Episode 163 - The Running Man

[Smigg 1488]

Great episode, guys! It was great to hear Kulap with you all again!

 

What I found really strange about this movie was how easily Arnold Schwarzenegger's character just seemed to accept his fate with almost joyful abandon. For instance, the reason he is a contestant in the first place is because he was falsely accused of massacring a crowd of protesters, but instead of ever trying to convince people he's innocent, he goes on a brutal killing spree. Granted, he and his compadres are being hunted by bloodthirsty Stalkers, but it's hard to believe it's all in "self-defense" when he takes such pains to deliver a pithy one-liner after each kill. I mean, I'm glad he's showing resourcefulness and the crowd is coming over to his side, but he really isn't doing a whole lot to convince people that he's not the "Butcher of Bakersfield." If anything, he looks even more guilty.

 

When you put it that way, it could be some kind of thing where he's on a TV show, and he thinks "Okay, I'm gonna give these assholes a fucking show!" so, instead of going by the spirit of the show, and becomes "The Running Man", he becomes the aforementioned "Fighty Killy, Fuck People Up Man".

 

So, not only does he kill these hunters, who are considered celebrities for all intents and purposes, in front of an audience of millions on live TV, he then verbally teabags them and makes a joke about it. It's the Muhammad Ali element, Ali knew that if he talked shit, and played the villain, more people would tune in in the hopes that they see Ali get his ass kicked. Obviously, this is all conjecture, but maybe that was the plan all along, get as many people watching as he possibly can, and then make the case for his innocence.

 

Or, I'm just thinking too much about it.

[RyanSz 3140]

Hey Smigg, got a simple question for you, who wore it better?

 

[Smigg 1488]

Hey Smigg, got a simple question for you, who wore it better?

 

 

 

Dynamo, by a country mile. But this made me laugh and caused me to spit out my drink, so...

 

 

Although, if it was this, then Jericho would have won

 

 

I fucking love Chris Jericho.

[RyanSz 3140]

So glad this is the version of him Funko is making a pop of.

[Smigg 1488]

So glad this is the version of him Funko is making a pop of.

 

Even at 46, he was one of the most consistantly entertaining things in WWE. And, he did an episode of his podcast, with Mr. Paul Scheer.

[RyanSz 3140]

 

Even at 46, he was one of the most consistantly entertaining things in WWE. And, he did an episode of his podcast, with Mr. Paul Scheer.

Can totally see Paul as a wrestling nerd. The only unfortunate thing about the Wrestlemania that I went to was that he was out either injured or touring with his band at the time so he wasn't on the card or at the Axxess event signing autographs, but he's definitely one I'm hoping to meet one day. Almost as bad as I when going to a comic convention I was hoping to meet HDTGM all star Roddy Piper and he sadly passed away the week prior. Hoping that doesn't occur again this year as the big wrestling name for this year is Ric Flair.

[Smigg 1488]

Can totally see Paul as a wrestling nerd. The only unfortunate thing about the Wrestlemania that I went to was that he was out either injured or touring with his band at the time so he wasn't on the card or at the Axxess event signing autographs, but he's definitely one I'm hoping to meet one day. Almost as bad as I when going to a comic convention I was hoping to meet HDTGM all star Roddy Piper and he sadly passed away the week prior. Hoping that doesn't occur again this year as the big wrestling name for this year is Ric Flair.

 

The story of Paul and Chris meeting each other is great. They were both on one of the VH1 shows, maybe I Love The 80s or something along those lines, and they'd be ushered into a booth to talk about some pop culture bullshit, and when they leave, the other one comes in. And they said it was always awkward coming out, and there's another guy waiting for you to come out, so you can go in and talk about the same shit.

 

Found it here, the sound quality is shit though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZSD5xAY-1E

 

I once met Mick Foley, and told him the story of how he got me into wrestling. There was a show on Saturday lunch time called "Movies, Games and Videos", it was a show that reviewed Movies, Games and Videos if the title didn't make it obvious, Well, after that, it was WCW Worldwide, I'd never seen wrestling before, and I watched this guy with long hair and a beard, kick the shit out of this guy, that guy was Cactus Jack. My mum comes in and says "Oooh, Smigg (because that's my real name....) why are you watching this rubbish?! It's all fake", and while she's saying that, Cactus Jack made a disparaging comment about the Royal Family, my mum stops, pauses, and then says "What's that got to do with him! The cheeky bastard!" and I was hooked, this guy just annoyed my mum just like that.

 

Mick Foley is the only wrestler I've ever met outside a venue, but I did get aisle seats to a house show, and I got into an "argument" with Ric Flair. Because I decided to make it fun, and when the bad guys came out, I talked shit to them, and I still believe to this day, someone went back after their match and said "There's a guy on the aisle you can get stuff from" because sure enough, I had the heels talking shit to me, and it just made my life, arguing with Ric Flair, especially with HHH chiming in, and then getting high fives from Shawn Michaels and Dave Bautista.

[RyanSz 3140]

 

The story of Paul and Chris meeting each other is great. They were both on one of the VH1 shows, maybe I Love The 80s or something along those lines, and they'd be ushered into a booth to talk about some pop culture bullshit, and when they leave, the other one comes in. And they said it was always awkward coming out, and there's another guy waiting for you to come out, so you can go in and talk about the same shit.

 

Found it here, the sound quality is shit though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZSD5xAY-1E

 

I once met Mick Foley, and told him the story of how he got me into wrestling. There was a show on Saturday lunch time called "Movies, Games and Videos", it was a show that reviewed Movies, Games and Videos if the title didn't make it obvious, Well, after that, it was WCW Worldwide, I'd never seen wrestling before, and I watched this guy with long hair and a beard, kick the shit out of this guy, that guy was Cactus Jack. My mum comes in and says "Oooh, Smigg (because that's my real name....) why are you watching this rubbish?! It's all fake", and while she's saying that, Cactus Jack made a disparaging comment about the Royal Family, my mum stops, pauses, and then says "What's that got to do with him! The cheeky bastard!" and I was hooked, this guy just annoyed my mum just like that.

 

Mick Foley is the only wrestler I've ever met outside a venue, but I did get aisle seats to a house show, and I got into an "argument" with Ric Flair. Because I decided to make it fun, and when the bad guys came out, I talked shit to them, and I still believe to this day, someone went back after their match and said "There's a guy on the aisle you can get stuff from" because sure enough, I had the heels talking shit to me, and it just made my life, arguing with Ric Flair, especially with HHH chiming in, and then getting high fives from Shawn Michaels and Dave Bautista.

Yeah while I didn't get to meet Piper I did meet Jerry Lawler who told some great stories about Piper. And if you ever get a chance to go to a big event like a Wrestlemania, there are always outside companies doing meet and greet conventions. So while I didn't go to Axxess, I went to another convention that had dozens of guys including Terry Funk and Ivan Koloff (easily two of the nicest people that I've ever met), Rob Van Dam, Sabu, Bad Influence, Hillbilly Jim, Vader, and Ken Shamrock (easily the biggest jerk I've ever met at one of these things).

[Trailerpark Atheist 2]

Here's my question: If, as the opening crawl states, the world has basically run out of oil, then how is it possible that there are civilian flights to anywhere, let alone Hawaii? One can easily expect the military to have ready access to things like petroleum-based products like gasoline and jet fuel, as they need them to defend the country. But airlines? Come on, if we're living in a dystopian future where millions of Americans have no access to things like food, and oil is a scarce commodity, then how is it that someone could book a flight to any place on a whim? Assuming such flights were available, shouldn't you have to at least prove a need for you to go there, if not cough up an insane amount of money for a ticket?

[Smigg 1488]

Yeah while I didn't get to meet Piper I did meet Jerry Lawler who told some great stories about Piper. And if you ever get a chance to go to a big event like a Wrestlemania, there are always outside companies doing meet and greet conventions. So while I didn't go to Axxess, I went to another convention that had dozens of guys including Terry Funk and Ivan Koloff (easily two of the nicest people that I've ever met), Rob Van Dam, Sabu, Bad Influence, Hillbilly Jim, Vader, and Ken Shamrock (easily the biggest jerk I've ever met at one of these things).

 

I'm sure I'll end up going to one sooner or later.

 

I keep on hearing so many stories about Ken Shamrock, some days he's this great guy, others he's a complete douche who takes his "Worlds Most Dangerous Man" moniker too seriously, the more I hear of him, the more I lean towards the latter.

[Cam Bert 8145]

When Subzero is coming out the announcer goes through all his records and accomplishments and finishes with the line:

"Let's welcome the incredible iceman who slices his enemies from limb to limb into quivering bloody sushi."

 

Now, this movie was written in the 80s when sushi was seen as a trendy food item. Of course at the time it was just seen as "raw fish" however that's a vast oversimplification. The term sushi has nothing to do with fish at all and rather refers to the vinegared rice. There are many different kinds of sushi out there from the familiar makizushi to the more common nigirizushi which has an item placed on top of rice. While there vast majority of the time that item is raw fish or seafood there are many other exceptions like natto, egg, cucumber, etc. Further more there are other kinds of sushi such as inarizushi which are completely devoid of fish. So even though when you think of sushi you think of a piece of raw fish on rice, the term sushi has nothing to do with that fish but rather is referring to the rice beneath it.

 

Now if you want to have "raw fish" that's sashimi which is sliced raw seafood which you then dip in soy sauce and add wasabi if you like. There is no rice at all. If you were to eat or prepare it you would not be making sushi you'd be making sashimi. Which brings me to the second point about the statement. No sushi chef would ever serve bloody sushi. At high end places, and as anybody who has seen Jiro Dreams of Sushi can tell you, sushi and the preparation of the ingredients is an art to them. It's a fine craft. Even at the cheapest sushi restaurant in Japan where craftsmanship means nothing, you'd never get bloody sushi. Any piece of meat that had blood or unwanted viscera on would be cleaned before being cut and served.

 

Which brings us to the third point. Even if we put all that we've learned aside and just go with the 80s mind set that "sushi is raw fish" sushi wouldn't be quivering. While the fish used in sushi and sashimi is raw it comes from a fish that's dead or been butchered already. There is a form of sashimi, again not sushi, called ikizukuri (or ikezukuri) in which a fish will be butchered and prepared while still alive. Often in the case of fish it will be fished out of the tank and then immediately filleted, sliced and served with the head and tail intact. Sometimes, not all the time, the head may still be moving slightly. The sashimi itself is not quivering though. In the case of other sea creatures like octopus or squid, sometimes the tentacles can still be moving however.

[Asbell 19]

A few things with this movie.

 

1) Ratings are brought up a lot, but they said its "State Sponsored TV," like North Korea style... And there is so little variety.... Why are they worried about ratings? Do TV shows in North Korea worry about ratings? Like that old video of Kim Jong Il riding a horse... does that have ratings?

 

2) We are to believe this is the most popular show and everybody is essentially forced to watch it... So why do all these prisoners not know about it? Like things are never clear to them. They don't already know the attack plan of each of the famous stalkers.

 

3) Not one of contestants stops to made a weapon out of the rubble and stuff.... These stalkers are constantly out numbered. Every fight they get into, especially in the beginning is 4 to 1. If 2 of them made even just a basic spear or something, when one is being attacked, the other could kill the stalker from behind.

 

4) During the prison escape... why does the security system announce when the collars are off? Isnt that information you wouldn't want the prisoners to even know? like... ever? even if they had to be turned off from time to time, why not just let the prisoners assume they area always on?

 

--Kevin

[Cameron H. 23786]

1) Ratings are brought up a lot, but they said its "State Sponsored TV," like North Korea style... And there is so little variety.... Why are they worried about ratings? Do TV shows in North Korea worry about ratings? Like that old video of Kim Jong Il riding a horse... does that have ratings?

 

I was super close to bringing this up, but when I tried to pull some quotes to support myself, I found this line from Dawson: "You want ratings? You want people in front of TV sets instead of picket lines? Well, you ain't going gonna get that with reruns of Gilligan's Island" So, no, ratings aren't really important in the way we would normally view them, but in this case, I guess ratings are important as a means to measure how good a show is at distracting the people from their miserable little lives. If they're busy watching The Running Man, they aren't out on the streets rioting.

[Monkeyboy1138 0]

Random Schwarzenegger fact. Back in the 80's James Cameron had the movie rights to Spider-Man and had put together a hard R rated treatment of the movie (complete with a Spidey raw dogging Mary Jane scene). It was set to Star Arnie as Peter Parker/Spider-Man...imagine what could have been.

[Smigg 1488]

A few things with this movie.

 

1) Ratings are brought up a lot, but they said its "State Sponsored TV," like North Korea style... And there is so little variety.... Why are they worried about ratings? Do TV shows in North Korea worry about ratings? Like that old video of Kim Jong Il riding a horse... does that have ratings?

 

2) We are to believe this is the most popular show and everybody is essentially forced to watch it... So why do all these prisoners not know about it? Like things are never clear to them. They don't already know the attack plan of each of the famous stalkers.

 

3) Not one of contestants stops to made a weapon out of the rubble and stuff.... These stalkers are constantly out numbered. Every fight they get into, especially in the beginning is 4 to 1. If 2 of them made even just a basic spear or something, when one is being attacked, the other could kill the stalker from behind.

 

4) During the prison escape... why does the security system announce when the collars are off? Isnt that information you wouldn't want the prisoners to even know? like... ever? even if they had to be turned off from time to time, why not just let the prisoners assume they area always on?

 

--Kevin

 

 

I could answer question number one as someone from the UK. The BBC is state sponsored, it's paid for by the TV License, which is essentially a TV tax. If you're caught watching live TV without paying for a TV License, you're fined £1,000 (around $1300), and if you don't pay the fine, you can face a prison sentence.

 

Well, even though it's tax payer funded, they still care about ratings.

[IRONicmerMAN 391]

This movie is fantastic. I was a little disappointed with Jason's initial enthusiasm waning by the end recommendation. I'm also disappointed that they didn't pull out more lines from the movie. There are some real gems.

 

Amber Mendez: Me and my big mouth. We should have taken the trip to Hawaii.

Ben Richards: I had the shirt for it, but you fucked it up.

 

Ben Richards: I hope you leave enough room for my fist, because I'm going to ram it into your stomach & break your god damn spine!

 

Tony: The Justice Department's calling every ten minutes.

Damon Killian: Just give them an evasive answer. Tell them to go fuck themselves.

 

And my personal favorite...

 

Ben Richards: Uplink underground, uplink underground. If you say that one more time, I'll uplink your ass, and you'll be underground!

[FisterRoboto 7499]

Random Schwarzenegger fact. Back in the 80's James Cameron had the movie rights to Spider-Man and had put together a hard R rated treatment of the movie (complete with a Spidey raw dogging Mary Jane scene). It was set to Star Arnie as Peter Parker/Spider-Man...imagine what could have been.

Schwarzenegger wasn't attached to the project, but the rumor was that he was Cameron's pick to play Doc Octopus.

 

The history of the Spider-Man script is crazy. Our old friends Cannon Films had gained the rights several years before Cameron's script, and the original Cannon script also included Doc Ock. Joseph Zito was the director originally tied to the Cannon project. His two biggest films at the time had been Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter and Invasion USA. Zito reportedly wanted Bob Hoskins to play Doc Ock. That version never got produced because Cannon slashed the budget (much of their finances were tied up in Superman IV and Masters of the Universe), and Zito walked.

 

So then it got picked up by Columbia contingent on rewrites. Cannon Films had folded, and Menaham Golan had moved to 21st Century Films, bringing with him the rights to both Spider-Man and Captain America. The Captain America movie got made, and Golan started shopping for new Spider-Man scripts. Cameron delivered a scriptment to Carolco (who had produced Terminator 2: Judgement Day), and then he, Golan, and a few others developed it into a full screenplay. Allegedly, along with Schwarzenegger as Doc Ock, Cameron wanted Edward Furlong as Peter Parker and a pre-Titanic Leo DiCaprio as Harry Osborne

 

Then Carolco, 21st Century, and Marvel all went bankrupt in the same year (I know it's crazy to think that Marvel wasn't the juggernaut it is now, but the 90s were a really rough time for them). Marvel reorganized and merged with Toy Biz to pull them out of their bakruptcy woes. Carolco and 21st Century's assets were bought out by MGM, which would include the rights to the Cameron script.

 

But things weren't done yet! After a lengthy court battle between MGM and Marvel/Carolco, a ruling was made that the original contract between Stan Lee and Golan had expired. So Marvel relicensed the rights over to Columbia. Meanwhile, the head of MGM moved to Columbia Pictures (which was owned by Sony) and sought to start making James Bond movies based on Kevin McClory's work, the rights to which Columbia had recently acquired (McClory was famously known for suing Ian Fleming after the release of the novel Thunderball because he said it was based on an unused script that he and Fleming had developed together when originally adapting Bond to the screen).

 

So now both Columbia and MGM had rights to both Spider-Man and James Bond. Finally, in 1999, they reached an agreement: Columbia would relinquish their rights to Bond if MGM would relinquish their rights to Spider-Man. This way, each studio owned one of the franchises and wouldn't be putting out competing films.

 

So then Sony/Columbia began developing the film with director Sam Raimi. David Koepp was brought in to rewrite the script. He basically just turned in a slightly modified version of Cameron's script. Then Columbia hired Scott Rosenberg to rewrite Koepp's script. Then, a producer sent the script to her husband to have him polish the dialogue (her husband being Academy Award-winning Ordinary People writer Alvin Sargent) before filming. Finally, the script went into production, but Rosenberg, Sargent, and Cameron all relinquished credit for the script, and David Koepp received the sole screenwriting credit.

 

During the Koepp rewrites, Electro and Sandman from Cameron's script were dropped, and Green Goblin was added. Koepp originally kept Doc Ock, but Raimi felt that having secondary villain - with accompanying backstory - would be too much and could muddle up the film (a lesson he apparently forgot by the time Spider-Man 3 came around). So Ock was dropped from Koepp's script and then picked back up as the villain for the sequel.

[Cameron H. 23786]

 

Schwarzenegger wasn't attached to the project, but the rumor was that he was Cameron's pick to play Doc Octopus.

 

The history of the Spider-Man script is crazy. Our old friends Cannon Films had gained the rights several years before Cameron's script, and the original Cannon script also included Doc Ock. Joseph Zito was the director originally tied to the Cannon project. His two biggest films at the time had been Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter and Invasion USA. Zito reportedly wanted Bob Hoskins to play Doc Ock. That version never got produced because Cannon slashed the budget (much of their finances were tied up in Superman IV and Masters of the Universe), and Zito walked.

 

So then it got picked up by Columbia contingent on rewrites. Cannon Films had folded, and Menaham Golan had moved to 21st Century Films, bringing with him the rights to both Spider-Man and Captain America. The Captain America movie got made, and Golan started shopping for new Spider-Man scripts. Cameron delivered a scriptment to Carolco (who had produced Terminator 2: Judgement Day), and then he, Golan, and a few others developed it into a full screenplay. Allegedly, along with Schwarzenegger as Doc Ock, Cameron wanted Edward Furlong as Peter Parker and a pre-Titanic Leo DiCaprio as Harry Osborne

 

Then Carolco, 21st Century, and Marvel all went bankrupt in the same year (I know it's crazy to think that Marvel wasn't the juggernaut it is now, but the 90s were a really rough time for them). Marvel reorganized and merged with Toy Biz to pull them out of their bakruptcy woes. Carolco and 21st Century's assets were bought out by MGM, which would include the rights to the Cameron script.

 

But things weren't done yet! After a lengthy court battle between MGM and Marvel/Carolco, a ruling was made that the original contract between Stan Lee and Golan had expired. So Marvel relicensed the rights over to Columbia. Meanwhile, the head of MGM moved to Columbia Pictures (which was owned by Sony) and sought to start making James Bond movies based on Kevin McClory's work, the rights to which Columbia had recently acquired (McClory was famously known for suing Ian Fleming after the release of the novel Thunderball because he said it was based on an unused script that he and Fleming had developed together when originally adapting Bond to the screen).

 

So now both Columbia and MGM had rights to both Spider-Man and James Bond. Finally, in 1999, they reached an agreement: Columbia would relinquish their rights to Bond if MGM would relinquish their rights to Spider-Man. This way, each studio owned one of the franchises and wouldn't be putting out competing films.

 

So then Sony/Columbia began developing the film with director Sam Raimi. David Koepp was brought in to rewrite the script. He basically just turned in a slightly modified version of Cameron's script. Then Columbia hired Scott Rosenberg to rewrite Koepp's script. Then, a producer sent the script to her husband to have him polish the dialogue (her husband being Academy Award-winning Ordinary People writer Alvin Sargent) before filming. Finally, the script went into production, but Rosenberg, Sargent, and Cameron all relinquished credit for the script, and David Koepp received the sole screenwriting credit.

 

During the Koepp rewrites, Electro and Sandman from Cameron's script were dropped, and Green Goblin was added. Koepp originally kept Doc Ock, but Raimi felt that having secondary villain - with accompanying backstory - would be too much and could muddle up the film (a lesson he apparently forgot by the time Spider-Man 3 came around). So Ock was dropped from Koepp's script and then picked back up as the villain for the sequel.

 

I always heard Michael Biehn was Cameron's pick for Peter Parker. Is that not correct?

 

 

[IRONicmerMAN 391]

Another item on this masterpiece film. I was hoping the crew would have some of the Dynamo actor's biography. Pretty interesting guy, and he unfortunately died just before the film came out.

 

Erland Philip Peter Van Lidth De Jeude

--From Dutch nobility lineage

--BS in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering from MIT

--Wrestler and actor at MIT

--Worked in IT and was an alternate heavyweight wrestler in the 1976 Olympics

--Bronze medalist in 1978 international wrestling competition

--Taught computer programming at a community college concurrently with his acting work

--Studied to be a Heldenbaritone, German operatic baritone

--Played a mass murderer in Stir Crazy (Wilder/Pryor)

[Quasar Sniffer 4174]

This movie is fantastic. I was a little disappointed with Jason's initial enthusiasm waning by the end recommendation. I'm also disappointed that they didn't pull out more lines from the movie. There are some real gems.

 

Amber Mendez: Me and my big mouth. We should have taken the trip to Hawaii.

Ben Richards: I had the shirt for it, but you fucked it up.

 

Ben Richards: I hope you leave enough room for my fist, because I'm going to ram it into your stomach & break your god damn spine!

 

Tony: The Justice Department's calling every ten minutes.

Damon Killian: Just give them an evasive answer. Tell them to go fuck themselves.

 

And my personal favorite...

 

Ben Richards: Uplink underground, uplink underground. If you say that one more time, I'll uplink your ass, and you'll be underground!

I was... disappointed with the crew's overall lack of enthusiasm for this film. It's not Arnold's best, but I still love it. I love Arnold in a manner akin to how Jon Gabrus loves Arnold, which is a WHOLE BUNCH, so listening to comedians I admire kinda dump on this minor masterpiece made me kinda...

 

It especially boggles my mind that June is SO into Vin Diesel in the Fast and Furious movies but finds Arnold almost repellent. To me, Vin Diesel is like someone tried to clone Arnold but was missing some DNA sequences, Jurassic Park style, and then filled in the gaps with the protoplasmic goop that turned Matt Hagan into Clayface, only with way less charisma. Finding that guy, the star of the most fridge-tastic movie in recent memory (F8 of the Furious), appealing makes my skin crawl. Like Clayface's skin, I guess.

 

ANYWAY, speaking of Chris Jericho, because he is also great in every way, would he make a better Ben Richards.... or Damon Killian?

[IRONicmerMAN 391]

I was... disappointed with the crew's overall lack of enthusiasm for this film. It's not Arnold's best, but I still love it. I love Arnold in a manner akin to how Jon Gabrus loves Arnold, which is a WHOLE BUNCH, so listening to comedians I admire kinda dump on this minor masterpiece made me kinda...

 

It especially boggles my mind that June is SO into Vin Diesel in the Fast and Furious movies but finds Arnold almost repellent. To me, Vin Diesel is like someone tried to clone Arnold but was missing some DNA sequences, Jurassic Park style, and then filled in the gaps with the protoplasmic goop that turned Matt Hagan into Clayface, only with way less charisma. Finding that guy, the star of the most fridge-tastic movie in recent memory (F8 of the Furious), appealing makes my skin crawl. Like Clayface's skin, I guess.

 

ANYWAY, speaking of Chris Jericho, because he is also great in every way, would he make a better Ben Richards.... or Damon Killian?

This film came out when I was 7 or 8 years old. I'm not sure if I saw it then, but considering my parents were a bit too hands-off when it came to what I watched, it's absolutely possible I saw this before the age of 10. Just like other Arnold movies. I love him. I think this one and Commando are my favorites, as is Total Recall. Conan the Barbarian? Pure gold. Pumping Iron is a must for Arnold fans...and people with a pulse.

 

Agreed on the enthusiasm level. Jason seemed keyed in early on, but it waned. I don't get their excitement for the Fast & Furious franchise. Those are some of my least favorite episodes, but I listen, because it's HDTGM. Yeah, they're insane and they keep switching up the films, but I don't get the intrigue.

 

You nailed it with Arnie vs. Vin. I don't understand having any interest in Vin at all. Arnold is a beast and says ridiculous lines, but he has charisma and charm that Vin seems to completely lack.

[FisterRoboto 7499]

I always heard Michael Biehn was Cameron's pick for Peter Parker. Is that not correct?

I think he was over Biehn by then. But also, I think even Cameron's script had Parker as a high school kid, so Biehn would have been too old.

 

It especially boggles my mind that June is SO into Vin Diesel in the Fast and Furious movies but finds Arnold almost repellent.

She liked Arnold a lot more in Hercules in Hew York, if I remember correctly.

[Cameron H. 23786]

I was... disappointed with the crew's overall lack of enthusiasm for this film. It's not Arnold's best, but I still love it. I love Arnold in a manner akin to how Jon Gabrus loves Arnold, which is a WHOLE BUNCH, so listening to comedians I admire kinda dump on this minor masterpiece made me kinda...

 

It especially boggles my mind that June is SO into Vin Diesel in the Fast and Furious movies but finds Arnold almost repellent. To me, Vin Diesel is like someone tried to clone Arnold but was missing some DNA sequences, Jurassic Park style, and then filled in the gaps with the protoplasmic goop that turned Matt Hagan into Clayface, only with way less charisma. Finding that guy, the star of the most fridge-tastic movie in recent memory (F8 of the Furious), appealing makes my skin crawl. Like Clayface's skin, I guess.

 

ANYWAY, speaking of Chris Jericho, because he is also great in every way, would he make a better Ben Richards.... or Damon Killian?

 

I won't say that I was disappointed, because I thought the episode was great, but when it was announced, I did kind of have Dragonheart deja vu. I was just saying earlier today that I feel like the movie is dumb (in a fun way), but not exactly "bad." It's clear that the movie is aware of how silly it's being, and it's this self-awareness that I think makes it kind of unassailable. As has been commented on these forums before, I think the best HDTGM films are the ones that were made with sincerity, but fail in execution. And I really don't think this movie failed to deliver it's message. Bagging on this movie is like reading Alice in Wonderland and then making fun of the fact that there's a talking rabbit. Yeah, I guess a talking bunny is kind of an oddity, but if you're making fun of it, you're kind of missing the point.

 

Of course, that's just my opinion. I enjoyed the episode thoroughly. I just think there are dumber Arnie movies out there (*cough*The 6th Day*cough*)

[Smigg 1488]

ANYWAY, speaking of Chris Jericho, because he is also great in every way, would he make a better Ben Richards.... or Damon Killian?

 

Killian, all the way. Jericho can pull off the role of the host of a super-cheesy game show... because he WAS the host of a super-cheesy game show... TWICE!

 

 

Hell, he was THIS close to becoming the host of America's Funniest Home Videos, but that damned Carlton Banks just squeaked it.

[RyanSz 3140]

 

Killian, all the way. Jericho can pull off the role of the host of a super-cheesy game show... because he WAS the host of a super-cheesy game show... TWICE!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xq7_qRdTYew

 

Hell, he was THIS close to becoming the host of America's Funniest Home Videos, but that damned Carlton Banks just squeaked it.

I honestly never heard of Downfall, but now I want to watch every episode. Jericho never gets the love he rightfully he deserves as a mic worker in wrestling because he was in the middle of the pack of guys including The Rock, who really was great and making snappy catchphrases but was okay overall, and Steve Austin who could keep an audience on the edge of their seats whenever he spoke. The man really has the gift of gab and if they ever remake this movie I have fingers crossed that he is brought on as Killian.