80s | Cavalcade of Awesome

Archive for the 80s Category

I ponder a modern day WarGames sequel with the original cast

Posted in 80s, movies, pop culture, War Games with tags LEB, movies, pop culture, sequels, War Games on February 24, 2012 by Paxton

We have a new assignment for The League this week. The League of Extraordinary Bloggers, that is. This week, Brian asks what 80s kid/teen movie would we want to see a sequel to today, including the original cast members. And what do we envision those characters to be doing now?

Great question Brian, and I really had to think about this one. I’ve talked about my views on movie sequels here. I also talked about them for Episode 20 of the Nerd Lunch podcast. Essentially, I like sequels. If I enjoy the characters then I want to see those characters again. However, Hollywood has totally perverted the idea of a sequel and it makes it hard for good legitimate sequels to get a break.

Anyway, for this week’s assignment, I briefly thought about sequels to Ferris Bueller and The Goonies. But if there were sequels to those, I would have wanted them to be in the 80s or early 90s. Not now. Shawn over at Branded in the 80s pondered a third Teen Wolf movie starring Michael J Fox and Jason Bateman which quite literally blew my mind. How did I not think of that? However, I agree with him, the time for that sequel would have been around 1991 when Fox was still up for it. Doc Hollywood Fox would have been awesome in a Teen Wolf Three. But I digress.

So, I thought about it and I think I would really like to see a modern day sequel to the 1983 hit, War Games starring Matthew Broderick, Dabney Coleman and Ally Sheedy.

War Games

War Games is one of my favorite movies from the 80s. Broderick is so great as the goofy, funny, computer dork David Lightman. Ally Sheedy was amazingly cute as Jennifer Mack, Lightman’s crush and eventual love interest. I highly identified with Lightman in this movie. I was into computers and a bit of an introvert. Especially many years later in high school. I even got in trouble a few times for saying snarky remarks in the middle of class. However, I did not have the incredible computer setup that Lightman has in his room. That collection of hardware is amazing. For those that don’t know, it was a sort of “kit-bashed” IMSAI 8080 computer. A-mazing.

Also, another reason I love this movie is that the director, John Badham, was raised in my hometown of Birmingham, AL (even though he was born in the UK). There is a scene in the movie in which a tour group at NORAD is identified as being from Birmingham, AL. This is an homage to Badham’s hometown.

So, in my modern day sequel, what are the characters from the movie doing today?

Dr John McKittrick – After the events of the original movie, Dr McKittrick kept in touch with David throughout college. He even supplied him with recommendations to MIT. McKittrick would help David get a job with NORAD after graduation. McKittrick would mentor David for many years within NORAD until he is appointed the director of the National Security Agency (NSA). As Director, McKittrick would bring David over from NORAD as a high level code breaker. At the time of the sequel, McKittrick is only a year or two from retiring as Director.

David Lightman – After high school, David is accepted into MIT with a full ride (obviously helped by some highly placed government recommendations). David graduates with honors and begins working for NORAD as Dr McKittrick’s protege. David would work with McKittrick for many years afterward. After McKittrick is appointed the Director of the NSA, David would accept a high level job with his mentor. He would eventually gain the coveted title of Head Cryptographer. As the HC, David oversees the NSA’s version of WOPR called DECODR. It’s a code breaking super computer used to crack highly encrypted data. Late one evening, the DECODR comes across an encryption it can’t break and David receives an email stating that this “unbreakable code” will be auctioned off to the highest bidder in 24 hours. Lightman calls in McKittrick and they must figure out who wrote the encryption and how they can solve it before the encryption code is released into the wild.

Continue reading →

3 Comments »

5 Reasons why the 1987 John Byrne Superman kicked ass

Posted in 80s, comic books, nostalgia, pop culture, Superman with tags Cavalcade Comics, comic books, DC Comics, nostalgia, pop culture, Superman on January 11, 2012 by Paxton

Last year I talked about the 25th anniversary of the John Byrne mini-series Man of Steel. That 1986 mini-series was a post-Crisis on Infinite Earths reboot of Superman which updated his origin and character and served to make him a little less powerful and thus, more interesting.

The reboot led to a revamp of Action Comics, a renaming of the old Superman book to The Adventures of Superman as well as the launch of a brand new Superman book. The new Superman book as well as Action Comics would be written and drawn by John Byrne. The Adventures of Superman would be written by Marv Wolfman and drawn by Jerry Ordway. And this month, the post Crisis Superman reboot celebrates its 25th anniversary.

Here is a DC in-house ad advertising the launch of the new Superman titles.

The three issues that started the reboot and featured in this ad are Superman #1, The Adventures of Superman #424 (previously titled Superman) and Action Comics #584. This reboot was a pretty big event and DC advertised it to the hilt.

For the most part, I wasn’t a fan of the Marv Wolfman Adventure issues, but I was a HUGE fan of the Byrne Superman and Action Comics titles. His art and action packed writing style made Superman fun to read. I still have many of the original issues.

Anyway, in celebration of the 25th anniversary, here are 5 reasons why the John Byrne Superman titles kicked so much ass.

Superman vs Legion

Superman got into fights with EVERYONE – Under John Byrne, Action Comics essentially became a free-for-all. It turned into a team up book starring Superman and another character (a la Brave & the Bold for Batman). Within the majority of those issues, Superman wound up getting into a fight with his co-stars, usually over some misunderstanding. But Byrne drew the fights with awesome jaw cracking detail. The regular Superman title was the same way with Supes fighting the Legion, Metallo, Supergirl and a giant mutant ape.

Superman fights 1 Superman fights 2 Superman fights 8

Superman fights 6 Superman fights 7 Superman fights 5

Superman fights 9

Superman didn’t always win his fights (Bizarro, Metallo, Superboy, Rampage, Supergirl) – So, as I said, Superman fought a lot. And surprisingly, he actually got his ass kicked…a lot. At least every other issue featured a panel of Superman getting either smacked in the face or being hit so hard he flies through the air. Check out the myriad of comic panels above showing the Man of Steel on the receiving end of a Bronx haymaker.

Continue reading →

5 Comments »

A collection of vintage milk PSAs

Posted in 80s, commercials, nostalgia, pop culture, TV with tags commercials, nostalgia, pop culture, TV, vintage on August 26, 2011 by Paxton

I loved milk commercials when I was growing up. There were tons of them and they were shown all the time. And there were so many versions of the ads that it was endlessly interesting.

So on this Friday, I’m going to show you a bunch of my favorites.

Let’s start with one of the most iconic. The one directed by Michael Bay. The “Aaron Burr” commercial.

Next up are the “Milk it Does a Body Good” commercials. These are the ones I generally think of when I think of milk commercials. There were two versions of these. The first was a series of musical numbers featuring kids and random images of things flying all over the place. Things like animals (cows, penguins and kangaroos).

Check out the awesome 80s randomness of this ad featuring a lot of kangaroos. Seriously, kangaroos on pogo sticks and tap dancing kangaroos.

Here’s the “cow on the moon” musical PSA.

…and here’s the penguin version.

The other version of the “Milk it Does a Body Good” PSA involved kids talking to someone about the benefits of drinking milk. As they talk, they transform into an older, taller, better looking version of themselves. There were even two versions of this ad, one in which the kids were talking to someone else and one where the kids were looking in the mirror talking to their future selves. All of these commercials are filmed in front of a gray backdrop that looks like a crinkled up curtain.

Continue reading →

2 Comments »

Uploading the Mad Magazine Computer issue from 1985

Posted in 80s, computers, Mad magazine, magazine, pop culture, technology with tags Book Report, computers, Mad Magazine, magazines, pop culture, reviews, technology on August 19, 2011 by Paxton

Earlier this week I looked at the awesome Star Wars Q&A Book About Computers from 1983. In there we got to see Artoo and Threepio show us the until then current history of computers including an awesome painting of the droids playing an upright video game.

Then I took at look at the Marvel Super Heroes Computer Fun Book Two from 1984. In there we saw lots of BASIC code for programs based on Marvel Super Hero adventures like the Iron Man Robot Retriever and Doctor Strange and the Computer Gremlin.

Today, I’m continuing my look at vintage computer activity books with Mad Magazine #258 from October 1985.

This particular issue of Mad had a special “computer section” in the middle of the magazine. The feature article in that section was the Mad Computer Program.

The article provided code for three major BASIC platforms that you could enter into your computer and when you run the program, it would print out a special surprise output. You can click the images above to see the code more clearly.

Continue reading →

Learning BASIC with the Marvel Super Heroes

Posted in 80s, books, comic books, nostalgia, pop culture, reviews with tags Book Report, books, comic books, computers, Marvel Comics, pop culture, reviews, technology on August 17, 2011 by Paxton

Yesterday I looked at the Star Wars Q&A Book about Computers. It featured a history of the computer (through 1983) and some awesome art by Ken Barr. Today, I’m looking at another awesomely vintage computer book, it’s the Marvel Super Heroes Computer Fun Book Two from 1984.

This book is LOOOOOOOOONG and it features A LOT of programs. I’ll just be looking at some of the more notable programs and artwork. You can check out my Flickr set to see more.

Here’s the cover to the activity book and the intro page telling you what to expect inside.

And here’s the Fantastic Four to tell you how to use this book (in case you weren’t already aware that you used it to, you know, program your computer).

Here’s Capt America reminding you to code your 900 lines. He gives you 9 examples (there’s another page of code I’m not showing you) of 900 lines from different BASIC environments like the Commodore 64, IBM PC and Apple II.

Here’s a program featuring Cap called Menace of the Gray Gargoyle. It’s a “fence busting” program. See the code here. Man, that Gray Gargoyle looks lame.

This program is called Iron Man to the Rescue. It’s a game in which Iron Man has to stop a ship from shooting missiles at a school filled with children. Hope you get them all or the deaths of thousands of small schoolchildren on your head. Is it just me or does that seem like a needlessly violent scenario for a kid’s computing activity book?

There are two other Iron Man programs. The first is called Robot Retriever. It’s awesome because the title page features MODOK and ROM: Spaceknight. The other is Iron Man’s Lock Problem. I like the artwork on the title page. I didn’t realize Iron Man was popular enough in the 1980s to get three programs in this book.

The article continues below the break…