Part of growing up is learning to see your parents not as just your parents, but as human beings. It’s a right of passage, a sort of epiphany that marks your first true steps into the world of adulthood. You find yourself eager to put aside all past turmoil and disagreement and engage with the people who gave birth to you on a human level, as equals. Then you come home and realize that this desire for human connection is entirely one-sided.
The closest I have so far come to bonding with my father as an adult man is watching an entire movie together, and even that is an extremely uphill battle. Here is every film from his favorite actor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, ranked by how likely he will actually sit through the entire movie and sort of tolerate my presence in the room.
35. Junior
After a quick “This is the future liberals want!” he’s storming out to the bar. That might be for the best.
34. Kindergarten Cop
Our dad has never been big on children, a message Mom was kind enough to dictate into every birthday card growing up. He did say he likes the first 20 minutes of the movie and then it “Turns to absolute dick” after that.
33. Maggie
He lost interest once he read the words “A dedicated father” in the streaming service description.
32. Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines
He gave up once he realized there was a female Terminator. “They expect us to believe a girl could be a Terminator?!” He actually said that before leaving the room, and I’ve been unpacking how stupid that sentence is for hours.
31. Terminator: Dark Fate
To be fair we couldn’t make it all the way through this one either, but I made it further than Dad who walked off after his joke “There’s a dark fate for ya, women drivers!” didn’t get a laugh.
30. Last Action Hero
This movie was kind of a bomb, sure, but since it centers around a kid desperate for approval from a father figure, Dad wouldn’t even give it a chance.
29. The 6th Day
Best nap we’ve ever shared, that’s something.
28. Collateral Damage
Anytime John Leguizamo was on-screen Dad would say “I bet he did it, he looks like an MS13 guy.” I tried explaining that it wasn’t a mystery, and they showed who “did it” at the beginning of the movie, and he got mad at me and left the room.
27. Red Sonja
Dad thinks Brigitte Nielsen’s career was part of a government psyop to make men “confused.” He refuses to elaborate.
26. Terminator Genisys
Did you know that the Terminator’s mildly paternal demeanor in this film was “part of the liberal war on straight white masculine alphas?” Dad didn’t teach me to ride a bike, drive, or shave but it was super important to him that I learned this.
25. Batman & Robin
Another one dad bailed on due to a major plothole: “A guy with a body like that would just get a new wife.”
24. Jingle All the Way
Dad was never big on Christmas. Every year when we would open gifts in the morning he would stay in bed, coming downstairs only once or twice to tell us all to keep it down. He just doesn’t do well with expectations like gift shopping or decorating or showing the slightest shade of warmth toward children he made. He is on record saying Sinbad is “One of the good ones,” but he’s not sitting through “Jingle All The Way.”
23. Sabotage
My dad is highly critical of anyone with a neck tattoo unless they’re a cop. Then they’re “real men.” Why do I want to connect with this guy again?
22. Eraser
I actually have no memory of this movie. No one does. If you have ever watched this movie please let us know.
21. True Lies
James Cameron’s hit action/rom-com was a miss for Dad because “Women shouldn’t have their hair all short like that.”
20. Stay Hungry
I thought this movie went a little off the rails but in a fun way. My dad thought all those hippies needed haircuts and then went out and stood on the back porch looking towards the treeline for what seemed like four hours.
19. End of Days
Yeah, weirdly Dad went all in on the mediocre apocalyptic action film “End of Days.” To this day he still wears a WWJD bracelet, which he thinks stands for “What would Jericho do?”
18. The Expendables
Honestly, these movies are pretty unwatchable, but for some reason Dad likes them, and if sitting through them is my only shot at having at least one meaningful conversation with him in my adult life then I’m just going to have to suck it up.
17. The Expendables 2
As soon as the credits started to roll on “Expendables” he threw on “Expendables 2” without a word. At first, I thought he was just that desperate not to talk to me but he is glued to this thing. I actually heard him say “It’s even better than the first one.” Not to me, obviously, but to himself.
16. The Expendables 3
This is brutal, but he spoke to me! He turned his head, looked me in the eye, and said right to my face “They’re old, but they can still get the job done.” I have no idea what “The job” is, these movies are so bad your brain deletes them as you watch, but I’m starting to see why my 65-year-old hard-ass of a father loves them so much.
Look, something has to be ranked last. “Bacchanal ‘N’ Philadelphia” is a great album, as it’s really just a bunch of snippets of early recordings and split singles given a nice fluffing up and repackaging. It’s mellow, it’s melodic, and it reminds us that even our mistakes can be beautiful. Well, maybe not beautiful. But they can still be fun, if occasionally requiring tetanus shots sometimes.
This is Mischief Brew’s first album and, you know what, it really embodies that quality. It’s not bad by any stretch – in fact for a first album it exemplifies much more of a developed identity than many bands go their entire career without figuring out. Whether that means that Mischief Brew were bound for greatness or that most punk bands straight up just suck boring eggs is for you to decide. “Smash the Windows” is a smash, but there’s better mischief on the horizon.
Mischief Brew sure do love their splits – and we’re not just talking about the groin-bursting high kicks that lead songwriter Erik Peterson would frequently break into during practice to, as he claimed, “protect the band enemies above.” No, here we’re talking about split albums, and this split with Joe Jack Talcum of the Dead Milkmen showcases two of Philadelphia’s greatest punk songwriters at their finest. Listening to Talcum and Peterson’s songs side by side show the obvious influence between the two artists, and the Mischief Brew cover of “Watching Scotty Die” is a perfect melding of the energy from both. Just remember though, no matter how amped up this record may get you, take it easy on the high kicks – you’ll give yourself a hernia, kid.
In 1494, Hieronymus Bosch completed his now famed painting “Cutting the Stone,” depicting a medieval surgeon extracting the stone of madness from the head of a fool via primitive trepanation. In 2011, Mischief Brew released “The Stone Operation,” which posited the philosophy “why don’t we just cram that motherfucking stone right back up in there?” The album showcases Peterson’s “hobo poet” persona to its furthest extent, and it delves as equally into straight forward three-chord punk rock as it does into traditional Romani caravan concertos. Basically, “The Stone Operation” deals those unaccustomed to distorted folk songs a real kick in the stones.
Odds are that if you’re a fairweather Mischief Brew fan, or have just spent any amount of time in an anarchist coffee shop in the past fifteen years, then this is the album you will be most familiar with. “Songs From Under the Sink” includes classics like “Thanks, Bastards!” and “Coffee, God, and Cigarettes” which provide as ideal a soundtrack for a unionized picket line you dare not cross as it does for bothering the heavily tattooed barista who just wishes you would take your fucking cortado and walk away from the counter.
To say that Mischief Brew’s style aged like a fine wine is cliche as all fuck and insulting to who they were as both a band and likely group of alcoholics. But to say they aged like a fine jugged juice forgotten in the back of an eastbound headed boxcar until a runaway train punk named Scooter Rust found it on his way to the Philadelphia railyard, now that makes sense. Mischief Brew’s penultimate album makes full use of their full band lineup without losing any of the intimacy of Peterson’s singer-songwriter origins. Songs detail scenes of love, squalor, love for squalor, and, without filter, depict blue collar day to day life in a way that feels lived and genuine, and not like some punk rock ethos cash in effort. Though it may not be the album that first comes to mind when most people think of Mischief Brew, it is undoubtedly the band at their most creatively ambitious.
