| Al-G Rhythm | |
|---|---|
 | |
|
No Title |
Male |
|
First Appearance |
|
|
Actor |
Don Cheadle |
|
Occupation |
King of the Server-Verse |
|
Friends |
Joker, Nolan Sorrento, I-R0k, Lord Voldemort, Agent Smith, Sauron, Pennywise, Wicked Witch of the West, Lord Business, Lex Luthor, The Penguin, Catwoman, The Riddler, Two-Face |
|
Enemies |
LeBron James, Dom James, Bugs Bunny, Batman, Parzival, Conductor, Hero Boy, Hobo, Lola Bunny |
Al-G Rhythm is the main antagonist of the 2021 Warner Bros. hybrid film Space Jam: A New Legacy, the sequel to the 1996 classic film Space Jam.
He is an evil computer algorithm who rules the Serververse, a virtual reality in the cyber space which houses different worlds based on Warner Bros. properties and the leader of the Warner Bros. Villains. When he kidnaps Dom James, the son of LeBron James, he forces LeBron to play a basketball game with the Looney Tunes against the Goon Squad. He is the boss of Pete and the archenemy of LeBron James, his son Dom and Bugs Bunny.
He was portrayed by Don Cheadle in his first villain role.
Personality[]
At first glance, Al-G is a hardworking AI who wishes to be recognized for his hard work at the Warner Brothers servers. He also seems to show sadness over how no one ever acknowledges what he does.
Al-G is shown to be quite manipulative and deceiving, as he easily convinces Dom that his dad was more interested with basketball rather than him and used his technology to lure people into the server and create the Goon Squad. Even before the events of the film, he persuades the Tunes, except for Bugs, to leave Tune world and explore the other worlds in the Serververse, much to Bugs' sadness.
He is arrogant and narcissistic, as he took a liking to Dom when he praised the ad that he made when not even the executives at Warner Brothers would (because Lebron didn't like it and they did not want to look foolish). This adds to his short temper, as he becomes incredibly angry when things do not go his way or if others disagree with him. This brought his somewhat father-son relationship with Dom to an end after the Goon Squad begins to lose to the Tune Squad in the second-half of the game and after LeBron apologized to him.
Al-G is also revealed to be a hypocrite. After Dom leaves to play with his dad and the tunes after reconciling with him, he takes his place on the Goon Squad and transforms into a giant, muscular basketball player. He then bends the rules of the game and cheats by rewinding the points the Tune Squad scores and breaking past LeBron. When Bugs uses a move that temporarily glitches the game at the cost of his life and Dom throws a jump pad so his dad can score the final point, Al-G screams "That's cheating!" even though he cheated first.
Biography[]
Past[]
Sometime before the events of the film and after the original Space Jam, AL-G confronted the Looney Tunes on Tune World. Wanting to separate them in case they get in the way of his future goals, he offers them the chance to explore different worlds in the Serververse. All of the Tunes, except for Bugs, are excited and accept it. They then leave Tune World in a rocket and ignore Bugs as he attempts to convince them to stay. He then watches in sadness as they leave.
Space Jam: A New Legacy[]
In the film, Al-G plans to have LeBron James as his replacement while he enters the real world. During the trip to the studios, he kidnapped LeBron and his son Dom to the Serververse. Holding Dom captive, Al-G made a deal with Lebron of playing a basketball game, and if he loses the game he will be forced to stay in there forever. Al-G had his assistant Pete to send LeBron to the Tune World.
Lebron then met Bugs Bunny, the only remaining resident of the world. Bugs revealed that Al-G took all of his friends away to the other worlds. LeBron then started his journey of finding Bugs' friends, such as Daffy Duck, Yosemite Sam, Wile E. Coyote etc. which also involved with stealing Marvin the Martian's spaceship to travel around the Serververse.
Meanwhile, Rhythm had manipulated Dom into turning against his own father by creating the Goon Squad and upgrading himself as a unstoppable basketball player.
LeBron and Bugs successfully find their friends and assemble the Tune Squad. Despite Bugs' objections, LeBron insists on teaching them the fundamentals of basketball. The Tune Squad then met Al-G and the Goon Squad, led by Dom, to further the stakes, Al-G livestreams the game and abducted the countless viewers into the virtual world, which included LeBron's family, and if they lose the game, the viewers will get to stay in here forever with the Tunes being deleted permanently.
As the Goon Squad dominate the first half of the game, LeBron and his friends start planning a way to beat them. At one point, Sylvester suggested to recruit the former member Michael Jordan (the protagonist in the first film), however it turns out he got Michael B. Jordan (the actor of Erik Killmonger) instead of the player. Realizing his mistake, LeBron allows Bugs to devise the strategy of using cartoon physics in the second half of the game. LeBron eventually apologizes to Dom for interfering with his dreams, and Dom forgives his father by joining the Tune Squad.
Angry and disappointed, Al-G turned himself into a giant basketball player and and was ready to defeat the Toon Squad in the final seconds. Dom then realizes the way to win the game and defeating Al-G, is to use the move that LeBron had done in his video game which caused it to glitch out. With the cost of being erased, LeBron proposed to do it, but instead Bugs sacrificed himself to do the move and weakened the Goon Squad. In the last stand, Al-G tried to grab LeBron from dunking the ball, but Dom tosses an extra jump boost to his father allowing him to "posterize" Al-G before getting shredded by Pete, as LeBron and his family returns the real world.
Shortly after Al-G's defeat, LeBron takes his son to E3 rather than Basketball Camp. Despite this, Dom continues to enjoy basketball. Afterwards, LeBron met Bugs once again, as Toons cannot die. He then invites him with all of his friends to his house.
Trivia[]
- His name is an evident pun on "algorithm".
- In contrast to Mr. Swackhammer, the main antagonist of the original Space Jam film, Al-G Rhythm is a live-action character, whereas Swackhammer is an animated character. Interestingly, Swackhammer was originally planned to be a live-action character as well before it was decided he'd be an animated one to save time.
- Also Al-G is much more evil than Mr. Swackhammer. While Swackhammer only wants Jordan and the Looney Tunes to be the attractions for his park, Al-G wants to separate LeBron from his family, trapping all the viewers in the Serververse, and even vowing to delete the Tunes. All of his deeds can consider him crossing the Moral Event Horizon, therefore making him the most evil villain in the Looney Tunes franchise.
- When Bugs and LeBron try to recruit Lola Bunny for their basketball game, she rejects their offer at first while stating that she's been training under Wonder Woman for years. This means that Al-G separated the Tunes quite some time ago.
- Al-G is the second main antagonist to be a live action character, after Mr. Chairman from Looney Tunes: Back in Action.
- Al-G, Swackhammer and Chairman have one thing in common as they all have monitors to watch every move of their enemies, while having five accomplices to aid them: Goon Squad (White Mamba, Chornos, Wet-fire, the Brow & Arachnneka) for Al-G, Monstars (Pound, Bang, Bupkus, Nawt & Blanko) for Swackhammer and the Tune pawns of ACME Corporation (Yosemite Sam, Wile E. Coyote, Marvin the Martian, Elmer Fudd & Tasmanian Devil) for Chairman.
- In a deleted scene, Al-G survive deletion and his evil laughing until Petey interrupts him which results in Al-G chasing after him.