Episode 195 - Never Too Young to Die: LIVE! (w/ Matt McConkey)

[JulyDiaz 2797]

Matt McConkey (Homophilia) joins Paul, June, and Jason to discuss the 1986 action adventure comedy Never Too Young to Die starring John Stamos. Recorded live at Largo at the Coronet in Los Angeles, they talk about Gene Simmons’ tongue being the most violent thing June has seen onscreen, skilled gymnast Stamos, the Stargrove song, and The Room level sex scene. Plus, stick around at the end of the episode for 2nd Opinions songs!

 

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[muttnik 476]

I would definitely see June's gymnastics movie. I think she might enjoy American Anthem?

The scene where two of Velvet's henchmen are beating Stargrove up in the kitchen and they force feed him the cherry tomato, I think you can see Stamos disassociate from his body.

[samtrano 33]

A correction for Jason: He says the wrestlers just came out of nowhere and weren't sharing space with the gymnasts but that is not true.

During the montage where they play the Stargrove song, in the background you can see someone set up a mat on the spring floor for some reason and two guys are wrestling on it.

There's no reason for them to be doing this here on the specialized gymnastics equipment when all they need is a floor, but it sets up the next shot where they watch Stargrove on the trampoline, which is also on the spring floor for unknown reasons.

[FrancisRizzo3 212]

This is a legitimately fun movie to watch, and the episode is a great listen.

So what happened to Riley (played by "Nightmare on Elm Street";s Robert Englund (who even got a special credit)? After yelling "Good boy, Ripley", Ragnar leaves him behind, and the two punks protecting Riley get gunned down by Danja, but Riley is just left sitting there. Danja and Grady go running off to the chopper (after the hilarious image of Grady running one direction and then course correcting to follow Danja) and Lance jumps on the motorcycle. You'd think the guy who built the valve system might be useful in shutting the whole thing down.

 

 

[FrancisRizzo3 212]

Watching Ragnar's crazy crew of punks (especially Pyramid), I couldn't help but think of Bobcat Goldthwaite's gang of similar psychopaths in Police Academy 2, which came out the year before. One would think perhaps it was the influence of Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, but that came out the same year as Police Academy 2. Weird Science (also 1985 like Police Academy 2 and Beyond Thunderdome) also featured insane marauders. So, what the heck was happening in the mid-'80s that gangs of post-apocalyptic mutants were a big element in all these films?  

[FrancisRizzo3 212]

A minor point, but the script Jason reads from says "god joy" but the subtitles on the film says "gut joy", which i think was a term Kerouac coined. 

Doesn't change much.

[FrancisRizzo3 212]

Watching this film, it struck me that If John Stamos at some point doesn't play Zac Efron's dad (if he hasn't already) it will be a true shame.

[samtrano 33]

They talk up Stamos training in gymnastics for this film but realistically there's very little he could have learned in a few months. Anything more complicated than a flip on the trampoline was shot from far away or with his back to the camera

[ChunkStyle 1160]

Hilarious episode.  My favorite part of the movie had to be Cliff.  He is an absolute first ballot entry into the Roommate Hall of Fame.  There is a good chance that Cliff and Lance never met before getting randomly paired up for their dorm assignment.  Then a year or two later absolutely no questions asked he is a killing machine against impossible odds to help out Lance.  Normally you are just happy if you have a roommate that keeps things relatively clean.  Cliff puts everyone to shame.

I don't know if the movie made this explicitly clear but Ragnar killed Carruthers and then assumed his identity, right?  It makes me think the real Carruthers must not have had a great working relationship with his coworkers if no one in this organization ever batted an eye at his replacement.  Also he must have had no friends or family to notice that he had gone missing.  That unseen character is really bumming me out.

 

[grudlian. 4725]

I'm with Matt. I had no idea Gene Simmons was Carruthers. I thought Carruthers looked weird but it never once occurred to me he was Ragnar. That reveal blew my mind but made so much sense.

I, like Paul thought, George Lazenby and John Stamos were connected with some psychic/physical connection. One of my only notes was something of the was some Corsican brothers or Xamot and Tomax type relationship.

[The_Triple_Lindy 2482]

[FrancisRizzo3 212]

7 minutes ago, grudlian. said:

I'm with Matt. I had no idea Gene Simmons was Carruthers. I thought Carruthers looked weird but it never once occurred to me he was Ragnar. That reveal blew my mind but made so much sense.

I, like Paul thought, George Lazenby and John Stamos were connected with some psychic/physical connection. One of my only notes was something of the was some Corsican brothers or Xamot and Tomax type relationship.

Yeah, I knew he was a bad guy from the way the camera lingered, but I didn't realize it was Ragnar until he said he's close. Then it was obvious.

Similarly, I had no idea that Ragnar was Simmons until I saw the tongue and looked up the cast,

[AlmostAGhost 2718]

I had to scroll pretty deep through Google images to find a pic of the apples

(I also did not realize Carruthers was Simmons. But to be fair, I was distracted by Vanity and apples.)

[FrancisRizzo3 212]

15 minutes ago, AlmostAGhost said:

I had to scroll pretty deep through Google images to find a pic of the apples

(I also did not realize Carruthers was Simmons. But to be fair, I was distracted by Vanity and apples.)

I completely expected him to say "Have mercy" at that point, and we find out that when Lance Stargrove gave up the spy business, he moved to San Francisco, changed his name and started a band.

[Aaron TE Price 30]

1 hour ago, FrancisRizzo3 said:

Watching Ragnar's crazy crew of punks (especially Pyramid), I couldn't help but think of Bobcat Goldthwaite's gang of similar psychopaths in Police Academy 2, which came out the year before. One would think perhaps it was the influence of Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, but that came out the same year as Police Academy 2. Weird Science (also 1985 like Police Academy 2 and Beyond Thunderdome) also featured insane marauders. So, what the heck was happening in the mid-'80s that gangs of post-apocalyptic mutants were a big element in all these films?  

It's all a result of Road Warrior/Mad Max 2 which predated all of these.

[FrancisRizzo3 212]

4 minutes ago, AaronTEPRice said:

It's all a result of Road Warrior/Mad Max 2 which predated all of these.

I get that, but that was three years earlier. That's a long time for something like that to gestate. If they were all jumping on a bandwagon, it took a long time. Maybe the zeitgeist worked differently back then.

[SevenDollarsWorthofHoobastank 226]

I was completely annoyed at the off-beat clapping during that Ragnar "musical" performance. The audience was ALL. OVER. THE PLACE!

And also, did anyone else feel the "Stargrove" song and that "Christmas Time is Here" song by Horatio Sanz and the SNL crew sound somewhat similar to each other?

[joshg 207]

Paul alluded to this, but I can't get over how bonkers the chewing-gum bug was.

1. You can't actually chew the gum with the bug inside it; it's just a thin circle of gum wrapped around a metal device. Even if you could, the way you'd be contorting your mouth to chew around the metal would look so awkward that it would defeat the whole purpose of surreptitiously disguising the device. You're going to be nearly as obvious when you try to extricate the bug from the gum. You're way better off just popping a regular piece of gum and then slipping the bug from your pocket into the chewed-up wad when no one is looking.

2. Since Cliff was just a normal college student, why did the bug have to be disguised in the first place? Designing bazookas, etc. is crazy, but you could say that Cliff was a pyro. Those weapons were out in the open for all to see (and apparently...not suspend him for?) Disguising a listening device is specific to spy gadgetry, a la James Bond. What did Cliff plan to eavesdrop on, so crucially that he'd go through the trouble of disguising it as a piece of gum? If I found out that my roommate planned to eavesdrop on people for fun, I'm not so sure I'd trust him.

3. I hate the wording Cliff uses, "Chew it up."  GROSS.

 

[Aaron TE Price 30]

The whole time I was wondering whose water supply Ragnar was planning on poisoning. After all, a water supply is a very limited geographical area. It's often just a city. But near the end Lance answered that question when he told Ragnar he was going to save the world. Ah! So it was the world's water supply! Wait... What?

[Aaron TE Price 30]

Lance tells Danja that he know Carruthers is a traitor and she says she’s impressed and that he’s really a Stargrove for figuring that out. What do they do with that knowledge? Absolutely nothing. I kept waiting for Lance to have some secret plan in his back pocket, that they were just waiting to be kidnapped to put into action. Nope, instead, they decide to strip and eat apples.

 

From second one I could tell Carruthers was Gene Simmons. So I was really confused when he never revealed himself to elder Stargrove. In fact, after Ragnar killed him I  thought that we would never see Carruthers again and there was a scene deleted where we found out they were one and the same. So, it made even less sense when he showed up later and we know he’s a traitor already. There was no point in hiding the fact that he was Ragnar at this point.

[Aaron TE Price 30]

Lance is “going undercover” to get Ragnar’s autograph and Ragnar tries to catch him off guard by shouting “Stargrove!” Lance replies, “Is that name supposed to mean something to me?” So he’s playing it cool that he has no reaction to hearing his name shouted but at the same time, he’s aware that “Stargrove” is a name? I think would think any normal person’s reaction to being shouted Stargrove would be “The fuck did you just say?” As an experiment, I’ve begun sneaking up on strangers and shouting Stargrove at them just to see how they react.

[JimKata 62]

Just a note on Karate Dog: Pat Morita (a.k.a. Mr. Miyagi) is actually in Karate Dog. He plays a character named Chin Li.

[taylor anne photo 11311]

I have to disagree with June on the amount of time it would have taken Gene to do that eye makeup in the helicopter! I do agree that it wasn't the best job done and it does look rushed, but that was for sure at least a 15 minute apply job. It takes me around 15-20 minutes to do my eyes and I'm not doing anything nearly extravagant as that and if you ask any drag queen how long it usually take them to do their makeup they all say usually on average 2 hours. Of course that is meticulously applying everything on the face perfectly, so if you just focus on the eyes and rush it that sounds like it could have taken him 15 minutes at least.

[samtrano 33]

1 hour ago, joshg said:

What did Cliff plan to eavesdrop on, so crucially that he'd go through the trouble of disguising it as a piece of gum? If I found out that my roommate planned to eavesdrop on people for fun, I'm not so sure I'd trust him.

It was the 80s, so he was probably planning to listen to girls shower or something

[FrancisRizzo3 212]

1 hour ago, Aaron TE Price said:

Lance is “going undercover” to get Ragnar’s autograph and Ragnar tries to catch him off guard by shouting “Stargrove!” Lance replies, “Is that name supposed to mean something to me?” So he’s playing it cool that he has no reaction to hearing his name shouted but at the same time, he’s aware that “Stargrove” is a name? I think would think any normal person’s reaction to being shouted Stargrove would be “The fuck did you just say?” As an experiment, I’ve begun sneaking up on strangers and shouting Stargrove at them just to see how they react.

Thus Lance saying "name" is what tipped off Ragnar that he was there under false pretenses, leading to the bug sweep.

Never underestimate the mental acuity of Velvet von Ragnar.