Old v. Gold

Season finale and conclusion of our 2-part Star Wars smackdown video spectacular! Having shot our womp rat on Star Wars last week, we move on to 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back, where Irvin Kershner takes the tauntaun reins and leads the saga into a dark cave of personal discovery. H.P. Mendoza and Mark Del Lima rejoin us for our second tour of the Star Wars universe, where we get our Hothian chill on, do handstands in a swamp, hang out on an asteroid, enjoy scenic Cloud City with its luxurious carbonite baths, and finally end our vacation as many families do, with a really awkward father-son moment.

After our usual old-or-gold vote, we then raise the stakes and put our money where our exogorth is, taking on the question: which is the better film, Star Wars or Empire? Spoiler: the answer is roughly as conclusive as Empire.

It’s OK to be racist against creatures that are mythical.

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, H.P., Mark

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

Part 1 of our Old v. Gold Season 2 finale smackdown spectacular takes on a movie that’s as old yet still omnipresent as The Force: 1977’s Star Wars. (And if you think the movie should be called anything else, your opinions on it are as suspect as … something involving wookiees, whom it’s apparently totally OK to denigrate in the Star Wars universe.)

This edition of the podcast comes in two flavors: the usual audio and our first video version. Joining us for this momentous light-being-recorded-as-well-as-sound occasion are returning podcast panelists H.P. Mendoza and Mark Del Lima of Ersatz Film.

Star Wars is a particular challenge for the film archaeologist, since it’s next to impossible as a movie consumer to see it as it was first seen. But we try our best to look past the extra banthas, the useless new Jabba scene, the Greedo controversy, and the perplexing sound effect changes to see if there’s really a good film underneath our voracious nostalgic appetite for this sci-fi landmark.

The audio version of the podcast extends the discussion to include the lovability of stormtroopers, more on the film’s avoidance of emotion, and, as required, a reference to the dreaded Holiday Special.

He’s like, “A million voices screaming in terror, then suddenly silenced. No matter, what’s for dinner?”

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, H.P., Mark

We wrap up this Old v. Gold two-parter and the season as H.P., Mark, and our video cameras rejoin us to evaluate Star Wars’ successor, The Empire Strikes Back. Then we whip out our light sabers (figuratively) and try to settle which of the two is the better film.

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

We hide behind our space couches and revisit the horror of 1979’s Alien, the (only) Ridley Scott movie about space predators (worth talking about). Tom Skerritt, the white male captain and thus surely ultimate survivor, leads a small crew of industrial tow-jockeys against a clingy, gooey menace. Also Sigourney Weaver is there.

In a cut scene, it said, “Crew expendible, protect cat at all costs.”

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, Dana, Justin

We’re taking a break next week as we prep for our two-part Season 2 finale spectacular, which may include video. (“May” = “will.”) Details to come.

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

In Robert Zemeckis’ 1997 film Contact, a child raised in a single-tragedy household grows up to be Jodie Foster and a scientist listening for signals from extraterrestrials, which are tough to hear over all the mansplaining directed at her.

Last year’s Interstellar reminded us of this movie in a lot of ways, good and bad, and not just in both films’ McConaugheyness. Now we see whether the earlier film actually broadcasts a strong signal across 18 light-years. Regardless, Tim will hurt you if you talk during the movie’s opening sequence.

She doesn’t ever react to it, she’s just like, “Oh, FINE, I’m gonna go make a mix tape that expresses my angst.”

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, Dana, Justin

Alien wraps your face in its cinematic embrace.

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

This week, we hit the 1988 quasi-musical Earth Girls Are Easy, starring the Blum! And also Geena Davis, and pre-In Living Color Jim Carrey and Damon Wayans. Watch music-video director Julien Temple pretty much hijack a few great and funny Julie Brown songs and turn them into a collection of carefully composed shots that might possibly be considered a movie.

Why are you adjusting that flower? You are so Jeff Goldblum right now.

Podcasters: Tim, Robert, Christian, H.P., Joanna

Jodie Foster and Matthew McConaughey make interstellar Contact.

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

The year is 1994. A new science-fiction series with groundbreaking computer graphics and not much budget at all debuts in syndication. It carries a secret, revolutionary agenda of long-form serialization. It also carries some dubious acting and set design. The name of the show is Babylon 5.

The year is 2015. A group of podcasters watches and reviews two Season 1 episodes of that show, “And the Sky Full of Stars” and “Signs and Portents.” Some of them were fans of the show. Some of them have not really watched it. As they consider its legacy, the Off-Topic Robot fights a perhaps futile battle against tangents on atheism, Supernatural, Gotham, and the newest Hercules movie.

If you’re not careful a tinfoil-covered box may be thrown at you.

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, Carolyn, Justin

Jeff Goldblum, Geena Davis, a not-yet-famous Jim Carrey, and Damon Wayans NOT Jr. (god we’re old) come to Southern California upon hearing that Earth Girls are Easy.

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

Out of the TV static left when 1982 signed off comes Steven Speilberg’s Tobe Hooper’s Poltergeist, which among its many frights and delights also raises a killer tree of unanswered questions: What is the light and do we run toward it or away from it? What’s up with the daughter’s secret sex life? Who the hell dyes their hair while bathing? Did the movie really expect us to buy that Zelda Rubenstein’s spiritual-guide character was named “Tangina”? And come on, who really directed this?

That subdivision sure had a lot of thunderstorms.

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, Carolyn, Mary Ellen

We survey the first season of Babylon 5 via a sample of two episodes: “And the Sky Full of Stars” and “Signs and Portents.”

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

The 1988 Japanese animation classic Akira blows up our screen — and, of course, Tokyo — bringing us, yes, plenty of yelling, but also plenty of action, cinematic vision, trippy cosmic plot developments, reflections of the state of mind of an entire damaged nation, and a surprising but welcome lack of sailor-skirted little girls.

Viewing note: We’re watching the English-subtitled Blu-ray version, not the dub. Good god, not the dub. Also, in case you don’t know, this cartoon is definitely not for kids.

Oh, here we come with the tentacles … but it’s not headed just for orifices.

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, David, H.P., Joanna

They’re heeeeeere — “they” being Poltergeist.

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

An initial discussion of the darkness of Santa Claus leads naturally to a January podcast about 1986’s Big Trouble in Little China, a comic epic stage-fighting romp from title-preceding director John Carpenter and star Kurt Russell — who may or may not actually be the hero of this quietly subversive little piece. OK, maybe not “quietly,” because there’s plenty of splosions, and we guess about $11 million worth of lightning. And Kim Cattrall is there being feisty.

“Mystical” battle – that implies it’s Asian.

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, Chris, Jack

What more do we need to shout repeatedly besides Akira!

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).

In 1985, Val Kilmer was a Real Genius, which it turns out is one rank below Top Gun, at least chronologically. In what some (well, one) consider Kilmer’s greatest film role, he shepherds a younger and perhaps realer genius through a college gauntlet of enemy dickey-wearers, mysterious closet passer-throughers, an administrator serving the perpetrators of a military weapons system, wacky parties, and even a girl!

So he was sandwiched between two “Top”s.

Podcasters: Robert, Tim, David, Joanna, Sam

In what and where can you find Kurt Russell? Big Trouble in Little China.

Check us out on Twitter (@hiddendeadly or #oldvgold).