TBG Eats: The NEW Whiplash Whopper from Burger King

Current Weight: 168.8 lbs.

Last weekend, my mom and my grandfather came down from Long Beach to Stately Bootleg Manor in San Diego for Mother's Day. It's an indescribable blessing to see my six-year-old son and his 84-year-old great-grandfather craft a relationship. In fact, my mom and grandfather made it down just in time for Jalen's final Little League game.

I was about Jalen's age when my grandfather introduced me to the game with a plastic pitching machine one Christmas. Thirty years later, here he is watching Jalen's insufferable showboating at the plate and on the basepaths while exclaiming to the complete strangers in the stands around him, "That's my great-grandson!"

Speaking of "indescribable blessings", the arrival of my mother and grandfather meant movie night (of the Jalen-free variety) for me and Mrs. Bootleg. And, yes, in MY house, "movie night" is a comparable "indescribable blessing" to the multi-generational span of my family's bloodlines.

Unfortunately, I couldn't convince Mrs. Bootleg to see Iron Man 2. Remember, this is a woman who's willingly gone along with family vacations built around baseball games that don't count. Back when we were dating, I didn't exactly have to twist her arm to see this guy perform live. Hell, I wore her down to the point where she gleefully acknowledges Black History Month icon Booker Taliaferro Washington is only the second most recognizable Booker T. in our lives.

But, she wouldn't budge on her anti-Iron Man stance, so we saw The Losers, instead. (Terrific flick, by the way. Absolutely exhilarating…y'all should see it before I remember I'm supposed to be writing a fast food review here.)

Back in the day, I would've had additional firepower in my attempts to change my wife's mind. For decades, the fast food industry's standard summer movie crossover promotion was…glassware.

How could Mrs. Bootleg say "no" to Batman Forever after I presented her with the grotesque visage of Tommy Lee Jones (and the similarly unattractive half of his head that's all made-up like Two-Face) chiseled out of molten glass? And, is there any doubt that she'd have been my date if I'd known her when The Great Muppet Caper was released?

Sadly, most of today's fast food movie tie-ins and giveaways are limited to the kids' menu. But, for the past several years, our friends at Burger King have served a modified version of their ubiquitous Whopper sandwich influenced by one of cinema's summer blockbusters.

In 2007, I reviewed BK's Ultimate Double Whopper (The Simpsons Movie). In 2009, I covered the Angry Whopper (a re-released favorite originally tied-in to Ed Norton's Incredible Hulk). There was also a Whopper inspired by the fourth Indiana Jones movie, but we're all going to pretend that flick (and anything associated with it) never happened. Cool?

With Iron Man 2 in theaters (in case anyone reading this would like to go with me) Burger King has unleashed the Whiplash Whopper – named after the film's primary antagonist, ably played by the resuscitated Mickey Rourke. The burger is topped with [from the BK website]: "melted pepper jack cheese, crispy red peppers and spicy mayonnaise" along with lettuce and two slices of tomato.






The red peppers give off a decent amount of heat – and I'm not referencing the usually tepid fast food standard of "spicy", either. Their texture and "bite" work well with the meat and mayo (which, on the other hand, isn't all that spicy). Pepper jack cheese – even the processed variety here – is akin to bacon's dairy-based doppelganger: it simply makes everything better. In fact, a few strips of bacon would've positioned the Whiplash Whopper as 2010's fast food item to beat with roughly six months remaining.





Without the bacon, this is still a must-eat item before BK bounces it from the menu. I hope I can hold on to the memories until Iron Man 2 is released on DVD…or HBO or whenever I end up seeing it for the first time.


Grade: 5 (out of 5) Calories: 890 Fat: 59g