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These sci-fi movie icons would be on our 2022 Winter Olympic Dream Team
Would it be cheating? Yes. Can you prove it? No. Would it be fun? Definitely.
The games are afoot! The XXIV Winter Olympic Games, aka the Beijing Olympic Games 2022, are almost here. We can feel the packed snow under our feet, we can hear the metallic sharpening of ice skates, and we have a chill thanks to the whooshing winter air.
It may surprise you to learn that we are not competing. Blasphemy, you say? There’s a good reason for it. For one, countries compete in the Olympic Games; websites do not. Even if we were invited to compete, we don’t have a staff that is full to the brim of champion athletes. Take a moment to register your surprise.
If we could compete, however, and if we were given the freedom to pack our team with icons from science fiction (and other genre entertainment) who do not exist in real life? Watch out, world… here we come. Many of the members of our fictitious team would make us cheaters, but there are no rules in this exercise. There is only fun.
Before you watch the 2022 Bejing Olympic Games on NBC (also streaming on Peacock) starting February 3rd, take a look at our stacked deck of champs. Let the games begin!
MacReady (The Thing, 1982)
It’s right there in his name! He’s MacReady for anything, and that’s something our team is going to need. He has proven that he (mostly) knows how to keep a cool head when things get tough in a wintery environment. If some unknown horror emerges during the games, he’ll be very useful in that department.
The real reason we want him though? He’s played by Kurt Russell, and we want Kurt Russell on the team. He’d be a perfect leader, and we’re going to have quite the array of personalities in the mix.
We want a crisis-ready Kurt Russell, and we're going to get him.
Sam Hall (The Day After Tomorrow)
It is one of the most outrageous things we’ve ever seen in a disaster movie: in The Day After Tomorrow, Jake Gyllenhaal (playing Sam Hall) outruns the cold. We see the cold literally nipping at his heels. The cold is deadly. He has to outrun it to save both himself and Laura (Emmy Rossum), his love interest.
He also fights wolves, and does a host of other things that nobody outside of a winter disaster movie could do. He doesn’t have superpowers and we don’t really know what we’d use him for, but anyone who outruns weather should be on this team.
Naomi Nagata (The Expanse)
We’re going to need endurance. We’re going to need people who never give up. We’re going to need someone who has seriously been through it and has come out on the other end stronger than ever. We are going to need Naomi Nagata, played by Dominique Tipper on The Expanse.
Her long escape from the cold clutches of space in Season 5 of the series proves why she’s one of the toughest around. She’s no stranger to the cold, she has years of Belter know-how, and she is physically formidable. The only issue here is that she’d have to adapt to the gravity in Bejing. Being a Belter, she’s not used to being on a planet. This isn’t a hindrance, this is just another obstacle for her to conquer. The news outlets would love the story, and relations between Earthers and Belters may improve too.
If she wanted to bring Holden, Amos, and Peaches from the Rocinante along, we’ll make room.
Spock Prime (Star Trek, 2009)
Why would we not want Spock on the team? If we have to choose a Spock, we’re obviously going to go with Leonard Nimoy. If we have to pick a Nimoy, we’ll go with the version of him that survived on a ice planet in the 2009 Star Trek while he watched an alternate version of Vulcan be destroyed.
He’s got wisdom, and he has experience. He’s also got more than a few Vulcan tricks up his furry sleeve. There’s no rule that we know of that says that participants in the Olympic Games have to be human, so until someone says otherwise we’re going to live long and prosper with the good Mr. Spock.
Han Solo (Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back)
The games don’t have a category for winter survival, but if they did? Han Solo (Harrison Ford) would know what to do. It’s easy. Find the nearest carcass, cut it open, and shove your friend inside of it.
Solo proved his winter-based skills in The Empire Strikes Back, but aside from all of that he'd still be a boon to the team. He’s one of the greatest pilots in the galaxy far, far away, and that counts for speeders as well as starships. We’re sure that this scoundrel could easily find his way around a toboggan or a bobsled.
Chewbacca would come with him because they are rarely apart, so we get him on the team too. Yes, we just slipped that in there. Whoops.
Killer Frost (The Flash)
Now we’re fully into cheating territory, because this DC villain/anti-hero (played by Danielle Panabaker in the Arrowverse) has power and control over ice and snow. Unlike other cold-based comic book characters, she doesn’t need a special gun or a diamond-fueled suit. Ice to see you!
She’d dominate any event, mostly because she’d be able to manipulate the ice and snow to her advantage with minimal effort. She’s devious, so she could make it look like she’s playing fair. Famed Olympic events such as skiing, skating, and the hurling of deadly self-made ice daggers would be nothing for her.
Odo (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine)
This would be continuing our cheating streak, but who cares? If we have the chance to add a changeling to our team, we’re going to take it. Not one of the evil ones, either; we’re going with the great Constable Odo, played on Deep Space Nine by the equally great René Auberjonois.
Once again, nobody said “humans only.” Even if they did, what, are you trying to slander our team member? We don’t know how he is twisting and stretching his body like that, we only know that he's gifted.
The secret would be out early, because Odo wouldn’t need skates; he could just morph his feet into becoming them. He wouldn’t need an actual bobsled, he can just become a bobsled. He’d be the fastest one down the mountain because he can just shape-shift into a falcon and soar right down.
How strict are the shape-shifting rules? There probably aren’t any, so here comes a bucket full of Odo.
Caprica Six (Battlestar Galactica)
Are they going to try to tell us that she’s not human either? How would they know? She’s a Cylon, but it’s 2022. There’s no way she’d be detected.
Played by Tricia Helfer on the beloved Battlestar Galactica reboot, the greatest of all the Number 6 Cylons would be a big help in a number of areas. She’s strong, she’s fast, and she’s brilliant. Cylons are made of stern stuff, and she’s the toughest one there is. No human is going to beat her in any event.
“That’s not fair, she’s some kind of robot!” they say? Prove it. Go ahead, we’ll wait. Work that out while Six goes to collect yet another medal.
Boba Fett and Fennec Shand (The Book of Boba Fett)
We already have a number of ringers who can easily take on anything having to do with skates, but we’d still want Boba and Fennec (Temuera Morrison and Ming-Na Wen) on the team. Why? Couples ice dancing.
A crime lord and an assassin who share a bond as strong as they do would surely prove to be a smashing success on the ice. Fennec would know all about the proper use of a toe pick, and Boba would definitely keep his jetpack on. Once again, what do the rules say about jetpacks? We’re gonna guess that the rules committee didn’t consider them. That’s their fault; one must always consider jetpacks.
Boba and Fennec will ice-dance their way to victory.
Frozone (The Incredibles)
As if we’re not cheating up a snow storm already, here comes Samuel L. Jackson’s beloved animated character from The Incredibles movies. He’d be the second super-powered team member who can control ice and snow without any technology, and yeah, we’re gonna recruit him.
Can’t find your supersuit? Don’t worry about it, Frozone… wear this team jacket. Name an event that he wouldn’t win. Skiing, skating, ski-jumping, skate-jumping, speed skating… all would be his. If he doesn’t take them, then Killer Frost would.
This is not at all fair, and the superhero registration drama that Frozone often deals with may hinder his participation. We don’t care, we’re going to court him anyway. Frozone will wisecrack his way to Olympic glory, and with him on our side, there will be no stopping our fictitious team.
Does any of this fall into the category of good sportsmanship? Not at all, but as Arnold once said to Batman, “Chill.”
The 2022 Bejing Olympic Games are now airing on NBC and also streaming on Peacock.
