ohtani's jacket

There's no evidence to suggest that Hughes wasn't tossed from Mr. Mom. Hughes was consistent about that from his earliest interviews and it's been corroborated by others. It's also consistent with the creative control he demanded from Universal. That deal wasn't on the table when Hughes wrote and pitched Breakfast Club, which happened a good year before Mr. Mom or National Lampoon were released. Hughes had no track record as a director at that stage. According to him that was the reason he chose to film TBC as his directorial debut since it was a low budget, single location shoot, but A&M didn't think much of the idea and Universal execs even less when it was finally made. They buried it with a February release, but it was a sleeper hit. The details may be off, but the general timeline on Hughes turning writer-director makes sense and I'm not seeing any McMahon-level fabrications. Regardless of how it panned out, it's a different kettle of fish from Rambo or Back to the Future. I know Zemeckis and Gale had a hard time getting Back to the Future made and there was a big risk of it bombing, but Fox was a star with Family Ties and the word of mouth it garnered was tremendous. Rambo II opened in over 2000 theaters, which was the first time in US cinema history. It got a huge push.

Also, what's a NJPW iPPV cost in Japan? Is it (the equilivant of) $45-$55? Hardly anyone has satellite or cable in Japan, whereas practically everyone has the internet. These are the prices for watching a show on the internet -- https://www.njpw.co.jp/news/detail.php?nid=10500 And this is the price for watching the same show on PPV -- http://www.skyperfectv.co.jp/genre/sports/list07/s02.html

Axel Dieter vs. Pat Roach (Hannover 1981) I really want to like this match as it's 30 minutes of Pat Roach, whose matches we have are almost always joined in progress, but it just doesn't go anywhere. This is second or third time I've tried watching it and I still can't find a hook to get me into it. Dieter stymies the match early on with boring holds, Roach roughs him up a bit and Dieter makes a comeback, but none of it is uninspired. In theory, this should be as good as Dieter vs. Moose Morowski, but it doesn't play out that way. Axel Dieter vs. Mile Zrno (Hannover 1981) This was a good match. It was quintessentially European, which made it easy for me to understand. The work wasn't that slick early on, but everything from the second round onward was solid and Dieter mixed in a lot of cool shit. Bull Power vs. Axel Dieter (8/30/86) It's a shame this is clipped as Vader brutalised the old man. Worth watching if you've got a spare couple of minutes.

There's a decent Santana vs. Buzz Sawyer match from Georgia. It's kind of structured a bit weirdly as Santana beats the crap out of Sawyer for most of the bout, but it's an example of good Tito.

The problem with 1989 is that the whole No holds Barred Hogan vs. Zeus feud sucked and then they got Beefcake involved. It's too bad the Earthquake thing couldn't have happened a summer early. I think I would have gone with Boss Man instead of Zeus.

Wasn't it supposed to be Beefcake who beat HTM? I guess they wanted someone to get the rub from defeating the longest running intercontinental champion of all time.

Rikidozan's son-in-law was the Minister of Sports and had close ties to Kim Jong-il and his brother-in-law. He got the bum's rush from junior, though. Inoki usually visits on the pretense of watching a sports event or attending some other ceremony while claiming he wants to open Japanese and North Korean talks or some such BS.

Inoki is in North Korea at the moment, which the Diet aren't too happy about, but it reminded me of this story about Inoki wanting a meeting with the Taliban: http://dawn.com/news/1048661/inoki-ready-t...ks-with-taliban

Togo seems like a cool dude. It's always refreshing how "Japanese" Japanese wrestlers are. Gordi will get what I mean, but aside from the odd exception they're just like regular folks. Togo reacted exactly the way you'd expect a Japanese person to react to all of your questions and especially the compliments you paid him. It's kind of tough to get Japanese folks to do any critical thinking or talk about themselves too much which is maybe why he didn't answer some of the finer points of your interview, but he seems cool.

After watching as much Mid-Atlantic Valentine as I could find, I wondered if I was wrong to like Valentine more than so many other American workers, then I watched the Strongbow stuff and had one of those if lovin' you is wrong I don't wanna be right epiphanies. Man, I dig those 70s-to-mid 80s Madison Square Garden crowds. When did the MSG vibe change? Is it post-SNME where it's not the same sort of wrestling crowd? Gorilla was FAT in 1979. Holy shit.

I don't know if it's true, but HTM claims they never really trusted him again after he refused to lose to Savage. After he put Warrior over, he slid pretty far down the card and he's always bitching that he's not a road agent and shit like that. Does he get any sort of legend kickback?

The magazines are printing the average household rating not the audience share. And it's for the Kanto region. There are no national ratings.

Thus reminds me of when Jesse Ventura sold out at Wrestlemania VI and admit that Hulkamania will live forever. Speaking of cultural icons, I knew this guy who heckled Rick Derringer once by requesting Real American at one of his shows. Turns out Derringer has had a change of heart about performing his iconic song. Here's Real American better than ever, jeez:

I dunno how I feel about that. These days when something happens in popular entertainment you have real time commentary in the form of twitter and instant reaction on the internet. I have no doubt that kids today are more interested in taking selfies and connecting through social media than watching the 1001 greatest films ever made, but there's still shit they're heavily into. Right now One Direction are big in Japan and I'd argue that there's never been a better time for young Japanese fans to really get into an overseas foreign artist because of the internet. Beside which, the number of people who are interested in exploring pop culture from the past has always been small compared to those interested in the here and now. We're in the minority on that account. It wouldn't surprise me, though, if there was at least one old thing that most of your students had discovered somehow whether it's through their parents or the internet. I do get the gist of your argument. When I was a kid there were only two channels before a third one was added and you'd all watch the same stuff after school and on weekends and rent the same videos and games from the video store. There is far greater choice these days. But I also feel that things like memes are modern pop culture and that popular culture has simply moved on. No matter how much I chew it over some kid not knowing MacGyver, Bill Cosby or The Muppet Show isn't indicative of some decline in popular culture. I had an English teacher in high school who used to boast that of course he understood all the popular culture references in The Simpsons that we didn't so evidently he felt we didn't know much about pop culture in the late 90s. What's more, you need to give these kids a chance. When I was 20, I hadn't begun watching classic or foreign cinema yet and was still listening to grunge music. They still have a lot of experience to be gained. When I was 20, all I would have known of Bogie or Cagney would be parodies like Daffy Duck so don't be too hard on them. The kids are all right. They just like shitty One Direction.

They have their own pop culture. I haven't watched a TV series religiously since the Sopranos, in fact I haven't even owned a TV for the past few years. People my own age ask me whether I watch numerous types of shows but I don't watch new movies let alone TV. I grew up in the 80s, but I'm also a product of the internet. I watch 1950s movies, read 70s comics books, watch old wrestling and listen to everything from 50s jazz to 70s funk, all of which I discovered through the internet. I have no grasp on modern popular culture. I'm basically stuck in the past, but if I were lecturing I don't think I'd make jokes about ALF. I don't see any reason why these kids should be overly familiar with the pop culture from my generation when I'm not overly familiar with the pop culture from theirs. One day these kids are going to be surprised that someone younger doesn't know a meme that was big in their youth, etc. I think you're downplaying the generational divide. My younger sister's generation remember 00s shows more fondly than I do. For me they were rubbish compared to the 80s and 90s stuff that I grew up on. If pop culture were this ubiquitous thing that we all experienced at the same time we'd never lose touch with it, but it's obvious that it's something we're most closely attached to in our youth. And I don't see how you can be disgusted about people not knowing Bill Murray. Bill Murray is a brilliant actor but he's only iconic in the minds of cinephiles. He's not Bogie or Cagney or Jimmy Dean.

I can see how someone could see that.

According to Mr. Mom's producer, Lauren Shuler Donner, Hughes was fired and they brought in a group of TV writers. I know there were times when Hughes tried to fob off failures like National Lampoon's Class Reunion by saying they'd butchered his original script, which the director Michael Miller steadfastly denied and produced Hughes' script to prove it, but Hughes was pretty upfront about being fired for being a pain in the ass.

Didn't Nash and his wife separate at some point? Hokuto and Sasaki are still going strong 18 years after they married. They're still on TV a lot and frequently appear in commercials.

This we should most definitely do. Who can forget that Canadian crooner Henry Burr or the irresistible Alice Joyce? Bigger star? Hogan or Steve Guttenberg? Hogan or Al Bundy? Hogan or Kathleen Turner? The funny thing about Hogan is that outside of North America he was more famous than Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Joe Montana or Wayne Gretzky. In Southern Europe in the 90s Magic and Bird were much bigger than Hogan (I imagine Central Europe too but I'd be only guessing). I think the difference is that your dad would know Magic, Bird and Hogan, but your grandpa wouldn't know Hogan. Montana would mostly be known by teenage males as the guy on the NFL video game on the SEGA consoles. Gretzky is a total no name. I know he's a hockey player but I couldn't pick him out of a lineup. Before satellite it was next to impossible to see NBA games. When satellite took off, it was Jordan who led the NBA boom. Bird and Magic were basically out of the picture after '92, though I'm sure they were a big deal in Barcelona that year. In their primes, they were basically inaccessible compared to wrestling unless Europe had some major NBA coverage I'm unaware of.

Well, it depends what you mean by "outdated". Is Wizard of Oz outdated or has it become a part of our collective cultural memory / conscious? Poppins? The actor Bill Murray? The Godfather? In my mind, all of these things aren't "outdated" but are "ingrained" in our culture. Seemingly (and sadly), however, it's just in my mind. Firstly, one of these things just doesn't belong here with Bill Murray. I can see how Wizard of Oz, Mary Poppins and the Godfather wouldn't be so culturally relevant to today's young people. I doubt very much that kids today grow up on Playschool and Sesame Street like I did. I don't really get why you're so surprised. Peyton Place meant nothing to me when I was a kid, but I remember my parents talking about it a lot. I'm not saying you're wrong about your overall point re: television vs. the internet, but it's not often someone sings the virtues of television so loudly. And from a literature professor no less.

No name? He wrote the #9 and #11 box office hits of 1983. It earned him enough of a name that Universal gave him $6M+ to make, while it doesn't seem like much was about the same Footloose got made for and more than Police Academy... and likely more than Purple Rain got made for. Hughes wrote The Breakfast Club in '82 when he was fed up with being a writer and wanted to direct, but A&M weren't sold on the idea and the budget was so low that Hughes got nervous and tried writing something more commercial in Sixteen Candles, which sold to Channel Productions and was picked up by Universal. After that, he was able to shoot TBC, but he took a huge pay cut on it and made nothing from it. Being a writer isn't worth as much as being a director in Hollywood; that's why Hughes wanted to switch to directing because he'd been fired off Mr. Mom and National Lampoon's Vacation. He'd never directed a film when A&M agreed to finance TBC, but even after Sixteen Candles he didn't have a name. Not one that the public would recognise. As for the Brat Pack, I think they really rose to prominence with TBC and St. Elmo's Fire. The other thing about TBC is that it had a short theatrical run. I don't think it's much of a surprise that more people went to see Back to the Future or Rambo, that's a given, but considering where TBC came from, the fact that it was allegedly an extremely poor pitch and this was strong opposition among the studio execs, the overall pulling power should be measured a little differently from Michael J. Fox or Sly Stallone. It's a second tier level of stardom. If Hogan isn't analogous to Fox or Stallone then it's a little hard to compare him to what the Brat Pack were able to achieve with a low budget, almost indie level, planned directorial debut. But really the Brat Pack faded so fast I don't think they had the same level of stardom as Hogan.

Why do you expect a bunch of kids to know your outdated pop culture references, Parv? People I work with ten years younger than me don't understand half the shit I rabbit on about. The Breakfast Club was made for a million bucks on a single shoot location with a no-name director and group of actors who gained notoriety during '85. To gross that much on an R rated film is a big deal.

This we should most definitely do. Who can forget that Canadian crooner Henry Burr or the irresistible Alice Joyce? Bigger star? Hogan or Steve Guttenberg? Hogan or Al Bundy? Hogan or Kathleen Turner? The funny thing about Hogan is that outside of North America he was more famous than Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Joe Montana or Wayne Gretzky.

You can read about the television situation in Steve Sims' Konnan HOF bio: http://wrestlingobserverhof.wordpress.com/konnan/ But basically television was not a factor until EMLL's 1989 deal with Televisa.

I don't know about the NFL, but there are plenty of sports fans who don't like the way the modern game is played compared to the sport they grew up on. And plenty of older fans who have dinky memories about the way their sport used to be played. Complaining about wrestling is nothing new. When I watch Crockett, I'm enamoured with the excellent wrestling, but the Observer was full of criticism at the time. The same is true of WCW. My favourite period for that promotion was the early 90s when they were in the doldrums, but I don't care, because when I look back on WCW I pick out the good stuff and don't particularly care about whether the promotion was a success. At some point in the future, people may do the same with the current WWE product, cherry picking the good stuff that Cena, Punk or Bryan produced without caring about the ongoing criticisms of the booking. Wrestling is more of a creative pursuit than sports. Creativity dries up and folks burn out. A lot of people give up on television shows after a few seasons. I gave up on the comics I was obsessed with as a child. Folks stop listening to their favourite bands or the musical genre they were into. Throughout wrestling history, we've seen that promotions can only be super successful for short periods at a time. Compared to most other forms of entertainment, it's a wonder that wrestling is still chugging along. It should have disappeared at the end of the 80s. But it hasn't, instead it's passed a lot of us by. You'd have to be the hardest of the hardcore to watch the same promotion continuously for twenty or thirty years without dropping out at some point. Only men like Johnny Sorrow are capable of such feats.