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deke-rivers-1957 · 4 months

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Kung Fu Elvis Part 2

After all this time here's an official part 2 to this series. I hope that my tidbit for each film after Girl Happy held you over until now. This isn't meant to replace those tidbits but expand on them.

If you're new to this series the point of this is find out which Elvis character is the best fighter given an uninterrupted hand to hand combat styled fight. The goal is to rank each individual Elvis character and then within each tier determine who would win against who.

How I plan on determining this will be each character's age, size and general background. How well a character does in on screen fights will also be considered but analyzed on a case by case basis. Sometimes an Elvis character loses a fight simply because it's a comedy, or due to the low quality stage fighting wins because his opponents are laughably weak.

At the end of the day this is all headcanon as these are all fictional characters. If you disagree with how I rank a character I would love to hear your thoughts on where you would put them. I hope you enjoy part 2.

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Jailhouse Rock is a movie that is meant to take place in the same year it came out. I just don't have enough evidence to suggest otherwise so for the sake of this argument it takes place in 1957. A 1957 Lincoln Premiere is seen when Vince wants to buy a new car which tells me that he likely went to prison in 1955/56 and left in 1957 14 months later. Vince Everett's occupation before going to prison was a construction worker. We know he operated machinery but don't know exactly what his job required him to do. He seems to have enough extra money to go to the bar so it's safe to assume that by 1950s standards he was eating enough for a man of his age and size. It would still be safe to assume that Vince is lower middle class since he does mention numerous times about coming from "the backwoods."

We don't have any concrete evidence about what Vince's age is. And since the movie takes place over at least a year that would also make determining his age difficult. He's old enough to buy alcohol which based on state laws at the time you had to be at least 21 (there were some exceptions but for simplicity's sake purchasing age was 21 as we have no idea where Vince is.) Given Vince's attitude and cockiness I don't see him as being any older than 25 by the end of the movie. Since Elvis himself was 22 when he made this film, I'd say Vince might've been 22 at the beginning of the film and 25 at the end.

Paradise Hawaiian Style has Rick Richards who's a recently fired pilot looking for a job in Hawaii. Since we have evidence that Hawaii is in fact a state as Americans are regularly seen doing business there, we can assume this movie takes place after 1959. We also know that the Polynesian Cultural Center exists in this movie so we can assume this takes place after 1963 as the center was opened in October of that year. Given that I'm not an expert in determining makes and models of vehicles, I'm going to assume this takes place the year it was filmed which was 1965. We don't know for sure how much money Rick made, but if we assume he was a pilot in the 60s and has worked with different big named airlines he would've been able to live comfortably. He can fly planes and helicopters based on his commercial's pilot license. Pilots back in the 60s were paid really well so we can assume that aside from his periods of unemployment Rick was able to eat well but he wasn't very active given his occupation.

We can make the very obvious assumptions that Rick is an adult but not middle aged or elderly just by looking at him. Also he can work for big name airlines and go to bars which means he has to be at least 21. To save myself the hassle I'm using modern guidelines that determine how old you have to be before you can get a commercial pilot's license. Given what Rick says at the beginning about how he's worked with several big name airlines, we can assume that he's had his commercial pilot's license for years. Even though we don't know his exact age, given our assumptions and Elvis' age when he made the film, Rick is about 30 years old.

Clambake is very interesting in that we know exactly what year this takes place in and the character's canonical age. Despite some of the mistakes on the prop itself, we know from his license that Scott Heyward was born in 1940 and that he's 27 years old. For that to be the case, Clambake has to take place in 1967.

Scott Heyward was born to a rich oil tycoon and we can assume that he's lived a privileged life based on the large gifts he was given for various birthdays and his inability to relate to Dianne having to do things to save money. Assuming it wasn't part of his ruse he has a degree in engineering and spends a lot of time on experiments. He's well fed but not as active.

Finally we have Charlie Rogers from Roustabout and there's surprisingly enough evidence to assume when this movie takes place. His motorcycle is specifically a Honda Super Hawk which was produced from 1961 to 1967. Honda reached its peak status when it became the largest motorcycle manufacturer in 1964. Part of the reason why Charlie had to stay at the carnival is because there's a supply chain struggle with getting parts. Despite being around for a few year, Japan was in the process of establishing a market in the US so a lot of developments needed to be made. You also see black people working there and visiting the carnival which tells me this is when Jim Crow laws were being challenged starting in 1954. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was actually being discussed during the production of this film and would eventually pass before the movie was released so you can assume that this movie takes place around 1964.

As for Charlie's age that's a bit more difficult. We know he was born in a swamp town outside of Shreveport, LA but we don't know when or how old he is now. We know he's old enough to operate a motorcycle and work in a teahouse as a performer which serves alcohol so he's at least an adult between the ages of 18-21. Despite being viewed as this "rebellious punk" I personally don't see Charlie as being younger than 25. He just has a lot of maturity that would be akin to someone in their late 20s. Since Elvis filmed this in March 1964, I would say that Charlie would be the same age at 29.

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Even though Vince is between 22-25 I don't see him as the best fighter. We can't assume how much muscle he developed as a construction worker and he might've even lost muscle while he was in prison. Despite being seen shoveling coal, prisons back in the 50s were not obligated to provide you nutritious and filling meals. Also because of the safety concerns there's no way they would prisoners anything requiring sharp utensils. Even before he went to prison Vince struggled to win against a man considerably older than him. Yes Vince did win and accidentally kill him, but I personally don't think that would happen in real life. We've seen Deke punch someone the same way and the other guy didn't die so it just doesn't seem realistic that Vince would end up killing him. He was never able to beat any of the guards in prison and made the conscious decision to not fight Hunk. A conscious decision not to fight doesn't affect a character's rank, but losing fights they purposely start would.

I still stand by my ranking in his tidbit post. Vince is C tier. He might be able to win some fights but he just isn't capable of winning against someone stronger. He would be a wildcard at best and a glass cannon at worst. Anyone is able to get a lucky hit in regardless of skill. Vince would win if he's able to get a lucky hit in but he just doesn't have the strength or durability to handle drawn out fights.

Rick actually fights three people in the same scene. However I don't consider that to be an actual fight scene. The way the fight was staged looks so unrealistic that even though he won, I just don't take it seriously. He does use a flipping technique in his final confrontation which does give him points as you have to have some level of skill to do that. The average person just doesn't have the ability to do that without severely injuring themselves. That's a skill that would need to be taught.

I still stand by my ranking from my tidbit post and put Rick in C tier. However I would put him ahead of Vince. Even though he wouldn't be as physically active, it would be beneficial if he's in good shape. That being said I do see Rick as having a weight advantage over Vince so I think he would be more capable of taking hits than he would. I just don't think that he would win if his opponents were stronger fighters. He might be able to last longer than Vince would, but ultimately he just doesn't have enough fighting experience or skill to win. Based on MMA standards, 30 would be past a fighter's peak so he might also be at an age disadvantage depending on his opponent.

Scott punched Jamison once. That's it. That's literally the only thing we have to go off of regarding his physical skill as a fighter. He might technically have an age advantage over Jamison, but we have no idea just how skilled Jamison is. He could've been capping about his skill level in karate or he could be a triple black belt. We have 0 idea so only having one punch thrown gives us 0 idea on just how capable Scott is as a fighter.

If I absolutely have to rank Scott I would put him in C tier. I have no idea how he would compare against Rick or Vince since one punch means absolutely nothing. If we're to assume on the basis of his background, Scott wouldn't have any real reason to learn how to fight. He's lived a privileged life and more often than not keeps to himself in his lab work. I don't think he would take the time to work out when he's doing lab work given how much time he puts into it. That being said, it just isn't fair to assume how well he would do as a fighter when all we have to go off of is one punch. Again one punch is not an indication of skill so I stand by my decision in his tidbit to mark Scott as Does Not Apply. If anything I don't see Scott as someone who would fight people regularly. He's more likely to talk things out or ignore transgressions.

Charlie has had multiple physical confrontations and fights with various outcomes but would constantly get interrupted before a winner is officially determined. His best showing was when he had to take on three people at once. Even though he was interrupted before he could face the final person, he still managed to easily take out two of them in a realistic way.

Charlie is easily the best fighter of this group. Maybe I'm selling him short but I still think he's in B tier. He has enough skill to be a great street fighter. He can beat multiple people at once if they don't have the same experience as him which would get him far. That being said, he won't be able to beat opponents who have more professional experience. The amount of raw skill he has just wouldn't be enough to beat an opponent with technique and the actual training that goes into being a professional fighter.

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To summarize for this part:

Charlie in B tier.

Rick is in C tier.

Vince would also be in C tier but I would put him below Rick.

Scott does not apply and therefore doesn't have an official rank.

Tagging: @karel-in-wonderland, @crash-and-cure, @lynettethemadscientist, @leighpc, @alienelvisobsession, @seredelgi, @southcarolinawoman, @ohmygiddd, @arrolyn1114, @ash-omalley, @snicks-12, @freudianslumber, @be-my-ally, @xanatenshi and @vintagepresley.

#kung fu elvis #tier list #charlie rogers #roustabout #rick richards #paradise hawaiian style #scott heyward #clambake #vince everett #jailhouse rock #elvis headcanons #ecu discussion #elvis films

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