the movie the warriors tells the story of an eponymous new york city gang trying to get home after attending a summit (meeting, conference) with all of the other gangs in the city. at the meeting cyrus, the city’s most powerful gangster, gives a speech urging (recommending) the various gangs to unite pointing out (mentioning) that all together they outnumber the police 3 to 1. in one of the most famous lines in the movie, cyrus asks the assembled crowd of thugs (gangsters), can u dig it? then lowers his voice and asks it again.
dig means break and remove earth, make a hole. the most common tool for digging a hole is a shovel. dig is an irregular verb (dug, dug)
but when cyrus says can u dig it? he’s asking the warriors and the other gangs if they understand and agree with him.
fun esl practice 
richyrocks english on youtube
spoiler alert (warning: if u haven’t seen the movie, i’m going to talk about what happens at the end, even though spoilers don’t really apply to movies that are 40 years old 😹).
when cyrus finishes speaking he is shot by luther, the pathetic leader of another gang: the rogues. luther blames the warriors for his crime, so as the protagonists try to get back (return) to their turf (neighborhood, home territory) they have to fight off (win fights against) attacks from several other gangs. when they finally arrive, luther and the rest of the rogues are waiting for them, and luther challenges the warriors with perhaps the most famous line of the movie, warriors, come out to play, while clinking (sound of glass hitting glass) three bottles together on his fingers.
wouldn’t it be hilarious if somebody spoke these lines from the warriors in the style of shakespeare? without a doubt. thus (for that reason), this video from my facebook page.
in the video, can u dig it becomes canst thou fathom? canst is an antiquated way to say can. thou is you. technically, thou is singular; the plural is ye. fathom is still used in modern english as a synonym for understand.
william shakespeare + the warriors = rofl
come out to play becomes come hither frolic. come hither is an archaic form of come closer, come here. frolic is still used but it is not extremely common. it means play.
what is your opinion about the warriors? shakespeare? share your feelings under leave a reply
