Theme Song: Bad Guys had a full soundtrack album release full of groups you’ve never heard of or barely remember.
“Bad Guys” by Precious Metal, who were an all-chick hair metal band similar to Vixen, Girlschool, etc. Nobody really liked these all-chick bands. There was a video produced for this song, which plays over the closing credits.
“Snap Dance” by Hand Tools plays during not one, but two montage sequences. Different montages, exact same song. And it’s super terrible, yet the filmmakers felt it needed to be heard twice in the film. No further information is available about Hand Tools.
Interesting Dated References: The slightly more innocent realm of 80s-era professional wrestling; Movies that cater directly to a small segment of the population (boys who are 12) and have no regard for other demographics.
Best Line: Said without innuendo by two men to a woman — “We’re gonna go take a shower.”
Social Context: In the 80s, everyone liked to fantasize about Americans defeating Russians with feats of strength. Rocky IV was probably the pinnacle for this fantasy. Now take the script for Rocky IV and hire naive white kids to rewrite it, drop in some studio musicians, and there you have Bad Guys.
Summary: Dave and Skip are beat-duty cops who also enjoy participating in small-time wrestling events held in high school gymnasiums. After getting kicked off the police force for police brutality during a biker gang bar brawl, the duo wander from job to job trying to make ends meet.
This includes construction work and male stripping. During the stripping sequence the crowd of women are thrown into such a crazy cock-frenzy they storm the stage. Bad Guys came out before everyone shamed themselves into being uptight. PG movies could still have sex references and innuendo and it was okay.
Skip, played by Adam Baldwin (Full Metal Jacket, Firefly), looks ridiculous with bleach blonde hair and matching eyebrows. It’s disturbing and there’s no way he could drive women into a frenzy. Later that night, two lecherous women try to pick up Dave and Skip, but the guys refuse because the writer of Bad Guys wants all 13-year-old boys to know that old women are disgusting and less than human.
The next day the guys decide to call Janice, an eager reporter who offered to help their wrestling career. The first big match she arranges is against the Kremlin Krushers. After 40 minutes of slapstick wrestling action, Dave and Skip win, but fail to engage the crowd because their wrestling names are Dave and Skip, as if they are some type of folk-pop duo.
So they go to see Turk McGurk, who is played by renowned stuntman/grappler Gene LeBell. Knowing that there’s someone in this world who can put “world-renowned stuntman/grappler” on their business card makes every job title you’ve ever had a big disappointment.
Turk trains Dave and Skip to become The Boston Bad Guys. This montage sequence goes on forever and contains the terrible song mentioned above. For their first big match, The Boston Bad Guys live up to their name and (again) throw the crowd into a frenzy by attacking other wrestlers whose gag seems to be that they are priests.
Throughout the course of Bad Guys, there has been an unnecessary side plot about wrestling manager Lord Percy, who wants to take over some shitty bar with the help of a biker gang. There’s a bunch of turmoil between the cops, Dave and Skip, and Lord Percy leading to a big wrestling finale.
On the way to the big showdown, Dave and Skip are accosted by the bikers, rescued by the cops, and show up at the match in the knick of time. Then because this movie is for 13-year-old boys, Sergeant Slaughter shows up to help wrestle. Remember when you were young and the world was fucking awesome and not controlled by corporations, and Sergeant Slaughter had a fucking tug-of-war match against Bigfoot the monster truck? Remember how you were so excited and full of Kool-aid your fucking head almost exploded when Slaughter defeated Bigfoot? Holy shit, the world sucks now.
After another 3 hours of wrestling action, the Boston Bad Guys win the match and defeat the Russians. Since everyone is really proud of the song “Bad Guys” by Precious Metal, the entire video plays for the duration of the credits. This song made three appearances in the movie.
Worth Noting
Poster and Box Art: For the home video release they decided to cater once again to young boys.
And possibly shove in some homoerotic overtones. This illustration looks like Tom of Finland in colored pencil. It’s nuts.
Availability: No.