He's The Hero?!? Keanu Reeves
I am going to be trying something new with the next few posts from F.Y.E. I will be running a 5 part series where all the posts will be related. I also will have some help from a buddy of mine from the Anything But Credible Podcast, Nick Duggan. If you have not checked out this Podcast then you are wasting your time, usually every week is a new conspiracy theory with some hilarious news stories to round out the episodes. Like I said, check these guys out wherever you get your Podcasts from, you will not be disappointed.
This 5 part series will ultimately culminate in answering the question "Who is the Best Worst Actor You Would Want to Save the World?" In other words, if the world is ending who do you want in charge of saving all of our asses? Now I know everyone is going to say "what about actors like Tom Cruise, Bruce Willis, Will Smith, Chuck Norris..." those guys are great, don't get me wrong, but they are too good for this list. We are looking for a specific set of guys to make our list. When this series is over you will have answers for who has saved the world the most times, what the world was saved from, and how the world was saved. Nick and I each took 2 actors and he started out with Keanu Reeves so strap in ladies and gentlemen; it's time to save the world.
What’s up guys, it’s Duggs here from the Anything But Credible Podcast (wow, a shameless plug in the first sentence?), and I’ve been going back and forth with Foshe over this topic so I decided to give it a try myself. So what are we doing here? When I say the words ‘save the world’ what do you think of? Keanu Reeves? If so, I think you might be my new best friend. Throughout the thousands of movies made, I can’t help but think which actors have saved us the most. Which ones have the quality world saves? Who has saved the world in the coolest way? It is sad to admit, but no one is asking me these questions, so here I am to take a little stroll down the IMDB page of one man who has saved us all more times than I bet you have thought of. The man, the myth, the legend....and possibly immortal ....Mr. Keanu Reeves.
Let’s face the facts, sometimes the world just needs to be saved. Sometimes we need movies to help document how the world was saved. When it comes to all of the movie stars who have saved the world Keanu Reeves has to at least be on the top 10 list, right? Top 5? Top 3? I mean, come on, the guy’s name is Keanu. Everybody likes Keanu. Not the strongest actor in front of the camera, but damn can he land a good punch and kick. He is a man of few words, but that doesn’t matter when he is always doing cool shit. Not to mention the dude has had near perfect head lettuce since day one. I have to admit I’m a bit of a biased fan, so if you are writing a list or ranking of people you want on your side to save the world and Keanu Reeves isn’t one of those people…we aren’t going to be friends. Off the top of your head I know you can think of at least a couple times Keanu has saved the world. Plus, even if he didn’t make your list, you know you still want to hang out with him off screen. He has to be a cool dude; I mean his name is Keanu.
Going off of his IMDB page I am seeing 91 acting credits, which I think is safe to say is good for at least a few world saves. I know what you are thinking. What documents as a legit world save? I’ll keep it simple, if you and everyone you know would be alive today in the movie world because of Keanu, that is a world save. We won’t get too specific into the rules. You be the judge if he saved the world or not.
World Save #1. 1984. Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure
It doesn’t take long for Keanu to jump into the top tier of humanity. His IMDB page starts with this first credit being in 1984, and by 1989 he is already saving the world? Impressive. That’s right, I’m talking about Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Of course, an all-time classic, but most people just think of Keanu going back in time to help learn stuff for his exam. The future is what we are looking at here. Don’t forget about Rufus, a traveler from the future, who comes into the film to help Bill & Ted along their journey. Also, remember that Rufus is helping these dudes because Bill & Ted’s music is the foundation for a perfect society in the future. So yes, Keanu goes back in time to help pass his test in current time in order to save all of society in the future. A perfect society based around awesome music sounds like a cool future to me. As far as world saves go, I’d rate this a 6/10. World save #1. Let’s call this one the ‘Excellent Save’.
World Save #2. 1991. Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey.
A whole lot goes into this quality save, so I’m going to let my dude Todd Baldridge explain the plot. Here is a link to his plot summary on IMDB, so don’t sue me Todd. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101452/plotsummary
"For many years now, at Bill and Ted University of the future, the people of the world have been excellent to each other. But fed-up with Bill and Ted's peaceful world and even more fed up with heavy metal, Chuck De Nomolos decides to do something about it. De Nomolos creates cyborg versions of Bill and Ted, who travel back to 1990 with orders to kill the human versions of Bill and Ted, win the Battle of the Bands, and pave the way for De Nomolos to take over the future. In 1990, Bill and Ted are sent to hell by the cyborgs. Cyborg Bill and cyborg Ted make time with the real Bill and Ted's girlfriends Joanna and Elizabeth and prepare to take the human Bill and Ted's place in the Battle of the Bands. With the help of their friend Rufus, the human Bill and Ted are forced to find a way out of hell, deal with the Grim Reaper, and talk to God himself, in their mission to get to the Battle of the Bands and stop the two cyborgs." Again, with a little help from Rufus, Keanu helps save human society one more time. This one takes some serious effort. He had to go to hell, beat a cyborg clone of himself, get his girl back, and then convince God to help him out. I’m rating this one a 7.5/10. Excellently impressive. Let’s call this one the ‘More Excellent Save’
World Save #3. 1992. Dracula.
Another classic, especially for the vampire lovers out there. If you’re not a fan of this one I kind of feel you, but we have to respect the saving that is going on here. I’ll keep the plot summary on this one short. It is a super close play on the classic Dracula story you all have heard, except my man Drac (yeah I shortened his name) pulls some savagery in this one and tries to steal Keanu’s girl. Does that happen in the original Dracula story? I really don’t know, but if so that is hilarious. Anyway, that adds to the awesomeness of saving the world by defeating not only the top dog of the vampire world, but also the dude that tried to end his love life. Don’t test Keanu like that. Now, this is a group effort, so it might fall down to the bottom of Keanu’s list of personal quality saves, but as the quality of an overall world save it has to be towards the top, right? I mean, the dude just helped kill Dracula. If he doesn’t kill Dracula are we all vampires right now? Are we even born? Vampires can’t have babies, right? Then again, if we are vampires, we wouldn’t technically be 100% dead. It doesn’t matter because Keanu and his squad ended Drac…and basically all vampires as we know it in this movie world, but I don’t know if I’d rank this as a full save. I give it a 4/10 on the save-o-meter. Pretty Impressive. Let’s call this the ‘Deadly Save’.
I know what you’re thinking. Are we going to skip past 1994 and one of the all-timers, Speed? Yes. Look, as much as we all love this movie we have to be honest here. Keanu saved a bunch of people, possibly even the entire city of LA, but that is not world saving material. Even though it's heroic, this will not make the world list. Still impressive though.
World Save #4. 1995. Johnny Mnemonic.
I’ll be honest I’ve never seen this one. Never even heard of it, but after reading up on it and watching some YouTube videos it seems like a cool old school check out. Long story short our man Keanu has a crazy brain chip implanted with the cure of the extremely wide spread disease NAS (Nerve Attenuation Syndrome), a.k.a. the black shakes, which is being caused by an overexposure to electromagnetic radiation in the distant future of 2021. Rough. Anyway, Keanu is a badass so while fighting the Yakuza he figures out how to break the code on his brain chip and downloads the cure so it can then be transmitted worldwide. Can you imagine everybody walking around with extreme radiation exposure? It wouldn’t be pretty. Don’t think this save is that legit? Imagine all of the dogs you know dying slowly due to their cells basically burning and deforming. Exactly. Safe to say saving the world from radiation by hacking into your own brain is pretty dope. I’m impressed. 8/10. Let’s call this the ‘Hacker Save
World Save #5. 1999. The Matrix, The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolutions
Finally, it's time for the first film that popped in your head after reading the first few sentences of this piece. I am grouping all three movies of the series together, but if you are adding up world saves these could technically count as 3. Can we all agree that I don’t need to provide a plot summary for this one? If you don’t know what happens in the Matrix I honestly think you should go to jail for a couple of days. This is probably Keanu’s most impressive save. Definitely the coolest. Not only becoming the savior for the human rebellion, but also saving the human race from the machines in a computer simulated world that he originally thought was the real world. Amazing. Wait, was the world before he took the pill real world or was the real world after the pill? Never mind. This is a save on a mass scale, and something we might need to take notes from moving into our own real future. This is an easy rating: 10/10 for one of the best movies ever made and a great save. I’ll call this ‘The One Impressive Save’ (see what I did there?) The real question is do you believe ‘The Chosen One’ is actually Neo or Agent Smith? That is a different article for a different day.
World Save #6. 2005. Constantine.
I am not a religious person. I do not do religious things, but I dug this movie all the way until the end. In this one, Keanu is a dude with weird powers. He can see angels and demons, which helps him just a tiny bit when it comes to sacrificing himself for Lucifer. Before that, he slits the wrist of Mammon (Lucifer’s son) who is trying to come over to our world to start jacking souls. I wouldn’t necessarily say this is a cool save, but it is a quality one for sure if you believe in the idea of a soul. If you do, the last thing you want to do is give it up to a dick like Lucifer. Thanks to Keanu, everyone still has their soul to ruin later in life and the world continues on not in hell. Still impressing me Keanu. Let’s call this one the ‘Holy Save’. Soul believer – 10/10. Non-Soul believer – 6.5/10.
World Save #7. 2008. The Day the Earth Stood Still.
First of all, this is a remake of the super classic 1951 film. Secondly, Keanu is an alien. Don’t get it twisted though, this is still a major world save. This remake is a classic script for Keanu because he can’t have more than 200 words in this one. At first he thinks of the human race as I do most of the time: crazy. Then throughout the movie he realizes that humans are kind of cool and decides to sacrifice himself once again by disintegrating this giant alien sphere that has come over the skies of planet Earth. Are you seeing a reoccurring theme here with Keanu sacrificing himself? I told you this dude was cool. This has got to be the lamest save of Keanu’s amazing career. He kind of just walks into this thing and uses his crazy alien abilities to make the bad things just go away. Nothing spectacular, just like the entire film, unless you are a Jennifer Connelly fan. Nonetheless, you have to appreciate alien Keanu giving up not only his beliefs, but also his beautiful human form (Keanu Reeves). I’m calling this the ‘Alien Save’. 1/10 on the save-o-meter just because I hated this movie. Harsh, I know.
Keanu has had some different roles throughout the years, especially different kinds of quiet ass kickers! (bad joke). One thing you have to say is throughout all of the roles he has saved a shit ton of people. You can’t deny that. You also can’t deny that saving the entire world in any single situation is on another level of saving. Seven times. Seven times my man Keanu has saved us all. Is that a lot compared to other brave actors out there? I couldn’t tell ya. It’s a lot compared to me. He saved us once as an alien. Once as a half-breed angel-demon-ghost thing. Twice as a high school stoner dude. Possibly three times, depending on how you’re counting, as the hailed savior in an ‘alternative universe’. Once again as a technologically savvy badass, and don’t forget about as an old school demon murderer. Every time as a boss ass dude. Seriously impressed, Keanu. If you have made it this far, first of all thank you for spending way too much time reading this. Secondly, this probably doesn’t mean much to you now, but don’t judge me for my terrible grammar. I know I use a million commas, I’m an idiot who is much better at talking than writing. Keep checking out F.Y.E. and in between stories hop over to wherever you get your podcasts and check out Anything But Credible.