20 Reasons Why You Rock: Commando Ninja
If Commando Ninja is a love letter to the action films of the 1980’s and 1990’s (and it is) then this post is a love letter to Commando Ninja.
Benjamin Combes’ Commando Ninja tells the story of John Hunter (Eric Carlesi), a Vietnam Green Beret Veteran, Half Commando, Half Ninja, whose daughter has been abducted by a secret Ninja Organization, led by Col. Kinsky, a Central-American dictator, who wants to create a new-world order. Hunter is joined by two members of his platoon from Vietnam, Hopkins and Kowalsky, as they time travel from 1986 to a post-apocalyptic 1998 to battle the evil Kinsky and his army.
Commando Ninja was actually funded by a successful Kickstarter campaign and I think everyone who contributed to the project can agree with me that Commando Ninja rocks and here’s why…
#1 – Commando Ninja gets off on the right foot with their re-imagining of the classic Carolco Pictures logo before we even get to the first scene. For those of you who may not know, Carolco was an independent production company founded by Mario Kassar and Andrew Vajna. Carolco was worthy of the nod since they produced such action hits as Terminator 2: Judgment Day, First Blood, Total Recall, They Live and Universal Soldier.
#2 – With a name like Commando Ninja, one would expect that there would be at least one ninja in the movie and I am happy to report that the movie does not skimp on ninjas. Col. Kinsky has an entire army of ninjas at his disposal. But one particular ninja stood out from the rest… this ninja wore a gold mask and had Predator like technology including the classic Predator vision and Predator cloaking.
#3- What happens when Hopkins gets his arm blown off in the opening scene set in 1968 Vietnam? He gets a bionic arm to replace it of course!
#4- There is no shortage of blood and guts in Commando Ninja. Limbs and heads are both shot and cut off, guts come oozing out of bodies and there is blood spurting everywhere. A guy even gets the barrel of a gun jabbed into his eye!
#5- The movie went to great lengths to make Commando Ninja look and feel like it was an action movie from the 1980’s… the inclusion of politically incorrect humor added to the feeling that this movie was a product from a time when society was not outraged by everything.
#6- Commando Ninja hit the “R Rated Trifecta” when they threw in some boobs to go along with the blood and gore and the offensive humor complete with colorful language.
#7- Did you know the Viet Cong had trained velociraptors?
#8- Jenny Hunter, John Hunter’s young daughter, sets up a trap in her room that blows away anything Kevin McCallister ever came up with… it also blew away one of the bad guys!
#9- Jenny Hunter has some posters on her bedroom wall that I wish I had on my wall right now… they included First Blood, Bloodsport, America Ninja, Predator and Ninja III: The Domination.
#10- There was a quality Highlander reference complete with lightning storm when John Hunter proclaimed “There can only be one… ninja!”
#11- Have you ever wanted to see someone hide an uzi underneath a pizza box?
#12- After Col. Kinsky has Jenny Hunter kidnapped she is imprisoned in the most logical place on Earth… Val Verde!
#13- Two words: Exploding Helicopter!
#14- As a fan of chopsocky imports, I thought the dubbed voices of the actors was a nice touch.
#15- Two more words: Training Montage!
#16- Have you ever wanted to see a guy chop down a tree with a katana sword?
#17- Every great action hero needs a quality weapon, well John Hunter has ALL the weapons, he has the aforementioned katana, he has some shuriken, a machine gun, a big ass Rambo knife and some sais!
#18- The name of Col. Kinsky’s evil organization is the Pentangle… a mother freakin’ Avenging Force reference. I love it!!!
#19- After John Hunter’s buddy Kowalsky is killed in the opening scene in Vietnam, he is brought back to life by Kinsky and turned into a Universal Soldier like character… but is he a good UniSol like Luc Deveraux or a bad UniSol like Andrew Scott?
#20- The Commando Ninja theme song is top notch! Stan Bush would be proud.
If you’ve made it to the end of this list and now have an insatiable desire to check out the over the top awesomeness that is Commando Ninja, I have some great news for you… it is available on YouTube and you can check it out right now by clicking here!
