"WITHIN THE ROCK" Intro
Yes, it's time for yet ANOTHER Alien rip-off here on "MonsterVision." How many of these have we had? Sixty-seven? I'm Joe Bob Briggs, and tonight, an outer space mining crew accidentally releases a man-eating beast in Within the Rock. Giving new meaning to the word "Whoops!" Which is something I wanna talk about, because every time a car blows up, or a plane crashes, or somebody busts his head open by slipping on a wet sidewalk and flying up in the air like Wylie Coyote, what's the first thing we think of? Lawsuit, right? And the more it hurts, the bigger the lawsuit.
The best lawsuit you can possibly have is when you're dead. You can get LOTS of money for being dead, especially if you became dead while doing something FUN, like flipping over in a Jet-Ski or getting crushed by a rock concert stampede. Does the idea of an "accident" even exist anymore? Or is it ALWAYS somebody's fault? For example, several years ago a Delta Airlines plane crashed at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport, and the investigation showed that it was caused by "freak" storm. Five minutes before the crash, the weather was absolutely clear. Then one of those weird prairie thunderstorms came up. I've seen em myself. They last about ten minutes, and you get humongous winds, rain, lightning for 30, 40 seconds, then the thing goes back up in the sky.
So everybody's pretty sure that's what it was. And I thought, if there was ever a pure-dee "act of God," this was it. But the lawsuits over this deal went on for YEARS, with all kinds of debate about whether it was the air traffic controller's fault, the pilot's fault, the airline's fault, or the airport's fault (for the placement of the storage tank that the plane eventually ran into). What if it was JUST THE WEATHER? What if God occasionally just says, "Time's up"? If you're using your Lawn Boy and it flings a rock out and beans a neighborhood kid and cuts his cheek, you end up in court nine months later, trying to decide: Is it the Lawn Boy user's fault that he didn't see the rock? Is it a requirement that before you use a Lawn Boy, you comb through the tall grass SEARCHING for rocks? Maybe the Lawn Boy had a defective design, and the hard surface of the rock was supposed to STOP the blade. Maybe the kid was standing too close to the mower. Maybe the owner of the Lawn Boy failed to warn the kid. Maybe he DID warn the kid, but the kid ignored him. Maybe the kid was keeping a safe distance, but he had to run over and pick up his football, and at that moment . . . And after a while you wanna scream at these people "IT WAS JUST A GOLDURN ACCIDENT!" I'm gettin too upset. Start the movie. "Within the Rock." [fading] I hope these people don't move to West Texas, where everybody over the age of six has been cut, burned, beat up, hit with foul balls, injured by equipment, and lost family members in railroad accidents, wars and car wrecks -- and has fewer "plaintiffs attorneys" per capita than any place in America. Because they still believe there's such thing as a "neighbor." And you know what a neighbor says? "Don't worry about it, Joe. It was just an accident." How quaint.
"WITHIN THE ROCK" Commercial Break #1
Wow, you really shouldn't put that much lame acting in one place, should you? Frustrated thespians in close quarters -- not good. What kind of a title is "Within the Rock"? It sounds like a documentary on Israeli diamond merchants, or the behind-the-scenes documentary on the making of "The Rock," which was a decent movie. "Within the Rock" -- you know what's inside a rock? MORE ROCK. Okay, this movie was PRODUCED by Robert Patrick, the T-1000 from Terminator 2. Also Stanley Isaacs and Scott McGinnis, and two of em cast their wives in the flick. Robert Patrick's wife is the explosives gal, "Nuke Em" Rogers, and Scott McGinnis's wife plays Dr. Shaw, the one who just showed up to make everyone's life miserable. There are only two female roles in the whole movie, so I bet Stanley Isaacs' wife was pretty p.o.ed the day he came home and told her who got em. All right, I never seem to have time for the drive-in totals before the movie, so here they are:
Fifteen dead bodies.
One dead creature.
Face-eating.
Puking inside a gas-mask.
Ricocheted bullet to the chest.
Baby-brother crushing.
Brain-drilling.
Creature drilling.
Exploding moon.
Fire extinguisher Fu.
Two pints blood (that's after the TNT censors got a hold of it).
Two stars.
[fading] By the way, that was NOT Ted Turner as the General. That was Hollywood military advisor Dale Dye. Captain Dye provides technical advice on war movies. Works a lot with Oliver Stone. Remember when we had Colonel Hackworth here on the show? Hack said Dale Dye is one of the few guys who knows what he's doing. But he did NOT tell us that he looks like Ted. Have we HEARD from Ted lately? Ted's okay, isn't he? Okay, good.
"WITHIN THE ROCK" Commercial Break #2
Excuse me if I'm wrong, but was that the first WELDING MONTAGE in film history? A musical welding sequence. Oh -- wait -- I forgot about the one in "Flashdance." So it's the SECOND welding montage in film history. I don't wanna say this is a little SLOW, but I hope they don't do montages for all the power tools in their possession. Okay, boy, that sexual harassment issue just always pops up in outer space, doesn't it? "Let's do this. Let's put nine guys and one woman on a spaceship for, like, THREE YEARS." Then "What! Somebody made an inappropriate remark to her? KILL HIM." That's Xander Berkeley as the weenie leader, Ryan. Course, those of you who watched "Poison Ivy II" when we had it on already knew he had a way with the ladies when Alissa Milano had to kill him to stop him from stalking her and sniffing the panties she left in his art studio. Actually, he seems to like sniffing things- - didn't he just stick his hand in the alien goo and smell it? Why do they always do that in movies? Somebody write in and explain it to me, care of TNT, 1010 Techwood Drive, Atlanta, Georgia, 30318. Or e-mail me at joebob@turner.com. Anyway, let's get back to it, after the ads.
[fading] "Hey, there's some really disgusting gooey crap on the wall here. Lemme stick my hand in it and sniff it. Yep, it's disgusting gooey crap, all right." What are they thinking?
"WITHIN THE ROCK" Commercial Break #3
Ooooooo, a giant monster foot. Shouldn't we be seeing a little serious slime right now? We don't wanna watch em eat meatloaf and complain about ten-hour shifts, we want em to go MONSTER-HUNTING. And those fake scares where the guy jumps cause another guy tapped him on the shoulder -- been there, done that, stuck it in a pocket and put it through the wash. Now, who remembers what gruesome part the heavy guy played in "Pulp Fiction"? The guy who plays Potter here, Duane Whitaker. How bout this to trigger your memory? Hillbilly sado-masochists who do unspeakable things to Ving Rhames and Bruce Willis while a guy in a leather mask called "The Gimp" sits tied up in the hall. If you saw the movie, you DO remember that scene. Okay, some commercials, and then back to "Within the Rock."
[fading] NASTY scene. Course, I've got relatives who taped it.
"WITHIN THE ROCK" Commercial Break #4
Did they just say they're gonna kill the monster with . . . fire extinguishers? I guess that's what they did say. Well, we'll ask Rusty the Mail Girl, who is joining us now to help out with "Joe Bob's Advice to the Hopeless," and I know that she's a big fan of the explosive-puke-inside-the-gas-mask scene.
RUSTY: Oh, jeez, I can't believe you mentioned that after I've been sick all week.
J.B.: I'm sorry, honey, were you sick?
RUSTY: As a dog.
J.B.: You shoulda called me -- I woulda brought over some granola power bars.
RUSTY: That's nice of you, but there's no way I would've let anybody see me in that state -- not even YOU.
J.B.: Why do I always feel mildly insulted when you're around, Rusty?
RUSTY: I don't know. Should I be more obvious about it?
J.B.: Apparently not --
RUSTY: I'm kidding! I'm kidding. Here's a letter from Shelina Lawson of Indianapolis, Indiana.
J.B.: [beat, then] I'm just waiting for another one of your zingers.
RUSTY: I was only kidding!
J.B.: "Dear Joe Bob,
RUSTY: Nice shirt, by the way. Don't have to worry about getting run over in THAT one.
J.B.: "My fantasy is to play footsie with you while watching MonsterVision and the only way my fantasy can be realized is for TNT to have a contest where the winner gets to be a guest on MonsterVision. How do you like my idea?
"Also, I would love to know what movie you would consider to be the scariest movie of all time. My pick without question would be 'The Changeling' with George C. Scott (I think that the TNT censors would love it, hardly anything to cut.)
"Sitting in the dark with you and loving it!
"Shelina Lawson,
Indianapolis, Indiana."
Shelina, that's not the only way your fantasy can be realized. We could make a plaster-of-paris cast of my foot, perhaps ad some animatronic toes and voila! Preciate the support, hon. Scariest of all time is "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre." And waiting to hear what Rusty's gonna say next.
RUSTY: Joe Bob, you're obviously popular enough for me to kid around a little.
J.B.: That's true. Shelina DOES want to play footsie with me.
RUSTY: See? [exiting] I'm sure they're used to toxic fumes in Indianapolis.
J.B.: They're re-casting "Laugh-in," right? Is that what it is?
"WITHIN THE ROCK" Commercial Break #5
Okay, I have a question. Actually, I have several questions. 1) Why don't they just leave the planet and blow the whole thing up, since they HAVE rigged the place for it? 2) How come they haven't phoned home? Did we lose the scene where they do that? We lost the scene where Luke gets stabbed by the alien and blood pours out of his mouth and floods his mask. I can't imagine why they cut that. But it kinda screwed up the teary moment the brother had. And here's my third and final question: Shouldn't they be using DEAD bodies to bait the monster, instead of live ones? Didn't they explain that already, that the monster is carrion-eater, and that it was originally trapped using the smell of rotting corpses? So why the fire extinguishers? This thing was directed by a special make-up effects guy, Gary Tunnicliffe. Gary did the "Hellraiser" flicks. So we got the guy who built Pinhead trying to do a rubber-suit story. TWO DIFFERENT SPECIALTIES. Duh. Okay, they left a little blood in the finale, so let's get to it, after the ads.
[fading] The weepy big brother -- he's kinda the poor man's Ben Affleck, isn't he? That's Bradford Tatum. He enjoys bodybuilding and sculpting.
"WITHIN THE ROCK" Outro
Wow! Did the beast eat Ryan in about one-HALF second? Shouldn't we get a little more chomping than that? And PRE-"Armageddon," no less. Which is about all it had going for it. Next week an Albino psycho-computer-hacker tries to take over the world while the Keystone Cops run around like idiots in Virtual Assassin. Check out the rest of the schedule on our website: tnt.turner.com/joebob. And that's it for me, Joe Bob Briggs, reminding you that they call it PMS because Mad Cow Disease was already taken.
I got a couple Father's Day jokes for you guys. One day, Mom is cleaning Junior's room, and she finds an S&M magazine in his closet. She hides the magazine until his father gets home, and shows it to him. Dad looks at it and hands it back to her without a word. Mom says, "What should I do about this?" Dad says, "Well, you shouldn't spank him."
Joe Bob Briggs, reminding you that the drive-in will never die.
[fading] A little boy comes down to breakfast. Since he lives on a farm, his mother asks if he's done his chores. Little boy says, "Not yet." His mother tells him he can't have any breakfast until he does his chores. Well, he's a little annoyed, so he goes to feed the chickens, and he kicks a chicken. He goes to feed the cows, and he kicks a cow. He goes to feed the pigs, and he kicks a pig. He goes back in for breakfast and his mother gives him a bowl of dry cereal. Boy says, "How come I don't get any eggs and bacon? Why don't I have any milk in my cereal?" His mother says, "Well, I saw you kick a chicken, so you don't get any eggs. I saw you kick the pig, so you don't get any bacon, either. I also saw you kick the cow, so you aren't getting any milk this morning." Just about then, his father comes down for breakfast, and as he's walking into the kitchen, he kicks the cat. The little boy looks up at his mother with a smile, and says, "Are you going to tell him, or should I?"