Sequels are Rules

This post will require some filler from my NU friends, with whom we were wacky.

The title is taken from a saying of Quantum's, that "Games are Rules." Sadly, I was not at the drunken revels that produced this tidbit of wisdom, nor do I quite know what it means, but the implication seems to be that games, in a strictly ontological sense, are only a composition of the rules that create them. I'm sure others could expound on this theory at length, but I merely bring it up as a tie in to my actual point.

In undergrad we came up with a loose set of rules governing movie sequel titles. Every Movie 2 must be, in some form, "The Revenge." The revenge of what was always unspecified, for that extra ominous bit. The third, taking it's cue from the Darkman saga, had to be "Movie 3: Die Movie, Die." Then, because we figured sequels had really hit their peak with the Leprechaun series, the fourth movie in a non-trilogy series must be "Movie 4: Movie in the Hood," whilst the fifth would inevitably be "Movie 5: Movie in Space." We felt that the transition from hood to space only made sense, as once one was in space, the odds of returning to Earth (and to the hood, no less) were astronomically (pardon the pun) slimmer.

Now, this isn't horribly inventive, but it did afford us no manner of glee. And, more important to this post, it spawned one of our truly marvellous running gags. I believe it was Irish McJew who had to watch Cyrano de Bergerac for a film class (or a French class, or a French film class), and this prompted him and Quantum to come up with the sequels, according to our schema. Which gave us the following:

Cyrano Deux: La Vengeance: In which Cyrano is awakened from cryogenic sleep in the late 20th century only to be horrified at the burgeoning European Union and it's trademark currency, the euro. Thus prompting the catchphrase: "La Euro? Sacrebleu! La vengeance, c'est ma noit" (I am unclear on the spelling, as I never took French. Roughly, it translates to "The vengeance, it is now!" Feel free to correct me if you want, McJew). I believe in this film, Cyrano would battle the euro, and, somehow, cyborgs (though the cyborgs may have been in a later film).

Cyrano Troix: Mort Cyrano, Mort. Don't remember the plot of this one, or if we even expected the franchise to go this far. I believe it involved some kind of long-lost enemy of Cyrano's, maybe a returning character presumed dead in the first film.

Cyrano (French for Four): Cyrano dans La Ghetto (Cyrano in the Hood, again feel free to correct my spelling): I forget what Cyrano did in the hood, but I believe the movie would also feature Snoop Dogg, who had just made cinematic history with his recent release Bones (which, sadly, we never did see).

And then there was Cyrano Five: Cyrano in Space, whose French I don't even pretend to remember. This may have been the one where Cyrano fought the cyborgs. I do remember that, after seeing Jason X: Jason in Space (where Jason got an upgrade), we felt that Cyrano in space had awesome potential for slaughter and French taunting.

Anyway, if you're one of my old NU folk and you remember this gag, feel free to add in any other information I'm missing. Might be worth a laugh, and I have very little else to post, since the semester is winding down and we're all busy. Or maybe I'll have a hilarious post tomorrow about how much the mechanics are going to charge me to fix my car, which has taken to stopping at random times. Just pray I make it to the dealership tomorrow.

Question of the day: Who was Sloopy, and why did he need to hang on?