Battle(ofCali)Ship: Vancouver Edition Part II

Remember back in the beginning of Battleship when Hopper broke into a convenience store to steal a chicken burrito and how that was the greatest scene in movie history? Well you’re in luck because the next scene is the best scene in Battleship. Trust me, the logic works. We’ve got Hopper and Nagata floating in the ocean all sad and mopey because all their ships have been destroyed. But wait! What’s this? Hopper has a plan because...THERE IS A BATTLESHIP! Sure it’s completely decommissioned and is an actual museum that’s filled with gift shops and vending machines, but if Hopper knows one thing, it’s how to see a plan through with little to no thought.

They get on the deck of the USS Missouri and Dollar Store Rock is making it sound like starting up a museum to go fight aliens would be almost impossible, and I’m starting to believe him until old seamen start popping up all over in the background of the shots. Why are these old guys just hanging out on this old boat? It’s a museum, so do they work there? Are they the tour guides and just bored because everyone is scared and staying in their houses because aliens are attacking the island but they’re like “well, I’m out of PTO days, so I better go to work so I don’t get fired.” Does this country care that little about its veterans? Anyway, the old guys all come together and join Hopper on the deck, and let me tell you, there’s a lot of old dudes that were scattered randomly around. Hopper has a simple ask of these guys, let me steal this museum to fight aliens. And the lead old dude was like...let’s fucking do this!

AC/DC’s Thunderstruck starts playing, as it should, and everyone goes to town on the battleship to get it working. Mind you, and I feel like this needs to be restated, it’s a museum and it hasn’t moved in decades, but everything still works perfectly. You got old guys showing their modern day counterparts how they did it in the old days, like Todd getting yelled at by an old curmudgeon to actually do something and a bunch of old guys making gross innuendo at Rihanna. We finally see Hopper again and he is getting schooled by Popeye about the specs of the ship. They have 600 long tons of fuel (whatever that means) and there’s some ordnance on board too. That’s right, this decommissioned battleship has had live ammunition on board for years. Wouldn’t that be like the first damned thing they’d remove? Christ this movie is perfect. So they head out to to sea while Thunderstruck is still wailing away.

Bad news guys, the giant alien ship that put up the force field can move. I know, it makes no sense. It also comes as a shock to Hopper and Nagata. So the giant ship is blocking the path to fire on Oahu, and it starts to transform because that’s a thing it can also do. So the giant ship is about to shoot every single last bit of weaponry it has at Hopper and the gang when Hopper remembers Art of War. He tells Rihanna to aim all their weapons away from the alien spacecraft and then turns the battleship hard to port (or starboard) to really confuse the aliens. And it works! The alien wonder ship that traveled light years through space and shoots a giant force field over Hawaii can’t make a slight turn to rain hellfire down on the humans. The aliens finally get Hopper lined up again and fires some death pellets at them but Hopper throws another curveball at the aliens and drops the anchor! Nagata is worried that they’re going to die and Hopper calms him down that they are going to die...but not today! The anchor hits the ocean floor and the battleship power slides into position and starts shooting the small amount of ordinance they have at the aliens and just rocks the hell out of the space bastards.

All is right and everything is, whoa whoa whoa, the alien ship is barely deterred and they launch an offensive at the battleship. A couple of the death pellets land and blow up some of the guns but guess what, there’s no sinking this battleship! It’s just a shame they blew all their weaponry in that first offensive. Hahaha, just kidding somehow “some ordinance” means they can fire round after round at the aliens and everyone now has a machine gun turret to shoot as well. Seriously guys, this was a museum where people toured around that had enough ammunition to fire continuously for a disturbingly long time, until the spacecraft finally blows up! Phew. But wait, that also means the force field is down! General Neeson is scrambling those jets to get in the air ASAP. Nagata is absolutely floored Hopper’s plan worked (as am I) and Hopper just casually retorts “Yeah, Art of War. Fight the enemy where they aren’t.” And Nagata is like, that’s not even close to what that means you absolute idiot.

Well well well, it’s the Vancouver Canucks on the 2^nd game of a back to back for the second time this season. This should be an easy win for the boys in teal. Brock Boeser is dead, Vancouver traded for more 3^rd and 4^th line guys, and I’m pretty sure they have no goalie anymore. The Sharks, on the other hand, uh, still can barely put together 2 good games together so that bodes well for the playoffs (if they hold on to a spot that is). But who cares, I’m in Hawaii right now. There’s only 10 minutes left in Battleship, so that’s sad, but the last 10 minutes were perfection and oh god I can’t wait to watch this movie again already.