Hot Shots! Part Deux(1993)

Submitted by Tornado Dragon

SHORT VERSION:
Topper, Ramada, and their team get into the Iraqi prison camp and rescue Col. Walters and the hostages, and after one of the hostages tells them that Dexter is being kept in Saddam Hussein’s palace nearby, Topper heads over there. Inside, he comes face-to-face with Saddam and has a comedic duel with him until President Benson appears to assist him, and after Benson orders Topper to find Dexter and get him out, he continues the duel with Saddam.

Meanwhile, Ramada and the others get to the rendezvous point and find Michelle – the CIA agent co-leading the rescue mission with Topper – and their helicopter waiting for them, but Michelle tells them that they need to forget about Topper and Dexter and get out of here now. Ramada then reveals that she knows that Michelle is the saboteur of all of the previous rescue missions, and they reveal that they were once close friends in college until they had a falling out, and Michelle swore to make Ramada pay someday. Michelle explains that she had Dexter imprisoned and sabotaged the previous missions so he would stay imprisoned, and then, after she realized that she couldn’t win Topper’s heart because he was still in love with Ramada, she tried to have him and the rest of the team killed. Ramada ends up having her arrested.

Topper frees Dexter and gets him to the helicopter, and Benson defeats Saddam by freezing him – as well as his dog – with the contents of a fire extinguisher, and Saddam falls backwards onto his dog and they both shatter. However, after Benson leaves, the heat from a nearby fireplace melts their pieces, but their pieces join as they reform themselves, resulting in Saddam gaining the facial features of a dog. He then heads toward the Americans’ helicopter with his men. Meanwhile, Topper tells Ramada that he is going back for Benson, and she needs to join Dexter on the chopper because she really belongs with him. However, when Dexter tries to get a picture of her and Topper before leaving, he backs up too far and falls over a cliff to his death.

Benson then appears, and he and the protagonists take off in the chopper just as Saddam and his men arrive. The chopper’s pilot soon informs the others that they are carrying too much weight and need to lose some, so Topper and Ramada push a piano out, which falls onto Saddam and crushes him. Topper and Ramada then kiss as they fly off into the sunset.

LONG VERSION:
While Topper (Charlie Sheen), Ramada (Valeria Golino), Harbinger (Miguel Ferrer), Rabinowitz (Ryan Stiles), and Williams (Michael Colyar) are traveling on a fishing boat towards the prison camp where Col. Walters (Richard Crenna) and the hostages are being held, Ramada informs Topper that she is a married woman and has been before they met, but she never told him about her husband because she thought that he was dead. She explains that he worked for the government training pilots for the CIA in Germany, and they had told her that he was killed over Villenstulden. The day before she and Topper were supposed to go to Hawaii to elope, she received word that Dexter was alive in a Berlin hospital, and she had to go to him, but she was told that she had to keep this completely confidential, hence why the farewell message in the goodbye card that she subsequently sent to Topper didn’t provide a clear reason as to why she had to leave him (and her sudden departure left Topper so crestfallen that he decided to retire from the Navy). Ramada tries to tell Topper that she knows how he must feel, but he resentfully replies that she doesn’t.

When the quintet are soon confronted by an Iraqi patrol boat, Topper notices that Harbinger is nowhere to be seen, and the Iraqi soldiers eventually open fire on them when the disguised Ramada blows their cover by going into the ladies’ restroom since women are not allowed to fish. As the protagonists return fire, Harbinger jumps off the boat and swims straight to shore, and Topper soon has the rest of the group do likewise while he single-handedly engages the enemy troops. Though the Iraqis are able to wreck his boat enough to cause it to start sinking, Topper kills them all and destroys their boat in return, and the explosion sends him flying through the air until he crash-lands on solid ground right where the others have gathered. After collecting his thoughts, Topper accuses Harbinger in a roundabout way of being the saboteur of the previous rescue missions based on his absence during the patrol boat attack (and considering that he was the only member of the other teams to escape), but Ramada separates them before they can get physical and reminds them that they have a job to do. Meanwhile, President Benson (Lloyd Bridges) is told by his top advisor that he has received word from Michelle (Brenda Bakke) – the CIA agent co-leading the mission with Topper – that Topper is missing and his boat has been demolished, and they need to come up with a plan now because this may be their last chance to get the hostages out. Benson thus decides to take two soldiers, sneak into Iraq by water, and saves the hostages themselves.

Just before they hit the prison camp, Ramada speaks to Topper alone and tells him that her husband is freedom fighter Dexter Hayman (Rowan Atkinson) and that he is one of the prisoners that they have to save. Though she explains how important a role that Dexter has played in her life and how she feels she owes him everything, Topper is still too sore over their breakup to really listen to her. The group soon begins their attack, and after silently killing or incapacitating several of the guards, the group finds the building where Walters is being kept imprisoned. Walters makes eye contact with Topper through the door’s window blinds and uses hand gestures to tell him to get the keys resting on a table next to a sleeping guard. Using an open window next to the guard, Topper gets a broomstick and threads it through the ring of keys, then tosses them to Walters. Unfortunately, just after Walters gets them and gets himself out, the guard is awoken by a sneezing mouse crawling near his head. Walters hits the guard in the face with a flyswatter, which causes him to fall backward and hit his head on the alarm button. As the rest of the compound’s soldiers rush over to the building, Walters gets outside and tells Ramada where the hostages are being kept, so they head over to them while Walters heads for the back gate to fight the soldiers there.

While the heroes free the hostages, Ramada finds out from one of them that Dexter is being held in Saddam Hussein’s (Jerry Haleva) palace nearby. Topper then finds Harbinger hiding and outright accuses him of being the saboteur of the other missions, but Harbinger breaks down and explains that he is only hiding here because he feels burnt out from fighting and feels that he can’t keep doing it any longer. Topper inspires him to get up and continue fighting, and after sending Harbinger in the direction of the main gate to engage the Iraqis further, Topper lays waste to scores of soldiers. Afterwards, he meets back up with Ramada and the others, and Ramada tells everyone that the pad for the helicopter that will be picking them up lies half a mile from the compound, but Topper tells her that they can’t leave without Dexter, having had a change of heart. Ramada then notices a dying soldier taking aim at Topper, and she is able to get in front of him before the soldier shoots, taking the bullet in her chest. Thankfully, Topper finds out that the bullet was stopped by the locket he gave her back when they were dating that has their pictures in it, and Ramada tells Topper that, no matter what happens, she wants him to know that she never stopped loving him. Topper helps her to her feet and tells her to get to the helipad with the others and wait for him.

Topper sneaks his way into Saddam’s palace, but he is soon confronted by Saddam at gunpoint. Topper easily disarms him, and they then get into a comedic duel using various items. Just as Saddam gets the upper hand, Benson suddenly appears to back Topper up, and he soon sends Topper off to get Dexter while he continues the duel with Saddam. Meanwhile, Ramada and the rest of the team make it to the rendezvous point to find Michelle and the chopper waiting for them, but Michelle tells everyone that they must leave now and forget about Topper and Dexter because the enemy artillery will be down on them in seconds. Ramada then reveals to Michelle that she has figured out that she is the real saboteur, and the picture all came together when she saw her here. We then learn that they were roommates and close friends in college until a bungee jumping incident brought all of that to an end, and Michelle wrote in Ramada’s yearbook that she was going to ruin her life if it was the last thing she ever did. Michelle soon runs off into the Gauntlet from American Gladiators with Ramada chasing after her and demanding to know how she could hurt so many innocent people, and as they go along the Gauntlet until finishing with the Joust event, Michelle explains that she had Dexter imprisoned and sabotaged the other rescue missions so he could stay imprisoned, all just so Ramada could suffer as much as she felt she made her suffer. Then, when she discovered that she couldn’t win Topper’s heart because he was still in love with Ramada, she tried to have him and the rest of the team killed. After being visibly gladdened by the fact that Topper loves her, Ramada tells Michelle that she turned her back on America because of her own petty jealousy and she will pay for it, then knocks her out with her pugil stick.

Meanwhile, Topper finds Dexter, but he has to carry him all the way to the helipad because the Iraqis tied his shoelaces together. Benson defeats Saddam when he freezes both him and his dog with a fire extinguisher, and then he pushes Saddam down onto the dog, shattering them both to pieces. However, after Benson departs, the heat coming off the fire from the nearby fireplace melts the pieces into liquid, and Saddam and his dog start to reconstitute themselves (not unlike the scene in the steel mill from Terminator 2: Judgment Day where the T-1000 was frozen, shattered, and melted before reconstituting itself). Unfortunately, their liquids get mixed together, resulting in Saddam gaining the facial features of a dog.

The altered Saddam exits the palace and hitches a ride in a jeep with his men, telling them to take him to the Americans’ helicopter. Topper gets to the extraction point with Dexter just as Walters cuffs Michelle’s wrist to his, and after Walters tells him about Michelle’s treachery, she asks Topper to help get her off the hook, but Topper refuses without hesitation. Ramada meets with Dexter and hugs him, but he soon tells her that, now that he is back together with her, he is eager to start hitting up the talk show circuit in America. After Walters stresses that they all need to go because the Iraqi troops are closing in, Topper tells everyone to go on ahead because he is going back for Benson. Ramada tells him that she is staying here with him, but he replies that she needs to get on the helicopter with Dexter where she belongs. He explains that, while he loves her and wants to be with her, they both know she belongs with Dexter. Just as the chopper is started up and Ramada says goodbye, Dexter tries to get a photo of her and Topper together as a great visual for the talk shows, but when he backs up to get a good shot, he goes back too far and falls off the edge of a cliff to his death.

Benson then shows up, and they get on the helicopter just as Saddam and his troops arrive, and Saddam gets out carrying an RPG, wanting to blow up the helicopter himself. The chopper’s pilot tells the others that the aircraft is carrying too much weight and needs to lose some, so Topper and Ramada push a piano out, which lands right on Saddam and crushes him. Topper and Ramada then share a passionate kiss as the helicopter flies off into the sunset.