We can shit on Street Fighter: The Movie all we want, but Jesus Christ, Raul Julia deserved an award for being a part of it considering what he was dealing with. The man was a testament to what an actor will do to keep food on the table and a smile on their kid’s face.
Not just for being a part of it, but undoubtedly being the most fondly-remembered part of the whole thing. Just a guy hamming the hell out of his role as one of the most recognizable villains in video games and doing it to make his kids happy.
Speaking of Raul Julia and Awards Culture? I don't love the Kiss of the Spider Woman movie, mostly because Hurt winning for that movie is the WORST Lead Actor win of the 80s. There are worse MOVIES that won Lead Actor (Gandhi, Wall Street), but Kingsley and Douglas weren't really the problem with those movies. Hurt absolutely IS the biggest problem with Kiss of the Spider Woman. The role is written as archetypically gay, and I get that going too far with it would have been offensive, but William Hurt is just...William Hurt, at among his most "I love you wife"-iest. AWFUL. I get that performances being both Oscar and Razzie nominated are rare, as they should be, but Hurt absolutely SHOULD have been for that lazy-ass work. But I also don't hate it, because Raul Julia would have been, absolutely, worthy of that win.
The story of Raul Julia only doing this movie because his kids loved Street fighter at the time, playing one of the most iconic bad guys in gaming. It's the coolest thing ive ever heard from a movie
Add Jim Carrey to the list as one of his reasons to portray Dr. Eggman/Robotnik on the Sonic movies was because of his kids, there's even an interview where he says that
@@ASteelWheel There's also Denis Hopper from the Mario bros film. He added, "My six-year-old son at the time - he's now 18 - he said, 'Dad I think you're probably a pretty good actor, but why did you play that terrible guy King Koopa in Super Mario Bros.?' And I said, 'Well Henry, I did that so you could have shoes,' and he said, 'Dad, I don't need shoes that badly.
The whole section of Raul Julia got me. Not just because it's a beautiful thing he did for his kids, but on a personal level something I think a great dad would do and something I feel my dad would've done for me. I hope to be able to match that amount of love some day with my own children. Love you pops.
In fairness, Bryan Cranston also did a lot of VA for shows like Power Rangers way back when, so he was a voice actor first. His ascension to actor stardom starts with Fei Long and MOTWs.
I honestly believe to this day that Raul Julia's Bison was so awesome that it influenced future depictions of Bison. That man was a Legend. Thanks for going through the Street Fighter history, looking forward to SF4s story next time!
Great observation. I did notice that when they started to have english voice acting for SF games, Bison's persona or character always seems to take a little influence from Julia's Bison. Like the one in SF 5.
Just an addendum, the line "It was tuesday" was actually improvised by Julia himself, you can see it in Chun-Li's actress face since she didn't expect it coming from him.
Ya got a source for that cause the scene wouldn't make much sense without that line, plus the actress being surprised isn't really proof as that part is about her realizing Bison is to evil to remember her
@@spensirmclife6549 Actually I expressed myself wrong, the whole dialogue between Bison and Chun Li was differente. Apparently he had s much more villainous exchsnge about he enjoyed killing Chun-Li's family and.such, but Julia sensed that the dialogue did not match the character, so he improvised.
@@rogueashuraIronically enough Bison is lame enough to be all "i loved killing your family" but Raul's choice to be like "I've broken many families of course i don't remember yours" is infinitely more interesting.
Ngl, I'd be down for a Let's Watch of Street Fighter the Movie where Matt, Thorgi and whoever else is interested just talk about the insanity and such as well as favorite moments and alike.
I keep hoping Capcom will canonize the Baz one day. I would only hope they would let indie games keep using the character as an indie darling that just appears in places, but just add to the Baz lore by finally letting him be playable in Street Fighter.
What a badass. Raul Julia played the part of M. Bison, despite his terrifying health conditions at the time, for his children, and still gave the best show for the movie. What an absolute legend if a man.
this Blade Story is now implied canon, since in the SFV CFN website they have profiles from the original characters of SF Movie, and in the Blade profile they made sure to put the same Weight and Height as Gunloc, and also the fact that he likes Popcorn... just like Gunloc.
*"For I beheld Satan as he fell from heaven... LIKE LIGHTNING!"* Is just unbelievably iconic. If they'd put that in a game I wouldn't even have questioned it.
Thorgi: “One of the stuntmans, a former kickboxer named Benny Urquidez…” Me after my jaw dropped: “Former undefeated 61-0 full contact Kickboxing champion Benny (The Jet) Urquidez was in the Street Fighter movie!” 🤯
Yeah, I'm not even that into kickboxing (well, kinda. It's just that I'm more of a taekwondo and boxing type person) and when Thorgi said Benny Urquidez I was like "YOU DROP BENNY FUCKING URQUIDEZ LIKE IT'S NOTHING?!?!?!"
1:16:38-1:18:06 All these years I thought Woolie was hyper exaggerating with his Shen Long bit in the Fighterpedia episode on the SF Movie. And you mean to tell that was actually all *100% on point?* Right down to the blindfolded Ultra Instinct dodging with a dragon arm?! Man, Incredible Technologies was wild.
I always thought was a wierd story that apparently Capcom was SO IMPRESSED with Time Killers, they hire Incredible Technologies to make the SF Movie game.
Just a reminder: In 1993 we got the best depiction of Chun Li ever in a movie called City Hunter, interpreted by the great actor... Jackie Chan. Yup. Chun Li vs. Ken, it even got special moves... you can watch two human beyblades spinning against each other. It is magical.
Another thing the anime Street Fighter 2 movie was known for was showing Chun-Li naked. Most modern cuts of the film have removed that part of the scene. (Where she's showering shortly before her fight with Vega) Any teenage boys who got to see the original cut when it first came out were pretty lucky.
What modern cuts have removed that scene? As far as I can tell only the PG-13 cut removed it, and you'd have to go out of your way to watch it as most digital storefronts have the unrated version. I can't find anything online about this new censorship change but maybe I'm not looking hard enough
@@raihidara Whenever the movie was shown on cable TV. I remember the Sci-fy channel showing the movie a few times. And when the movie was included as a bonus feature in the Street Fighter Anniversary collection on PS2 it removed the shower scene. If they had included that scene, that alone could've bumped up the game's rating to M.
@@raihidaraNo, the uncensored cut is the most widely distributed one. I have seen like 4 versions of the movie (the original japanese one with subs, the english dub, and both latinamerican dubs) and the bath scene was in all of them. Never really liked that scene tho. It feels weirdly out of place.
Street Fighter II V(ictory) is incredibly underrated and not known for those that never watched it on Manga Video (VHS/DVD). Even as a kid watching it, I considered it the alternate universe of the Street Fighter II story
I genuinely love the American street fighter movie and learning how much misfortune they experienced in the production just goes to show how immensely talented the people were who made it. Also, my two favourite bits of the way they handled Bison are the scene where he's telling the architect to increase the size of the food court at his palace/shopping mall so that all the major fast food franchises can have restaurants there and the fact that he has a portrait of himself dressed as Pogo the Clown (John Wayne Gacey, in case you didn't know. He used to perform at children's parties in that costume). The latter I didn't even notice for years but once I spotted it in the background of the 'Tuesday' scene I couldn't stop laughing 😂.
Great retrospective as always! Funnily enough Akuma being Ryu’s father is implied in two other different movies mentioned and we also potentially get to see Ryu’s mother. Street Fighter: Alpha Generations is the one that really leans into the subtext that Ryu’s mother is Sayaka, the childhood friend of Akuma and Gouken and the daughter of their master Goutetsu. Street Fighter: Assassin’s fist adapts that story into live action but changes Sayaka into Goutetsu’s niece, it’s not as direct as Alpha Generation but the implication is still there.
I'm normally a bit hard on movies and games for portraying the Jamaican accent in an overly exaggerated or fake-sounding way, but I have to commend Miguel Nunez for his role as Dee Jay. I don't know if he's actually Jamaican but he sure convinced me! Better than SF6 Dee Jay anyway.
Words cannot describe how incredibly frustrating the production of Street Fighter II The Movie sounded. Like could capcom not let the man they hired to make their movie do his job for five minutes without trying to force him to do something else.
Fun random story: I used to be a Starbucks barista, and Damien Chapa's sister was one of my regulars. A day after she told me about this, she dropped by (I wasn't working) and left me a photo of him and Kylie Minogue on location in Thailand. I still have it somewhere.
So Jon claw van Damme the hero of this film was snowboarding down a mountain of coke and Raul Julia the villain push through stomach cancer because he loved his kids that much are you sure their roles weren’t reversed😢
Just want to add a bit of insight from someone that was near the fighting game scene AND martial arts at the time. The SF movie was HYPED (if floppy), and the game was a real opportunity to get more eyes on it. My tae kwon do instructor's son was asked to do motion work for the game. _That's him as Akuma._ Unfortunately, either he kept all the merch he got from it, or Surf Ninjas was just a better experience for him, because from there I saw absolutely NO mention of this around the school.
Legend of Chun-Li was clearly an issue with direction. Kristen Kreuk is an amazing actress. Neal McDonough proved he could be a cheese-coated villain with his time as Damien Darhk in the CW Arrowverse shows.
I have a feeling that movie originally had nothing to do with street fighter but then changed once they started filming and were forced to shoehorn in all the street fighter related stuff in it.
This whole series is incredible, I learned so much about the history of SF while being very entertained the whole time. I love all your fighting game retrospectives, your the best in the game! I even watch them for games I don't care about, they are that interesting!
Darn was actually hoping for a star gladiator retrospective, never played it but am interested in the series (the only obscure capcom fighter I played was techromancer, near the start of the year)
I don't even think star gladiator is on the Capcom fighting game collection or either one of the Capcom arcade collections so yeah it is fairly obscure that would be kind of cool and they do need to release that
@@GmNdWtchr96 In all honesty, I think that's what Capcom should right now. A Capcom Fighting Collection Vol.2 with their 3D fighting games series. Star Gladiator, Rival Schools, Power Stone, Tech Romancer, and their sequels. If there's a time and place to finally see those titles being brought back to modern consoles, it is now. Better than collecting dust inside Capcom's vault.
Star Gladiator is ok since it feels like something unfinished, the one that is worth it is Plasma Sword which is the sequel. Anyway, I hope you can play them.
On the ps3 re-release of final fight, this SF episode is unlockable & available. That was how I was introduced to the SF cartoon, I never saw or heard of it back then
Fun fact: Street Fighter Alpha: Generations was aired at EVO (either 2005 or 2006) after the tournament wrapped up. Needless to say it got ripped to shreds by the audience Also if you want to down the Street Fighter live action rabbit hole, the unofficial short movies and TV shows are bonkers. I recommend the Korean SF II adaptation and the Boxer/Claw short films by Chubby Boy
I kinda like the idea behind the throw from the movie game. Definitely tweak it so that it’s only one button, not a specific one for each character, but maybe take out the limit to the amount of times that you could do it, and make it so that the timing for each subsequent input gets cut in half. I want to see that craziness at a tournament at some point.
Street Fighter the movie actually had more moves than you think: Ryu does something like a Hadouken on Vega Vega does his Rolling attack when fighting Ryu Ken does something like a Shoryuken to Sagat Guile does a Flash Kick on Bison Bison does something like a Psycho Crusher to Guile
Funny, I was waiting for Street Fighter II V to pop up, since that is the one I have the fondest memories of and I like to rewatch it very often, the vibe of it is just awesome. Just to hear here that it's apparently not very well known. I on the other hand heard about the American series here in this video, I knew the live action movie, but saw the anime from 1994 the first time this very year. And yes it's awesome and the fights are amazing but based on the atmosphere Street Fighter II V will still be my favorite Street Fighter series/movie go-to. So, I was kind of disappointed that it wasn't at least a bit more featured here, one cool scene, the awesome theme song, something. But at one point this long and impressive retrospective had to disappoint at least a little bit... ^^
Despite all its shortcomings .. I do believe that the Street Fighter movie was a fun watch and it has some historic importance as one of the first movies based on a videogame to be financially successful , even if its profits were not that huge compared to other hits of that period. The movie showed to the industry that productions based on videogames could be successful if done right. Oh ...and that was Raul Julia's last film.He was really sick but he still take the effort to work on this for his kids, who were great fans of the game.
I'm sure that Star Gladiator will be highly requested for a Fighting Game Retrospective now and I have no problems with that. Also, I have never heard of those pallet swaps of Blade mentioned when Thorgi was talking about him, are they in the files of the game? are they secret characters? what's going on with those guys?
I know it was just for a short joke, but thorgi's rant about street fighter and star wars being the same makes me want a Star Wars fighting game build a roster
Loved it. Some great insights into the live action SF2 movie and all the issues. I had heard some of it, but the detail you put in is always awesome that even as a long time fan I learn something new. I have a complete collection of SF games on Playstation consoles and the The Movie The Game was a tough one to procure. It is reasonably rare so I had to pay quite a bit for it at the time, much more than its worth. Also, always been a fan of the SF2 V anime. The V stood for Victory. It was always listed as the SF2 Victory Series when I was younger and shopping around for the VHS. And I do have the complete series on VHS and DVD still, even if I dont have a way to watch them anymore.
Kinda wish Gunloc was in an episode of SF as Guile's brother. Maybe if it had a Season 3, we could've gotten a family reunion and maybe Gunloc had Guile's family because if Guile can't be a family man then why not his brother? EDIT: Actually, he was along with Titanic Tim and The Great Oni but as mutants. Seriously.
I remember the audio commentary saying that Street Fighter II just added some characters and that Street Fighter III was based on the film. (I think the audio commentary was from before III came out.)
Great video as always. Thanks for all the hard work and effort you put into making this video. I definitely learned some facts about the Street Fighter live-action movie I never knew.
3:28 seeing the actions of one british bald man affect the entirety of youtube is very funny. respect for pointing to the sources IN the video and not some unorganized unlabeled pastebin, we love diligent fighting game journalism in this house🫡
Thorgi, I've been looking forward to this section of the Retrospective since it began. And you did not disappoint! There is so much I want to say, but I'll add some thoughts/trivia to The Legend of Chun-Li, since I have a personal poor choice connection to it. The movie hit theaters in February 2009, literally ten days after the home release of Street Fighter IV, and was meant to tie-in and promote it. I had a free day in my work week during that time, so I went to the theater and saw it. Yes. I paid for a ticket on day one. I was excited for a new Street Fighter movie and intrigued about it focusing on Chun-Li's story. Oh, boy... In no particular order: 1. Why does the movie focus so much on Chun-Li being a pianist? That was never part of her character in game and doesn't add too much in the movie's story. 2. Why did they include a smart mouth detective called Charlie Nash? They couldn't have made him a military guy, also after Bison? 3. Nash's partner? The female detective? Her name is Maya. SF IV lore says Maya is C. Viper's real name. So...is she meant to be C. Viper? 4. Neil McDonough is an AMAZING character actor. He played opposite Tom Cruise in Minority Report, has been in both the Marvel and DC extended universes, and even recently was opposite Kevin Costner in Yellowstone. Here? He's an Irish crime lord in Bangkok...who parents were Christian missionaries murdered by local thugs when he was a baby. So...he has an Irish accent because his parents were Irish. Accents are genetic in this universe. 5. And one of the worst scenes...Not to get into the topic of "queerbaiting", but in that club scene Chun-Li notices Bison's hench woman is eyeing other women. So...Chun-Li flirts with her and they do a sexy dance scene together before fighting in the bathroom where Chun-Li lured her. Except it's super clear Kristen Kreuk and Josie Ho are straight women who were uncomfortable and awkward during that whole take.
I completely forgot about the legend of chun li and when i saw bison immediately i just rolled my eyes. Of course they'd use the same guy who played damian dark and william birkin in that film. God this movie was weird
Man, this was not a birthday gift I was not expect today... But it is one I can appreciate greatly. Thank you so much for all of the work you do, Thorgi!
Also for one unexpected bit of hilarity for the home console release of the game, the font choice makes "2 hit combo" look a bit like "shit combo" at 1:32:11
I saw the animated movie before the live-action one (in french specifically). I knew Street Fighter II V because Joueur Du Grenier talked about it in one of his videos (in the 2010 to 2014 era if I recall). I also watched a parody dub of the scene where Ken and Ryu meet Dhalsim in the show. Just seeing the Alpha movie characters moving makes my brain tingle very much. Thanks A.P.P.P, from Jojo part 3 ova and Bloody Roar Primal Fury intro fame! The fact the Street Fighter movie has a french canadian dub, meaning that some of the greatest cheesy quotes of all time are said by voices I and a bunch of people bassicly grew up with (even if they translated the Tuesday line by replacing tuesday by Wednesday. Probably labial synchro, idk. The "Of Course" equivalent is dope though), and it's kind of a point of proudness to me about my province. I too would be glad to watch it with a friend, or even buy the dvd/Blu-ray. Good luck for the rest, even if you'll not cover Future Cops and the Korean anime movie.
1:14:58 Oh come on Thorgi...describing martial arts legend Benny "The Jet" Urquidez as "another stuntman" smells like blasphemy. The man was one of Jackie Chan's greatest opponents in his long movie career.
Your Fighting games retrospective are the best, no doubt! There is still time to start a Tekken one before January 26th . Or maybe another 3D Fighter like Virtua FIghter or DoA.
Great video as always thorgi. You actually just shed a lot of new light for me with this movie; really bittersweet overall when i think about it after ALLL these years looking at this movie. Also with that being said, Imma need capcom to surprise drop Shen-Long in SF6 at this point 😂😂💀💀
In a way, they already did. Not as a separate fighter, unfortunately, but as a secret challenger in the World Tour mode who uses Ryu's moves with inflated stats, if I remember correctly.
my favorite street fighter film is Future cops, the chinese knock off film where Guile, Vega, and Dhalsim have to travel back in time to stop Ken, Sagat, and E. Honda from killing Chun Li's younger brother, who is Goku, because he will grow up to become a judge and put M. Bison in jail. It features such great moments as Guile's musical number, Vega and Chun-li going on a date into Mario bros, and Blanka showing up and becoming a beach ball
I remember seeing SF2v the complete series available at my local Walmart back in 2007. I bought it & binge watched 2 to 3 episodes a day after school for the next 2 weeks. I never heard of the series until that day
Yes! New episode. I’ve been waiting on this for awhile. Just want to say thanks for these top notch quality retrospectives Thorgi. The level of detail is always outstanding. I know these videos are a painstaking effort to make. They are definitely appreciated.
Great job dude and holy cow the story behind the movie is crazy more than what I thought. I’m excited for part 5 your thoughts on street x tekken ps it’s a guilty pleasure but understand people’s problem with it.
Glad he brought up that creepy plot point in Legend of Chun-Li. Putting all the goodness of your soul into your newborn daughter has no place in a movie where you are just a boring businessman trying to kick people out of slums for gentrification using criminal methods.
As for Ryu being implied to be Akuma/Gouki's son: besides Star Wars there's Baki. The Legend of Chin-Li also had C. Viper in it but never called her C. Viper. Has Thorgi's gone over White Wolf's Street Fighter: The Storytelling Game in a pervious part?
The only voice that I liked in Street Fighter Alpha Generations was Ryu's. Only due to the fact that the voice actor also voiced Kenshin Himura in the 1996 Rurouni Kenshin anime.
Outstanding video thorgi. Another amazing masterpiece. Two things I have to say: one, I actually like Van Damme as Guile. He gave the character rizz before the term rizz was a thing. And it’s crazy how Stallone and Schwarzenegger were capcom’s first two choices. Now second, rest in peaceful paradise to Raul Julia he did a fantastic job as M.Bison. In my honest opinion: he was the living definition of an actor and you can tell by his performances that he had a deep strong love and respect for the art of acting. God rest his soul.
So sad not to see any love for the best and first live-action Street Fighter movie, the 1993 Hong Kong movie, Future Cops. It’s just a really fun movie.
Oh man! I loved this dive into the Street Fighter tv and movies! I will say the Assassin's Fist is WAY better than the two live action movies. We never EEEEEEVER mention Legend of Chun-Li, don't even get me started on that King of Fighters live action movie that's out there!
The story of Raul Julia to me (just hearing about it) sounds like a Tragedy. He was dying, and he took his role as Bison to make his kids happy because they were fans of the IP. He endured so much pain because he cared and loved his family. If that’s not a legend, I don’t know what to say.
I actually own the street fighter 2v DVD set and I love it. I'm pretty sure they re-recorded a few lines for the DVD because I remember watching it on KissAnime way back in the day and there was a terrible deadline that doesn't exist in my copy so I'm kind of happy for that as well and kind of sad that I missed out on the terrible deadline but...
The night I saw this movie was so special to me. That was also the 1st time I saw Tekken in the arcades! Man the 1st time I saw Marshall Law...shit honestly blew my mind and I'm a Virtua Fighter guy to the core! Those flip kicks left a mark on my soul! To this day when I see this movie, I think about that night...those memories still live in my mind vividly
FUN FACT: That's not even Sawada's voice! That was Michael McConnohie! Yes, the voice actor who voiced Tracks and Cosmos in Transformers G1 and would go on to voice Kano in Mortal Kombat 9 and X and SETH in Street Fighter IV and V provided the poorly dubbed Engrish of Captain Sawada.
As usual, a video 100% worth the wait. The only thing that still leaves me curious is related to the MIDI renditions of Street Fighter II themes you used all allong the video. So of course they are from the game, but they happen to sound like a less polished rendition of the MIDI soundtrack from the X68000 version of SSFII. Going from the principle that Incredible Technology was indeed given a prototype of said soundtrack by Capcom, of course they may not have known what it would become in parallel. Yet, especially nowadays, I would imagine some diehard Street Fighter fans being very interested in that kind of material, so it would be so ironic if it was just there in that crazy, almost so broken it's good, game. Oh, And while we are at it, is it just my imagination, or is the "reversal" voice clip the same as in the Wrestlemania arcade game from Midway?
SF2 The Animated Movie is one of my favorite video game movies ever. Not just fighting game movies, just video game movies in general! How can I not love a movie that lets us see Chun-Li's boobies? Easily the best scene in the movie! I also love Fatal Fury the Motion Picture, because it lets us see Mai's boobies! Anyway, does anyone else think that Street Fighter The Movie: The Game looks like a Mortal Kombat parody from a 90s sitcom?
