Rare Flix with Kicks: Tiger Claws III (2000)

At last, the Trilogy is complete.  Well, calling this a Trilogy is a bit specious.  Today's Film is Tiger Claws III, the final Film in the Series courtesy of the year 2000.  Given the Time Period, will it look like The Matrix?  Nope.  Instead, they go for a late-'80s vibe, which is weird for the Film made farthest from then.  I won't SPOIL it just yet, but the Film goes for the vibe of one specific Film from the early '80s.  As for the rest, it feels like a Sho Kosugi Film- good or bad.  As noted last time, Bolo Yeung was retired at this point (he mostly still is) and does not appear.  If you recall, his 'redemption' story was wrapped up via magical time travel.  Well, as long as there's no silly magic in this one.  Jalal- our Star and Producer- is still center stage, now with even less Cynthia Rothrock.  Is it bait-and-switch on his part or the people that market the Film?  I'll go with 'yes' for both, but more for the latter (since they know what the final product is and lie anyways).  The Plot is just plain weird for a number of reasons.  If I tell you it now, there's not much reason to read further, so I'll just be a giant tease and tell you to read on...

Jalal and Cynthia are back in New York...because no reason given.  They are trying to stop a Robber and do so, only for him to get away.

As thanks, the Owner of the Museum invites him to his big event.  He has the uniforms of 3 Ancient Masters and they are 'blessed' by a Ceremony...done by the same guy who tried to steal them.

Lightning strikes!  This...resurrects the 3 Ancient Masters somehow and they attack everyone.

The trio are all mute & consist of a big, scary guy, an older guy with a beard and a mean woman.
Figure out which Film inspired this one yet?!?

In the chaos, they kill Cynthia with one of their energy blasts. 

By the way, they can shoot energy blasts.

In a bit that was confusing at first, Jalal seems to find his old Master- only that guy was said to be dead in Part 1.

Well, he is.  This is just another Master.

If you think I was joking about the late-'80s vibe, here's Jalal culminating his 'defeat the 3 Masters' training like he's in Rocky IV. 

It all eventually leads to a battle in *sigh* a generic Office Building (just like Revenge of the Ninja btw).

While Jalal fights the Masters, *his* new Master has a one-sided beatdown of the main Villain.  Joy.

The fight seems to go pretty easily at first.  He bests the lone female Master in about a minute, while the big guy is taken down by an errant blast from his comrade.

The final one proves to be the most difficult, but is ultimately defeated when his necklace (and tether to this world) is destroyed, leading to...

Time mother-f@%$ing resetting.  No, really.

It goes back to the initial lighting strike and the duo arrest the guy before he finishes.  Cynthia is back alive Deadpool 2-style to do...nothing.  No more Sequels.  The End.

This is...just silly fun.  The Plot of this one is just bonkers.  I was wondering what they would do after, you know, the MAGIC TIME PORTAL in the last Film.  Well, they managed to add more magic, albeit at the cost of less Rothrock.  She's sidelined after two Fight Scenes, save for a dream sequence and then the ending.  In her place is the new Master- who is fun, to be fair- and his Daughter- who does nothing, really- to help train him.  We don't have Bolo, but we have his K-Mart equivalent in the mute giant Master and the previous villain's replacement as Generic Evil Guy.  He's even more generic and more evil than the last guy!  Speaking of those Masters, every Review- admittedly there's like 4- I found for this Film jokes about them being the bad guys from Superman II.  I mean...yeah, kind of.  For this comparison, Jalal has to be Superman, so I guess that's a bit of a stretch.  The new stuff does add some genuine (accidental) humor as the effects are pretty cheesy (see below).  The trade-off for the silliness is that there is more Action throughout the Film than in the last Sequel, so that is a plus.  There's some cheating involved- like Jalal's back-flipping stunt double on loan from Beowulf- but it is otherwise fun.  The actual Plot is just not as interesting as one might hope when all is said and done.  In a weird way, it returns the Series to its roots as a cheesy Action Film, even as it has guys that shoot lightning and warp time itself...

Next time, I celebrate a religious Holiday with a Film.  I mean, if you can't (and shouldn't) go to a big Church service, what are you doing then?  Stay tuned...