190: Captain Starcrash and the Beauty Queen from Mars

Hello, this is Caroline Munro and you're listening to Movie Meltdown. The following feature has been rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America. It is intended for mature audiences and parental discretion is advised. It's showtime, folks. Enjoy the show.

Our nuclear reactor pumping out one million kilowatts of power. They bought their tickets. They knew what they were getting into. I say, let them crash. Way down among Brazilians, coffee beans grow by the billions.

So they've got to find those extra cups to fill. They got an awful lot of coffee in Brazil. What's up and welcome to Movie Meltdown. I'm Brian. I'm Ben.

I'm Erin. I'm Greg. I'm Marlena. I'm Beau. I'm Fred.

And we are back with another exciting adventure of The Caffeinated Movie Geek. Cappuccino on my butt. I still drink coffee. The last fucking thing you need is another cup of coffee. It's time for The Caffeinated Movie Geek.

Woohoo! We are coming to you live via digital recording from Nancy's Bagel Grounds, where we will get together, drink too much coffee, and start getting kind of silly, obviously. So, with that, we'll see. How is that funny? I don't know.

He's always asking for some kind of noise during the call. Not at the wrong place. It's too late. You already missed that one. It's like a joke in church.

The very fact that you're not supposed to laugh at that moment makes it so damn funny. Interrupting Cal. Woo-hoo! I've had too much coffee, so. Well, this will be a good test on your memory.

So, Erin, I ask you, what blend of coffee are we drinking this week? Pacific Blacktail? Good! Way to pull it out. All right.

It is, in fact, Pacific Blacktail. Come on, have it. I'm going to enjoy some now. We established that that's a fish. Is that right?

I still say it's a deer. Oh, okay. It's a deer. You guys don't believe me. I was just going to say that there's a fish in the percolator.

Everybody else thinks it's a fish and they want to put it in their percolator, which sounds kind of inappropriate. But speaking of fish. If you move that deer out of the way, put that in my percolator. Speaking of fish and inappropriate things, I'll do a quick one-off geek activity here. And it ties into this week's movie.

I watched Piranha Double D. Yeah. I knew what I was getting myself into. It already got released? Oh yeah, it's on DVD already.

Apparently it just got dropped in the Redbox from the sky. Immediately. Here you go. They were not messing around. A present from God.

Because that was my thing. I was like, how the hell is this here already? It was just in the theater like a week and a half ago. I think movies don't actually exist outside of Redbox. I think they're completely produced in them.

They might be. There's a lot of computer stuff now. It might all be going on in that box. I don't know. Yeah, they can crank out those fake Madagascar and fake Brave movies faster than they can complete the previews for the real ones.

That's true. As soon as you turn around, there's another, there's some sort of knockoff movie that's only available at Redbox now. I have high expectations for Piranha 3DD. I hope I'm not going to be disappointed. I just saw Double E because I was at home, so there was no 3 involved.

But, well, that's the thing. I'd already, like, as soon as it came out, which was that only week that you could have talked about it, because then it was already a red box. But that week, like, it got so much bad press that I just went in going, this is, like, I mean, like, unwatchable kind of, you know, comments. So I was just like, I was expecting it to be so bad. And I'm like...

I get in there, I'm like, this is just a bad horror movie. Like, it's like pretty much all of these bad horror movies. I mean, it's the same as the first one. It knows what kind of bad horror movie it is, and it's playing with that, and it's making fun of, you know, the fact that it's already a knockoff of a movie that really didn't take itself all that seriously to begin with. So it's, Yeah, I mean, if you're looking for something that's equally as much comedy as horror, this is probably for you.

Well, that's good. I mean, the trailer in and of itself, I mean, you see that Ving Rhames has shotguns for legs. I'm like, all right, I mean, I can buy into this. That's the thing. They had to pull out, like, how many people could we kind of explain that we could get back, even though we thought they were dead last time?

Because there's a couple of characters that they're like, well, we didn't see him die, so we're going to bring him back in the sequel. I mean, Christopher Lloyd, that's the first thing he's done in forever is those films, and he steals the scene. I mean, he's chewing the scenery more than the piranhas are when he's gone. He's back, not to spoil it for you. Speaking of the cameos, that's what steals this movie.

It almost runs away with it in a bad way. The Hasselhoff. That Hasselhoff. Which, I mean, that's not really a spoiler, because I heard he was in it from the beginning. But, if you don't want to ruin the end of Spirana Double D, yeah, turn it off for a minute.

He's, like, the joke doesn't stop. In the beginning, it's kind of fun, because it shows you how self-aware he is of What a joke he's kind of become. Like, and he's sort of playing with that in the beginning. Like, he's in a motel, and he's still writing one of his bad songs. And he's like, he gets to the thing, and he says something to the effect of, oh, God, how desperate am I?

You know, he makes some sort of comment to that. So he's acknowledging the level of stardom he's fallen to. And then, like, but it doesn't stop. Like, he gets in there, and it's like they just keep beating these Hasselhoff jokes to death. And by the end, like, there's, like, multiple endings of Hasselhoff jokes.

Like, it continues on. As the credits go on, they do several alternate joke endings of Hasselhoff. And I'm just like, okay, we get it. We think he's funny for a minute, but not anymore. So, yeah, maybe that's it.

Maybe just a little Hasselhoff goes a long way because, yeah, it's too much by the end of it, but. Other than that, I didn't hate it. I mean, if you want a stupid movie, this is your movie. It doesn't pretend to be anything else. So it's like Pieces.

It's exactly what you think it is. My favorite. Stolen straight from the trailer there. But, yeah, you've got to respect movies that do that. Yeah, that's how it is.

Yeah. I mean, any film to where it's self-aware, I mean, I very much like. Yeah. Well, that middle line of self-aware but not winking at the camera. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Very much, yeah. Yeah, that's okay. It can go too far, as this one kind of seems to, at least with that joke. The rest of it is tolerable, but it just beat that to death. On that note, we'll get back to that actor in a minute here.

So we will take a break and be back with this week's movie. Woo! Woo! So are the. Stars in the sky Singing goodnight to the setting sun That's when.

My world comes alive I am the Night. Rocker I wanna rock you all. Night long I am. The Night Rocker I want to love you with my soul. It's a sweet lullaby.

And I know you want to fly. So come, let's fly away. I am a night rocker. When you're on a picnic, hot dogs are mighty good this way. But when you're here at the theater, hot dogs are at their best.

We start with the choicest franks. Cook them until they're just right. Make available your favorite seasonings and leave the rest to you. Everyone likes our hot dogs. Why not get one for everyone right now?

All his life, he only cared about one thing. Himself. But now, the best hotshot pilot in the galaxy was playing babysitter to an old man, a green kid, two robots, and a princess. Han Solo really had his hands full. Han Solo is back.

Star Wars is back. Star Wars. Rated PG. Parental guidance suggested. Tweet Audio.

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Tweaked Audio. Sounds better. I made it for $ 30, 000 in two days and a night. This is Roger Corman, and you're listening to Movie Meltdown. It's time for Sofa Theater.

Sofa Theater. Is split into two warring factions, our own and the one ruled by the evil Count Zarzan from the League of the Dark Worlds. The Count has created a weapon, a weapon so vast, so huge, that it would take a whole planet to conceal it. You must sail through the haunted stars, find accounts, secret, planet, and destroy it. From dusk till dawn You don't miss a kiss till it's gone So just hold on You don't have forever for long I don't need to tell you what you already know.

I don't want to say. What my lips want to show My heart's like dynamite, ready to blow. Until the stars come crashing down. Until the earth spins halfway round. Until the sunlight hits the ground.

Baby, you should know I won't let you go. Until the stars crash down. Alright, welcome back to Movie Meltdown Sofa Theater. This week's Sofa Theater feature is Star Crash. The year is 1978, which is arguable depending on where you look at it, but I believe it was actually released in 78.

The director, Luigi Cozzi, I believe is how he says it, or again, if you watch the movie, Lewis Coates is his Americanized cover name. I don't know why he needs a stage name as a director, but whatever. I guess people hated to work with Italians. I don't know. The plot, according to IMDb, and this is almost as bad as it gets, For IMDb, and that's saying a lot.

Epic action in outer space when the good guy set out to track the evil Count's secret weapon. That's not even a sentence. They were five years old, right? Right. Because there's no excuse for a grown-up to have written that.

Right. The bad guys and the good guys. And in the middle, I expect it to go, and then pew, pew. But it does. It does in the movie.

I mean, in the description, I expect them to work in the sound effects. It's that badly pieced together. So with that, spoiler alert, because, yeah, we're going to ruin this. And it's, It's an epic action in outer space. Can we ruin it?

Right. I think we can. Maybe that description's perfect. I think we can, and we probably will. Right.

But before we get to our thoughts, it's time for one from the vaults. And with that, I thought I would share with you. Go ahead and get the props out here. I would let you all partake in my official Stella Star autographed photo here. Oh, wow.

So if you want, I can leave that there for you to gaze upon her the entire episode. Sure. Caroline monroe was still hot she is she she. Has held up amazingly well yeah and was ridiculously nice so i have to give her credit. Well she has access to a uh a vehicle that can stop time so maybe she's so.

Did the emperor in the movie. She might have tapped in a little of that i suppose so with that yeah we we did sit down and talk to caroline monroe and we're going to get her take on uh stella star and um star crash as a whole here so We'll see what Caroline has to say. You did Star Crash, which is pretty interesting. I've just been recently watching it again, and it's so likable. It's likable.

What a good word. Yeah, there's so much fun going on. How did you end up in that? That was Luigi. It's Luigi.

He knew, he loved Ray's work, Ray Harryhausen's work. And.... I think he'd seen some of my work, but I think he liked the thought of the combination of me having worked with Ray on his special effect films and some of my work that I think I was cast as Dennis Day. He kept sort of playing the character around you more? I think so, yes, which is wonderful, really.

Very, very lucky. She was a character. She was just. You just had to go for it. I mean, in every way.

And, of course, then we had David Hasselhoff, Christopher Plummer, who bought the heavyweight acting, serious stuff, who was wonderful, wonderful. And then they had the rest of us. How about the costuming for you? How much fun was that? Well, the costuming is.

Or lack thereof. The lack of. I was quite surprised when I'd I read the script. Luigi had called me, you know, said I'm very interested. Let's see the script, read the script, like the script.

Came over, he said, oh, we're going to do the costume fittings first. I thought, wonderful. Space pilot, I'll wear, you know, the 2001, I'll wear all the serious stuff. So I get to the place, and there's... A leather bikini.

There was a strip. He said, I said, this is your costume, can I? This is your costume. I said, oh, great. I'll put that on under the, you know, under the suit.

He looked at me and said, he said, what'd you say? I said, I'll put that on under the suit and then, you know, that's fine. He said, no, no, that is the suit. I said, okay. So we use lots of what you call toupee tape.

What do you call toupee tape? Yeah. Or double-sided. Yeah. Yes, and I think there's one or two mishaps, but I don't know.

I'm sure there must have been. So there I was, still a star. Wasn't it like platform heels running around through space? Well, I did wear tiny... No, actually, no.

No, no. No, there was tiny little heels. And then for certain scenes they had... Because I had a lot of running and stuff. So for certain scenes the boots were flat.

But they were long thigh boots, but with little heels, if you noticed. Hardly any heels. No, I couldn't have done it. Can you imagine that? I think Barbarella did that.

Jane Fonda, I think she did it in platforms, but no. It sort. Of has a Barbarella look about it. Yeah, that's what I thought. Very Barbarella.

All the costumes had a kind of ubiquitous space wedgie thing going on. Right. They all sort of had that extended wedgie V Vulcan something. Well, that was the whole thing is when David Hasselhoff's character was fighting the, I can't even remember the character's name now, the fellow with the shaved head, you know, the alien. I just noticed as they were fighting, of all things, I was like, the whole back of that costume zips up.

And then I got to thinking on a day-to-day basis, what a pain in the ass to like, Be in some sort of uniform to where you have to reach and try to zip up all the way from the butt to the neck. He gets his green bald girlfriend. Can you zip me up, honey? Isn't that how you do it in those situations? I mean, they're stuck in space forever.

I guess the robot does it for him. Right. As she said, he was a girl's best friend or something like that. So obviously we've already rolled. Into it here.

So yeah, thank you to Caroline. Now let's get into our thoughts. So I'd say where do you want to begin? But I mean, you get the overhead ship shot. I mean, the first shot you get is stolen from Star Wars.

I feel like this movie was like everything they used was like scraps or leftover props and like sets from Star Wars that Lucas didn't want to use. And they just like... I don't. Think they look that good. I'm sorry.

Yeah, I don't know. My feeling about it was that it was so cynical, it was innocent. It didn't even know what cynical was. Yeah. Kind of like the early Beatles, you know?

And I remember like. Paul thought back on it and he said, I guess all of our early songs were basically written to our fans and essentially said, please buy this record. Yeah. It's like, yeah. That sounds about right.

It's so cynical that it's innocent. I felt there were moments about it that were endearing in and of themselves. I think there were a lot of them. I think that if 2001 made you feel like you were in space, this movie made you feel like you were in someone's basement or something. But it's an awesome basement.

Yes, it's an awesome basement. It's a very crazy awesome basement with Cool stop-motion robots and things. And really good weed. That's right. Yeah, because I've never seen space that colorful in any movie.

It was like Christmas space. Yeah, the colors in there. That was the better part of the whole movie. It's very inspired. Charming color sensibility.

Art direction for space. I really do. He did that on purpose. I mean, he actually... I mean, he shot it in Technicolor.

He dusted off the technology it used to make that, I guess, because if you look, it's actually used in part of the process. And that's what it... Which, this is why I almost give him credit. I mean, for as much as wrong with this movie, like, it's the same thing with all of those. With anybody who really kind of loves what they're making, I mean, it's like he... really wanted to make a good movie in his mind.

It's that Ed Wood thing. This is the greatest thing ever. And again, being inspired by much better movies. He's looking at all the old sci-fi from the 50s and Forbidden Planet. Look at those colors.

And he was looking at that going, I want that. I want that in my movie. And he's trying to do it. You're just... You're like, oh, look at you trying to make a sci-fi movie.

It's very much like that. You can almost imagine just him sitting in there opening day of Star Wars like, oh, this is so cool. I want to make a movie now. And then that's what happened. I don't think it was a malicious attempt to ride the coattails of Star Wars.

I think it was just, you know, just what I took from it is it was the person who was so awestruck with it. It's just like, I want to make a movie like that. Sure. I thought it was some of those bands, those garage bands in the early 90s that might have listened to Pearl Jam or Nirvana and said, I can do that. I want to be that.

And then you get the crap of 96 through 98, 96, 98. That's kind of what you... And I don't want to call this crap, but it is on obviously a lower level. Now, I got a different feel from it, though. I kind of thought...

Because I thought the Barbarella thing, I thought it was like your dad had this awesome Barbarella Star Wars porn. and then your mom found it and made him edit out all the sex. I had the exact thought that it was like porn without the sex. Without the sex, exactly. I thought the same, yeah. I expect her to be sentenced to be like a sex slave.

Right. I mean, when they go on the plane with like all the ladies who I, it looked like, what's her name? Oh, who, was that a famous actress who played like the leader of the woman plant? Not that I. Heard of her.

What's her name? She looked familiar. I heart Huckabees. Um, Are you talking about Lily Tomlin? I thought it was like a young...

No, seriously. No, for a split second, I was like, is that Lily Tomlin? Because she's really hot. She was really hot. Because she sounded like Lily Tomlin.

I was like, that can't be her. She'd be okay on a lesbian play. The weird thing is, I looked up on IMDb, and I was looking at all the credits, and of all the odd credits, Hamilton Camp dubbed that character... The voice of Gizmoduck from DuckTales dubbed the woman you're talking about in the English version. Wow.

So obscure. Well, I mean, you were talking about watching Star Wars and being taken with it. Now, if you want to go with Luigi's story, again, this is how he's telling it years later, is that he already had this big sci-fi project together. and was trying to sell it, and the guy was like, no, I don't want anything to do with this. Not a chance in hell. And, like, a few months later, Star Wars opens up, and the guy calls him back, and he's like, hey, remember that movie?

So then suddenly they buy it. I think there's maybe somewhere in the middle that's true. I think maybe he had a sci-fi story, and then they started adding in all this knockoff Star Wars stuff once they saw it. And that might have been the Roger Corman thing, too. He's like, why don't you put some of this in so that way it helps sell it a little bit more.

I thought maybe he bought it after the fact. After it was already made. I don't know. I think that's what it sounded like. It's like the original company that finished it with the guy watched it and didn't want anything to do with it and dropped it, and New World picked it up and was like, Roger's like, I don't care.

This looks great. It was awesome. In fact, I'm going to make Battle Beyond the Stars now. Wouldn't you love to sit and watch a movie with him? Because, especially a movie that was undiscovered and it was something like this, and just to watch his expression like, this is it.

This is what I want. This is my favorite part. Right. I would love, that would be like a bucket list kind of thing. Oh, yeah.

Sit and watch a movie with him. That's, I really, I met him a couple years ago at Fright Night Film Fest and there's a guy to where, hey, I was just kind of sad and you go there and You've got these giant lines for the new Jason and these obscure zombies from Dawn of the Dead. And here's Roger Corman sitting there, just tumbleweeds blowing by his table. And I come in and I'm just like, ah. It was kind of sad.

Yeah. Right. But you could tell that he just loves every project that he's done. That's great. And was amazingly talented.

He gets so much... notoriety for being sort of schlocky as a producer which he was but like you go back and look at those things he directed early yeah he's got a good eye i mean he knew how to make a movie granted he was also really good at getting him in under budget but for what he was doing for what he was dealing with i think he makes some some pretty decent looking pictures for what he was trying to do and what he was working. With poor stella your escape efforts have been wasted okay i've lost again Take me back to that hell of a prison. You don't understand. We were sent to free you. Your sentence has been canceled.

Have you both gone mad? I only have logic and emotion circuits. No room for craziness. We've only been assigned to a top-secret Imperial mission. We must now leave and set Acton free.

I did think the robot sort of C-3PO character... I thought his southern accent was very charming. It actually kept me going through the movie. He was the cook on the western wagon thing. That was that boy.

Yeah. The guy who's the cook. Yes. He's cooking. I'm wired for logic and emotion.

Got no room for crazy. Yeah. He was telling her where they're stuck on the snow planet and he tells her to lie down in the snow and monitor your heart. And he says, like, lay your head down. He says, like, lay your head down.

He's like, lay your head. And the way he said head was so funny. I was just like, that's so cute. Lay your head down. I think the thing that cracked me up the most about that scene, too, is when the snow starts piling on them.

It's like you can essentially see the footsteps. Around the door. People were like, dump some more snow on them. And it ran out of shot. And it's like, let's go back in and put more on them.

And it ran out of shot. What I really appreciated is when they're warming her back up. her hair is wet from the melting snow and then all of a sudden she sits up and it's blown dry and perfect. The wonders of space. It was beautiful. One thing I thought was weird is like the robot doesn't have room for crazy but he said something about being nervous.

He's the nervous robot. They programmed you to be nervous but you can't be crazy? It's going to be like C-3PO somehow. That's because he's also part the cowardly lion. Yeah.

He definitely is. To her Dorothy. Which again, Star Wars is kind of being known for ripping off Wizard of Oz as well as many other movies. So, I mean, that's just, yeah, it all kind of falls in there. But in a weirdly prescient way, he was also Bender.

He definitely was. But, I mean, to me, like the look, I'm like, so you kind of stole the Darth Vader look and took the personality of 3PO. and gave him a weird texan accent or whatever the hell that accent i don't know where it was from but yeah i was just like it was because i mean you had dressed all in black you had a weird black helmet so i mean that's the closest thing we really get because even our villain isn't really darth he's a little more grandma of tarkin i guess and. Also kind of wondered too with that robot like is that the way it was originally written or if that was something that was changed in like post-production since he has to be dubbed anyway like they decided to do sort of a last minute change of his lines like maybe Carolyn really didn't know exactly what she was reacting to.

Like or there's a version in Italy somewhere where he just sounds normal and he's not Yahoo and as. He jumps that. I thought it was really funny when, like, I think it was when they were finding the third launch site. He said something about chauvinism. Yeah.

Robot chauvinism. Robot chauvinism. Robot chauvinism. I thought that was very quotable. He said a lot of defining one-liners.

Like, can't keep a good robot down. I'm like, that is true, sir. Circuits, don't fail me now. Yeah. These are classics.

Come on, man. Yeah. Well, the rest of the crew there, I mean, is it Acton? What is it? How do you even?

What is that guy? He was the most perplexing character. Well, first of all, I was just like, that hair. I'm like, to make a, I would say a dated reference, but it's actually equal with this movie. He's just like Willie Ames in space.

It's just, why are you, for God's sake, shave that down. Yeah, what was that guy? He was kind of like a. Man, I don't know what that dude was. Well, he's like a mix, because they all, like you start watching it, if you're going to, I mean, Stella's obviously the Han Solo.

I mean, she's the smuggler. She's the cool one. She's also the pilot of the ship. He's the navigator. So really, it's like they mixed him with two characters, because he's the navigator, and if you read on it, he was supposed to be this hideous creature, but he wouldn't wear any makeup.

He was a pissy bitch, obviously, so he wouldn't get in the makeup. So really, he was going to be a giant creature that was the navigator of her ship. Isn't that chewy? I mean, isn't that... But he also was pretty much chewy.

Calculating the logic of, we have this percent chance of... And I thought, isn't that stolen? That is stolen, right? From Star Wars. Right, yeah.

But then they kind of steal the Luke storyline, because then he becomes the one that kind of has the powers, if you want to call it that. Of course, yeah. And he's got the lightsaber that they randomly bring up out of nowhere. You really can see the future. They just jammed all these characters into one and gave.

It to him. And then he's also kind of Michael Bolton. Unfortunate. Yes. Why?

Because he has no soul? Yeah, that's it. Exactly. I thought it was strange how Stella, going through the whole movie, wasn't phased or didn't seem to be like, impressed by anything that was happening to her, anything that was happening around her. But the scene where they go in and see some computer, she's.

Like, wow! These computers! They can store memory! I'm just like, you just saw David Hasselhoff just kick some alien's asses with the lightsaber. And there's a southern accent robot, and you're impressed by this?

That was the only thing that. They didn't have an internet. Yeah, I guess so. That perplexed me about this. I was like, all right, so...

And maybe I got confused on something here, so correct me if I'm wrong, but the whole movie up until that point was to find that planet where this weapon was, but as soon as they found it, the Count shows up, and he's like, I'm going to blow it up now. I was like, wait, I. Yeah. Wait, what? You're blowing up.

I didn't understand. It was a trap to get... Ah, see. Pretty early on. It's the Admiral Ackbar moment.

We gotta have one of those. All these power modules, what are they for? This is the force that projected the red monsters into space. Then this is the way they produced real monsters? No, not real.

The monsters never existed. These machines discharge metal projections of monsters in our brains. Incredible. Images of monsters designed to drive men insane with fear. With this kind of weapon, Count Xarth Arn can take over the entire galaxy.

But why didn't they finish us off? When the red monsters were attacking us, suddenly they disappeared. This machine controls how long the attack will last. It's all done automatically. Programmed for a certain amount of time.

Usually the amount of time is enough to drive most people insane. But we're not like most people. Pretty early on I was just like that The exposition in this thing. The minute and a half of rambling on with techno mumbo jumbo with space thrown in front of it. right yeah i mean it just goes on forever and you're like i don't i don't care like just stop just like don't. Even bother it reminded me of like when i tried to write a sci-fi short story when i was in fifth grade and i i literally wrote like i was like oh this is so cool like i thought it was the best thing ever i was like and then they go and they he picks up his laser phone and the scene where she's like i think it's a laser spear i'm like that's like me how when i was writing those short stories and you must have been just as excited as i was you wrote the plot for this on imdb too yeah yeah and and somewhere she set down that rifle ray yeah rifle ray wouldn't.

It be a ray rifle i don't know i remember staring at the weapons laser spear Like, the weapons that the Count's people are using, they have, like, the bat wings on the side. I'm like, those are the most cumbersome, impractical weapons I've ever seen. I mean, it's just, they'd get entangled if you're near close quarters. And what were the prisoners? That was the other thing.

They were like, hurry up, hurry up, hurry up. Dump the uranium or whatever into the hole. And then they're like, okay, now everybody take a break. Yeah, five minute break. Like, what?

My favorite part of that whole thing was, like, we get there and, like, And everybody in there is dressed like a peasant from medieval times. Except for her, who's magically wearing a leather bikini. Where did that come from? She was not wearing that in the opening scene. That is not explained at all.

It's just shamelessly there. Why is she the only one? Which is maybe the best way to handle that kind of costume, I guess. And that could have been explained so easily. Just have a little five-second cutaway to where you... have the supervisor for all the workers, and they're all working, and he's just looking down at her.

And then you would know in that little moment that when she first got put into prison, it's like, this is your uniform. This is your uniform. My favorite part. I mean, it's mostly a bathing suit of sorts, but thank God it's got a collar. And a popped collar.

Right. This was cutting edge. This was the 80s. Later, they had the sparkly popped collar. Though, too.

She is stylish, let me tell you. And at one point, like, the straps on the stomach disappear, and it just gets even smaller. Well, they change anyway. Like, she ends up in a couple of variations. But, yeah, one time within the scene, it's a changing, so.

And then you can, like, see that under her costume when she's on one of the planets. Well, you know. But in the way of, like, exposition i like the scenes to where there wasn't any because i think my favorite moment of the entire movie was when you know the emperor christopher plumber he's just like chip please stop the passage of time and. He's like i have this real all right he's got powers i mean he told you he's got powers i think. My favorite moment in the movie was whenever somebody would just add an extra unnecessary word.

Like, yes, you can breathe on here, yes. Like, where they asked if she could breathe on the planet, and he said, like, yes twice in a weird way, and I was like, that was odd, how he just said that. And the editing is kind of like when a news anchor, like, when the camera lingers on them just a little too long, and they don't have anything else to say. Whereas they're watching the monitor, and there's just a pause of, like, they're watching the planet, and he's telling them, like, it's breathable, and it's just a pause. Like, someone forgot their line clearly in that shot.

She's like... So what's the planet like? I'm like, was someone supposed to say something? Or when there's an exchange and they cut to the other person who says nothing. Then they cut back again.

I love that. That's a great shot. They pointed the camera at the wrong person or something. I got nothing. Okay, well, I'll continue then.

Don't look at me. I don't have nothing to add. Allow me to retort. Well, the extra words might be, okay, their mouth's still moving in Italian, so throw an extra yeah in there or something. After the fact, I'm assuming they had to do some creative dubbing since half the people weren't even there to dub their own parts.

The exposition, you know, like early on, it's like, why are we... But then late into the movie, it gets to the point where they say, if we do this, we could save billions of lives. And I'm like, why? Because I don't remember. Anybody ever doing in the entire movie anything that makes a life seem worthwhile?

Yeah. I mean, nobody eats, nobody has a conversation about anything, nobody. And then, you know, in the final speech, not to ruin this movie, but it's just like, well, good has triumphed over evil, but evil will come back again, and the wheel will always turn. but for now we can. Rest oh man oh man he was just setting up the sequel i'm sure evil will be back and so will we next. Year speaking of evil and going back to the whole costume thing i remember watching the and especially in the scenes to where he confronts them at the basement of the giant supercomputer planet ridden with troglodytes.

And I was watching him, and I thought, you know, there's a man who knows how to work a cape. There's a lot of other people. It's like they just have a cape. It was like his prop throughout the entire film. He flipped it around.

Exactly. He would wrap himself in it, I guess, if he got cold on set. I mean. It's like between that and this. There was Tim Curry in The Worst Witch.

And now this guy. He did. He out-Tim Curry'd Tim Curry. Joe Spinelli. Put that on your resume.

Just the laugh. The laugh alone. I can work this shit out in this kitchen. I want that laugh as my ringtone on my phone. That's what I'm saying.

He's an entertaining villain. Are you talking about the laugh that goes down the hall? And then he gets in the elevator. Yeah, I was like, I'm in the elevator, now I can stop. Yeah, I'm in the elevator.

I'm not laughing anymore. No, there was like a weird... Okay, the transition. Seven. That scene where he was laughing...

Oh, yeah. That scene where he was walking down the hall and he was laughing with his cape and it was just really cheesy. I was like, oh, yeah, this just looks bad. And all of a sudden, it just cut to this kind of really awesome shot to him in the elevator. The camera zoomed in and it was centered really...

I was like, that was... it was like something like almost sort of maybe like if Martin Scorsese were to do a shot of something in a space like it was almost that good I really do think that like it zoomed in in an interesting way and it caught me off guard. Why don't we have Scorsese in space? He's really been slacking on that specific genre. Next movie. I think we need to get on that, Scorsese.

But yeah, I mean, I like the fact that, you know, the Count was channeling more Ming the Merciless than like, Vader, which could have been easy to do, but it's like he went a different route with that. I thought that was a lot of fun. Definitely a lot more Ming. And the whole thing feels a lot more kind of Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers. It's very serial-oriented in the way the acting kind of goes.

So it seems fitting, really, because those are kind of fun, and it transfers over. I mean, as ridiculous as it is, it's pretty damn fun. How do they, because they talk about breathing a lot, Are they able to breathe on this planet and this planet? But then when the emperor's troops are using their gold vibrators... I had a.

Lot of questions about that. Yeah, exactly. Wouldn't they just be bringing the vacuum of space into the ship with them and they all die? Don't they just dive out the window at some point? Yeah, they do.

They do. She had a helmet on by the end. I was thinking, I thought, okay, two things. If you're in that, A, how hard does that have to hurt your head when you crash through this window? You have to aim for the window.

And that was the other thing. What if they just misshoot and don't even hit the ship at all? They just keep going in this golden dildo forever in space. That's their own movie, like, you know. But I like the attitude.

It was like kamikaze dildo. It's like, we're going to fire ourselves in there, and I don't know what's going to happen, but if I live, I'm going to jump out and start shooting someone. But I thought it was a cool idea at the same time, because I didn't picture that, but I pictured, like, okay, what if it was maybe submarines fighting, and they did something like that, where you launch people in torpedoes, and it goes through the hull, and then suddenly, like, not only is the water rushing in, but then these soldiers come out and start shooting people. I was like, it's kind of a cool concept, just sort of, oddly done. Yeah just i haven't seen that before i'll give.

Them that yeah it seemed to me like though to launch yourself into a place and then throw open a door and look over and shoot why wouldn't you just make a window and have a turret where you would go in there and be still protected, and you could see where people were before you throw open a hatch and look around like a groundhog. Or why not just make that dildo a bomb? No, you're losing me there. That sounds dangerous. No, it has to be two guys with machine guns.

It needs to be guys in a dildo. That is no way to make a dildo. But I also appreciate any bridge of a ship that has the option of stairs outside Or the fireman's pole. I did notice the fire pole. Because towards the end, he walks around the pole to go down the stairs.

I was like, oh, I don't want to go down the pole. Why would you want to go down the pole? You've got a cape. Think how much more. Fun it's going to be.

Maybe it gets hung up when you go down the pole. Oh, no. It seemed like a missed opportunity to me. Dude, there's a pole right there. I liked his leadership as a general as well because he walks out onto the catwalk and he's like, shoot that guy.

Shoot that guy. And then later on, suddenly he has a gun. It's like, wait, you had a gun? But he just likes telling people what to do, you know. Oh, we're shooting people now.

Well, then later on they send out these. I'm a great leader. Yeah, they send. Out these troopers that have heavy armor and they can shoot crazy fast. I was like, why didn't you send them to begin with?

You let your men get killed for five minutes before you send in the guys you knew could take care of the problem. Who's leading this battle? And I was also confused about the structure of his ship. I mean, I liked the hand, but every time it was going into protection mode... the fingers curled, and I thought, how bad does it have to suck to be like, you know, maybe those are the crew's quarters on the outside of the fingers. It's like, sucks to be you, man, but we're in battle, so we got to let you.

Be the father first. It was a left hand, like instead of a right. I don't know. It's just weird. It's just an odd choice to make it left.

I don't know why. But I think that's the first time in any movie I've seen the structure of that ship, and I thought the phrase, you know, Never Ending Story 2 ripped off that design. It's probably the only time. It's probably the only time anybody's seen it. The inspiration for Never Ending Story.

Well, I mean, you mentioned the Choglodites, or as I refer to them, Flying Cavemen. Mm-hmm. Why were they just, like, they just spring out of nowhere? That scene was one of the most confusing. They had amazing pouncing abilities.

They did. Um.... And then I was like, obviously this isn't a Starfleet vessel, because Prime Directive says you shouldn't be beating up these cavemen. They shouldn't even know about you yet. You're doing it wrong.

They don't like robot chauvinism. No, you're not supposed to. Don't be infecting them with your robot chauvinism, dammit. You're ruining this planet. Look!

Amazon's on horseback! I hope they're friendly. Soon find out. The planet of women that's scantily clad yeah i mean i like that i like that because that's definitely a throwback to a lot of old b sci-fi but you know there were just so many moments where it's like we're here five minutes we gotta move. On right yeah well what i was i thought it was kind of funny that l when they first got there said that they there must be this must be some sort of civilization here uh you know And then they go through the whole queen and the escape and everything.

And he said, let's hurry. He doesn't know anything about them yet. He goes, let's hurry. The Amazon women will soon be releasing their fighter jets or something. How did you know that they had them?

How did you figure out that they had them? And how did you know what they called themselves? We used to work for Batman. Which character was that, though? El, the robot.

Okay. Because my problem was the other guy, the giant-haired dude. Why did he know everything? Because he could see the future. But he would ramble off, like, not even future, just random plot details that he shouldn't know he would magically know.

He'd seen the movie, though, before the movie was made. I think so. That was his future. He just read the Into the script. And definitely going back, you could tell he loved Harryhausen because when I was watching that statue, I was like, this is exactly Talos from Jason the Argonaut.

It's like almost shot for shot. Yeah, the whole beach scene looked exactly like... I mean, it's like they found the same beach. That's what I was so amazed by. I was like, this looks like the exact same set.

The best person working on that movie, I think, was the location scout. They had some nice spots. It looked pretty good, yeah. Yeah. They had the field planet, the snow planet, the water planet.

They did beat Lucas to Hoth. This was before? That's true, it was 80. I had a whole, if we're on that, I started noticing all of them. They did the Hoth before he did.

They captured her. They had a floating city. They had her captured and were hanging her upside down and carrying her off to potentially. Go eat her. That's straight out of Jedi.

Most of these weird, I don't know. That was a weird kind of Terry Gilliam moment too when they were just carrying her off Like the camera had this fish eye lens. I was like, this, wow, okay. Kind of a break in tone. It was interesting.

A lot of that, it's interesting that, you know, for being a ripoff of Star Wars, they kind of beat Star Wars to a couple of different little plot points there. Yeah, it's not like the Star Wars exposition and storylines make all that much sense. It just feels like you have maybe just enough to go on to get through the little passage. It's just done more coherently. I think, yeah, they sell it a little better.

You're just like, oh, okay, I'll buy that. These guys are just like, what? Okay, but that one part, when they were over on the women's planet. Where they're taking the robot. The lady's planet.

The lady planet. They're taking the robot, and the woman just jumps out of frame and shoots him. That was crazy. Because you don't see that in movies. Usually when something happens, it cuts to someone with a gun jumping out.

But they were just walking, and she just ran into him off frame. It was really weird and jarring. She probably just missed the cue, and they didn't know. They cut him off mid-conversation, too. Like, we don't want to die.

She just jumped out and shoots him. You're like, holy shit, what? What is this? That was probably the most surprising part of the movie. I can't believe when they killed L myself.

I know. I cried a little bit. I know. It was pretty sad because they beat the hell out of him. Yeah.

I was pretty sure we'd see him again. But still, it was a sad moment because they didn't just disconnect him. And see, that's something else that they beat Lucas to because, you know, C-3PO. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think the thing that surprised me was when that guy.

Michael Bolton, act on. Willie Ames, whatever. Yeah, when he was dying, he said, I'm no use anymore at this time. At this time. Didn't need that extra.

What was that for? At this time. How about right at the same time, she's looking at him going, but you never die. Enough with the dangly personable... Just don't...

You never die? Like, this happens this weekend, and you never die. I mean, what the hell? Yeah, you can breathe here, yes. Yeah, that made it sound like it was a TV show.

I know. Like, remember last week you didn't die? All the other episodes. And it was also very much, you know, a Monty Python-esque sort of thing, too, because it's like, you know, it's just a flesh wound. No, no, no, I'm dying.

I'm dying. I'm dying. I know they just grazed my arm, but I'm dying. And by the way, I'll disappear. Why does everybody that dies disappear?

Whether they're human or robot, whatever. Also, I will say this squid judge thing kind of reminded me of the weird squid thing in Dune. That's immediately what was my first thought when I saw it. But he looked like whoever the actor they had filming for that, he looked like he was literally reading the script. He was looking down.

You have to go to. Yeah, but he's also operating on a squid thing. He's reading it, but he's following along with his squid fingers. You have to. He's handling other trials because he has extra arms.

Yeah, but that's very much Invaders from Mars right there. Which I think was another one he referenced as being Invaders from Mars and Forbidden Planet as being a big influence on him. So you can kind of see, again, how much he's invested in this type of movie and And really loves it. And I think that's still like what comes through it. It is ridiculous as many of the problems are.

It feels genuine still. Only occasionally. And that's what I'm trying to decide is what stuff got jammed in after Star Wars. Because I'm like, you know that lightsaber wasn't there. Yeah.

There's no way that was written in there because nobody would have known what the hell it was. But all of a sudden, because there's no explanation, they never mentioned that they had it before. I mean, they're running around with blasters. Well, The whole rest of the movie. When he was hiding it behind his back, it looked like a gun that he had had earlier.

It's not a gun. It doesn't come out as a gun. He holds it really weird. Actually, the effect didn't look as bad as I expected. It looks kind of iffy in the first Star Wars anyway.

It looks... a little worse than that but it's still better than i expected but it didn't match like he wasn't holding it right i was like it was like he was holding a different type of weapon and didn't know that's what they were going to animate in sometimes. Yeah i mean like when he would say like hit a robot with it like the lightsaber would totally overlap like the outline of the robot like they animated it over the outline it didn't make like there was no hit detection it was yeah. I just remember seeing those two robots, and I was like, this is the best that the Count has got. It's just these two robots. With pirate swords.

And see, I need to go back and watch. And angry eyebrows, got to make that there so you know they're evil. But was there an earlier scene to where, am I getting David Hasselhoff and Michael Bolton? confused in my memory to where a little bit there was a scene earlier in the movie to where he had the michael bolton character on his ship am i incorrect in recalling it like near the very beginning i could have sworn there was but i guess it. Was you can tell the difference because hasselhoff is wearing eyeliner yeah. I think they both are.

No, I don't think the movies do have a little bit of a resemblance. But yeah, when they did that close-up on him, I was like, is he wearing that? Like, he was wearing almost as much as she was. Also, their ship had a really, what looked like just kind of impractical front view window. Like it was just like two real small windows and they're really far apart.

So you could kind of see, only see what's to either side of you in space. You're like, here's this planet. I'm like, well, you're lucky. Like the one eyeball is aimed right in front of it. Cause you can't, it's like, cause.

I saw that as a pilot. It's almost like when you have a bad wiper on your car, you keep like looking around the street. Yeah. I feel like it was that same way with that vehicle. It was a peripheral vision.

You couldn't see him straight in front of you, only on his side. It's like a hammerhead shark. You've got the two eyes looking different directions. Yeah, the thing about that lightsaber battle, though, was that at some point he decided to focus for a while on the one robot. And that's what gets you in trouble.

And the other. Robot thought for a long time before he decided to take. Advantage of the situation. He had to process. Yeah, I picture him sitting out of frame, like maybe sitting down in a chair and thinking about it.

Like, you know, he's really pointing that thing at the other guy a lot. And he's not really paying any attention to me. You know what I think I could do is attack him. They did seem a bit lacking. He's got 1978 computer systems.

He's only got 64-bit, man. I was going to say, maybe you're just putting too much into it. Maybe they just had one stop-motion animator, and so he could only animate one at a time. So the other guy... The other one is just.

Not being moved. Yeah, he's just sitting over there. But apart from the giant hand ship, none of the other ship designs really jumped out at me. or made an impression. The city one looked like it'd be interesting, but they never got a good close-up of it, so I could never really tell what it looked like. And not only that, but they had this giant floating city that was just empty.

Well, they cleared them out. They said they did their little evacuation, but I'm like, that seemed pretty quick. That's what I'm saying. If you're evacuating this entire gigantic thing, that was pretty darn quick. It just looked interesting, because it looked like the only shit model they bothered to paint.

Yeah. Well, that was the thing about the. package or whatever. The other ships, like you were saying, they didn't... It's because none of them were really... There was no theme.

There was no uniform. They were all just random. Everything was just, and this sort of looks like this, and we glued some stuff over here. I really enjoyed, especially when you talk about just random things, when Thor was on the ship, on Hoth, trying to get it restarted after... acton had stolen the little drive or whatever um and he's just like pulling random things from under the table you know they weren't connected to anything they were supposed to be and he was just touching a little lighted thing to it and like well that one doesn't work and he just pulls out and touches something and that one doesn't work and it just i i don't know it was it's like okay somebody just get me a bunch of things that could run a ship and we'll make it Make the green-faced guy touch a light to him.

And what was that weird laser-like thing that he just decided to play with instead of doing whatever, you know, the million other important, you know, life-threatening things that he should be doing on this show? You know, I'm just going to hang out and just play with my laser beam until someone comes and knocks me on the back of the head. Why was that there? He was very amused by it, whatever it was. He was really stoked.

Like, his facial expressions, like, I think that was the most excited he was in the whole movie was him playing with that thing. I mean, just very self-contented. It's just like, yeah, I rock. And another touch is that. L referred to himself as like the space police or something like that.

Um, you know, when they were, he. Literally said, it's the police. Like they were, the line was like, Oh no, it's the police. Right. It was just weird.

And it said like that. Space version of Dukes of Hazzard. Right. It just, um, I was laughing those first few minutes of the chase scene and why does one come on? And then the other come on, they're like bantering back and forth while they're supposedly chasing each other.

And, uh, I don't. Like that, but it's like you have the robot. I got the impression early on that, like, Al and Atkin were in different ships. Right. And then suddenly it's like they're in the same ship but on different monitors.

I was like, it was just very weird. Yeah. Well, and the set design. Some of it's awesome, but then those big, like, chairs that they're in, which change color, or I guess they change ship, because early on it just looks like a giant eggplant sitting there. Well, did you notice the chair that. on the female planet, the main throne that the queen was sitting on, it was very phallic.

Did you notice this? I was like, is that purposeful? Is that incidental? Am I like looking too much into the shape? Maybe you're reading a little too much.

I expected the Freudian undertones. There's a lot of this that feels very Futurama, I would say. It seems right at home in that universe, actually. But if we're going to the thrones, I did want to, like, jump ahead when we get to the emperor's throne at the inn. That was awesome, and I kind of want one.

Yeah. But at the same time, it almost looked like the ornamentation you would see on a 70s bowling trophy. It was just that. It's awesome, though, but I'm just like, that... It doesn't strike me as outer space, but it's awesome, and I need one.

On that ship where they were at with the Emperor, I just remember thinking, that's a tremendous waste of space they've got there. I mean, look at how big the walls and the ceiling and everything are. It's cavernous, and there's, like, nobody there, and there's nothing there. There's no computers. There's no windows.

It's just, it's like the warehouse portion of the ship, and they just put it there. That's right. They hadn't made the pickup yet of all the, you know, they got to haul in all the stuff that's their food. And then they had the the shuttle uh ship that they take down to the little window the window ship and like you don't even your people can't even fit into it like he had to duck down and bend backwards to even get into like that's the most impractical shuttle I've ever seen. There's no, nothing driving the thing.

It's just a metal and glass. Oh, the controls are easy, right? You should have no trouble with it. Why don't you fly? You should have no trouble with this.

It's easy. Well, we're talking impractical. I mean, I brought it up to her, but I was just like, it really struck me in this. And you see the cover of like the cheesy pulp sci-fi stories. And it's like, those outfits always look awesome on the girls, but watching her walk around and I'm like, this is, This is so impractical.

It makes no sense. And she was supposed to be like that the whole movie, actually. She was supposed to have the leather bikini thing going on as her look. And then midway in, the American producers got involved and were like, again, if it's not being caught up on the sex end of it, it's money. They were like, we don't think we're going to be able to show this on television with her in the whole movie like that.

Somehow it's okay for the second half to not. Be like that. It's okay for like 90% of the crew to be in that. Is that when they put her in the sandwich bag? Yeah, then she's in a plastic bag the whole rest of it.

I mean, if she was wearing that in the place where it was really cold, that. Would just be like, It would make a little more sense. It would just make her seem like an idiot. Come on. Well, I mean, we've had some good thoughts on it.

Marlena, you did not seem as thrilled. So with the alternate take, what was your thoughts on this? On the movie? Yes. It was really hard for me to watch without the assistance of Crow and Gypsy.

That's true. It is asking for that treatment. Yeah. They would have had fun with it. Yeah.

Yeah. And we would have had fun hanging out with them. I like how you say they would have had fun with it. It's like a past relative. She would have had a good time if she were here tonight.

In spirit she was. It's true because they're not around anymore. In spirit they are in another way now, but it's just not the same without their little silhouettes up there. So I don't know. Aside from that.

I mean, her outfits were really fun. It was campy. It was fun. I didn't realize... To, like, the end of the movie, that that was the Hoff.

Yeah, he's... You know, I had the exact opposite. I knew he was in it, and I'm like, is that too David Hasselhoff? And it wasn't. No, he looks like Michael Bolton.

What is this? I kept wondering when he was going to show up, and I was like. He's not the robot, is he? I was like, David Hasselhoff looks really skinny and weird. Yeah, he looks like.

The Gautier guy or something. I was like, yeah. Guys, what's going on? I remember looking, and I was like, he hasn't aged that much, but. Well, watch him running in slow motion on the beach in Toronto Double D and you'll change your thoughts.

It's how I met your mother syndrome. Yeah. He got older and became someone else completely. Yeah, that's kind of what happened. Was the mask he was wearing ever explained?

Basically. Stole that from something. Yeah, so it was a shield something. It was a something shield. There's a caveman.

I assumed he was, yeah, playing a god, which happens in every sci-fi movie. It was a something shield. Zardoz mask is what it was. It's Zardoz. Yeah, the same mask he's wearing in Clash of the Titans, I'm pretty sure.

That thing keeps turning up. I don't know. This movie really made me wonder how I don't flunk out of college. I can't focus on anything. I did my nails the entire time.

I don't think that's you. I had a really hard time keeping my face clean. directed in the general direction yeah of this. Movie the dog fight at the end was where it just kind of lost me it literally felt like they looped they did over it for like 10 minutes like it did not end it was the same shot of the golden dildo and the people shooting and the guy going kill them and then i was like i've seen this it's almost surreal like it's like a fever dream is this. Like the movie Speed, where they loop the video. Yeah.

That's exactly what... And you start to notice something's off after a while. You're like, what? Wait a minute. He already put that short pass.

And it just takes you a while. It's as long as the... chase scene, the motorcycle chase scene with the cops and the thing with two heads. The hell you say. I don't think anything is that long. That's the longest chase scene.

Unnecessary chase scene ever. But I'll give you, that's the, if there's a weak point in this movie, I mean, that's the point where you're like, okay, really? Let's start around. That's my own. Other than that, this is flawless.

This is flawless cinema. I'm sure it won all the Oscars out here. Yeah, that scene is a little tedious, I'll give you that. Well, again, it's a flawed masterpiece. It is.

I mean, by the end, I was just like. Like Citizen Kane and Vertigo. Star Crash is Star Crash. It would be on my list. But you could say the same thing about Madame Bovary.

Because it begins from his point of view, and then it shifts to hers. But when asked about it, Flaubert said, life is like that. And then we looped a scene over and over again. Yes. I've just been distracted by the autograph there.

And just the very fact that she put to Brian... Brian is in quotation marks. It's a weird nickname. I'll sign it to Brian. She knows your true identity.

We'll call you Brian. She's the only one. She does a drawing. I like the star. No, it's the star.

It's a disclaimer asterisk. You turn it over to the back of the autograph. It says, this is Nolan Boyd representing It's actually signed by Brian in quotation marks. This is a total fraud. That's what it says right there.

Is that a question mark? I don't know. She did it. She's the Riddler. I think it's supposed to be a heart.

Maybe it's a heart. She's like, I've got this negative space. I need to just. Just scribble something out. Maybe it's like one of the explosions of the ships.

Or maybe you're all thinking that was like the ending. Maybe that was the beginning. Does this pen work? It's the tester's spot. I'm guessing that's her navel half hidden under the...

It bothers me when you can't see a navel because it makes me think somebody's a replicant. It's like the movie The Brood. It's like she just. That or Invasion of the Body Snatchers. One or the other.

And from here, the red part that would be the codpiece front looks kind of like the Autobot symbol. It does. I was going to say it looks like Cobra. She's Autobot. That would be one badass Baroness, wouldn't it?

Yeah. I'd watch that. That seems fine to me. And we're all staring at the picture. Yes, we are.

For those listening. Because it got dark and you couldn't look out the window. You're going to have to put the picture up because people will just be like, God, I wish I knew what they were talking about. I'll post it. It doesn't matter.

Okay, what else? Anything we forgot to hit? I don't know. It's pretty epic. I don't know what else we can do.

I mean, it's very much one of those everything-in-the-kitchen-sink movies. We could talk here for a long time and then afterwards be like, oh, wait, we forgot about this. I can't believe we didn't even go into that. I just wish the story was a little better because a lot of the cheesy effects have a kind of primitive charm that I would like to see them really working in the service. Of the story.

Yeah, mm-hmm. I mean, if you had a really tight story, that would just be so amazing to see these pastel colors and the sky and some of the weird landscape effects. Or just the weird effect of the red aliens that get into your brain and make you think they're monsters. It's like there's a liquid light show that just kind of pours into the ship at some point in time. I was like, this is either really cheesy or really cool.

I can't decide. The first time, I swear, I thought she reached up to her head and said, my hair. I was pretty sure that's what she said. But I cracked up at that. My hair.

Such a funny line. And then what's his name? Michael Bolton goes, we just survived an attack by the most powerful. Weapon in the universe. Yeah, congratulations.

Mike, he was really excited. Cross that off my bucket list. The best part is then she does this little hop and is like, that was awesome. Like, we are so cool because we just did that. Yeah, those little moments, it's like, these are the movies Burt Reynolds made in Boogie Nights.

Yeah, I know. I don't know. I mean, there's a level where I think it does work, like you were saying. It still has the really cool visuals and the campiness that sort of carries it. And then there's a lot of moments of, and it's mostly dialogue and just, yeah, story stuff that sort of drags it down.

It's just the awkwardness and dead space that keeps it from cohering. But in a way, that's almost, it's like charm. At the same time, it's like there's dead space, but there were so many times I was watching that and I feel like, did they cut 20 minutes out of this? Yeah. Kind of.

Where are we now? At moments, I thought, this is just like the room in space. Yeah. It's Sinbad in space. That's what he wanted to do.

And it feels like that. Even aside from the weird stop motion stuff, it still kind of has that same spirit of the Sinbad movies, only their ship is a spaceship. It still kind of feels like a Sinbad in space movie. I thought you meant Sinbad the comedian. That guy's hilarious.

I don't want to hear anything other than that. Why haven't they made a Sinbad movie with Sinbad? That's... They really should, actually. Was it Man of the House?

The one that had the weird girl that was obsessed with the Smiths? You're assuming we've seen any Sinbad movies. I have. I have seen... Fucking ruled.

I've seen First Kid. And There's the Door, Sir. I have seen... It doesn't end there. Is he in Jingle All the Way?

Let me tell you. He is. He is in Jingle All the Way. Oh, crap. I have seen one.

That's it. We're all leaving then. I'm guilty. I've never seen any of them. Call Tiffany, because he's going to know everything.

Yeah, Tiffany will know all of them. So what's your final take on this movie, Eric? The lack of. Fill in the lines. So many things.

Yeah, well, Mad Libs the rest of this. We've got a Mad Libs review right here. The whole, he suddenly has superpowers that are completely unexplained really bothered me. And they just, he kind of mentions, oh, it's illegal to mess with time. Like, oh, okay, that's why we're not doing it.

Yeah, like wagging his finger. Yeah, but the emperor can do it. Well, he's the emperor, right? He can also fix parking tickets. Mess with time.

And if you get a parking ticket... Well, when you've got. That bling like the Emperor, those gold chains he had going on, he was. I've got to give it to Christopher Plummer. I mean, I'd seen Rock-A-Doodle, and I didn't know that he could top that, but damned if he didn't.

Damned if he didn't. I really like Rock-A-Doodle. Marlon, there's the dole. I did too. It's another childhood movie that.

I don't know. Something about growing up as a kid, Don Bluth animation stuff, it just rubbed me wrong. I mean, it just... To me, like, every single Don Bluth movie felt like I was watching a fever dream. As a kid.

Like, they made me feel sick watching that. Did he do All Dogs Go to Heaven? Yeah. Which I tried to rewatch, and it's, like, unwatchable. Like, it really.

I think I was saying, like, last week how it's... You don't realize when people are in a recording booth for an animated movie how you can't talk like a normal person. You have to be in your emotions, exaggerate everything. And basically, All Dogs Go to Heaven is just Burt Reynolds and Dom DeLuise just kind of bullshitting with each other with no script. And they just animated over that.

It's so distracting. Well, the funny thing is when I caught part of that on something... Not too long ago. Yeah, I don't know what the circumstances were, but I remember watching, like, five minutes of it, like, near the beginning, and I was like, you know, when I was a kid, I never realized that the whole plot of this is a film noir. I was like, huh.

And I went back to whatever I was doing. Like, I didn't keep watching it after that, but I just remember being like, I didn't get that when I was a kid. No, I still haven't given it a chance. I just moved on. You never realize that The Brave Little Toaster is a Homeric epic.

Right. It's a work of art. Speaking of nightmare fodder from childhood, Scott. What if your toaster had an adventure all its own? I like the fact that, you know, 20 years down the road, Brave Little Toaster goes to Mars.

Well, sure, like you do. We sent it there before we sent Curiosity. Yeah, that Curiosity guy, he's not only ripping off Johnny Five, but also the Brave Little Toaster. Yeah, I mean, what's going to happen now is essentially Mac and Me is going to come to fruition now that we've set that up in there. Oh, Canada and your knockoff movies.

Yeah, speaking of these. That Mac and Me was, it was a McDonald's creation, wasn't it? That's the best scene in the whole movie. It was, they like funded the movie. I'm not familiar with this.

It's a horrible. Oh my God. As a kid, I remember watching it and that's what stood out to me. Like that was one of the very first times as a kid I became aware of the concept product placement because like this alien that crashes to earth i'm and i can't remember much of it but basically as i recall the plot he comes to earth he befriends some kid it's need to rip off and what saves him when he's like ill at the beginning is eating mcdonald's food of course. I just thought of this funny thing that happened um not related to anything we're talking about other than I was with a friend, and we were scrolling through Netflix.

Speaking of segues. Trying to find a movie, and I was like, ooh, Mac and Me. He's like, hell no. And then there was a little animated movie right next to Mac and Me, and he's like, what's that? He's like, Todd Slons, Todd Slons, get the fuck away from that.

Get the fuck away from that. Like it was a bomb. Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb. All that stuff, American Tail, Land Before Time, all that stuff, the animation just... I don't know.

Not so great. Was Land Before Time? Land Before Time I'm pretty sure was Don Bluth too. He brought in bigger names there. My daughter loves anything and everything to do with dogs and animation.

She draws non-stop. She watches shows and draws everything that's going on. Well you know Netflix she's scrolling through and All Dogs Go to Heaven it's like two and then like a Christmas episode and then one and I said, what do you think about this one, the original All Dogs? She goes, that's the worst movie I've ever seen. And I said, really?

She goes, yeah, it's bad. And I was like. I'm very proud of you for knowing the difference between. Good and bad. Good and evil.

Right. It's not just bad. That's the true message of All Dogs. That's the same moment my nephew, when his mom had taken, because he was one of those kids that really never had an opinion, and. Loved movies.

And his mom brought him back from seeing Flubber. And I said, what did you think of it? He goes, it was stupid. I was like, you've now transcended and you realize. You've just taken your first step into a larger world.

Yes, it was. We could almost make an episode. We need these bad movies. Yeah, make an episode almost about the very first time we became aware of movies just being shit. Yeah, right?

They were all awesome. Add that to the list. Hold on. Yeah. Just like the first time there as a kid you were sitting there and you were just like, what am I watching?

And to think, you know, you become cognizant of that at like an early age and then at the same time you do the same thing you do as an adult. It's like, well, I haven't made the commitment to sit here and watch this. I'm going to see it through to the end. It's a very adult moment in a child's life, you know, to basically learning to cope with disappointed expectations. Yeah, I think I've already covered mine.

We'll save all of that for another episode. So I think we've covered Star Crash. We've veered off as we usually do by the end of this, so I think we better wrap it up and get the hell out of here. Yeah. So with that, I'm not going to give you the official Secret Circle reveal yet, mostly because these bastards won't come up with a decent fanfare to save their life.

But I'll give you sort of a... It doesn't matter now. It doesn't matter now. You missed your chance last week. And the crowd goes wild.

Come on in my kitchen. You don't even know what the fuck that is. Robert Johnson. Cobbler, cobbler, cobbler. He has no fanfare.

That's selling him short. So, okay, well, just to kind of give you a heads up, a potential amazing episode is coming your way. We're going to return to our Tales from the Cryptids series. We haven't done a Bigfoot episode in a long, long time, so we're going to try to put together a very special Bigfoot episode. We're roping in a few extra people, some we've had on the show.

Because Harry Henderson is such a step above Mac and me. I'm not sure we're going with that one to lead off. Eventually, I hope that we'll get to all Bigfoot movies. I don't like Harry Henderson. Ben Kingsley's finest moment.

I think we'll try to find something even more ridiculous. So, yeah, we're going to come back with, not next time, but probably the following. We will come back with some sort of Bigfoot episode that I'm not sure any of us are prepared for. Well, then, otherwise, that about does it. We will return next week.

Same geek time, same geek feed. Thanks for listening. Dressed up for a big day. Like Halloween day. It was 4th of July now.

A car crash with. A suitcase and a painted face. She was one of a kind. She wears a blessed crown. Like cinderella and roller skates in.

Bed he rides the playhouse from his hometown when he comes. Around cause i don't let him drive now i'm mixed up as a milkshake but make no mistake man she's looking. Like a star yeah like a. Star You and me, we're invincible Together we can be Oh, so tragical Whatever. Dress up just like.

Ziggy But he couldn't lay me down Captain Crash And the beauty queen from Mars. She had a toothpick Drained lipstick Watching traffic. At the diner, holding. Hands, playing big plans, playing Superman. He was wearing eyeliner.

Another local legend, in his longtime lucky charm. You and me, we're invincible. Together we can be all so tragic, y'all. Whatever. All dressed up like a singer.

But he couldn't break a tie. Captain Crash. I mean for Mars Drunk on love As you can get Getting high on lust And cigarettes Living life With no regrets At least they're gonna try To. Blind We're invincible. Together we can be.

Oh, so tragic. Love. Whatever. Captain Crash and the Beauty Queen from Mars Captain Crash and the Beauty. Queen from Mars.

My painkillers are wearing off you. And Bo and The rest of us really. That's some more in the car. No, I do not. This episode is a production of Movie Meltdown, produced and edited by The Oddity Studios, with opening music performed by The Empires.

For more on how to sponsor or support the show, email producer at moviemeltdown.com. Talk hard!