October is over and Ammon and Law are nursing their Halloween hangovers with a lil’ Halloween Round-Up. What movie made Law’s kid cry? Listen in to find out. Who’s kid can’t stop screaming ‘RedRum’ at school now that they’ve been exposed to The Shining? And did the beloved classic Poltergeist finally make it’s Halloween debut? Plus, Ammon and Law fife over Doctor Sleep and poke so many holes in Terminator: Dark Fate, that if you didn’t hate it before… you will now. All this and so much more on this Halloween recap edition of the Angry Drunk Movie Dads.
Since we hit a milestone, we put up a poll here and on Facebook with a list of topics that we wanted you guys to vote on. The topic with the most votes would then become a subject of a show entirely on its own.
We threw in what we thought would be some kick ass topics that would make a good show, but one topic in particular took the prize.
You need to survive the apocalypse. And you need a team. Choosing from movies and TV characters (human only), who would you pick as your team?
What follows on this podcast is one of the most fun, violent, filthy, and yell-y discussions we’ve had. And it was all due to you guys donating on Patreon and voting on the topics. We fucking love you guys.
More shows like this in the future will be had on the BingeCast, so stay tuned for that. Below are our teams that got us so goddamn heated that we called each other cocksucker, yelled loudly, and threatened to fuck one character in their empty eye socket.
What would your team look like?
Law’s Team:
John Rambo – First Blood
John Conner – Terminator Series
Snake Plissken – Escape From New York
Batman – Where else?
Ellen Ripley – Alien
Moreno’s Team:
Sarah Connor – Terminator 2
Beatrix Kiddo – Kill Bill
Barry Pepper (forgot his name) Saving Private Ryan
Well. If you’ve come this far into our Terminator Retrospective, you have proven to be braver than human race leader John Connor ever was on the Judgment Day aftermath battlefield. Or, did Judgment Day even happen? Or does Judgment Day happen in the future?
Confused yet? That does not even begin to describe how we feel going into this viewing of 2015’s Terminator Genisys. Join me and my colleague Matthew Goudreau as we go over each of the film’s plot points, detail by detail, and try to pull apart some sort of logic behind it all. And, as a little preview -and is evident by the ratings below- I will say one of us is deep enriched in how bad this movie is, and one of us is not necessarily a staunch defender. But, the closest Genisys will get to having one on this site.
Will Ah-nold’s appeal to Matt be enough to make him said defender? Listen below and find out.
Big thanks to Matthew Goudreau for spending three podcasts deciphering the entire Terminator franchise with me. Be sure to check his work out at www.theyoungfolks.com.
Starring: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jason Clarke, Emilia Clarke, Jai Courtney, JK Simmons, Dayo Okeniyi, Courtney B. Vance, Byung-hun Lee, and Matt Smith
Did this movie ever have a chance? Before anyone jumps to answer, let me say this: Even with the deck stacked totally against it, I went into the screening of Terminator Genisys with a completely open mind. Thinking back, did JJ Abrams have a chance of making a good Star Trek film in 2009? Did Jurassic World have a chance at breaking box office records? Believe it or not, a movie like Terminator Genisys is not made solely for financial reasons. It is also made because people behind the scenes actually believe they have a story to tell. Yet even after trailers for the film caused more and more detractors, I found myself still rooting for it. With the return of an out of office Schwarzenegger, an endorsement of the film’s script by Oscar winning co-star Simmons, and a video endorsement of the completed film by none other than King of the World James Cameron himself, Terminator Genisys seemed poised to prove detractors wrong, and give a huge metal middle finger to those that doubted it. However, I’m here to unfortunately say Terminator Genisys did nothing of the kind. In fact, imagine the lowest of expectations you have for the film, and lower them even more, as Genisys is one big jumbled mess that needed to be thrown in molten steel before even going into production.
Terminator Genisys makes its name by taking parts of the first, second, and fourth films of the franchise and completely ignoring the third. In the process, writers Laeta Kalogridis (Shutter Island) and Patrick Lussier (Dracula 2000) mess with the timeline of the series in unspeakable ways. In the beginning, it was hard not to commend Kalogridis and Lussier for how they take established material and make it their own. But after the third or so time of Sarah Connor (Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke) calling Schwarzenegger’s T-800 model ‘Pops’ due to his reprogramming and raising of her character, it was hard to not miss the simplicity that came with the original storyline of a robot being sent through time to kill the mother of a future world leader. Given how much Kalogridis and Lussier mix and match previous storylines -Cameron’s one contribution was suggesting Ah-nold’s age was due to his model being made to be organic- I do not see Genisys being embraced by anyone, neither enthusiasts or newcomers to the series.
The heart of this franchise, even through a short lived TV show and the second & third films, has been the mother/son relationship between the characters of Sarah and John Connor. What made the first two films so good to me was the way they played with the notion of these characters dealing with things they have no idea how to comprehend. Here, director Alex Taylor (Thor: The Dark World) makes them into mere pawns of a needlessly over complicated story, with John’s father Kyle Reese (Courtney) getting his trip to 1984 Los Angeles altered in a way that finds him face to face with a T-1000 (Lee). What’s weird about Genisys is that as much as it wants to alter events of the first couple films, it reads as more of a Back To The Future Part 2 type film, as old well-known scenes are reenacted in a new sleek 2015 aesthetic. It all does not read well and while Emilia Clarke handles herself better than expected, Jason Clarke (no relation) makes it 0-2 for me in being unable to hold any water above intense faces and speeches, with the other being his performance in last year’s Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.
By now, the so-called ‘twist’ of John Connor (Jason Clarke) being the main villain of the film is widely known knowledge. But as much as the script tries to justify how this happens, the explanations result in the worst facets of the film. The best rule for makers of films involving time travel is that there are no previously set in stone rules. But Genisys takes this concept to whole new levels, and everything becomes so befuddled that one wonders why they did not just re-title this something else and make a trilogy (yes, this is the first of a planned trilogy) of films based on its own concept.
Of course, that would mean abandoning a returning Schwarzenegger. Truth be told, Ah-nold looks to be having the most fun here, and he gets to play with toys in Terminator Genisys that he was not even able to touch in his previous incarnations of the role. But while the comedy of Rise of the Machines is one of its most derided aspects, Genisys could have used a bit more. Its ‘best’ lines are uttered by Scharzenegger’s T-800 model, and it says a lot about a movie when the best moments of humor are made by a synthetic character.
I cannot completely chide Terminator Genisys. As I already pointed out, Emilia Clarke does a credible job of filling Linda Hamilton’s battle boots, and as he proved in 2013’s Thor: The Dark World, director Taylor knows how to orchestrate action. An example of which being a standout action scene involving a huge car chase on 2017’s version of the Golden Gate Bridge. But Terminator Genisys has ironically become what the series has told stories about since the beginning. It seems studios (movie factories) are churning out more and more sleeked up versions of their original, well-received models so much that new versions of each become all but obsolete merely months after they are released. Maybe that last sentence reeks of bitter bile being spewed from a man who was seven years old when the first film was released. But if Paramount decides to go through with yet another version of Cameron’s original vision, you can bet I will not be back.
A couple of days ago, I started a column having every intention of making it one post talking about ten movies. 5 films and 1500 words later, it became very apparent that it would be a good idea to split it up into two separate blog posts. So here we are at the second and final part, and I feel I am going to have even more to say about the movies being discussed here. So without any further ado, here are the final five movies which seem to have flown over the heads of executives looking to capitalize on our modern nostalgic culture.
6) The Breakfast Club
Shockingly, The Breakfast Club‘s original writer/director John Hughes was toying with the idea of bringing arguably his best film both to the stage and before modern film cameras all the way up to the day he died in 2009. While Hughes consistently wrote his entire career, he would never reach the heights he had ascended in 1990, when his hit script Home Alone was brought to screens by director Chris Columbus. Still, Hughes’s 80s teen comedy heyday is what he will be remembered for most. And 1985’s The Breakfast Club, the third film he released that year (after Weird Science and Sixteen Candles)was the biggest cultural impact film he ever did, catapulting music group Simple Minds into the fifteen minute mainstream and showcasing five parts of a group of actors one newspaper writer would famously label The Brat Pack onscreen.
Since Hughes’s death, talk of a possible remake rapidly went from mumblings to a whisper. A script by Lizzy Weiss (Blue Crush), which would have moved the group of introverts from a detention classroom to Chicago’s O’Hara Airport was briefly considered and subsequently never made. Something tells me, despite the vocal objections by original cast members Molly Ringwald and Ally Sheedy, we are going to see the movie updated in our lifetime. Imagine for a minute a Lady GaGa wannabe stuck with a football player who uses steroids at his coach’s insistence, a Dungeons & Dragons master who was caught with a gun, a school bully who has taken many people’s phones, and a silent type who makes up her entire life on social media. Don’t put it past Hollyweird.
7) The Terminator
Yes, I know there is a brand new Ah-nold starring Terminator film coming out this summer. And judging from the trailers released, there are more than a few things in it which could classify it as a remake (teaching him to smile?! Really??) But imagine for a second Terminator: Genisys completely flopping and starved movie executives deciding that they should have just remade the first one instead. I have said in the past that in a lot of ways, I find the first Terminator film to be the most enjoyable of the entire series. It was essentially a science fiction film rooted in the slasher genre. I may be hung by my ankles for saying this, but I feel a whole new take on the original Terminator using a modern aesthetic, could be great.
Then again, they have taken the franchise to TV, given it to McG, and now made a film which has been called a combination of a remake AND reboot. This is the type of film that makes me understand the outcry against remakes, because not even the film’s makers can clear up what exactly their movie is. So while I hope Genisys is fantastic, part of me kind of wishes if they were going to scrape the well, just start all over. Then again, if they had done that, they wouldn’t have been able to bring Schwarzeneggar aboard. All the pieces are kind of fitting together as I write about what a reboot could have meant for the series.
8) The Creature From The Black Lagoon
This one has one of the most complicated remake histories ever seen. And we still haven’t seen him return to the screen. No, The Monster Squad does NOT count. From writing strikes to poor receptions to films before it, there have been many, MANY ways this train has been derailed. Originally released in 3D, the 1954 film featured an amphibious Gill Man terrorizing a series of people in the Amazon.
Beginning in 1982 and ending in 2009, here is a list of talented directors who have at one time or another been attached to do the remake: John Landis, John Carpenter, Peter Jackson, Guillermo Del Toro, and Breck Eisner (2009’s The Crazies remake). Eisner’s version was in full swing throughout the mid to late 2000s, and then Benicio Del Toro’s The Wolfman came and went with a whimper in 2009, making executives get cold feet about funding another retelling of a classic Universal monster. Still, Hollywood has not given up. Gary Ross (The Hunger Games) is developing the movie now with the recently announced attachment of none other than constantly working Scarlett Johansson, who is set to play the role originated in 1954 by Julie Adams. With a name like Johansson attached, the likelihood of the Gill Man’s return seems more possible than ever.
9) The Gate
Here is one I have clashed with fellow Binge Aftertaste host Jason Morris over. I hate The Gate. I have never liked The Gate. I think the movie is ridiculous without being entertaining. To put it simply, The Gate is a mess. All that being said, there is a huge contingent (Jason included) who love The Gate. The original film told the story of a boy (Stephen Dorff) who plays a heavy metal record which unleashes spirits that were buried in his backyard.
In 2009, Alex Winter (Bill from Bill & Ted) was attached to direct a remake of The Gate with the one and only H.R Giger hired to do the creature concepts. As of 2013, there has been no word on the film’s progress or if it will ever get made. If you ask me, I hope this Gate stays locked up for good.
10) Swamp Thing
In 1982, two years before he unleashed the first A Nightmare on Elm Street and kickstarted New Line Cinema toward the ranks of high echelon studios, director Wes Craven wrote and directed this hideous film adaptation of the DC comic book character Swamp Thing. Ignoring the potential campiness of the subject matter and instead taking it as serious as Nolan took Batman, Craven proved for not the last time that screenwriting is not his forte, and Swamp Thing sank faster than the Titanic at the box office. Seven years later, King of Schlock filmmaker Jim Wynorski took the director’s chair, bringing back original Swamp Thing actor Dick Durock and casting a young Heather Locklear in a film which is more entertaining than the first one. But that is about as big an honor as being the nicest guy in prison, and 1989’s The Return of Swamp Thing did not fare much better than its predecessor.
USA Network ran a Swamp Thing show -also starring Durock- from 1990 to 1993. But in this day and age of comic book film fever, it would seem to be astonishing that greedy studios have not pounced on the potential of bringing another character from the page into their cinematic universes. However, I then start thinking about how awful a premise Swamp Thing is, and realize there is hardly any potential whatsoever. Even so, that has not stopped people from trying. Most recently, uber-producer Joel Silver revealed plans in 2009 to produce and release a 3D remake of the original film, which was to be written by Batman & Robin writer Akiva Goldsman and helmed by Splice director Vincenzo Natali. But as of 2011, Natali moved on to other projects and the project was put on hold. However, given the character has made appearances in comics such as Dark Knight Returns #1, I cannot see them keeping the character in the swamps too much longer.
There you have it. What films were here that you think shouldn’t be? What film DON’T you want attached to the word ‘remake?’ Let us know!