Setting: Sitting on Hannah’s floor with, excuse me what?! A THIRD HUMAN. Meet Steven. We had lime tortilla chips, salsa verde plantain chips, and various cups of water. Steven brought patriotic thumbprint cookies leftover from Memorial day.
Our friend Steven was invited to guest star on Disney Channel Panel because he is one of the funniest people we know. He’s got the smarts and he’s got the jokes! Steven just graduated from a master’s program after a successful college comedy career with an improv group and most importantly the Pittiful News. You should like them on Facebook because Lindsay, Hannah, and Steven have all been EIC’s of the paper at various points. Steven's a great guy be sure not to get on his bad side because he is a vicious cannibal.
This week’s film is Brink!, which tells the story of three friends who love to rollerblade, and the rival gang that threatens to tear them apart. It got a 7.2 skates out of 10 on IMDB.
The first person we see on screen is Andy Brinker, or just ‘Brink’ if ya nasty. He’s immediately recognizable as the hunky jerk from Princess Diaries, however Steven wins a prize for remembering his name, Erik Von Detten. Steven’s his biggest fan. He's a Detten-ator.
The stream we’re using is choppy so we pause to let it load and discuss whether or not Steven cares about his master’s degree and whether or not Lindsay will one day own the flower shop she currently works at.
Back in the movie, we meet Brink’s three blading friends, Jordie, Gabriella, and a third one who’s name we don’t know. As usual, the girl one was the coolest, and she even played the cool girl in Freaky Friday who wasn't Lindsay Lohan!
Lindsay: She’s cool.
Steven: I always thought she was cool. I still do.
Hannah: She’s cool. So cool. Why does every girl in Disney movies wear overalls?
Lindsay: Because they’re tomboys and no girl in a Disney movie wearing a dress has ever been accepted by a group of boys. Ugh I don’t wanna think too hard about this.
Brink makes them miss the bus so they have to blade to the skate park. They’re upset by this, despite the fact that rollerblading seems to be their whole lives so why don’t they always blade to school? I guess you wouldn’t ride your unicycle to unicycle class.
At the skate park, we meet X-Bladz, the rival skate team with slick gear and fancy sponsorships. Completely incomprehensible why they chose to spell it that way, as if it's someone's ex-bladder. The X-Bladz are villains even though their corporate model seems perfectly reasonable. But it goes against the mantra of the gang’s “soul-skating.”
Cut to the next morning where Brink grabs his lunch from his mom on the way to school (bologna on white with extra mayonnaise--we'd rather eat toenails), and we see friction in his relationship with his father, who’s upset that his son is too happy? Also that he’s wearing baggy clothes. Also there's a third tier story where his dad lost his job.
Later, at school, the soul-skating boys converse about Gabriella because "something happened to her." We see her walk up in a dress her mom made her wear to school. A DRESS.They can't handle it.
At lunch, Brink decides to prank Val, the leader of the X-Bladz, by putting EARTHWORMS on his SANDWICH! He takes a bite because the feel of your sandwich is not any different with a handful of earthworms on it, he spits it up, washes his mouth out with milk, then also spits up the milk. A teacher comes up and asks, “is there a problem here, Val?” He does not say, “yes, someone put earthworms on my sandwich and that’s truly disgusting,” but instead says, “no.” Throughout the movie the two teams are pranking/hassling each other but they decide to settle it with a skate-off!
They decide to do a relay around their very outdoor school. Why do all high schools in movies have so much outdoor space? Is every high school in California? Brink is next, head-to-head with an X-Bladder who soon falls and hurts himself. Instead of finishing the race, Brink decides to stop to see if the guy is okay. This makes him look like a fool but obviously he is not because he cares about the well-being of other humans. This is not the first time this will happen in this movie.
With the X-Bladder hurt, the team has an opening. Val approaches the soul-skaters but they refuse to try-out, until later that evening Brink overhears his parents talking about financial troubles and he decides he can help if he skates for X-Bladz. Brink ditches his friends with a lame excuse and shows up at tryouts late, but makes the team.
We let the movie load again, take bathroom breaks, discuss whether or not it's weird that Lindsay just peed with the door open, and stuff our face with more chips.
Steven: It's weird how much more normal I feel just hanging out with other people.
Hannah: You mean not students?
Steven: No just in my house! I've just been in my house for two days. I thought about the afterlife for the first time in like 10 years last night, it used to freak me out as a kid.
Lindsay: When will time end? IT'S NEVER GOING TO END!
Hannah: One time when I was little I couldn't fall asleep and I started crying cause I counted to 10 and I was like "Oh god the numbers just keep getting higher!"
Back in Brink!, young traitor Brink is still trying out for a spot on the X-Bladz so he can make $200 a week from skating. This is actually quite a lot of money and we don't blame him for wanting it.
Steven: Wait the [manager of this team] just said he moves $10 million of merchandise every year but he only pays his skaters $200 a week. This doesn't add up. This is like motown.
Hannah: This is like motown. That's like weirdly on point.
Steven: I think a lot of movies are motown when you think about it. Motion pictures. Motor City. They're practically the same.
Brink makes the team but doesn't seem to realize that he'll have to go up against the Soul Skaters in competition. Val, the X-Bladz leader, also makes a deal that Brink isn't allowed to shit-talk him in front of his friends. Maybe this is just is way of making friends? Also just like FYI, Val has an INSANE face. It's probably not right to say that about a child so we looked him up present day and it's even more INSANE. Hannah says he looks like a skinny teenaged Jack Black. Steven says he "looks like he's got a snout to him."
Hannah: His name is Val! Why does he think he has the authority to do anything?
Steven: What's Val short for? Valiant? What's the male version of Valerie?
Hannah: Valkyrie?
Steven: Valkyrie! He was born with wings. And abs.
Hannah: Okay I didn't know how to search for "What is Val short for" so I just searched "Val Kilmer." And Val is it. That's his full name. Also learned his brother died when he was 15 cause he had a seizure in a pool and now I can't read any further.
The gang hears that the X-Bladz got a new member, but doesn't know who it is. Brink, in trying to deflect the fact that he is the new team member says "Yea I heard it was a big guy. Big guy--like Korean I think. Wait, no no no, it was Native American."
Hannah: "A big guy, like Korean?" I mean there are stereotypes about Korean people but I don't think "big" is one of them.
Lindsay: Also like, he mixed up Koreans and Native Americans.
Steven: I just like that when he starts lying, he just starts desperately naming ethnicities. "I think he was Transylvanian. Or wait maybe Samoan. No I think he's a Native Hawaiian. No from before the Philippines!"
Brink doesn't tell his dad that he got a paid skating job, and consequently his dad got him a job as a dog groomer. Wait what? Yes. Now we see a brief montage of Brink struggling to juggle his soul-skating, X-Bladz, dog grooming, and school.
Hannah: Oh no he fell asleep at 11:30! But like for a high schooler, that's normal.
Lindsay: But also he's at an age where if you woke him up he could have a boner.
Hannah: Do you think that every mom has seen their son with a boner?
Lindsay: Oh for sure!
Hannah [to Steven]: Did that happen to you?
Steven: Babies get boners!
Hannah: Wait stop is that really fucking true? I mean I know children but babies?
Steven: Yea I mean it's not sexual at that age obviously…
Hannah: They're not like 'Oh man, that other baby's boobs!'
Steven: No, but the mechanics still work.
Now the invitational has rolled around and Brink has to fake sick so his teammates don't know he's sneaking around with the X-Bladz. This plan has glaring loopholes since they're all gonna be at the SAME competition. Brink is actually an idiot.
OH NO his friends have discovered his betrayal. They're supposed to forgive him because he means well or something but they shouldn't because he sucks. DOWN WITH BRINK!
Why is there still so much of this movie left? Now the X-Bladz and Soul skaters are racing each other informally down a hill and Val sabotages Gabriella by throwing gravel in her path. This births an amazing shot sequence of her falling for like 10 minutes. Gabriella breaks a leg or something and everyone has an emotional visit at her bedside as if she's dying. This somehow feels like Brink's fault because he sucks.
Brink's dad sees that his son is upset they have a classic DCOM father/son heart-to-heart. He tells him that he's a good son and a good friend, despite evidence to the contrary. Steven is very moved by this speech and worries it will trigger another existential crisis.
The next day at school, Brink angrily confronts Val. He throws down his roller skates on top of a pizza and quits the X-Bladz. He also throws a chocolate milkshake at Val's face, rendering it even more atrocious. Hannah says "His face structure is beautiful but he's hideous." Meanwhile, the Soul Skater's team is literally falling apart because of Gabriella's broken limb and because of another one's broken skate. Brink rolls in out of nowhere with new gear and a sponsorship from his dog groomer employer. Now we're confused about the moral of this movie, since now both teams have sponsors?
Anyway, some other stuff happens and then the Soul Skaters win, obviously. The moral of the story is unclear but we think it's just "have fun."
