Bright 2: To Live and Orc in LA
Trouble is a-brewin’ in the Bright-inspired city of Los Angeles. A “rift” briefly opened to another dimension and a cadre of skull-helmeted soldiers have emerged and promptly scurried off into LA in a giant skull. Officer Daryl “Will Smith” Ward and Officer Nick “Orc” Jakoby have rescued a cactusfolk named Chim from the rift. She has warned them that the so-called “Coalition” will seek to reopen a ley line rift back home to bring reinforcements. Can Will Smith and an orc stop these skeletal intruders in time? Probably not.
Zack: Welcome back to Bright’s version of Los Angeles! Where the elves are fancy and the orcs wear FOBO gear.
Steve: I hope the centaur riot cop makes an appearance.
Zack: When we left off you, as orc cop Nick Jakoby, and you partner Will Smith have just rescued cactusfolk Chim and stopped the LAPD from gunning her down.
Zack: No time to celebrate though, because a bodega just exploded and a giant robotic skull tore down the H in the Hollywood sign.
Steve: “I don’t know how to call this one in.”
Zack: “Oh hell no we are not trying to arrest that damn giant skull,” says Will Smith.
Steve: This cactus lady said something about ley lines. Does that mean there is one in the Hollywood sign?
Zack: You’re not sure why the robot skull is rampaging, just that it is rampaging.
Steve: Yeah, but what’s it doing? Like is it just tearing up the Hollywood sign or actually attacking people.
Zack: Both. It’s not walking down into the city, but it is shooting those cannons down from the Hollywood Hills. As you are staring it blows up a souvenir shop and incinerates one of those guys in a filthy Elmo costume.
Zack: Only it’s a costume for the orc Sesame Street character.
Steve: Noooooo! It blew up Daboo!
Steve: “This thing is going to pay and the price will be justice!” Dramatically racking my shotgun.
Zack: An unused shotgun shell pops out of the gun and falls on the ground.
Zack: Nobody notices because their attention is pretty focused on the rampaging mecha-skull.
Steve: What are the other cops doing?
Zack: Starting to wake up from their stupor of seeing a giant mechanical skull wrecking the Hollywood sign.
Steve: Well, dude, I mean these guys have seen dragons flying around so that can’t be totally weird for them.
Zack: Will Smith says, “I don’t think that shotgun is going to do much to that thing.”
Steve: What about Chim’s weapons?
Zack: Right, the catcus lady has a big vibrating knife and some sort of energy pistol.
Zack: Will Smith takes the pistol and says, “I’m not trusting you to figure this thing out. You take that turkey carver thing.”
Steve: “I will wield this mighty blade of the cactus lady.”
Zack: “You switch it on here,” she says, showing you how to turn it on. When she does it’s kind of like one of those sexy moments in a romantic comedy where the guy shows the girl a sports move like how to swing a hockey stick and then they both realize they’re hugging.
Steve: Awwww!
Zack: Only you take 4 damage from being stabbed with a bunch of cactus spines.
Steve: AAAAHHHHH!
Zack: While flailing in pain, you accidentally swing the vibrating knife and cleave through a nearby kitchen countertop like it wasn’t even there.
Steve: “Whoa. I feel like the orc in Star Wars who got to be a Jedi.”
Zack: “There wasn’t an orc in Star Wars,” says Will Smith. “All movies are exactly the same. Like Shrek, the documentary movie about the first ogre president.”
Steve: “I know that, I was a member of Ogrenizing for America. But Star Wars had an orc. The big hairy guy.”
Zack: “Chewbacca was not an orc.”
Steve: “He was an orc that became a Jedi.”
Zack: “He was a wookiee and he didn’t become a Jedi he had a crossbow.”
Steve: “All I know is that if an ogre can be elected president than an orc can be a hairy Jedi. Unless you are a huge racist.”
Zack: “I’m a huge racist.”
Steve: Good thing you put that in quotes.
Zack: As Officer Nick Jakoby and Officer Will Smith are arguing about Shrek and Star Wars, the LAPD swings into action against the giant robot spider that is blasting cars and buildings and tearing down the Hollywood sign.
Steve: Right, yeah, we need to get up there and fight this thing.
Zack: The first cop car that drives towards the skull spider explodes into nothing as a blast of energy from the skull’s cannons blow it to pieces.
Steve: Uhoh.
Zack: Two SWAT trucks and a bunch more cars driving ahead of you get blown up by a wave of Terminator-like energy blasts from the skull-headed infantry. Some cops are trying to fire from cover, but their guns don’t seem to be hurting the guys in the skull armor.
Zack: It seems like one shot from one of these MEGA DAMAGE guns is enough to blow up a cop car.
Steve: I’m going to drive our cop SUV using the other cars as cover. Is Chim with us?
Zack: She insisted on riding in the back.
Steve: If we can get in close then I can fight these guys using my super orc strength and my vibrating knife.
Zack: Will Smith leans out the window and shoots an energy blast from the pistol he confiscated. It hits one of the skull soldiers and he falls to the ground, either dead or seriously injured.
Steve: YES!
Zack: It’s not good news, because the other skull troopers see the energy blast and turn their fire on you guys.
Steve: The car explodes?
Zack: Mostly.
Steve: Do we explode?
Zack: The car bursts into flames and rolls over several times. You and Will Smith and Chim are thrown from the vehicle.
Zack: Surprisingly, the three of you are basically unharmed. It seems you were saved by some strange glowing energy surrounding your body.
Steve: What the heck? Did the sword do that?
Zack: “No, I used my psychic powers,” explains Chim, using more psychic powers to talk to you in a sexy woman’s voice directly in your mind.
Steve: “I would totally hug you again but you know what happens.”
Steve: She has a kickin’ cactus bod right?
Zack: In the sense that she has a vaguely human female shape with orbs of cactus and spines all over her, yes.
Zack: Will Smith grabs you by the shoulder and says, “Can you stop trying to hook it up with the potted plant here? We’re about to get fried by the skull brigade!”
Steve: Going to ask the cactus lady if she can use her mind powers to wreck these skull dudes.
Zack: “I may have enough strength to destroy their large machine,” she says. “But my powers will be drained and I will not be able to offer much help after that.”
Steve: “What do you think, partner?”
Zack: “I think we turn Veggie Tales here loose on the evil skull stomping the literal H out of Hollywood.”
Steve: What are the Coalition dudes doing?
Zack: Having fun obliterating the LAPD. As you’re watching, an LAPD helicopter and a local news helicopter are both blasted out of the sky and crash into the city below.
Zack: More than twenty police vehicles are burning and dead cops litter the ground. The survivors are either running or hiding in ditches.
Steve: Are the Coalition dudes advancing or setting up a defense.
Zack: It seems like they are defending the Hollywood sign that they have mostly destroyed. Only the “OD” are still standing and the robot skull is digging into the ground with its legs.
Steve: The ley line has to be under that sign or something. We have to stop them. “Chim, you have to do something!”
Zack: The cactus lady walks out from behind the burning wreckage of your SUV. Laser blasts seems to bend in the air around her. The giant skull notices her coming and slowly rotates its two cannons to face her.
Steve: “Chim! NO! We didn’t even get to second base!”
Zack: The cactus woman holds her arms out, palms turned upward, and stones begin to lift into the air around the robot skull. You feel the earth shifting beneath you. The letter O still standing falls over. The skull mecha rises into the air inch-by-inch but accelerating. It rises ten feet. Twenty. A hundred feet. The legs kick uselessly. 200 feet. Its swivels in the air. The tips of cannons begin to glow.
Steve: I’m going to run and try to grab her and pull her back.
Zack: Too late! As the robot rises 500 feet in the air, its cannons finally discharge, sending two brightly glowing shots directly at Chim. The massive explosion raises a fountain of earth and sends you and Will Smith tumbling backwards down the hill.
Steve: NOOOOO!
Steve: Running up there to see if she is alive.
Zack: As you run to the smoldering crater where Chim was standing you see the huge skull robot drop from the sky. It lands on the ground and a moment later there is an intense flash of light as it explodes. The “D” from the Hollywood sign bursts into flames and the Coalition troopers closest ot the explosion are incinerated.
Steve: How many are left.
Zack: Hard to tell, but you see several of them moving within the flames and helping others to their feet. You’d guess at least seven or eight of them are still alive.
Steve: What about Chim?
Zack: You find pieces of Chim.
Steve: She was like a plant, right? Maybe if we put the pieces in a pot she will grow back!
Zack: Will Smith pulls you away as you’re trying to scoop up pieces of Chim gunk. “She’s gone, Nick. She’s gone!”
Steve: “We can’t let those things open another evil portal!”
Zack: “We don’t have the firepower for this. Maybe the army or something, man.”
Steve: “I don’t. They don’t. But you do, Officer Will Smith! You have the Bright power!”
Zack: “I can’t do shit without that want!”
Steve: “Then we get that wand!” That elf dude who took the wand at the end of the movie left us with a business card or something, right?
Zack: “He mighta left a number. Right now, we got to get out of this mess.”
Zack: There are still terminator-like dudes blasting lasers all over the place.
Steve: Did Will Smith save his energy pistol?
Zack: Yeah, he still has that, but you lost your vibrating knife.
Steve: Okay, I guess we’re pulling back then. Did I manage to salvage much of Chim?
Zack: About a pint’s worth of cactus guts.
Zack: The surviving comes and new arrivals are setting up a perimeter and trading occasional pot-shots with the skeleton troopers up where the Hollywood sign used to be standing. Nobody is really paying you and Will Smith much mind as ambulances, fire trucks, and more and more cops continue to show up.
Steve: “Can we get some army tanks or something in here?”
Zack: “That’s above our pay grade. Here, call this number.” Will Smith hands you the business card from the elf.
Zack: It reads, “Kandomere, Head Elf, FBI Magic Department.”
Steve: I’m calling it.
Zack: “This is Kandomere,” he answers.
Steve: “Hey, uh, Kandomere. The elf. This is Officer Nick Jakoby.”
Zack: “Alright. Who are you?”
Steve: The orc LAPD cop.
Zack: …
Steve: In Los Angeles. The orc.
Steve: With the wand.
Zack: “Ah, right. What can I do for you?”
Steve: Skeleton robots are attacking Los Angeles and Officer Will Smith needs the wand back.
Zack: There is a long silence and then he says, “Is this a joke?”
Steve: No, it killed my friend Chim. She was a sexy cactus.
Zack: Even longer silence.
Zack: “I’m hanging up now.”
Steve: Wait!
Steve: Turn on the news.
Zack: You hear the click of a TV and a murmur of voices in the background.
Zack: “It seems you have skeleton robots attacking Los Angeles. I will be there with the wand in one hour.”
Steve: I hope that’s fast enough.
Zack: As you finish your call, Will Smith gets your attention and points to the fact that Apache helicopters are flying towards the location.
Steve: I’m not going to get to see the police centaur am I?
Zack: He was tragically killed by the skeleton robots.
Zack: One of the Apaches shoots a missile and blows up one of the robots and you definitely see that he is injured. And a human inside the suit of skeleton armor based on the fact that his missing arm is gushing blood.
Steve: So problem solved?
Zack: No, these guys start shooting at the helicopters and blow them up one by one. Their laser weapons have incredible range and accuracy and destroy the helicopters with a single hit.
Zack: The crowd of onlookers scream with dismay at the sight of the military helicopters being destroyed.
Steve: Okay, there is not a lot we can do until Will Smith gets that wand. I need to get Chim into a pot.
Zack: There is a garden store nearby. The teenager working there just sort of stares at you like, “What is this orc doing in here with a bucket full of crap?”
Steve: “Do you know what sort of substrate a cactus lady prefers?”
Zack: “Dirt?”
Steve: How about potting soil and then like sand on top?
Zack: She gets you a pot and you insert the disgusting remains of Chim you recovered into a pot.
Zack: Will Smith is like, “I’m glad you planting a victory garden and all, but the whole end of the world thing is happening.”
Steve: Gonna find a safe place to put it.
Zack: That’s all relative given what is happening right now.
Zack: Okay, I’m going to say you and Will Smith get burritos and then a bunch of SUVs roll up. Kandomere and that big slob guy get out. Kandomere is dressed all fancy with his silver gorget like he’s a German military police and the big slob has a locked case and is wearing one green rubber glove.
Steve: “Will Smith is the Bright, I’m just the orc cop. Maybe hand over the laser pistol.”
Zack: He hands it over and says, “Here, try not to put a hole through me.”
Zack: Kandomere wants to be sure that Will Smith knows how to use the wand.
Zack: Will Smith says, “Yeah, I read the WikiHow. I think of got it figured out.”
Steve: “Try not to burn a hole through me.” I pat him on the shoulder. “Let’s go waste some skeleton ass.”
Zack: He follows you towards the perimeter saying, “I think an ass is the one thing a skeleton doesn’t have.”
Steve: Then this should be very easy.
Zack: NEXT TIME!
Steve: Again?
Zack: We will conclude the Bright Bonanza with Will Smith and Nick Jakoby taking an unexpected journey.
Steve: Hey, we didn’t play this part yet. Maybe when we do I’ll just decide to shoot myself in the head.
Zack: The unexpected journey of death…
Zack: NEXT TIME!
Steve: Also, by definition if you are telling us about the “unexpected journey” then it is extremely expected.
Zack: Goddammit, I said NEXT TIIIIIIIIIIIIIME!