Alas, the Classic Cage Era begins! It's 1986 and Uncle Frank Coppola directs Peggy Sue Got Married, the film where Kathleen Turner travels back in time to high school. Nicolas Cage plays her high school sweetheart back then and her ex-husband now. Bryan and Desmond talk about it. What more is there to say?

This time, Bryan and Desmond present Nicolas Cage's eighth role: a Canadian legend in rowing from the 19th century in The Boy in Blue. There's a wild tangent early on, but they spend the rest of the time talking about how this is actually kind of good. It's just not so much what we have come to expect from a Nicolas Cage movie.

It's another episode of Cage Dive, so that means it's time for Nic Cage to have something to say about the Vietnam War again! This time, he is charged with helping his friend Matthew Modine come back from a mysterious mental health breakdown before he is committed to an insane asylum for the rest of his life in the 1984 Alan Parker film Birdy. Desmond and Bryan spend the bulk of this episode trying to figure out what, if anything, was actually wrong with Birdy. Birdy, the character we mean. We know what's wrong with the movie. It's boring! We talk a lot about Nic Cage's dental work in this episode, which is good, because Bryan isn't interested in talking about Peter Gabriel's score to the film.

Having not learned his Rumble Fish lesson, our hero spends six months with uncle Frank making The Cotton Club. Cage plays trumpet player Richard Gere's brother with gangster ambitions. The shoot was miserable, and the movie is interesting to talk about. Ha ha! Join Bryan and Desmond as they reckon with this movie.

This week on the show, Bryan and Desmond both watch 1984's Racing with the Moon for the first time. This one sees Nicolas Cage playing support to Sean Penn as he tries to woo the "rich girl" before they both ship off to join the Marines ahead of World War II. On top of Penn, there's more recurrences in the Cageverse like an appearance by Crispin Glover, concern about going off to war, and abortion is a subplot! The 80s were wild, y'all!

Well, Nicolas Cage didn't have fun filming it, and Bryan and Desmond didn't have fun watching it. But they enjoyed talking about it - among other diversions and tangents. Next stop on the Cage Dive is Francis Ford Coppola's Rumble Fish. There's a huge amount of talent involved in this one, but it's an art film that finds a pretentious rut and stays there. We have a fun time talking about it, nonetheless.

This episode, Bryan and Desmond dissect the first credited role to Nicolas Cage: Valley Girl. From having no lines to being the male lead from one role to the next, Cage plays a punk rocker from downtown Hollywood who falls for a girl from the Valley. Shenanigans ensue.

We're back, and it's Desmond's turn to interview Bryan about his Nic Cage fandom before they dive into a meaty review of Nicolas Coppola's feature film debut. Now, not even being Uncle Frank's nephew can guarantee a glorious film debut because, while the film is pretty widely considered a classic, our subject barely appears on-screen and utters zero lines. But why? Listen to our review of Fast Times at Ridgemont High to find out!

In this inaugural episode, Bryan first interviews co-host Desmond about his Nic Cage fandom before the two settle into a review of the failed 1981 TV pilot featuring the first film work of Nic Cage (nee Coppola): The Best of Times. It's got comedy, singing, dancing, Jackie Mason, and dramatic monologues? And in case this all wasn't weird enough, it also features the first film work of heartthrob Crispin Glover!