An interesting discussion

[Boz]

www.avclub.com/articles/popculture-were-afraid-to-revisit,49735/

Instead of taking about things we miss and wish would come back, this discussion is about things we used to love, but either:

A) Are afraid to revisit them as we're worried they might suck in retrospect; or

B) Have revisited recently and realized that, yes, they did actually suck.

Now, they guy in this piece, Josh Modell, who said that Inspiral Carpets doesn't hold up over time is clearly an insane person. Inspiral Carpets is STILL awesome (though, granted, not as good as Ned's Atomic Dustbin). However, other than that, there are some good ones in the article.

Of course, many people might not even know who Inspiral Carpets are, so maybe we should keep things a little more mainstream.

Here are a few of mine (and yes, I'm going to date myself, but what the hell):

Book:
I loved Anne Rice's Interview and LeStat novels, but I found that her later books got increasingly boring, self-involved and nearly impossible to read. I won't ever read Interview or Lestat again because I'm pretty sure they were boring, self-involved and impossible to read as well, I just didn't realize it at the time.

Music:
I used to love, love, love Counting Crows when they first came out. I listened to their first two albums nonstop. I haven't listened to a Counting Crows song on purpose in about forever, and when I listen to one by accident, I still can't figure out why I liked them so much. (I know Counting Crows are still around, but are they really?)

Movie:
When I was very young, I think I watched the movie Dragonslayer about 50 times. No joke. I happened to see it on cable a few months ago. Really? I liked that s***? For the love of God, why? Peter McNicol as the hero? An ugly, plain and ugly girl as the heroine? A guy who wishes he had a thimbulful of Peter O'Toole's talent as the king?

The guy who played the sorcerer was still pretty good though, for the little time he was in it.

Really, that was a bad movie and I will never get those hours of my life back.

TV:
I'm kind of afraid to watch Family Ties re-runs. One, I'm pretty sure it wasn't that funny. Two, I think that, as an adult rather than a child, I will realize that the show was mocking conservatism most of the time.

And I'm with Tasha Robinson from the link above as well. I like almost anything animated, but GI Joe and Transformers were really, really bad shows. Don't know why I watched them.

Video games:
Almost all old video games suck. It's sad but true. Not every one, but most of them.

Join in if you like.

[Elvado]

Might be slightly off point, but I am appalled that I am happy about Jane Badler's return on V.

[Boz]

Actually, V is an outstanding example. Other than Faye Grant (OK, and Jane Badler too), there isn't much redeemable about that show in retrospect.

Whether Jane Badler can breathe any life into the new show is up in the air, but I am highly skeptical.

Completely different situation when Richard Hatch returned to the new BSG. They show wasn't relying on him in the same way and he fit right in.

[thebin]

I've recently been horrified to see how bad the early larry sanders shows were now that IFC is replaying them.

Also the older i get the more i realize that led zepellin were not that great, even forgetting all of the plagiarism charges. 1968-1972 Stones on other hand is still getting better.

[SFHoya99]

Almost all TV from the 80s / old comedic tv is unwatchable. Don't watch Family Ties, Boz, it's unbearable. I don't even know why I laughed. I started rewatching Robotech and had to stop. Just boring. I think, in general, comedic tv ages really poorly.

A few, like I Love Lucy and Seinfeld seem to age well, but most are just trash. I don't think you have to go very far back, either. Early 2000s sitcoms I like are pretty awful to me now.

Same with comedic movies in some cases. There are classics, and then there are the 40,000 times I watched Space Balls.

Music is harder; there's stuff I loved that I'm somewhat bored by, but there's also stuff that is still good. "Anna Begins" came on my ipod the other day, and I still love that song. I mean, there's the obvious stuff, like why do I own two Aerosmith albums, but that realization came about 15 years ago.

[TC]

Music

iTunes landed me on Stone Temple Pilot's Core today. Talk about something that doesn't stand up - wow, I can't believe I ever listened to this. Meanwhile, Slanted and Enchanted came out within the same year and I still listen to that over and over and over.

TV

I thought Sledge Hammer! was the best TV show ever when I was in the 7th grade. I watched the first season last year on DVD and I couldn't get through an episode. It was beyond awful. I can't think of a single sitcom I used to watch in the 80's that can stand up against something like Modern Family or Community - the pacing is so slow and the jokes are so obvious and weak, and they hardly ever venture into inside jokes.

And Boz, I agree, most of the early Family Ties episodes are pretty bad. The Uncle Ned episodes are spectacularly awesomely bad and very watchable though.

And SFHoya99, I think the third Robotech (Next Generation or whatever) slightly holds up. I always thought the first two were pretty lame.

[SirSaxa]

Isn't anyone going to mention an old girlfriend or two?

[thebin]

Hunt for Red October and Amadeus hold up better than any other movies of my childhood favorites. A little later in period, but Wayne's World has aged quite poorly.

[SSHoya]

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid holds up very well.
The Exorcist still scares me.

[Boz]

Jan 7, 2011 22:26:00 GMT -5 SirSaxa said:

Isn't anyone going to mention an old girlfriend or two?

Isn't "all of them" the answer there?

[Bando]

I used to love Blues Traveler for some reason. I still have 6 of their albums on my iPod.

TC, you realize Sledge Hammer was a satire, right?

[hoyatables]

This is a great thread. Reminds me of the one where we debated the various hotness of 80s movie/TV girlfriends. (Teen Wolf was also on this weekend, which reminded me of Boof and her memorable role in that debate.)

Blues Traveler was at the top of my music list. I get very nostalgic when I hear Runaround but beyond that don't get why I loved them so much or went to as many shows as I did. I can still enjoy Counting Crows, but need to be in the right mindset. Good passive background music, but not something I could actively listen to.

They are rerunning both Transformers and Family Ties on "Hub" (some new channel in the 100s on Comcast here in DC. I've found the Transformers to be very hit or miss -- also depends on my mindset as much as the episode. But there have been some evenings when I have really enjoyed coming home from work, grabbing a snack, and sitting down to watch Transfomers before I start on my homework. The fact that they even use the old cut-ins helps the nostalgia factor.

Old 80s sitcoms, on the other hand, are always bad for the reasons set forth above. I remember trying to watch old episodes of Charles in Charge -- talk about painful. Yet I made it through to season 4 I think. Who's the Boss did not hold up well at all. Not sure whether Growing Pains would. I have a hankering to watch Family Ties, but want to wait for the later years when Alex dated Courtney Cox and then his eventual real-life wife.

80's movies, on the other hand, often hold up surprisingly well. Back to the Future is particular amazing. I could watch it every week (and AMC is trying to help with that goal). Same with a lot of classic 80s comedies. The 90s comdies, on the other hand, don't always stand up well (like Ace Ventura). Tommy Boy and Dumb and Dumber are still funny -- I hope.

Old SNLs are another hit or miss -- I can't get into the really old stuff, but the early 90s stuff can be funny. The Will Ferrell years, on the other hand, don't hold up well -- nor does anything right up to present day.

Back to sitcoms -- agree that 90s sitcoms do REALLY well. Seinfeld, Friends, Scrubs all look and feel great in reruns. Simpsons, too, of course. Other sitcoms that are enjoyable on reruns -- Spin City and Newsradio. Somehow workplace comedies are more timeless, perhaps, than the family-based ones?

To a new category -- comics. Interesting to go back in time with them because, in many cases, you're inspired to do so because current writers are reviving earlier concepts/eras of comics writing. In almost all cases the new stuff is better than the old stuff. For years DC writers were reviving Silver Age concepts and characters, and when I went back to the original stuff I was stymied to understand the reverence. It's so slow and plodding and rote. More recently, there was a real resurgence in the 80s comics - not the late 80s grim n gritty, but the early 80s mega-crossovers and lighthearted stuff. In this case, I've found that the late 70s and early 80s stuff was pretty cool -- some off the beaten path, some more main stream, but in many circumstances some genuinely "new" concepts and characters. Even the hokey 80s stuff (like Booster Gold, Blue Beetle, and the JLI) is still funny after all these years. Now there's a real return to the 90s stuff, and its downright scary to go back and re-read some of the 90s books -- and see the really REALLY bad 90s art, which was far too angular and inhuman and just ugly.

[hoyainspirit]

Jan 7, 2011 22:26:00 GMT -5 SirSaxa said:

Isn't anyone going to mention an old girlfriend or two?

Happy to say, "Not me!". But to take this in another direction, I am also happy to say that I always thought disco sucked. Hated that disco beat. And that stupid disco dancing. One of the worst popular musics, ever. I think history has proven me correct.

[nodak89]

I stumbled across Doogie Howser, MD. I used to love that show back in the day. It is certainly different than I remember.

I am afraid to watch Wonder Years, but Monty Python is still crackin'.

[Boz]

Monty Python is truly timeless.


....So is Winnie Cooper.

(But you're probably right about the rest of that show.)

[FormerHoya]

The Dukes of Hazzard is far raunchier than I was ever aware of when I used to watch it as a kid. That certainly makes it weirder to watch.

Should I be ashamed to admit that I thought Alf was the funniest show ever? I realize now that it may well have been the worst show ever.

[Elvado]

Jan 7, 2011 15:31:34 GMT -5 Boz said:

Actually, V is an outstanding example. Other than Faye Grant (OK, and Jane Badler too), there isn't much redeemable about that show in retrospect.

Whether Jane Badler can breathe any life into the new show is up in the air, but I am highly skeptical.

Completely different situation when Richard Hatch returned to the new BSG. They show wasn't relying on him in the same way and he fit right in.

FWIW, the Anna/Diana battle on V is shaping up nicely as is the impending clash between Anna and her own daughter. Now if we can get Faye Grant back into the bodysuit...

[Boz]

Finally got my Apply TV hooked up a couple of weeks ago & have been rewatching a lot of NewsRadio on Netflix.

I still love Phil Hartman and Dave Foley is a really great comedic actor.

But Good God, I can't believe how much low-creativity, standard sitcom, complete junk jokes were in that show! The kind of stuff The Simpsons used to mock mercilessly (you know, back when The Simpsons was a good show).

How did I not catch that the first time around?

I still think it's an above average sitcom, but some of the great sitcoms that came after it really put it to shame. And there's a lot of stuff in that show that doesn't hold up at all over time (though I suppose all shows suffer from that a little bit if they try to do anything topical; a show about a news radio station kind of has to try to be topical a little more than most).

[FormerHoya]

Mar 7, 2011 10:45:58 GMT -5 Boz said:

Finally got my Apply TV hooked up a couple of weeks ago & have been rewatching a lot of NewsRadio on Netflix.

I still love Phil Hartman and Dave Foley is a really great comedic actor.

But Good God, I can't believe how much low-creativity, standard sitcom, complete junk jokes were in that show! The kind of stuff The Simpsons used to mock mercilessly (you know, back when The Simpsons was a good show).

How did I not catch that the first time around?

I still think it's an above average sitcom, but some of the great sitcoms that came after it really put it to shame. And there's a lot of stuff in that show that doesn't hold up at all over time (though I suppose all shows suffer from that a little bit if they try to do anything topical; a show about a news radio station kind of has to try to be topical a little more than most).

Newsradio took at least half of the first season to warm up, then it wasn't on the air for very long, including the time after Phil Hartman died, so it is really hurt for having such a short "sweet spot."

I will fight to the death anyone who doesn't believe that "Super Karate Monkey Death Car" isn't one of the all-time great sitcom episodes. Really though, that's my answer to everything.

[Nevada Hoya]

Chariots of Fire started the 80's off, and it is still my wife's and my favorite. And how could you not like the kangaroo episode on Family Ties (my 30 year old son loves that).