of way, but awesome none the less. The first time I watched this movie I hated it but once you can just sort of forget that the rest of the film is happening and just watch Johnny Depp… it’s kind of awesome.

2007- Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

First off: this movie is super violent. Don’t watch it with little Bobby or Bretta or whoever. Secondly: it’s great. I mean it’s not a movie I would watch a lot (you can only take so much) but the plot is great and other then the “I’ll steal you Joanna” song being one of the four or five most annoying things in the whole of time and space I really like this… though the more I think about that song the more I remember how much I hate it. I’m downgrading this movie to another one of those “unless Johnny Depp is on screen you can probably fast forward” movies.

2010- Alice in Wonderland

I feel like I’m in the minority when I say that I really liked this movie. I mean sure it was random and weird and things but you have all read Alice in Wonderland, right? I mean the whole thing is pretty much an acid trip interrupted by a sugar rush being eclipsed by a red bull anti-coma. That’s exactly what this movie is. It’s weird and random and crazy and occasionally makes you wonder what planet your on but that’s the best part about it!! Also Johnny Depp performing “The Jabberwocky” (one of the most over recited pieces of poetry ever) still gives me goosebumps.

2010- The Tourist

This was a terrible movie. Depp had a terrible beard. Never watch it.

2011- Rango

My nominee for best animated movie ever (read the full article here… man I’ve linked to a lot of my own articles here, huh? Not sure how I feel about that. It’s like when you’re watching something on HuluPlus and a HuluPlus add comes on. You feel sort of offended that Hulu doesn’t know that you’re already paying them for Hulu. On a separate note if you want to pay me, I definitely will not forget about it. Ever. I suppose I’ve run out of room in these parenthesis huh? I mean I’ve estranged the lefty curved one so far from its righty curved sibling that it probably doesn’t even remember its own name. Maybe I’ll add another here just to give it some company. ( there. I’d add one up top too but I’d have to click a mouse and things and that wouldn’t be worth it at all. And now I’m moving it further away again. So much for that plan. I should really stop huh?)

2012- Dark Shadows

Somehow a movie with these two people was only mildly entertaining… yeah… I know.

Johnny Depp delivers a “meh” performance in a “meh” sort of movie. Not a lot to say beyond that.

2013- The Lone Ranger

I haven’t watched this movie yet but everyone seems to generally agree that it’s sort of a terrible film. I’ll be watching it as soon as I can though cause if nothing else they say it’s bad in an entertaining sort of way.

And that about sums up the career of Johnny Depp everyone! You’re welcome! Have a great weekend, watch a movie you haven’t seen before and tell me all about it!!… except, ya know, probably don’t tell me. There’d be a lot of reading involved and I’m generally not on bored for that kind of mental exertion unless there are snacks involved. But have a great weekend anyway and I’ll see you Monday!!

P.S. And as one more bonus link here’s me and my brother Zach talking the NBA offseason, his top 5 tv shows, and some Pirates baseball in our latest podcast!! Check it out here!