#Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over

[adamwatchesmovies]

Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over (2003)

I wasn’t able to track down any concrete proof that Robert Rodriguez reworked some unrelated, crappy script about kids going into a virtual world into an installment of the Spy Kids franchise but it wouldn't surprise me if he did. Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over has no spying in it whatsoever and barely features the characters from the previous films. Instead, it offers special effects so poor they’ll make you think you’re watching an unfinished version of the movie, awful performances, and a story that makes no sense. It’s so shockingly terrible the first time you see it, you won’t know what to say. If you’re brave enough to watch it more than once, you might find it hysterical.

Retired from the OSS and working as a private detective, Juni Cortez (Daryl Sabara) is called back into the field when he learns his sister Carmen (Alexa Vega) has gone missing. She entered Game Over, a virtual reality-based video game created by “The Toymaker” (Sylvester Stallone). The highly anticipated game is about to be released and the OSS has just learned that anyone who reaches the unbeatable level 5 will be brainwashed. In the virtual space where anything can happen, Juni summons his grandfather (Ricardo Montalbán) to help, unaware he and the villain have a history.

I should be given an award for concisely and semi-coherently summarizing this plot. Even Spy Kids 3-D doesn’t know what’s going on. Juni's goal is to prevent The Toymaker from brainwashing all children and escaping from his digital prison... at first. Once the film “reveals” that Carmen has been captured while inside the game, everyone forgets the global threat. The mission is now to rescue her and escape the game. Despite this, the theme of family - so prevalent in the other adventures - is completely absent. Antonio Banderas, Carla Gugino and Alexa Vega have little more than cameos as Juni navigates a virtual world created by someone who has obviously never held a controller in their entire life.

So little thought has been poured into this film it’s embarrassing. Juni begins the game with nine lives. As he progresses through the levels, he loses them by getting hit by rivals and falling from great heights. In theory, the closer he gets to zero, the more worried about him the audience will get. Except the way he loses lives doesn’t make sense. Sometimes he loses them one at a time, sometimes he loses as many as three from one hit. If it’s that easy to die, how come the beta testers he meets have all of their lives? Because they’re that good? no. Juni runs circles around them with ease. Because they’ve found extra lives at some point? no. One of them tells us they’ve never seen an extra life pack in the game before. What are they doing in this beta anyway? Shouldn’t the testing be done if the game is released in 72 hours? Why even have testers if the true objective is to brainwash kids and the fifth level is unbeatable? That’s the tip of the iceberg. This script feels like it was written on a bunch of dirty napkins while Rodriguez was waiting for executives to walk into the pitch meeting.

There is so much wrong story and script-wise I could go on longer but it's time to address the special effects and the acting. You might argue the horrible CGI is appropriate for a video game but this movie was released in 2003. It looks WORSE than the original Spy Kids and the game within the movie looks so bad no kid could believably be excited to play it. We're talking an ad for a local grocery store with delusions of grandeur bad. It’s The Phantom Menace cranked to a thousand. Not only can you tell the actors aren’t interacting with anything, they also have no idea where they should be looking. While their feet are sliding all over the floors, goop drips off of CGI armor so unconvincingly no kid - no matter how young - would accept it.

The lack of sets, costumes and props do no favors to the young performers. Daryl Sabara was always the weaker actor between the Cortez children and he’s awful here but at least you can give him some slack. He’s still a kid. Sylvester Stallone? The man’s got no excuse. With some funny costumes that include a military uniform, a bald cap and long hippy-like hair (all of which look horrible) he starts off as bad, becomes “so bad he’s good” and then spirals back around to being bad. One can only conclude from this embarrassing display that there is indeed long-lost hardcore pornographic footage of The Party at Kitty and Stud’s and that Robert Rodriguez is using it for blackmail purposes.

It’s so easy to tear Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over apart that you can probably have fun with it with your friends but to get the full effect, you’d also need to know how much of a betrayal to the series this is. I doubt your friends will be on-board for that kind of research and if they are, the laughter will turn to bitter tears. The first film is flawed but full of charm. The second one is ok for kids. This is a travesty. I can’t comment on the 3-D except that it’s kind of fun in a distracting, obvious and gimmicky fashion but I suspect anyone who watches the film with those red and blue glasses will leave with a headache. If you’re that invested in this, might as well stick all the way to the end of the credits for a small bonus too. (2-D version, July 24, 2020)

[justabunchofcrowsinatrenchcoat]

Absolutely devastating seeing people name movies that came out after 2005

what's the first movie you remember seeing in theaters? don't try and be all edgy and cool and say like tetsuo: the iron man. be honest.

Go!!

[heartbreakfeelsgoodinablog]

3rd mission. 3rd dimension.

[8-birdparagon]

Did y’all have a favorite movie as a child that you watched over and over again, much to the dismay of your parents?

[the-overseer2005]

The Guy said “cake” 20 years ago.

feel old yet?

[jessgirl2005]

The Guy said “cake” 20 years ago.

feel old yet?

[nexustoinsanity]

The Guy said “cake” 20 years ago.

feel old yet?

[snapscube]

Hi penny, I might have found the origin of "the deceiver"! Can't remember if you said you were a Spy Kids kid or not, but in the third movie there's a guy called "The Deceiver" whose goal is to lead the team down the wrong path, but he's undercover or something so everyone's just going who's the deceiver, are you the deceiver, XYZ is the deceiver etc etc. Maybe it's not where you picked it up from, but the movie came out in 2003, so that's probably where the phrase started?

ohhh that’s a VERY good guess!!! honestly i was much more of a Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over kid, tho i DID watch the first one a decent amount as well. definitely a possibility!

[sketchehm]

Had a silly idea

---------

"Dad! DAD!!!"

Sapnap stands up from his seat in a panic, turning around just as Milo and Naomi scramble into the room. Team Mafia said that they wouldn't hurt them, said that they would be safe while Sapnap worked, but what if-

Milo throws himself into Sapnap, knocking him back into the couch, Naomi jumping right beside them. They're both smiling, giggling and moving around like they eaten too much sugar.

"Dad!" Naomi grins, looking at him with those wide green eyes of hers, "we went on a work mission today! With Spreen! But he said you can't tell Papa!"

"Oh?" Sapnap smiles softly, unable to stop the fond look on his eyes despite the way his mind is racing to all the possibilities of what this 'mission' could have been, and why Spreen would tell the kids not to tell Dream, "and what did you do?"

"We-"

Milo starts, but Naomi slaps a hand over his mouth, shushing her twin

"Shhhhhh, he need to promise! You need to promise Dad, you promise you won't tell Papa?"

Sapnap sets his jaw, doing his best to look as serious as he does during his meetings with mafiosos.

"I do."

Both kids cheer and his masks cracks immediately, unable to stop the smile his kids always drag out of him.

"Don't hit your brother tho Naomi, even when it's to keep a secret"

"Sorry!"

Naomi chirps, but Milo is too focused on telling the story to mind the slap

"So Spreen came to us and he told us he had this plan to find the best ice cream in the whole city right? But!" Milo puts up one little finger, "But his English isn't that good, so he says he gets embarrassed to order-"

"I think that's silly!" Naomi cuts in, "His English is really good! Much better then my Spanish."

"Yeah! But we agreed, because we're super nice, so we went out to get ice cream."

"It was like a spy movie Dad! We had to like. We judged the look of the place before we even went in and the seating-"

"I ordered! All three times!" Milo puffs up his chest, "Naomi was too much of a scaredy cat!"

"I got shy! There's nothing wrong with being shy, Dad is shy-"

"You got ice cream three times?"

Sapnap interrupts their banter, raising am eyebrow. So that's why they weren't supposed to tell Dream.

"Yeah! It was so fun, Spreen got us a notebook to keep our scores!"

"But it has to stay in his car so no one finds out. It's a secret. Oh! Dad I ordered on a place where everyone spoke Spanish!" Milo slaps his little hands against Sapnap's chest, "It was like, scary, but Spreen helped me! It was really good to, I liked that place. It got a 21 out of 25."

"It would have been higher, but they only had like. 5 places to sit. So they got a low seating score. Sad!"

Sapnap huffs out a laugh, gently pushing Naomi's face. Oh my God the kids are aging zoomies.

"Get those high beams out of my face, my god you get those from your father," Sapnap smiles, hearing Naomi giggle behind his hand. He let's go of her, kissing then both on their foreheads before pushing them off the couch, "Go go, go play, go make someone's life hell, or else you'll tear the house apart at bed time"

The two of them take off, their little steps sounding around the house as they look for a new victim.

Good thing they had plenty of them now huh?

SO FREAKING CUTE AHHH

The kids go out CONSTANTLY with different Team members hehe :3c

They go to the coolest parks and ice cream shops and restaurants!!!! It's so much fun :D!!

(Their favorite to terrorize is ElRich :3! He plays boring old man games and it's really silly! But they also bet quarters and dollars with him to win some monies cause gambling is fun!!!)

I think the kids here would recognize all three dad's are always at home now!! And if they ever leave it's to join them going to the park!! Along with all of the new grown up friends/uncles/more dads who always join!! Together always yippie :D!!!

[weaselandfriends]

Were SAO and Ender's Game just a coincidence, or are you deliberately seeking out stories about "gamers"? If it's the latter, would you consider Iain Bank's "The Player Of Games" to fit the brief?

It was a coincidence, actually. I reread Ender's Game recently to prepare to read Speaker for the Dead, its sequel, which I had never read before. Meanwhile, most of the anime I'm watching is part of a groupwatch group of webfic authors. One of the members of the group, Gazemaize, has never seen much anime before, and wanted to watch anime that were particularly influential. We started out by watching all of Evangelion, and then decided that Sword Art Online would also, in a tragic way, qualify as massively influential...

I haven't read The Player of the Games, so I can't comment on that.

I did cut an extended section from my SAO essay on the history of video games in media. This section is fragmentary, but here it is if you're interested:

When Nintendo revived the video game industry in America in 1985, it did so fighting an entrenched social stigma against the term "video game." Two years prior, Atari crashed the market by flooding it with barely-functional shovelware; on top of lingering consumer mistrust, many considered video games to be a fad past its expiration date.

Nintendo tackled this stigma primarily through deception. The Nintendo Entertainment System was marketed not as a "video game," but as a multipurpose electronic toy. As part of the trick, the company drew on its nearly century-long history as a (non-video) game and toy manufacturer, bundling the console with toy-like peripherals like R.O.B. and the Super Scope.

It worked. The NES was a massive hit. But its success came at a price, at least regarding the cultural conception of video games. During the arcade era, video games had primarily been a teen activity, with arcades not just a location to play but a place to hang out. Now, though, the overwhelming image of video games was as a toy for children.

This image was reflected in media about video games. The pre-crash Tron (1982), despite being a Disney movie, was rated PG (before PG-13 existed) and starred an adult Jeff Bridges in a plot revolving around corporate espionage. Not a single child character appeared in the film. But the post-Nintendo The Wizard (1989) starred a 12-year-old Fred Savage and a 9-year-old Luke Edwards. Nintendo would also license multiple Saturday morning children's cartoons, such as The Super Mario Bros. Super Show (1989) and Captain N: The Game Master (1989). Nintendo's kid-friendly mascot characters became the cultural face of video games, recognized by billions worldwide.

Slowly, though, the demographic reality of gaming and Gamers changed. By the mid-90s, hardware had advanced enough for sprawling, narrative-dense RPGs like Final Fantasy VII (1997) to replace the cute, mascot-driven platformers of the preceding generations. By the early 2000s, graphics were capable of depicting gritty, realistic warzones, and first-person shooters became explosively popular thanks to titles like Halo: Combat Evolved (2001) and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2007). Teens once more became the core demographic, and adults who grew up with games were sticking around too.

But video games were still not taken seriously by the public at large. Either the kid-friendly image persisted, as through Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over (2003), or video games got sent to the horror movie ghetto via a startlingly long series of cheap, critically-panned films: Resident Evil (2002), House of the Dead (2003), Doom (2005), Alone in the Dark (2005), BloodRayne (2005), Silent Hill (2006), Stay Alive (2006), and the equally-startling number of sequels those films collectively spawned. Most of these adaptations were only marginally faithful to the source material, as if even slasher horror was too good a genre to consider video games a worthy mode of storytelling.

[odetochildhood]

Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over (2003)

Flushed Away (2006)

Robots (2005)

Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004)

Monsters, Inc. (2001)

Sky High (2005)

[chongoblog]

What's your favourite movie from 2003?

Either Curse of the Black Pearl or Spy Kids 3-D Game Over

[starwarsmum]

Day 29, finishing up on Third Time Lucky! Prompt is I Spy

Part 1 Part 2

@maribat-calendar-events

“Come on Lil D, I promise it'll be fun!” Dick said, a slight whine in his tone as he looked up at his not-so-little, younger brother. It was strange just how tall Damian had become, almost matching Bruce for height. “We're stuck here until the class gets here anyway, we might as well play a game to pass the time.”

“Grayson, I am not a child, I do not need to try and amuse myself whilst waiting to complete a job,” Damian shot back derisively. Dick gasped and held his hand to his heart as though he had been wounded.

“Dames, buddy, you don't have to be a kid to enjoy games. Besides, I'm bored but I can't play it alone.”

“Your inability to prepare for an assignment is hardly my problem,” Damian replied scathingly, giving him a disgusted look. “And the class is landing in four minutes, so I really do not see the point in arguing any longer.”

“But they'll have to get through customs and grab their luggage, so it's not like they'll be here all that soon,” Dick argued, bouncing on his toes slightly in agitation. 

But Dick ended up being surprised at how quickly a bunch of fifteen-year-olds came trooping out of the arrivals gate. They were led by a familiar looking girl, her dark hair shining in the fluorescent lights of the airport as she glanced quickly around the area. 

He knew the moment she spotted their sign, which read ‘Bienvenue, les etudiants de Francois DuPont!’ in bright, glittery blue, because she immediately switched direction to lead the group directly to them.

“Hello!” She said brightly in English, coming to a stop directly in front of them. “Thank you for coming to collect us, my name is Marinette Dupain-Cheng and I am the student representative for our class.”

“A pleasure to meet you all, my name is Dick and this is my brother Damian,” he replied, making sure to speak more slowly than usual for anyone who wasn't as fluent in speaking English. He turned to gesture to Damian only to find him staring at the petite French girl. He turned back to find her looking back at Damian with a thoughtful expression (and a blush) on her face.

“Mon dieu, toujours les yeux verts,” a dark skinned boy said under his breath to a girl wearing glasses, who stifled a laugh and elbowed him. At the implication of green eyes, it only took Dick a moment to place the memory of a young girl with dark hair and blue eyes. He was honestly annoyed at himself for not recognising her sooner given how closed off Damian had been those four years ago when Dick had met her the first time.

Marinette, adorably, had flushed even more as she turned back to hiss, “Nino, arrête-ça! I'm sorry about my friend, it has been a long flight and he left his manners in Paris.”

“Oh, that's okay! But you're right, if everyone has their luggage we should really go and get you settled at your hotel.”

A cheer went up as Marinette translated for anyone who looked confused and they all began moving towards the exit. Dick glanced over to check on Damian, only to find him approaching Marinette. She smiled up at him, but Dick was too far away to hear what they said to each other.

_ _ _

Marinette hated long flights, but she was beyond excited to win the Wayne Enterprises Class Award, granting her and her class the opportunity to visit the business and an affiliated school. So she had made sure she knew as much as she could about the program, the flight and the itinerary for the two weeks they would be staying in Gotham. 

But that very same excitement kept her from sleeping during the flight so, even though it had been planned so that they could land to spend half a day settling in and the rest exploring some of the safer areas of Gotham, the only thing Marinette wanted to do was sleep.

“Maribug, did you get any sleep on the plane,” Adrien said with a huff of laughter as they stepped to the end of a long queue for customs. 

“Sleep is for the weak and uncaffeinated,” she quipped immediately, wincing when he gave her a playful shove. “Watch it, furry, I'm not above crying to the chaperones to get you in trouble.”

Thankfully they were interrupted by a member of staff who opened a new lane for customs and gestured for them to come through first. Marinette gave a silent thanks to Tikki for that small piece of luck and then a second one when all of their luggage was out and accounted for in a timely fashion.

The group were chattering excitedly as they stepped out into the arrivals area but Marinette tuned them out as she scanned for their chaperones. She practically melted in relief when she saw two dark haired men waiting for them with a cute sign to welcome them.

As the class approached the pair, she felt a tingle in her gut and felt a memory tickling at the edges of her tired brain. She shoved both of them away as she greeted the men, first turning to the energetic looking one before locking eyes with a man she couldn't imagine being much older than them with vivid green eyes.

She completely zoned out and missed what the man was saying until she heard Nino joking about green eyes. She felt a blush take over her entire face and was mortified as she told him off before apologising and hinting that they should all head to the hotel.

Thankfully the man agreed and Marinette let herself fall to the back of the group to hide her embarrassment. But the green eyed boy came directly to her and she felt her face heating up again.

“Hello again,” he said quietly. She hardly noticed the amused looks being sent her way by Alya, Nino and Adrien. The only thing she could really focus on was how closely he stood and just how green his eyes were.

“Hi,” she squeaked, fidgeting with the strap to her backpack. “Um, it's nice to meet you, I'm Marinette Dupain-Cheng and I- already told you that.”

“It is a pleasure to see you again, my name is Damian.”

“Again?” She said, feeling like a blue screen was playing in place of the crucial memory of meeting this absolutely stunningly attractive boy before. But her tired brain just fizzled out until she gave up and looked down shamefacedly. “I'm sorry, I don't remember when…”

“That is understandable, it was several years ago now,” he said smoothly, though he was smiling slightly sadly. She wanted to apologise more, but he merely shrugged and took hold of her suitcase. “Perhaps we can talk about it at a later time, when you have not just traveled on a plane for a third of a day?”

“I would like that,” she managed to say after only a beat or two’s silence. And when he smiled at her again, she wondered if he could hear her heart beating out of her chest.

[spy-kids-database]

DVD ad for Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over.

[sophieinwonderland]

Watching r/systemscringe react to The Plurality of... Bill Cipher, and one of them brought up Spy Kids 3-D

This is something that's slipped under the radar for me since it's been years since my host watched this movie, and we don't remember most of it.

But for context, here's a clip of what they're talking about...

I could absolutely see this as plural-adjacent... But also not quite plural.

They're computer programs that Toymaker made, like making an AI chatbot based on youself.

What makes Bill's plurality plural is the fact that these different Bills are in his mind, sharing his body with him. These voices in his head appear to have their own consciousnesses just like the main Bill.

The argument that it's just a fun way to show villains thinking doesn't really account for the fact that... it's still happening... Just because portraying a character as plural is fun and makes things more interesting doesn't to see doesn't change the fact that the character is still being portrayed in a plural way.

Back to Spy Kids 3-D, is it plural?

I think it could be if you take the perspective that the game itself is plural, being a single machine that functions as a mechanical brain and contains multiple consciousness agents. Both NPCs like the Toymakers' copies of himself and the people whose minds are trapped there could be viewed as parts of the system, with the uploading of physical people's minds into the machine being a sort of sci-fi "system hopping."

But then, with that interpretation, it's not the Toymaker who is the plural system. It's Game Over, the game he created. And everyone in the game is within its inner world.

[quinloki]

I just now saw your kink game and I'm jumping on this. Since I'm such a basic bitch I choose breath play, choking, and orgasm denial for Law, Kid, and Crocodile. Please and thank you. 😘

<3 There's nothing basic about a good kink ^_^

We'll do these by character in order of being provided -

I'll probably say it while I'm writing these out, but please if you practice breath play please be careful! Breath Play has a notorious reputation of going south easily because people underestimate it.

If you have an interest check out this starter section on minimizing risks associated with it. Consent is sexy, and safe BDSM means getting to do it more often XD <3

Alright, enough reality land, let's get into these head canons \o/

Law:

Breath Play - Because of the versatility of his devil fruit, Law is a solid Yes for Breath Play of all kinds. It's all the rush and almost no risk, but he still has plenty of prep and such that he'll do to keep things in order. The point is about control, and as such he'll be sure that he maintains that impeccably. I imagine there's even a point where he pulls your heart or lungs out, and lets you watch as your body struggles.

Choking - A strong Yes again. But don't follow the captain's lead on this one, instead of just using his hands, Law will bring props - ropes, belts, etc. into the scene for it. There's far less risk for a slip with props when you can shambles them away in a split second. Careful monitoring again, letting you drown in the sweet mix of adrenaline and pleasure.

Orgasm Denial - Oh god you don't even know - Stoic as he is (or tries to be) otherwise, Law has always been a bit of a brat behind closed doors. Certainly a dom, but just as much a brat, and being able to deny you that final plunge over, and over, and over again and again is something he can easily delight in. There's a lot of control in it as well, so it hits more than one big button for him.

You ask for it one time, but after that it's almost entirely consigned to the realm of punishment play. Frustratingly good as it is, it is pretty hot when he finishes on you just as you're whining for yet another denial.

Kid:

Breath Play - Eustass is a Sure on this one. He doesn't have the capacity for safety for it that Law does, but he's not against it either. Ever the consummate kinkster, he'll be sure that the two of you are on the same page about it, setting up additional safety sounds, like finger snapping or you smacking your hand against something. Bondage is kept light during these sessions specifically so you have access to those kinds of movements easily.

Choking - I think Eustass was more of a I dunno on this - until he made a prosthetic that let him "cheat" a little. Managing to cram a few medical sensors into the palm and fingers he easily comes into a Yes on this one. The hands on aspect brings it up for him, feeling you twitch and struggle under his fingers.

Orgasm Denial - FUCK Yes - Eustass will tease you, rile you up, deny you over and over until you're a crying sputtering begging mess and then he'll force so many orgasms out of you afterward that you'll be begging him to stop. "C'mon, (y/n), make up your mind. First you're begging to cum, now yer beggin' me to stop." Not that you can answer him in the midst of another orgasm, but that shattered uncontrolled pleasure is what he was after anyway.

Sir Crocodile:

Breath Play - Overall Crocodile is a Sure for breath play. It has it's risks, and he's experienced enough to be fully aware of them. The comforting thing in a very uncomfortable thought, is that he's probably used breath play to dispatch an unwanted suitor/spy. Because of this he is keenly aware of where the line is, and has a experience-driven knowledge on being able to stay on the... safe side of it. He's only fairly neutral about it because you're not unwanted, and if he's not careful he'll risk something he means to keep.

Choking - Solidly more of a Yes for this, because of how more hands on it is. He prefers direct control, and he can watch your eyes, your face, and feel your pulse this way. Getting to hear and feel you squirm in pleasure makes it even better. While he only has one functional hand for this kind of thing, it still works out well - it's big enough, and the cold smooth metal of that hook caressing your body when you're on fiery edge from the choking certainly doesn't take away from the experience. >.>

Orgasm Denial - How Crocodile vibes this is a Sure, but how "good" he is at has much more passion to it. He won't seem to have much of an opinion one way or another, but if you put him in a mood he'll be denying your orgasms for days. Especially if you've irritated him in some way. You cannot beg this man into giving you relief, and if you try to find it on your own you might find yourself immobile or monitored for long stretches of time until he decides you get relief.

(A quietly adorable thing you may notice with time is that if you don't finish neither does he. >.> Take that as you please. )

Kinky One Piece Head Canon