This is it, folks. We estimated it would take us about two days to get to this point. Instead it’s taken 3 weeks. But, nevertheless, we’ve arrived. And the end. Well, the beginning of the end.
6:14pm, Season 5, Disc 1, Episode 1: ” The Fight”
00:10: Well, right out of the gate we have to compliment the DVD menus for this season. MUCH improved.
01:49: My school never had the “pool on the roof” gag. I kind of regret that. Feel like I didn’t have a proper high school experience.
02:32: Fun Fact: Elizabeth Berkley turned 44 during this season.
Die Hard 2 (Die Harder) was pretty disappointing on all fronts, basically a Die Hard rip-off in the vein of the later Die Hard on a boat andDie Hard in a tunnel and Die Hard on a zeppelin copycats that would densely populate the 90s, as opposed to a worthy follow-up to the original. But most dismaying was the severely diminished presence of Mr. Reginald VelJohnson, who undoubtedly stole the show as Sgt. Al Powell in the first film. He was John McClane’s confidant, his best friend, his rock, and his savior. It’s no stretch to say that without Sgt. Powell there’s no way McClane ever gets out of Nakatomi Plaza. So it’s nothing short of a travesty that Reginald VelJ’s role in the sequel was limited to a desk-jockey cameo:
But in his two minutes on-screen VelJohnson shines, giving a Masters class on eating a Twinkie while talking on the phone. And this scene really breaks down what an exciting, tumultuous time the early 90s were. Fax machines! Insurance companies! The ol’ in-laws! Fax numbers! Pissing in pools! It truly is a snapshot of 1990.
WAKE UP AND SMELL THE 90s! It smells like VelJohnson!
(Completely Made-up Fun Fact: the role played by Samuel L. Jackson in Die Hard with a Vengeance was originally written for Reginald VelJohnson to reprise Sgt. Powell. Strange, but not true!)
Thanks to the wonder of Netflix Instant Watch we’re now able to go back and relive all those years of SNL that we had only read about in Live From New York. As we had previously mentioned, one of the seasons we were most curious about was the 84-85 season, the year that featured a bunch of ringers named Billy Crystal, Martin Short, Harry Shearer and Christopher Guest. So as soon as we could we went right to season premiere, which began with a monologue from de facto lead cast member Crystal. We were struck by a number of aspects of the act: how young Crystal looks; the perfectly 80s sweater; the dark, depressing subway platform set. But what stayed with us most was this mildly racist bit about going to scary movies with African-Americans:
We’ve been meaning to upload this clip for a few weeks, but we were hoping to wait until we could procure better quality video. But we bring it to you now, without further hesitation, because last week’s SNL basically used the same exact joke in its “Globe Theatre” sketch:
Curiously, the sketch is not available on Hulu. Is a rights issue because they reworked a Black Eyed Peas song? Or maybe “Let’s all go the lobby” is not public domain. Or, perhaps. Mr. Crystal filed a plagiarism complaint.
Sadly, we’ll likely never know.
Either way, we’re a little concerned about how enthusiastic that one woman in the audience was when Crystal asked if anyone had “ever been to a scary film with a black audience” (it’s also kind of a weird question. The 80s weren’t the 60s, right?). Crazy times, man, crazy times.
Keeping with today’s Brooklyn theme (not to be confused with today’s ripping people off theme, or today’s “and speaking of” theme, or yesterday’s robot theme), check out the first few minutes of the Who’s the Boss? pilot, as Tony and Samantha pack up his windowless child molester van old, beat-up blue van and depart the Universal Studios backlot Brooklyn. As a bonus, we’ve included the original opening credits, which feature additional footage of the iconic van’s journey to the Bower home in Connecticut (no footage of the cast? How bold! Perhaps, an homage to the Taxi opening?)
Vodpod videos no longer available.
In addition, keeping with today’s snow theme, here’s a short clip of Danza from Taxi that can serve as your go-to video the next time a blizzard rolls through:
And speaking of ripping people off, was this Taxi clip perhaps the inspiration for the Bosom Buddies cabin episode? Makes you think.
We’re not sure what kind of black magic you employed to pull it off, Rolling Stone, but clearly you saw the post that we published extremely late on Monday evening and somehow rushed this cover to print in time to be delivered by Tuesday afternoon. Fess up! First Stephen Colbert infringes on our turf, and now Rolling Stone. What happened to the rules of decorum for tweeting and journalism (in that order)? It’s one thing to cop from New York Magazine (which we do from their Vulture blog all the time), but it’s a whole other thing to steal from us.
We guess chivalry IS dead.
(but go ahead and pick up the new issue, or at least read the article, because Fallon most certainly deserves all the attention)
We were hoping to make today an all robot-themed day (because 1.11.11 is like binary code, and that’s like robots, right?), but we weren’t sure where to take it. Then we got a tip from Jumped the Snark BFF Steve Ponzo informing us that Stephen Colbert has been tweeting about the Fox Sports Robot, a hardworking machine who has long been the object of our affection. Is Colbert cribbing from our notes?
Behold, a tweet from our personal account posted over Thanksgiving:
Now we take offense to this for a number of reasons. First, Stephen, buddy, let us have this one. We don’t go around trying to get our portrait into the Smithsonian. Secondly, “safest job in showbiz?” We think not. Not only did the Robot have to work on Thanksgiving, he also had to punch the clock during the great Blizzard of 2010. We hardly call that “safe.” And, finally, we object to Colbert’s tweet purely out of jealousy. His comment is retweeted by 100+ people, earning the rank of “Top Tweet,” and our observation fails to garner a single mention; where’s the justice in that? We think our tweet is just as good, if not better. Don’t you agree?
Well, Stephen, I think the only way to settle this is to have us on the Report. We’ll be waiting for your call. Let’s bring on this guy too:
Jumped The Snark 
