The Force Fed Sci-Fi Movie Podcast

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Time travel this week with the Force Fed Sci-Fi team as we go over the film Looper (2012) and discuss the movie cast, give our thoughts on Joseph Gordon Levitt's makeup in the film, attempt to give a Looper movie explanation, and finally give our Looper rating and review. Hold onto your noses and don't forget to listen to the podcast episode!

Looper Movie Explanation

Many of us look for a Looper movie explanation after watching the film as the time travel doesn't seem to make sense and there are some plot holes here and there. While Rian Johnson even said himself that this film is more of a character study rather than a time travel movie, it would have been nice to have gotten a bit more science out of the film, even if the science is based off of theoretical time travel.

One question that comes to mind is, the rainmaker (Cid as a grown-up having the loopers close their own loop, although we never see him grown-up as the rainmaker) is described as having a prosthetic jaw. Now at this point in the film, old Joe (Bruce Willis) hasn't come back in time yet, who ends up accidentally shooting Cid in the jaw. How can he be described as having a prosthetic jaw if old Joe hasn't come back in time yet to shoot him? If you have a theory, please explain it to us! The only thing we can think of is that Cid grows up to the rainmaker no matter what possibly?

We'd like to think that with young Joe (Joseph Gordon Levitt) protecting Cid as a child affected him where he doesn't end up becoming the rainmaker though. He also becomes the rainmaker because his mother is killed, assuming it is a looper and most likely old Joe when he comes back in time. However, for whatever reason, in this timeline that we watch and get with this film, young Joe stops the loop this time by, unfortunately, sacrificing himself so that his older self didn't exist.

This causes another time travel paradox and makes it difficult to explain the events of this film. If young Joe sacrifices himself by taking his whole life, then old Joe would never have had the chance to come back in time and cause the conflict that envelops the majority of the movie.

These are only a couple of explanations that we can attempt to provide, but we also just pointed out the flaws that the movie poses in regards to time travel. Hence ... why we needed a bit more science about the film's time travel!

Looper Movie Cast

Joseph Gordon Levitt as (young) Joe

Despite the appearance they decided to give Joseph Gordon Levitt (not his fault), he does a good job at playing young Joe. Apparently he studied Bruce Willis' mannerisms for a long time. It seems the filmmakers really wanted there to be a resemblance between old Joe and young Joe (apparently they didn't want to address the issue of their hair though?)

Bruce Willis as (old) Joe

We mention in the podcast episode that some say this is the last performance that Bruce Willis actually cared about and gave effort into his role. He did a great job in this film with his part, but after this, we do argue that Willis has only gone for the "B-level" action films since. What do you think?

Emily Blunt as Sara

Emily Blunt does a great job as Sara, Cid's mother. And while it is part of her character and doesn't have to do with Blunt's acting (which was wonderful as well), her character is not such a good mother. Cid has trouble controlling his emotions if you've seen the film. Her solution (until the final scene that is)? To hide until Cid is done dealing with the difficult emotions he is plagued with in this movie. Not such great parenting, right?

 

Jeff Daniels as Abe

While his role is smaller in this film, Jeff Daniels delivers more of a serious tone to his character, but is still able to keep a bit of a comedic tone. In my opinion, that can be hard to do for actors,

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