Just the Ticket #110: Boss Level

Good morning, Ticketholders!

Have you ever woken up on the wrong side of the bed, realized you fell asleep in a treehouse that somebody built at the top of the world's tallest asshole tree, you fell out of the treehouse, hit every branch on the way down, hit the ground crotch-first on an exposed root, and died an embarrassing death with your face in a pile of squirrel crap?

Good morning, Ticketholders!

Have you ever woken up on the wrong side of the bed, realized you fell asleep in a treehouse that somebody built at the top of the world's tallest asshole tree, you fell out of the treehouse, hit every branch on the way down, hit the ground crotch-first on an exposed root, and died an embarrassing death with your face in a pile of squirrel crap?

Good morning, Ticketholders!

Have you ever woken up on the wrong side of the bed, realized you fell asleep in a treehouse that somebody built at the top of the world's tallest asshole tree, you fell out of the treehouse, hit every branch on the way down, hit the ground crotch-first on an exposed root, and died an embarrassing death with your face in a pile of squirrel crap?

Crap! I've gotten myself stuck in a time loop again! If I'm not self-aware this time, nothing will change and I won't get the girl and my life will continue to suck and I'll wake up on the wrong side of the bed in some asshole's treehouse and fall out, hitting every branch on the way down, get my groin impaled by an exposed root, and die yet another embarassing death with my face in a pile of squirrel crap, watching Two And A Half Men with Charlie Sheen! See! I'm even reusing old Dish Network references now! And too many exclamation points!!!!! And hyphens-!-!-!-!-!-!-!-! And fanservice-! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service! Fan-Service!

So stop watching me repeat myself and go watch Boss Level on Hulu. If you haven't caught up with the MCU yet, get the Disney+ bundle with it, and save over the individual subscriptions. Also, hit those social media buttons down below, and leave a comment in the comments section, where comments should go because they're comments. Fan-Service!

I mean, SPOILER Warning!

Seriously, though, there isn't much to spoil about Boss Level. If you've seen any of Re:ZER0, Groundhog Day, Happy Death Day, or watched any long-running television show long enough to get to that episode, you've seen the premise of Boss Level before: guy (or girl, in Happy Death Day's case) who sucks at life lives the same day over and over again, going through the paces of trying to figure out what is going on, exploiting the repetition for their own benefit, getting everything they want, getting the love interest, getting bored, losing everything, getting suicidal, remembering what is important, and doing it perfect so the credits can roll on time with the audience feeling like they have learned something.

What Boss Level does differently is that it does all of that as an action movie. Frank Grillo is our guy this time, an ex-miiltary deadbeat dad and husband to Naomi Watts' quantum physicist, who is working on a top-secret project for obvious military bad guys played by Mel Gibson and Three Stooges star Will Sasso. Add in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon badass Michelle Yeoh as a third-act Chekov's Sword of plot convenience and a colorful cast of hitmen unlike any have seen since that annual cast reunion of Kill Bill vs. John Wick vs. The Punisher, a self-aware voice-over that would make Deadpool yawn while filing for copyright defamation, and you've got the second third fourth fifth sixth most awesome way to spend an afternoon. In case you were wondering, the first five spots go to Deadpool, Deadpool 2, sex, Willy's Wonderland, and Godzilla vs. Kong, in that order. I mean, I've never had sex, but it stands to reason that two Deadpool movies are still better, right? No? Guess I'll get back to you on that.

What Boss Level does differently is that it forgoes any pretense of adhering strictly to formula, immediately throwing us, and the main character, into the midst of the action at a time when he has already learned from a hundred or so deaths, is more of a badass than originally advertised, but still falls victim to stupid mistakes and boredom because what little he knows has become an almost mindless checklist, like someone learning to dance from a floor diagram or studying kata for their martial arts promotion exam. Also, this is a way to cast-check the numerous random assassins and artificially create some sense of growth, the latter making our badass lead seem like the stupidest death-loop character in the trope's history. Eventually, he figures out that going to a different place makes different things happen and extends his loop life, allows him to connect with his estranged son, gives him time to master new combat styles (this is where Michelle Yeoh's...cameo?...comes in), lets him see what the end of reality looks like, and gets him closer to figuring out what his wife's military boss has put her up to.

If you haven't already guessed (or watched Boss Level like I told you to at the third beginning), the cause of his time loop is more in the vein of Happy Death Day than Groundhog Day, and by the end, our hero fixes his family, saves his family, kills all of the bad guys, stops reality from being destroyed again because Hollywood time travel is a hand-waving, bitch-shaped chunk of Swiss cheese gone sideways, and in the biggest middle finger of a cliffhanger since...let's go with the second season finale of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, but also whatever the most recent middle finger of a cliffhanger is, he has to do it all one last time, perfectly, without dying, with the #no_pressure parting line: "Try not to die this time" stuck in his head. Never mind that the loop where he already did everything perfectly--without the added pressure--should have been the last loop, or that with his wife having shut down her DNA-powered time machine, another loop would have been impossible, or that any loop after the first time reality was destroyed shouldn't have happened, either, because reality was destroyed (pear-shaped, bitch-shaped, hand-waving Swiss cheese gone sideways, and all that). Ending on a possible worst-case scenario cliffhanger was the real mistake in all of this.

Boss Level is not a perfect movie. It isn't even an original movie. But if you like this premise, you like witty banter and charismatic, disposable characters, you like action movies, or you just want to watch the guy from the Purge movies beat the life out of Curly and Mel Gibson, turn your brain off and have some fun.
C+

Stay tuned for next week, as I give you guys a double dose of Overlord in Just the Ticket and Isekai "Quartet" and cover the first episode of Loki.

Ticketmaster,
Out.