In this new weekly column, I will examine one (or more) film(s) releasing in theaters and chronicle how some aspect of it has already been. Creativity runs dry pretty quickly when an overworked student attempts to publish a new article every week, so expect these to be ill-conceived and inordinately complicated.

In honor of Neill Blomkamp’s Elysium launching a mechanically augmented Matt Damon on a collision course with Jodie Foster and her paradisaical space station, I’m counting down the top five movies that managed to wrap a crunchy synthetic exterior around a soft and chewy human interior better, first.

5. The Tuxedo – The Tuxedo

Jackie Chan’s blockbuster family film featured Jackie Chan as limo driver who gets his hands on a high-tech tuxedo that let him run fast and jump high and do other things Jackie Chan can already do. He even slays Godfather of Soul, James Brown with a back-hand pimp slap to the face so hard that the real living legend felt it for real four years later. Ultimately, the suit can do everything but save poor Jackie Chan from a plot that was predicated on the language barrier between him and the English-speaking world.

4. Batman & Robin – Mr. Freeze’s Armor

Ice puns aside, we can all agree that Batman & Robin is the best adaptation we have seen of the Caped Crusader outside of the 60’s TV show, right? Good. Because Mr. Freeze’s sub-zero cooling power armor fits this list as well as Arnold Schwarzenegger fit the role of Mr. Freeze: PERFECTLY. Complete with freezing ice cannon and blue glow sticks in the mouthpiece, what more could you need? Oh. Retractable ice skates? BAM! Has that too. That movie really was at least a decade before its time.

3. Star Kid – Cybersuit

Chances are, if you were born in the late-80’s/early-90’s you probably at least caught a fleeting glimpse of the annoying kid from Jurassic Park stuck inside a talking alien suit of armor, desperately attempting to unzip the suit’s alien fly, which is all-too-conveniently (creepily?) also between the legs for this extraterrestrial race. Actually, that and one other scene is all I can recall about the whole movie. The other– in which his food intake needs to be smushed down into a poop pellet and fed to him from within the suit by a Giger-esque sustenance tube– earns it this spot on the list. Childhood trauma, for the block.

2. The Mask – Loki’s Mask

I know what you’re thinking: “That mask from The Mask had a name?”. Not only did it have a name, it had a previous owner! That owner was Loki, Trickster God, Brother to Thor. If you look closely at the mask in its inanimate, wooden form, you can definitely see the resemblance to Tom Hiddleston. Strangely enough, Loki was a huge fan of 1940’s Tex Avery animation and imbued his mask with the power of the Howlin’ Wolf and comedic prohibition-era Thompson sub-machine guns. Sure, it might make you certifiably insane upon putting it on, but The Mask grants the wearer the ability to transcend the physical realm and become a walking cartoon that lives beyond the pen and page.

1. Aliens – Power Loader

Leave it to James Cameron to make one of the most cumbersome and awkward pieces of future technology a crucial weapon in fighting the Alien queen. Not only does is move and handle like a golf cart in concrete, Ripley’s midsection and face are completely exposed behind the skeleton of a frame. There is absolutely no sane reason why that fight didn’t end with a face full of acid and a torso full of holes. Having said that, the Power Loader suit had the advantage in popular culture of being one of the first examples of an powered exoskeleton being used for combat in film. The aforementioned awkward speed and poor maneuverability only added to its appeal. This was the film’s protagonist making due with her available surroundings and essentially fighting with a wearable forklift. Each hit had a weight to it, grounding it in the world and making it real, something that modern action films have been throwing away in favor of detached, frenetic combat. I know plenty of people who harp on Cameron for being an unoriginal hack after the success of Avatar, but the man deserves to put his story on autopilot when he’s innovating in ways like this.