The Bitter Comes Out Better On A Stolen Guitar (Hook, Hoops, Hudson Hawk)

Oh dear god. What the hell happened? Things have been strange since we hit movie land. Home Alone, the accurate simulation of a burglary, led us to a nightmare where suitcases and mops were sentient. Macaulay Culkin's hell is a New York hotel, and Tim Curry is in charge. Of course he is. Didn't you see Stephen King's It? We all float down here, and Kevin McAllister will too. With all the dead kids. All these Lost Boys. Then things get even stranger. A deviant vacuum cleaner comes at us as Tim Curry gives chase. Its suction is overwhelming, and we are pulled into its maw... but instead of death, something different. Something new. We fall down the rabbit hole, and we find out Carroll was wrong. Dead wrong. It doesn't lead to Wonderland.

It leads to Neverland. Now we are Peter Pan, but not in a good way. We have no defense against pirates. They can shoot and stab us, and all we have to wave at them is this butter knife. We got it from the hotel cafeteria in the vain hope of defending ourselves. It doesn't work very well. Even getting our feet wet causes us to leap from the water with a cry of agony. Of course it would. We have fallen out of the world. We're in a video game now. Haven't you heard those game review frustrations? Video game heroes can't fucking swim, except when they can. It's Neverland. It doesn't have to make sense. If it were a video game, it would be quite bad. At least Neverland is lush and colorful. It assails your eyes like the writhing mass of Axos assailed the eyes of England in 1971... but there's no glam here. No Starman, waiting in the sky. If you think Peter Pan is going to make it, you'd better hang on to yourself. 

But then what happens? In a flash of something, you return from Neverland to find yourself on... a basketball court? Realism, back again? The age of Nintendo terrifies and confuses. One minute you can descend into a world of pirates and monkeys, and the next you're stuck playing basketball. The transition jars you. Your opponent is good. Very good.  You're barely able to take the ball from him, but he can't seem to make shots. Eventually you get one and you say you win. Why? Because that's all you can stand of this nonsense. Let's go pretend to be Bruce Willis or something.

Except our pretend game has to be Hudson Hawk. What the hell is Hudson Hawk? seems like something out of the secret history of 1991. Whoever he is, he's not very good at whatever he's trying to do. Dogs keep biting him. He keeps falling off of tall buildings. Lasers exterminate him. Here lies Bruce Willis. 1955-1991. Blasted by a Dalek laser gun mounted as a security measure by some fool named Rutherford. Bruce Willis is not the Doctor. Hudson Hawk is a foolish looking fellow with a foolish looking game. At least we have returned to the world of the normal. Let Hudson Hawk float for all I care. Let him forever remain in the deadlights.