“I cried throughout the entire thing. It made me want to be a better man.” We’re at the end of an era, folks. The Nicolas Cage season of Because You Watched Starcrash draws to a close with our obligatory holiday movie and a spectacular piece of metafiction. Your Distinguished Professors and salute the man of the hour. Topics discussed include our latest accompanying whiskey, yet another manifestation of the Magical Negro, movies that get dads to cry, Cash’s alignment is called into question, nos...
Dec 21, 2024•1 hr 12 min
Vampire’s Kiss (1988) “You’re in the goddamn crapper, Loew, and I’m trying to take a dump. So either shut up and leave the acting lessons for home or go back to the ladies’ room.” Is it a deft American Psycho -level satire, a taut supernatural or psychological thriller, or insane, ridiculous crap? That’s the question facing our Distinguished Professors as they discuss the 1988 Nicolas Cage meme-fest Vampire’s Kiss . Let’s see if they find an answer. Topics discussed include gratuitous displays o...
Jun 20, 2024•1 hr 7 min•Season 6Ep. 4
“Where’s Conan when you need him?” The distinguished professors discuss Jim Wynorski’s The Lost Empire and continue to do this profit-turning genius appropriate homage. Topics include trying to figure out what genre this film fits into, comparison with Fu Manchu, its Producers -like origins, self-aware dumbness and sexploitation, connections with Russ Meyer, Elvira-level wordplay, video game structure, 80s action movie racism, the movie’s clarity of plot, Anthony Kiedis’s dad, Wynorski’s open sl...
Mar 13, 2024•39 min•Season 1Ep. 6
Ho-Ho-Hallmark Holiday Special A Christmas Wedding Tail (2011), A Christmas Melody (2015), and Christmas Mail (2010) “Don’t worry, I’m a city girl. This small town is not for me.” Welcome to our 2023 Holiday Special, in which your three Distinguished Professors move from the big city to a small town and find love in only the most formulaic of ways! We invite our podcast’s first special guest, Jackie, to experience this holiday Hallmark (and faux-Hallmark) hell with us. Topics covered include mul...
Dec 19, 2023•1 hr 37 min•Season 100Ep. 4
Willy's Wonderland (2021) - Because You Watched Starcrash
Oct 24, 2023•1 hr 9 min•Season 6Ep. 3
“I had a miserable time tonight because of you.” It’s our first Francis Ford Coppola joint on Because You Watched Starcrash! And Kathleen Turner! Oh, and some other guy who was once named Coppola is in it, too. Your Distinguished Professors watched an early entry in the Nicholas Cage-verse, Peggy Sue Got Married, and now you’re going to hear about it! Topic discussed include Madonna’s genitals, the right level of weird vs. Nicholas Cage-levels of weird, Charlie’s insane appearance at the class r...
Aug 27, 2023•1 hr 36 min•Season 6Ep. 1
“This is a story whose chapters were carefully written.” In their ongoing exploration of the filmography of one Nicolas “Jor-El” Cage, the Distinguished Professors have watched the 2006 remake of The Wicker Man , which has 100% less depth and 1000% fewer boobs (don’t check my math) than the original. Topics covered include the intense dumbness of the conspiracy to trap our hero, the clunkiness of the dialogue, the universal dour evil of women in this movie universe, ACAB (All Cops Are Bumblers),...
Aug 11, 2023•1 hr 22 min•Season 6Ep. 2
Ho-Ho-Holiday Special III – GI Joe: A Real American Hero Episode 1:39, “Cobra Claws are Coming to Town” (1985) and He-Man and She-Ra: A Christmas Special (1985) “Well, I don’t like to feel good. I like to feel EVIL!” Your Distinguished Professors have prepared quite the holiday treat – we’re going back to 1985 with two ridiculously bad extended yuletide toy commercials! Topics discussed include constant Skeletor impersonations, our sense of nostalgia takes a punch to the gut, the weirdness of Ho...
Dec 21, 2022•1 hr 6 min
Back to the Future (1985), Back to the Future Part II (1989), and Back to the Future Part III (1990) “What are you looking at, Butthead?” In an amazing finale, your time-traveling Distinguished Professors end their journey with the Back to the Future trilogy! Topics discussed include Back to the Future ’s enduring excellence, the issues with the sequels, Part II ’s surprisingly weak visual effects (other than the various duplicate actor shots), the Jaws jokes in Part II , Goldie Wilson and Chuck...
Nov 14, 2022•1 hr 21 min•Season 5Ep. 10
“And if anything happens to the rose plants in my absence, then I will send you to hell.” This week your Distinguished Professors take their first trip to Bollywood with the Back to the Future ripoff/ homage Action Replayy! Singing! Dancing! Subtitles! A super-hot mom! Topics discussed include even worse grammar for our opening, lowering. . . our voices, musical numbers and their diegetic role in Indian movies, weird credits, we’re always living in the past, time travel here is pretty much magic...
Nov 12, 2022•1 hr 1 min•Season 5Ep. 9
“Thou art to be hanged, and then burned over a basket of living cats.” Your Distinguished Witchhunting Professors cross wits with the insane occult time travel movie Warlock ! And since no witch can cross no consecrated ground, they discuss the first of our magical time travel movies and a reference to Outlander , the dreaminess of Julian Sands, Lori Singer as the resident hot new wave girlfriend, comparisons with Hocus Pocus , the crazy fakelore of this movie, inconsistent rules regarding Zamie...
Nov 09, 2022•55 min•Season 5Ep. 9
“You don’t need a stretcher up there – you need a mop!” Just in time for the very most spookiest part of the year, your favorite Distinguished Professors discuss the films that established the slasher movie genre – Halloween , Friday the 13th , and A Nightmare on Elm Street – in their offensively-named named Goryhole Special! Topics covered include Psycho ’s origination of the slasher genre, Halloween ’s great main theme, Robert Englund’s thinly-disguised role as folklorist Jan Harold Brunvand i...
Oct 26, 2022•1 hr 17 min
“My mother was a rather atrocious woman in her way, but her many failings did not include raising mentally deficient sons.” Your intrepid Distinguished Professors unwittingly fall once again into the horrid clutches of Corey Feldman in 1979’s Time After Time , featuring a sexy and villainous David Warner and a decidedly less sexy role for ordinarily sexy and villainous Malcolm McDowell as highly unsexy author H. G. Wells. Topics discussed include a preview of this movie’s random homophobia, the ...
Oct 06, 2022•1 hr 11 min•Season 5Ep. 8
“Big mistake, dude!” Your Distinguished Professors tackle a movie that temporarily killed a franchise and that isn’t X-Men 3 ! We suffered through the joyless simulation of a movie that is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III , so now you have to listen to us chat about it! It’s only fair! Topics discussed include the confusing proliferation of TMNT media, a plug for The Toys That Made Us , Corey Feldman’s hacky voice acting, an interminable attempt to project our group dynamic onto the turtles, the...
Sep 25, 2022•1 hr•Season 5Ep. 7
“Beeee-dee beedee – what a fox!” In this memorial episode, the Distinguished Professors pay homage to TV bombshell Markie Post, another of the honored fallen of 2021, by watching a two-part episode of the disco sci-fi epic Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, “The Plot to Kill a City”! Topics covered include a lot of initial free product placement, a justification of Buck Rogers as a time travel story, the hot spandex-clad ladies of the 25th century, a rundown of the special guest stars, a brief rev...
Sep 06, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Season 5Ep. 6
“Christ! I’m getting tired of this guy!” This week your Distinguished Professors continue their run through time travel cinema with 1993’s Mark Hamill vehicle Time Runner ! Topics discussed include the alternate title, its setting in 2022 (the future is now!!!!), why you just can’t trust a guy named Neila, ripping off both The Terminator and Star Wars , how the demand for knock-off movies was vital back in the video store ecosystem, dramatic reveals, the intense Canadian-ness of Karen Donaldson,...
Aug 06, 2022•55 min•Season 5Ep. 5
“Time travel. It’ll turn your brain into spaghetti if you let it. Best not to think about it.” This week your Distinguished Professors grab some pints and go full-on Imagineer with the British science fiction comedy epic Frequently Asked Questions about Time Travel ! So let’s all call Hollywood sh*t and talk about Clink’s Carson routine, Berres’s inability to remember that Bonnie Tyler wrote “Total Eclipse of the Heart,” a comparison with Joker regarding the eternal horror of being a fired masco...
Jul 18, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Season 5Ep. 4
“Beware of the sacrilege!” This week your Distinguished Professors enjoy a film with Tom Hanks, fresh off his days of bosoming and buddying and on the cusp of a noteworthy acting career: the D&D-sploitation movie Mazes and Monsters ! Roll for initiative as we discuss the sad fact that two-thirds of this podcast can’t drink a man’s beverage, the “real-life” roots of this story, a series of tragic hat choices, the 80s backlash against Dungeons and Dragons , a bit about D&D ’s popularity, t...
Jul 03, 2022•54 min
“Dry hair’s for squids.” This week the Distinguished Professors dive deeply into the work of auteur Charles Band with the time travel adventure of future-noir tough guy Jack Deth in 1984’s Trancers ! Topics covered include forbidden early forays into porn-watching, connections to Quantum Leap , the five sequels to this movie, the recent loss of Peter Scolari, doing battle with Santa, the burned-out cop as a cinematic archetype, questions about the origin of Skid Row, Leena becomes self-aware and...
Jun 07, 2022•36 min•Season 5Ep. 3
“Then there were days, good days, when by anyone’s judgment they would have to be considered clever.” The Distinguished Professors get serious with their time travel with 2004’s Primer , an intense independent cinematic experience involving 20-something engineers in suburban Texas entering and leaving a storage facility at various times. Topics discussed include the $7000 budget, dilation, the lack of Steven Johnson’s “red flashing arrows,” what makes an art house or indie movie “good,” the 40-y...
May 24, 2022•1 hr•Season 5Ep. 2
“Well, double-dumbass on you!” The Distinguished Professors travel at warp speed into their time travel adventures with an impromptu episode right after a theater showing of Star Trek IV ! Topics discussed include Clink’s review of basic time travel theory, Trek time travel’s creation of alternate universes, the replacement Lt. Saavik, attempts to resolve whether Liz Taylor was ever in a Star Trek episode, a brief Warhammer 40k digression, why you shouldn’t think too hard about this movie, multi...
May 07, 2022•56 min•Season 5Ep. 1
“He says, ‘In America, everyone is a gynecologist.’” You’ve been waiting. You’ve been wanting. And now we’re going to give it to you. Distinguished Professors. Verhoeven. Showgirls . Topics covered include Berres’s first bad movie ka-tet (hat tip to Dave and Jessica), the pointlessness of the VH-1 TV version, the not-so-hidden misogyny of Joe Eszterhas, the good parts (which actually do exist), a disastrous lack of clear direction, the campy awareness of Cristal Conners, attempts to make Nomi a ...
Dec 28, 2021•59 min•Season 5Ep. 7
“It’s time for the Three Musketeers to saddle up and ride to glory, KnoWhutImean?” To save Christmas 2021 from the triple threat of a COVID-19 variant that sounds like a Transformer, a dire shortage of cream cheese, and general malaise, your beloved Distinguished Professors bring you the 1988 Christmas miracle that is Ernest Saves Christmas ! Topic covered include an overview of the Ernest cinematic universe, the connection between this film and The Star Wars Holiday Special , a bold claim that ...
Dec 21, 2021•47 min
“Oh, Wiploc, I think I’ll miss you least of all.” On this outing your Distinguished Professors crash land in the backyard swimming pool of 1988’s Earth Girls are Easy ! Topics discussed include a rival Dr. Love, the omnipresence of this movie on Comedy Central back in the day, this podcast as a social contract, the failure to launch Julie Brown’s career, the strange hotness of Geena Davis and Jeff Goldblum, Clink’s realization that he’s the only one of us without a side podcast, a failure compar...
Dec 06, 2021•35 min•Season 5Ep. 6
“I think you know what I’m getting at, Mr. President. We’re gonna kill us a mummy.” In this thrilling installment of Because You Watched Starcrash, your Distinguished Professors wade ass-deep into danger with 2003’s Bubba Ho-tep! Topics discussed include Soul Man, the director’s writing credit on The Beastmaster, this movie’s intense absurdity, parallels with Unforgiven and Logan in fears about losing usefulness in old age, the awesomeness of Joe R. Lansdale, defining words at the beginning like...
Oct 30, 2021•48 min•Season 5Ep. 5
“Pain is temporary – film is forever.” Your favorite Distinguished Professors have a showdown with the best and weirdest of the 80s teen movies, Three O’Clock High ! Topics covered include the insane opening sequence, comparison with Better Off Dead , connections to Back to the Future and Black Scorpion , interesting camera angles, the opening sequence as an arming of the hero, the inexorability of fate, remembrances of high schools past, attempts to get out of trouble by getting into trouble, t...
Oct 09, 2021•42 min•Season 4Ep. 4
“That’s for trying to kill me! That’s for trying to kill my friends! And that’s for being a real jerk!” The Distinguished Professors endure cosmic ray bombardment through laughably-absent safety measures to watch Roger Corman’s copywrite-maintaining placeholder, The Fantastic Four! Topics include the squareness of the Fantastic Four comics in the 1980s and 1990s, the role of the FF in starting the mighty Marvel superteams, the FF as adventurers and not crime-fighters or world protectors, the wea...
Sep 15, 2021•1 hr 13 min•Season 4Ep. 3
“And you can stick it anywhere!” The Distinguished Professors take a big, sloppy bite out of the infamous 1980 movie musical The Apple! Topics discussed include the dystopian future of 1994, the doing of the BIM, this movie’s insistent heterosexuality running against the disruptive queerness of the musical, contrast with The Rocky Horror Picture Show (released the previous year), the potential future musical season of your favorite podcast, the critique of capitalism and the music industry, para...
Sep 14, 2021•1 hr 9 min•Season 4Ep. 2
“I hope no one minds, but I have no intention of facing this sober.” The Distinguished Professors engage in some Errol Flynn-style hijinks and privateering in search of the solidified state of water with the 1984 movie The Ice Pirates ! Topics covered include a water as a post-apocalypse MacGuffin yet again, the star-studded cast, the questionable PG status of this movie, comparison with Princess Bride and a connection to Jason and the Argonauts , fairly broad comedy, MIT’s space piracy program,...
Sep 07, 2021•58 min•Season 4Ep. 1
“I like the death. I like the misery! I LIKE THIS WORLD!” This week the Distinguished Professors go back in time to the golden era of the career of Belgian dance-brawler and split-doer Jean-Claude Van Damme and watch Cyborg, a movie consisting entirely of slow-motion fighting and screaming. Topics covered include mistimed sound cues, the unsanity of our times, El Doobie, the steampunkiness of the costumes due to their origins with the sequel to Masters of the Universe and other film detritus, Go...
Aug 20, 2021•58 min•Season 3Ep. 10
