5 Movies That Could Have Been Fixed By Swapping Their Flaws

When it comes to fixing bad movies, usually the solutions are obvious: Better story, better special effects, less Mark Wahlberg, etc. And a good rule of thumb is to never apply the bad parts of one movie to another film. No one making Deadpool ever said "Whoa, rewind. This is great shit, but it's really missing the Ryan-Reynolds-as-a-fleshy-mute-super-condom charm that X-Men Origins: Wolverine had."

But let me propose to you an advanced math equation: What if we did? And let me add another level to it: What if we took two movies, exchanged their flaws, and that switch actually made both films better? I know, you didn't come to Cracked for some dang ol' calculus. But I believe that in a few cases, if you took the worst parts of two questionable movies and exchanged them, you'd end up with two awesome movies. "Which movies, Daniel, you sex baron?" Why thank you for asking, people in general.

The biggest issue with The Phantom Menace isn't Jar Jar Binks. Nor is it "Now THIS is podracing," though that is the quote I hear just before I wake up screaming for the mercy of any deity that will listen. No, the big problem is that in the realm of Star Wars, which is built around huge themes and climactic battles and unforgettable characters, The Phantom Menace seems to be kind of about nothing. There are trade regulations and a kid that might do something later and Liam Neeson's haircut. These are the only things that we're really given to latch onto. The rest is just a smattering of weirdness. The main villain is a ninja vampire with lightsabers that he duct-taped together, which is a far cry from the lumbering menace of Darth Vader.

On the other hand, The Force Awakens is too full of "classic" Star Wars moments. Remember in A New Hope when Luke was all like "Ugh, I wish I had less sand and more power converters" as he looked off into the twin sunset of Tatooine? Remember the music that played, "Theme For An Angsty Farm Nerd" by John Williams? That scene is ingrained in our heads. Well, the aim of The Force Awakens seemed to be a movie that is nothing but these scenes, a montage of "This is FUCKING IMPORTANT" moments. And it's not a bad film by any means. But it does feel strange to watch a Star Wars that seems to be asking me for a standing ovation every few minutes.

However, if you took this flaw from The Force Awakens and applied it to The Phantom Menace, suddenly the latter film gets the gravitas it needs to pull it out of the Watto-filled pit that it's dug for itself. The Phantom Menace desperately needs moments that we'll remember when we leave the theater, moments that feel even slightly Star Wars-ish. Sure, these moments are often ripe for parody the second they hit our corneas, but a grand, sweeping, orchestral bombshell is infinitely preferable to Qui-Gon taking future galactic douchebag Anakin aside to give him a Jedi anatomy lesson. To paraphrase a quote from the most annoying kid in my seventh-grade class, "WHAT WERE YOU SMOKIN', GEORGE LUCAS?!? HAHAHA. DRAGON BALL Z, EMINEM, ETC."

And if you took some of those sweet, inexplicable oddities from The Phantom Menace and sprinkled them throughout The Force Awakens, you'd get a movie that really felt like something we'd never seen before. Imagine that ninja vampire in The Force Awakens. He doesn't even have to be the main villain. You can still keep My Chemical Romance Vader, but throw in Darth Maul as a side quest. That shakes things up and holds The Force Awakens back from being A New Hope: Remix Edition. You might get a scene in which Rey fights Darth Maul. Rey. Fighting. Darth. Maul. If that doesn't sell you on a whole new trilogy, I don't think there's a lot of hope for you.

Casino Royale is a great origin story for Bond. In the post-Batman Begins era, when every action hero seems to require reinvention in some suitably gritty, self-aware way, Casino Royale managed to feel like an organic piece of storytelling, and not the product of a film executive demanding that all jokes be cut and replaced by monologues about vague suffering. But after Casino Royale, we got Quantum Of Solace, which was about ... water shortages? Look, I'm not saying that we need to go back to the days of Bond using a remote-control helicopter to drop a bald, kitten-loving villain into a smokestack, but maybe give us something with a bit more whimsy than an unscrupulous utility company.

Spectre, on the other hand, was all about trying to make you believe that this was the biggest thing to happen to Bond ever. Remember every Daniel Craig Bond movie? The main bad guy in Spectre was secretly behind all of that. All the villains worked for Spectre and somehow failed to mention that. Remember every chase scene and fight sequence and doomed makeout session? They all led to THIS, Mr. Bond, because Spectre is important, goddammit. It is. Every plot twist in Spectre feels like the boast of a deluded child. "You say your uncle works for Nintendo? Well, my uncle IS a Nintendo."

The switch is easy: Give Quantum Of Solace just a tiny bit of the rampaging "You thought you knew James Bond. Think again" bluster that Spectre had. Just something to indicate that I'm watching a real, awesome James Bond movie, and not the James Bond equivalent of a phone call to his bill collection company. "The price of water is going to go up? Well, I certainly can't have that. I'm James Bond. Can I speak to a manager? I'm James Bond."

And then take Spectre down a notch with some of that classic Quantum Of Solace disappointment. I mean that in the best way possible. Bond has fought a ton of villainous organizations over the years, but Spectre has always been number one. They kicked over his sand castles, stole his prom date, and threatened the safety of that world he lives in. They're significant. But we don't need to flip the whole James Bond table over when we explain why they're significant.

Don't give them a plot wherein they're trying to create a monopoly on a country's water supply, but also don't given them a plot that piggybacks on the plots of the movies before it in a shallow attempt to add weight. It can still be meaningful without begging to be seen as the most meaningful thing that's ever happened to any character in the history of fiction.

I love the Blade films like they're my children. If I ever do have children, my first will technically be my fourth, because I became a proud father in 1998, when Blade came out. But like any father, I was a little disappointed when my beloved son didn't quite stick the landing at the end of the movie. After 100 minutes of bloody, grimy hand-to-hand combat, a bunch of dudes exploded into skeletons and went inside the evil Deacon Frost. What? Why now? I'm not going to cry out for realism in my vampire movie, as "spirit skeletons with wings" will always come out of nowhere, but it's definitely a shift. This is followed by a short fight between Deacon and Blade, the greatest line in movie history, and a needle being spin-kicked into Deacon's face.

At the end of Blade: Trinity, however, Blade is taking on Dracula. Fucking Dracula. And the climactic scene between a vampire hunter and the ultimate vampire is ... a very simple fight. Wesley Snipes grunts and kicks. Dracula grunts and punches. Grunting and kicking are on Blade's resume, but you'd think that during a final confrontation with Dracula, the filmmakers would put some icing on the cake. Also, it kind of makes Dracula look bad. He's been a symbol of nearly unstoppable terror in dozens of films, but as it turns out, the secret all along has been to kick him, like, a lot.

If anything, the ending of the first Blade should've been a dozen minutes of Blade slowly chopping the shit out of Deacon Frost, followed, of course, by the greatest line in history. It fits the tone of film to cap it off with a measured ass-kicking, and not a headfirst dive into the bottom of a pool of craziness. That should've been saved for Blade: Trinity. Of course, we all dreamed of Blade turning into a ten-part series, with each installment somehow outdoing the last in terms of Blade quips and undead decapitations. But it's starting to look like we might not get that, which means that Blade: Trinity might as well have gone all-out in its attempt to make Dracula look like something more than a buff dude who hates smiles. Flying bones coming out of bodies, little bats that turn into people when they come inside, Blade singing the soundtrack as he does literally anything in the movie -- you name it and I'd honestly be fine with it. It's Blade: Trinity. It's not like you're gonna make it worse.