I Watched This Before It Left Netflix: Real Steel

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These things do look better if you open with a gif instead of a wall of text. Assuming I giffed it right. First, I’ll correct some things from my last installment. I didn’t take notes when I watched Goldmember. I’m either riding my exercise bike, or on my couch waiting for my cat to do the front-paw pat down before coiling onto my lap. This led to me forgetting one of my final thoughts, though it came back to me. Here’s the problem. I forgot two thoughts, and when I remembered one, I stopped. Here’s the other one, and even those who didn’t see Austin Powers 3 should get it. “When I saw the most blatant product placements, like Taco Bell in the prison, go unremarked upon, I was reminded of a much better Mike Myers vehicle. ‘Contract or no, I will not bow to any sponsor.’” And it turns out, I had seen one other Michael Caine movie in its entirety. Without a Clue was a Remington Steele ripoff, but with Ben Kingsley hiring actor Michael Caine to be the face of his genius detective work. Because John Watson didn’t want to take focus away from his medical practice. It wasn’t worthy of those two great leads, but I liked it well enough. I was 14, and she was Lysette Anthony.

So, Real Steel. I distinctly remember seeing commercials from this on TV at my casino job. I’d guessed this movie was about 5-6 years old. Nope, it’s from my first year, 2011. It seemed like a silly movie, like Stallone’s Over The Top but with real Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em robots. But then the buzz hinted that it was as good as a movie like this could possibly be. Speaking of Rock ‘Em Robots, they’re somehow not in the National Toy Hall Of Fame. You know what is in the HOF? That shit game Monopoly. Have you ever been excited to play a game of Monopoly, then it quickly becomes a huge slog for everyone but the clear winner? Board games don’t have to be like that. I can recommend two fun, simple games right now: Splendor (with cards and chips, but not like poker) and Imhotep (move and stack little blocks to best score points). If you like those, you can later move on to the more daunting Gloomhaven or an all-expansions Terraforming Mars. And since we’re a pop culture bunch, Dune: Imperium is a very good game based on the almost-here movie . I’m always down for discussing and recommending board games.

Happy birthday to Hugh Jackman, who stars as Charlie, a former human boxer who now controls one of the robot boxers who replaced him. We immediately learn that Charlie owes someone $30,000 and that debtee isn’t alone. Charlie arrives at a rodeo fair run by former rival Ricky, so his robot can fight a ... a bull?! Ricky is offering three grand just to fight, which will help Charlie start to get out of the hole he’s in. Charlie confidently bets twenty grand his robot will win ... okay, we can stop right here. I know who Charlie is. Story time!

I was dealing blackjack in the high-limit room to a player who’d bought in for $2,000. Luckily casino ATMs give out hundreds, because I do not want to fill the layout with twenties, then do that three more times, then gather up a wad so thick, I have to fold one of the bills underneath and cram the whole thing down the money slot. It’s just twenty bills. I give the player twenty black chips ($100 each) and he plays 1-2 hands for at least a black each. And loses his bankroll. Asks me to hold his spot, comes back with twenty more Benjamins. Goes on a little streak, makes back some of what he just lost, then it’s gone. Hold my spot, be right back. I do this two or three times without a hitch, but the next time, there’s nineteen bills on the layout, and we both just stare at it. I quickly run my finger and thumb over the bills in case two got stuck together. You know how $2,000 fresh from the ATM feels in your hand, sometimes the crisp bills sticking to each other. You don’t? Well, it is pretty cool, but the novelty wears off. While I’m looking for stuck bills, I’m sure he’s checking his pockets for the last hundred. It soon becomes clear what happened. He left a $100 bill behind at the ATM, and its gone now. Technically stealing, but c’mon. So he starts playing. I imagine he’s thinking, “Hey, I’ll pretend I just lost one $100 hand. Been doing it all night.” And he starts winning. By the time my shift was over, he had made back everything he’d lost. I mean at my table while I dealt, not overall. But I went home confident he would eventually lose everything he’d made back plus that $1900. The house has an advantage even against good players. Which he wasn’t.

So that’s who Charlie was. A guy who kept digging himself deeper by chasing his losses. Trying to make it back in big chunks. I’ve also felt that urge. It’s why I haven’t played at a casino in over five years. Why I only play fantasy football for money in friendly season-long leagues, not daily online action. And Charlie is responsible for this life. Sure, Ricky was an asshole, a bully, and we later find he’s a “just joshin’ with ya” bigot. But Charlie didn’t have to be goaded into making that big bet. And he really didn’t need to lose focus during the match and have his robot destroyed. After running from the bet, we find Charlie also ran from his role as father to Max, who’s now eleven. Max’s mom has died, and her sister wants custody. The aunt is the better choice, not because her husband has money, but because she was there for Max. Charlie’s fine with this, but when he hears about the rich husband, he starts scheming. In a fantastically cynical deal, just *chef’s kiss*, Max sells his custodial rights for $100,000. And the husband bargains for Charlie to take Max for the summer, so the kid doesn’t get in the way while he bangs his wife all over Italy. We see Charlie with $50,000 cash in his back pocket when the aunt brings Max to him.

So, Max is reunited with his father and is finally happy and content. Naw, I’m kidding, he’s righteously pissed about the neglect and also wants his cut of the money. They head to the boxing gym owned by Bailey, played by Evangeline Lilly. Bailey’s dad owned the gym and trained Charlie. The switch from humans to robots benefits her, since she has boxing experience plus engineering skills. But she stays loyal to Charlie despite also being owed money she’ll never see. It helps that he has the manly charisma and shirtless appeal of Hugh Jackman. They’re not a couple, but c’mon. Charlie heads to a robot fight club with a shiny new toy and a kid he can’t shake. And promptly loses after trying to score a big payday with a robot he only half understands. Same as it ever was, only now he’s got a kid to tell him what a screwup he is.

After almost dying in a robot junkyard and costing his dad the last 50 grand, Max finds his own robot. An old but tough ham-and-egger who can mirror boxing moves from his handler. We know where this is going. Before then, Max trains and bonds with Atom. And when they take him to fights, it’s now Max who puts Atom up for more money, and Charlie warning him to be careful. The story is predictable but effective. It leads to the big fight against the champion Zeus, where Atom hangs in there and Charlie ends up performing the boxing moves for Atom to mirror. Same ending as Rocky, with the champ’s team victorious but humiliated and the crowd cheering the underdog. Father and son finally drop the celebratory high fives for a hug.

The acting was solid, including the kid, Dakota Goyo. The robot Atom did not look especially high-tech, but he managed to convey emotion. We can see how much he cares for Max, and how lonely he is when Max and Charlie leave him to party with the big boys. And we see this because humans are self-centered and always try to anthropomorphize things that look like them. It still worked. One thread throughout the movie is how much kids love the robots, which is infectious. Early on three girls, credited as big/little/littlest sister and played by director Shawn Levy’s daughters, admire Charlie’s hunk of junk until he tries charging for a picture. Max takes Atom jogging, where he hilariously bumps into dumpsters and then a fire hydrant we see in the foreground for like a minute gets clipped and starts gushing water. And in the big father/son/robot reunion, Atom stands tall and proud in the street while neighborhood kids on scooters surround him, gazing up in awe.

Thoughts:

- The refs wore exosuits for protection and stayed the hell out of the ring during the actual fighting. Even if robots had protocols for not hurting humans (but apparently not bulls), shit can still happen. A chunk flies off Charlie’s early robot and into the stands near the three sisters, NASCAR-style. The ring girls also wore sexy robot costumes just because. It’s a tribute to how much I liked this movie, that it took me a while to wonder “Hey, are there sex robots too?”

- There’s a tribute to the classic Mean Joe Greene commercial, where Max excitingly runs up to a fighting robot in a tunnel and gets a shirt thrown to him. Except the robot is surrounded by an entourage of handlers, hangers-on and leggy babes, and that robot would kick Mean Joe Greene’s ass. Maybe.

- Bailey is watching Atom’s first televised fight in a bar. A guy is buying her drinks but is dismayed that she’s rooting for the fight instead of paying attention to him. Now, I know nothing about picking up beautiful women in bars. But even I could tell this guy to match her enthusiasm and root along with her. Yes, you’ll lose her to Hugh Jackman eventually, but you’ll get at least one night.

- Hope Davis played the aunt, and I had to look up what she’s been in. I always confuse her with Judy Greer and Jane Adams and one or two others. When I saw she was in Captain America: Civil War as Tony Stark’s mother Maria, I first read it as Martha and honestly thought Marvel was trolling DC’s Batman v Superman.

- I don’t have to worry about a redneck calling me homeboy, emphasis on the second syllable. If I did, I might respond with something like “Okay, CRACKER Barrel. What, it’s a nickname. Is that not your favorite restaurant?”

- The cold, rich foreign beauty who owns Zeus actually says “robut” Yes, like Zoidberg! Raging Bender is one of my favorite Futuramas. “Hahaha *wimpy bot transforms into champ The Masked Unit* aw, I’m boned.” I got a wax melt burner as a gift once, and one of the flavors was sandalwood. And immediately thought “If you can’t move sandalwood, you don’t belong here.”

- Shaun Levy’s interested in doing a sequel, teaming up Jackman with Ryan Reynolds (they just scored with Free Guy). Now, Ryan Reynolds has been hugely successful with a Marvel hero, but outside that, meh. In fact, that’s also Hugh Jackman’s career. A sequel with those two could be great, but I don’t like those odds.

I want to thank everyone who read my first feature and commented. I wasn’t especially interested in seeing this movie, but I thought it could make a good article and that tipped the scales. It’s a good thing, because I really enjoyed this movie. Though Nibbles was unimpressed.