FollowingThe Hollywood Reporterdropping the news that the team behind Netlix’sCobra Kaiwill be working on aDuke Nukemfeature film,AV Clubfollowed up with a characteristically snarky article asking simply “Why?” They wrote, “Why the hell are the Cobra Kai guys making a Duke Nukem movie? […] It’s the sound of the bottom of the barrel being well and truly scraped.”
1990s gaming character Duke Nukem exists frozen in the 20th Century, like Mike Myers inAustin Powers, or perhaps more aptly: a man out of time. Through the heady video game wars of the 90s, Duke was the big brother and hard-R equivalent of Super Mario or Sonic. Iconic and recognizable with his yellow hair and pants held aloft by braces full of grenades, Duke was this musclebound, machine-gunning product of the late 90s—spoofing the movies and the intensity of the time, while simultaneously adding to it. Duke was popcorn, best enjoyed at two a.m. after a few beers when you just wanted to make a load of aliens blow up.
Introducing the Duke
Building directly on the successes of the first-person shooter genre ofWolfensteinandDoom(and Duke’s own previous foray in side scrollers), Duke’s creative team, 3D Realms, would opt for the ingeniously simple idea to give their protagonist a voice—and thus a personality.Duke Nukem 3Dswore, frequently. He smoked stogies and was pulsating with machismo, to the point of being a sexist. In between animated bars and strip clubs, he kicked ass and was incredibly violent. Nukem was a jock and a meathead, and the video game world loved it (Duke Nukem 3Dalone sold over three and a half million copies).
More games followed, with graphics improving as they jumped from MS-DOS to the N64 and Playstation, eventually transitioning to third person. While the weapons updated, becoming more varied and fun with each new addition, added emphasis was also given to the storylines, which involved loose set-ups where Duke would have to travel through time to save dystopian lands made up now solely of the opposite sex.
Duke Nukem For-Never
And then, after 2002, Duke disappeared. The ill-fatedDuke Nukem Foreverwas released nine years later across multiple platforms, and the return we got entirely disappointed. With the game having been touted since all the way back in the franchise’s 90s heyday, the wait had appropriately felt likeForeverat this point.
Relatively basic and with buggy gameplay, Duke didn’t come back with the explosive bang the fans were hoping for (orpromised in misleading trailersall the way back at 1998’s E3). Some even felt straight-up cheated by the “finished” product. Critics ripped the game to shreds and effectively gave Duke his last “game over.”
In an eye-opening and all-encompassing piece forWired, Clive Thompson wrote:
Broussard simply couldn’t tolerate the idea of Duke Nukem Forever coming out with anything other than the latest and greatest technology and awe-inspiring gameplay. He didn’t just want it to be good. It had to surpass every other game that had ever existed, the same way the original Duke Nukem 3D had. But because the technology kept getting better, Broussard was on a treadmill.
Douche Nukem
Today’s landscape doesn’t really crave or even need Duke. He is, in every sense, a dinosaur of a character. No one believed he would show up inSmash Bros(or wanted him there), and theForevereffort left a dissatisfied taste in fan’s mouths after having to wait so very long. This was a character that didn’t necessarily die out, but rather was killed by disinterest.
And in a post-#MeToo era, Duke also now simply comes off as problematic. His rescuing of “babes” (a main goal of each of the levels in the earlier games) simply just wouldn’t fly in today’s film or game market (looking back at someDuke Nukembranding alone is eye-wateringly dated with, one ad reading “If you don’t playDuke Nukem 3D, you like men!").
The Duke Nukem character has been on life support since his failed return to gaming, only now kept alive by nostalgic memories of earlier games and a smattering of non-sequitur voice-overs on TikTok videos. Even worse for the character, the games thatDuke Nukemhad previously bested in the 90s (WolfensteinandDoom) are still extremely popular today and often critical gold for their innovations, leaving the buff bully Duke Nukem as a relic of the past, looking like some punk who peaked at high school—now fat, graying, and on his third wife.
Duke Nukem: Back Off, I Know Karate!
But we’re going to go out on a limb here, and say that with the news of Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz, and Hayden Schlossberg attached to aDuke Nukemmovie, this could actually be incredible. These guys resurrected the damnKarate Kid- another previously beloved series from the past that no one then gave a crap about—and punched and kicked it into an ugly and crude form that current audiences could consume. Their hit Netflix series,Cobra Kai, has now been running for four whole series.
Previously Hurwitz and Schlossberg worked on theHarold & Kumarflicks and (the far better than it should have been)American Piemovie,AmericanReunion, showing that they can do crass adult humor. Heald also co-wrote the cult classicHot Tub Time Machine, bringing evidence that the team has experience with sci-fi. These boys have loads of experience in no-hope projects aplenty.
Related:Duke Nukem: Why Cobra Kai’s Creators Are the Perfect Choice for the Adaptation
The footing is there. Over the last five years,video game movie adaptionshave shown that they can be done faithfully and sell tickets too. With theSonic the Hedgehogmovies, alongside the wonderfully funMortal Kombatpicture in 2021 and the announcement of a long overdueSuper Mariomovie, theDuke Nukembrand certainly has big enough balls to make this work—even after such a long hiatus.
Nukem-ular Fallout
If this proposedDuke Nukemmovie wants to keep its blockbuster main character, it must update to a current generation and appreciate that he hasn’t been current in over 20 years. So give us time travel, but set it in the current day; even this year, why not? And show how much the world has moved on from the throbbing hard-Duke sexism of the 1990s, but ironically still has the same taste for its bloody violence. Make the character clueless and sad inside all those bulging muscles; again, he’s a man out of time.
This series has always had a sense of humor (one of our personal favorite sight gags remains the scientists in theLand of The Babesgame, who are still essentially supermodels, just with lab coats to differentiate them), so there could be a great joke in the idea of a feature-length gender reverse. A female twist onDuke Nukemin anIdiocracy-style world is a mouth-watering premise.
Related:Here’s What Makes John Cena Perfect For Superhero Movies
And we’re not saying make it “woke” (hell, Duke Nukem has always been closer to bedding Miss America than being her). Far from it, make it as crass, cocksure, and obnoxious as it needs to be, but just don’t punch down and make it mean. AV Club thinks Duke is a joke. Okay, make him a joke, but a funny one again.
Is John Cena the Duke of 2022?
Speculatively going one further, there’s a reason that fans of the endless rumors behind aDuke Nukemmovie have beencalling for John Cena’s casting. The high demand for a Cena Nukem stems from him not only looking the part (as a pro wrestler, Cena’s body might as well be animated), but because he essentially already did it with this year’sPeacemaker. In the hit HBO series, Cena starred as a backwards killer who believes that as long as he’s killing for his country and patriotism then it must be good. Obviously, the characters are vastly different even if they look remarkably similar; but Cena,granting over 650 wishes for Make-A-Wish, is the kind and likable person who could give Duke Nukem charm beneath the chisel.
Is a whole movie going to be a major balancing act to get right? Absolutely. Duke’s content is as radioactive as the toxic waste insignia attached to his very name, but there’s so much potential with the source material and in the names already behind the scenes. As long as that team is careful, and respectful when it counts of these changing times, then aDuke Nukemmovie could be a scream. Then again, if they’re not careful, then this promising team may end up falling on their own sword.
