Professor Popinjay's Compendium of Perspicacity

A Non-review by Professor Popinjay

I didn’t fully grasp that Mr. T was from the A-Team when I was a kid. I didn’t know he was B.A. Baracus on the A-Team and then he was playing Clubber Lang in Rocky III. He was just Mr. T. I thought he was just Mr. T in everything he was in. Because he was that bad ass. I didn’t really grasp that the A-Team was even called the A-Team. I remember seeing Mr. T on tv and my 2 year old self asking my dad if this was the Mr. T show and my dad said yep! That’s all I needed to know.

I loved Mr. T. He’s in the same tier with Mr. Rodgers, Bob Ross, LaVar Burton, Elwood P. Dowd, Bruce Campbell, Dave Grohl and Macho Man Randy Savage.

So when this A-Team movie came out it took me a minute to realize the A-team used to be the show that had Mr. T in it. It was the Mr. T show! But wait… this movie didn’t have Mr. T in it.

Instead it had Quinton “Rampage” Jackson who, while not being Mr. T and therefore not automatically commanding my childhood reverence and adoration, still seems like someone who could wrap a street light pole around me with his bare hands and hurl me into the nearest open Dumpster™. So I shan’t say a single thing against him. He did a fine job as B. A. and he’s a good lookin’ dude! And a snappy dresser. And merciful. Oh so merciful. Please don’t kill me, Mr. Jackson.

This movie was decent and it made me want to watch the Mr. T show all over again. The scene where they’re attempting to direct a tank toward a water landing after it ejected from an airplane was fantastic.

Honestly I think I need to watch this again sometime because I suddenly remember being nervous as hell the first time I saw it due to some situations outside my control and I had a hard time enjoying it. I’m now enjoying it in retrospect.

A year later in 2011, a year after this film, we would get the animated Cloudy with Chance of Meatballs featuring both Bruce Campbell AND Mr. T! I hadn’t been this happy since 2002 when Spider-Man had both Bruce Campbell AND Randy Savage in practically the same scene! What a grand day that was! Why can’t they just put my whole top tier list in a movie together!?! That would be so rad! Could you even imagine!?! Like what if all those guys just showed up in The Expendables and just wiped the floor with the action stars and then disappeared just as fast and Dolph Lungren is like “Who were those silly silly bananas anyway!?! Oh my Gawsh!”

Roll credits.