MWP Minis Arny and Sly
[00:00:00] Kyle: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another tweener episode. Tweener. I like saying tweener. Uh, this is
[00:00:18] Drew: Kyle. Uh, is this what we're calling it? Tweeners? I don't know. We
[00:00:21] Kyle: need an official name. I'm Drew. Tweener. But, uh, we are doing another episode bringing you some stuff in [00:00:30] between our wars. Those wars take forever to work on and research, so we're having a lot of fun talking about movies in between.
[00:00:35] Some skirmishes. Some skirmishes, scrimmages. Skirmishes. It's no mystery to our listeners where we stand on Arnold Sly. It's pretty obvious that we have a love, a love, love relationship. Arnold who? Uh, Arnold Palmer and Sly. Sly the cat. Sly the cat, the Looney Tune. I was going to say there was a cat named Sly.
[00:00:52] cat? I think so. No, Sylvester the Sylvester the cat. Skunk. Skunk? That was Pepe Le Pew, right? Sylvester, wasn't he? [00:01:00] Who the hell was the skunk? I guess it doesn't matter. I didn't watch cartoons. Anyway, we're talking about cartoons today. Now, uh, you know, no one's questioning how big a fan we are of Arnold and Sly and You know, any of the big action guys, and I, you know, we've talked often, like, where is the next, who is the next, will there ever be a next?
[00:01:18] I'll go to you. Is it possible? I mean, what was it about the, the environment that created Arnold and Sly and let them have, you know, decades of success, still having success, but obviously not the [00:01:30] same thing, but what, what created that and is it more difficult now?
[00:01:34] Drew: Well, I don't know what created it exactly, but I mean, I think it's, it spoke to the culture at the time it was the 80s.
[00:01:41] The economy was booming. It was Reaganomics. It was, you know, American exceptionalism. Yes, it was. Everything was big and bad and muscly and You know, I think it just that kind of the, the blockbuster movie, I don't think it was necessarily invented in the eighties. I think it probably started in the seventies with jaws or [00:02:00] something like that, but I think it was kind of perfected in the eighties and that's really when things started to pop and something about just big guns and big muscles really appealed to Americans at the time and worldwide audiences.
[00:02:13] So I, yeah, I don't know exactly why, but, and, and let's, I think it gets overlooked. These were two extremely charming, charismatic, talented individuals. Like I've said before, they're not the greatest [00:02:30] actors of all time, but they are some of the greatest movie stars of all time. And I do think it takes a great amount of talent and ability.
[00:02:37] And skill to win over an audience and be a, a movie star. And
[00:02:41] Kyle: that's what they were. Yeah. And we talked about, we talked, I think, uh, pretty much every, uh, I think we talked about this on the raw deal, Cobra podcast, but you know, action was, was it existed before them, obviously, but it was Element. It was an element, you know, it was built into James Bond.
[00:02:55] It was built into movies kind of as a, you know, as like an asset. Mm-Hmm. . And then [00:03:00] when they come on, it's like. The action is the thing, the guns are the thing, the muscles, the oil, the blood, the fighting, like those became the thing. And I think you're right. I think something about kind of the, the movement of, uh, you know, American exceptionalism, uh, Reaganomics, kind of the, the thriving of the, you know, of the eighties, there was a time.
[00:03:23] And also we didn't have a lot. To take our attention away, you know, now you can open up Instagram and follow a muscle account or a bodybuilding account. [00:03:30] You're going to see 50 Arnold's, but not having social media. The thing is, is that if you didn't follow bodybuilding, you still saw Arnold and thought, Oh my God, you know, And obviously Sly was in the public before, but because of Rocky, and he had kind of created some gravitas around himself being a great writer, great director, but then kind of like, more, he actually morphed into this action guy, he morphed into Rambo, even the first Rambo is a little more of an art pick than it is an action pick, um, [00:04:00] but as they went along, he kind of morphed into Rambo.
[00:04:02] They got bigger and bigger, more muscles, like his
[00:04:04] Drew: muscles scaled with the budget size. Yes,
[00:04:07] Kyle: they did. I love looking at the pictures from each one. It's like, he was obviously on gear on the juice. Is there a flaw in my thinking? Do we have anything close now? Who's close to this?
[00:04:18] Drew: That's tricky. Uh, the closest, we certainly don't have a pair of them.
[00:04:24] We don't have a tandem, but I would say the closest to that type would be The Rock. [00:04:30] Mm hmm. The Rock, it kind of scratches that, I mean, he's obviously very muscly, has like that mix, the mixed bag of action and comedy. Now, The Rock leans a little more comedy films. And family film, stuff like that. Then Sly and Sylvester or Sly and Arnold did, but I think he's probably the closest we have to that.
[00:04:49] And even then it's still different. Yeah. What would you say? Would you say there's another one? Am I missing one? No,
[00:04:54] Kyle: I think I was having a hard time, like for a second, like, like I was, I think I almost thought Gosling first thing, but you know, [00:05:00] they do one action movie now, like, you know, like Arnold and Sly made a career out of it, you know, but anymore, it's like they dip into it, you know, they,
[00:05:07] Drew: yeah, well, the action genre has changed quite a bit to genres.
[00:05:11] What do you
[00:05:12] Kyle: think some of the biggest changes have been?
[00:05:14] Drew: Well, I mean, anymore, it's, and this is a whole different conversation, but if it's not Star Wars, Marvel, you know, or an animated movie, Disney, basically, if it's not Disney, then it's straight to streaming. I mean, that's kind of how most. [00:05:30] What, how Hollywood sees it.
[00:05:31] It's like, it's either going to be 150 million, 200 million movie. Uh, and it's going to be a big spectacle that you'll go see, or it's going to be probably something that may or may not go to theaters, but it's going to end up on Netflix or Apple TV plus or whatever. And so the biggest changes have, have been.
[00:05:46] Just the, the genres that used to draw audiences to the theaters, romantic comedies, comedies in general, action movies that aren't sci fi or fantasy, um, those have kind of gone away. You know, and
[00:05:59] Kyle: it's [00:06:00] interesting you mentioned the Disney movies, I was thinking with the Marvel, like, also, I think one of the attributes of those movies from the 80s and all the Sly and Arnold movies was that The chaos and the action was being generated most of the time by one person and it was them, you know, anymore.
[00:06:14] There is large scale action, but one, it's heavily CGI, so it's not necessarily, it's also not the, it's not always guns, you know, space lasers or maybe, you know, iron man's whatever, you know, weaponry built into a suit, but it's not. M 16s. It's not, you [00:06:30] know, uh, what is the, uh, the spinning machine gun called the, uh, minigun.
[00:06:34] It's not like a minigun generating the chaos. It's an ensemble. It's superheroes. It's, you know, it's typically generated by in that fashion. So, whereas in, you know, with a lot of the Arnold movies, one man wrecking
[00:06:45] Drew: machine. And I think another thing that kind of changed as Arnold and Sly's run sort of started to fade was technology evolved to a state where.
[00:06:56] We became fascinated with it. I'm thinking of the matrix. I'm [00:07:00] thinking of enemy of the state. Mm hmm You know like it just movies that kind of portrayed the technological advances that we were dealing with gadgets So yeah, so it became less about like ooh big muscles big guns big explosions. Okay, cool I don't care like how smart is this guy and what are his gadgets?
[00:07:19] And so that's and then that I'm kind of It, uh, transitioned into like what we saw with Iron Man, you know, like we're looking at a super rich, smart guy. He's charming. He's shmarmy, whatever, but it's all about [00:07:30] the cool crap that he's got in his
[00:07:31] Kyle: suit and yeah. Nerds rule the world now. I mean, you could have told somebody in the eighties watching raw deal that, you know, someday a bunch of Harvard and Yale graduated tech nerds that weigh a hundred pounds and can't make eye contact are going to.
[00:07:43] Fuckin run the world. I would've been like you're crazy Arnold is gonna run the world He can lift the world But one thing you said really blew my mind about the technological piece because it also reminded me something else We've hit on this podcast there were other action stars after you know And I think I'm [00:08:00] gonna name a bunch that just comes straight to my mind.
[00:08:01] We had Jean Claude Van Damme He was really his aesthetic was really predicated upon his martial arts. Like he was very fluent in martial arts, but again, he had some great franchise. He had blood sport, universal soldier, but that was never hit the heights. Like he ended up pretty much doing B movies, you know, sudden, sudden death, which was a great movie, but it was, it was not a huge deal.
[00:08:23] Like you probably haven't even heard of that one. Steven Seagal was close, but Seagal was not like muscle guy. In fact, [00:08:30] I don't think you, I can't even remember watching any of his movies. If you even saw his arms, like he was always wearing a black suit. He was really good with, uh, I think I've heard this.
[00:08:38] He was good with judo, whatever his martial arts was. It was the, the form that is really, it's for movies. He can't, he's not really necessarily great at. Kung fu or anything. He's just good at the movie art form of it. But you know, he's like, hello, talking like, Oh, you know, he messed with the wrong guy. But there was also this other thing, which we hit really hard, which we had this, this evolution of the, the meeker, [00:09:00] like the Bruce Willis to Keanu arc, which is the Everman.
[00:09:03] Yeah, the everyman still awesome, still can create a lot of havoc and carry the load, but they're not giant muscle. I mean, Bruce Willis was toned, Keanu slightly toned, I guess, but not like anything to look at, but tough enough, tough enough. Right. But then you're right. Like you, I think, I think you may have nailed it.
[00:09:18] The technology piece might have ruined it because it's like, now it's like, who cares how muscular you are? Cause actually that's funny in a lot of movies. Even in superhero movies being big, like I'm thinking of like, like juggernaut, [00:09:30] like being big, being muscly, being like overly macho is almost viewed as a disadvantage in villains now.
[00:09:36] Right. Don't you think? I mean, you're more into the superhero. We're better. Don't some of the superhero villains, kind of the minor villains are a little more, we got like right. Is Rhino in any of the movies?
[00:09:46] Drew: Yeah, he was in one of the Spider Man movies. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah. I mean, Hulk is still pretty awesome, but he never got his own movie.
[00:09:53] Well, he did, but I mean, he never got like his own trilogy, like, you know, Captain America. There were three of those movies [00:10:00] and Iron Man. There were three of those movies and Hulk is like the Thor. There's been what? Four, five of those. No, there's been four so far. Um, but Hulk was like after the debacle before Ruffalo, you know, with Edward Norton, the
[00:10:11] Kyle: whole thing.
[00:10:12] But well, what's funny about that is, you know, you look at the Lou Ferrigno sci fi Or it was on the TV series Hulk, which was extremely popular, but Mm-Hmm. Freno was a friend of Arnold's was a bodybuilder originally. He wasn't portrayed with CGI. They had a really massive bodybuilder. Mm-Hmm. painted freaking green.
[00:10:28] Oh, you
[00:10:28] Drew: know what? Now that I'm [00:10:30] thinking about it, uh, Hemsworth might be up there. Mm-Hmm. in the conversation with the rock in terms of just star power muscles. Um, he's not doing like the theatrical. Smashes in that genre, but like I'm thinking of like his extraction movies are very loved on Netflix I don't know.
[00:10:47] He's kind of in plays in that world a little bit Is there something
[00:10:50] Kyle: about the dialogue if you think about one liners? Yeah, like the one liners we love them In fact in our everyday life in our when we're hanging out and just chilling smoking cigars Well, how [00:11:00] many times did we just randomly? Drop a Arnold one liner just because it's in our brains, but is there is there room for that now?
[00:11:10] Is there patience from this new these new generations? Do they get that? I mean, I would say that the Marvel movies have a lot of comedy in them But they do come from people that like I think about Robert Downey jr Very capable of dialogue great actor talks has great monologues has great dialogue on on screen his one liners come from a wealth of words You know, yeah, [00:11:30] they're flying under They're smarter than Arnold wasn't talking a lot.
[00:11:33] Anyway, especially early on.
[00:11:35] Drew: Yeah. And the whole Arnold thing is in kind of an anomaly because of his poor English. You know, I think the one liners were kind of a crutch or like, this is not only is this funny, but he can't say a lot of other things. So let's just go with
[00:11:48] Kyle: that. Is the violence. This is something that crossed my mind.
[00:11:51] Like again, a lot of the violence, obviously there's still violent movies, but you look at what makes money, what's popular today, and I know we keep going back to Marvel, but what's making more [00:12:00] money than Marvel or has been traditionally in the past few years, the violence is, you can still equate it to a not real world, you know, you can still equate it to it's being generated by this world of heroes and planets and other worlds, whereas with Arnold and sly, like, except for like the exception of Terminator, which was still very real.
[00:12:17] Cause it's a future world. The commando, you know, I mean, Rambo, you know, the later Rambos, very real, bloody, especially when they, and they also came out around wars, like real war. They were [00:12:30] playing on the fact that we were in real wars engaged around the world. Um, and, and they were like caricatures of that.
[00:12:37] Yeah. Is that, I mean, is there something that's changed with our
[00:12:41] Drew: appetites for that? This might be a reach, but I think some of the kind of lighthearted, uh, violence, if you will, that used to be in films has kind of translated over to video games. And I think that scratches an itch for a lot of people so that when we go to movies, we want realism when we want the playful, just like, let's just [00:13:00] blow crap up and have fun.
[00:13:01] That's kind of what we do with video games now. Like I'm thinking like Far Cry 5 or something. It's very just like I just killed a whole group building of, you know, cultists. It's like, it means nothing because it's a game and it's kind of a, it's trying to be sort of tongue
[00:13:16] Kyle: in cheek. Damn, you were just full of good points.
[00:13:18] We should talk about movies sometimes on my go. You like your boy. That's why I'm asking you the questions that really blew my mind again, because I remember Red Dead Redemption 2 is probably my favorite game of all time. And then I love Last of Us and they, they just did a [00:13:30] remaster of Last of Us. Now I know a lot of people love the show.
[00:13:32] I freakin love the video game. Um, and I remember the first time I played the re the remake, not the remaster of one, but they actually, like, remade it for PS5. The first time I shot someone's head with a shotgun in the game, their head exploded and brains dri dripped slowly down the wall behind them. And I stopped playing and a zombie was like chasing me, but I just stopped and stared.
[00:13:53] I was like, they got that detail in there. Not only did the head explode, but they got the brains dripping down the wall. [00:14:00] Like this is where we are now, you know? So like, you're right. Like they've transferred and it's funny now for me. Now, granted, I always give this, give this on the podcast. I know a lot about the movies I care about.
[00:14:11] Like I've never said I'm a film guy across all of them. Like when I care about it, when I care about Arnold or Martin Scorsese, I know everything, but I don't know everything about every movie ever made, and that's, I put that out there. But, I do associate violence now with high art films. When I think of modern violence in films, it really is [00:14:30] predicated upon independent, uh, a lot of the independent directors I love, like Nicholas Winding Refn, who did Drive.
[00:14:36] Who did Valhalla Rising with Mads Mikkelsen, did Bronson with Tom Hardy, uh, Neon Demon. Those, he's a very violent director, but then again, he's not a, he's not a widely accepted guy because he's, he's very niche, very Indian, he loves that hyper violence. So, I think of, like Lars von Trier is another example, I do think violence has also almost been contained within high art films, too, with independent directors.
[00:14:59] [00:15:00] I could
[00:15:00] Drew: buy that. Which is not, you know, then I'm thinking of Robocop, like, and that's one of the most violent movies I've ever seen, but it's certainly not, well, that's a weird one. That's kind of like, uh, cause it is, you can make a case that it is high art, but it's also very just blockbuster and made a bunch of money and appealed to a very wide audience.
[00:15:18] So
[00:15:19] Kyle: that's, you got to peel the onion a little bit on
[00:15:21] Drew: that one to get, but I see what you're saying. It does feel like gratuitous violence. And maybe it's because of the gun issues in America and the school [00:15:30] shootings and all those things, like maybe it has like really gratuitous violence has kind of found its place in, I don't know, used as needed to make, to tell a story.
[00:15:39] Whereas the lighthearted tongue and cheek violence, I don't know, is a little bit more accessible.
[00:15:46] Kyle: Well, what you just said reminded me too, remember what John McTiernan said about, uh, when he directed Predator, like, he did not like guns, but, and I think we talked about this maybe on the Predator podcast, but Arnold, it was, it wasn't that Arnold had to go look for [00:16:00] roles, at a certain point it was like, directors and producers and studios wanted to be in the Arnold business, they wanted to be in the Sly business, we'll talk about the script later, we'll talk about the idea later, we just want you on the payroll, you know, we want you on our film.
[00:16:13] Yep. Yep. And that's kind of how it was. And so McTiernan, um, as much of an action guy, is he deplores guns and he deplores gun violence. In fact, that scene in Predator where they're shooting at the Predator, but they're shooting at nothing and just chopping down trees. That was, like, he says it was a tongue in cheek way of saying, you know, guns don't matter, you know, we [00:16:30] don't need guns.
[00:16:30] But, I mean, Who the hell cares? It was a movie about shooting an alien that hunts people on planets, right? So anyway, you'd have to really read into the subtext, but that's a great, the point I'm making there is that McTiernan didn't love guns, but what choice did he had? He had the biggest movie star who's known for the big guns and the big muscles.
[00:16:48] I mean, he didn't have any control over that. He was given an assignment and that was a direct predator with Arnold shooting guns in it. So he could have turned the job down. Oh yeah, he could have also not cashed the check. But I bet he
[00:16:59] Drew: did. Yeah, he [00:17:00] probably did. I bet he
[00:17:00] Kyle: still is. I bet he did. Or he probably donated
[00:17:02] Drew: it to PETA.
[00:17:03] So let me ask you this to kind of bring it back home. Okay. Is having an Arnold slash Sylvester Stallone type presence still feasible in 2024? Will there ever be like a plus less star of that type and style
[00:17:17] Kyle: again? Going into this conversation, I didn't know and after this conversation, I really do think it's, it's not, um, for a lot of the reasons.
[00:17:24] I think first of all, the advances of technology, scissors beats paper or whatever, rock beats scissors, you know, that [00:17:30] whole game. Technology beats big guys with muscles. You know what I mean? We're just in an age where like the biggest muscles and the biggest guns don't necessarily impress us anymore.
[00:17:38] Right. That and we're seeing unprecedented because this is the first time we've had wars during the social media age And now you go to Twitter and you can see corpses exploding from Ukraine. We're so neat We're just so exposed to violence now that I think I just don't think it's it's seen as entertainment anymore in that capacity Even though I don't think Arnold or Sly would ever say we wanted to [00:18:00] promote violence.
[00:18:00] We just wanted to entertain people. But, you know, you look at that today, I don't know. It's just not something that moves the needle for people anymore. Right. Um, I also think machismo is not necessarily something, not just the arc of the everyman action star with, you know, Bruce Willis and Keanu Reeves, but I just don't think that people are as interested in that level of machismo anymore.
[00:18:22] You know, Ryan Gosling, very attractive man, great actor, not a big dude. You know, I think about a lot of the new great actors besides the rock. [00:18:30] Yeah, there's a few exceptions. Hemworth, you know, Hemsworth and a few other dudes, but it's just not what moves the needle anymore. So go ahead. I was
[00:18:37] Drew: just going to add to that.
[00:18:39] I mean, then this is not intended at all to be a political statement and I hate that I even have to Say that, but the culturally to your point, the machismo is not celebrated like it was the idea of a big, muscly, strong man coming in and saving the day and, you know, rescuing the damsel in distress. Like that kind of that mode of storytelling is kind of been [00:19:00] frowned upon for better or worse or neither.
[00:19:02] Yeah. Um, but it's just not in the air like it used to be. Um, and then I also just think that there won't be as many or any celebrities quite as famous moving forward as they were, you know, in the eighties during a summer, you might have six or eight movies come out in the eighties. Now you've got, I mean, How many platforms with how many new movies and how many new shows, there's more content, there's more distractions, there's more things vying for our attention, whether it's [00:19:30] just tick tock or Instagram or what, what have you.
[00:19:33] And everybody kind of lives in their own little bubble of content and their algorithms feeding them what the algorithm knows they like. And so there's more celebrities, there's more people with millions of followers than there ever were. So, you know, Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, they were one of, you know, a handful of people at that level at that time, whereas today, I mean, you know, there's, there will be the Taylor Swift's of the world and, you know, but even her, [00:20:00] I would argue she was born into all this before social media really has become what it is.
[00:20:07] Um, but yeah, But I just don't think that stars will be that famous anymore. I think there will be a lot more somewhat famous people. But the idea that we just have like six A list stars and that's it, like, I think that's done. Yeah,
[00:20:21] Kyle: there's only so many opportunities to make crazy money right now. Whereas, you know, when Arnold and Sly were doing it big time, like, there was a lot of money to be made.[00:20:30]
[00:20:30] Well, can
[00:20:30] Drew: we even name one? Celebrity, one actor, actress that has become a massive star from the
[00:20:38] Kyle: streaming era like that were born of streaming or when like we're great actors already, then we're on streaming platforms or they started fresh and
[00:20:46] Drew: I'm saying like who, who is an example of an actor, actress who is kind of become a household name who started and has stayed in streaming.
[00:20:57] Yeah,
[00:20:57] Kyle: I know they kind of like stay like the first thought I [00:21:00] had was a guy from Stranger Things. What's the older guy's name? Oh, okay. That's a good example, but he didn't stay in it. He went on to do he went on to do You
[00:21:07] Drew: know, yeah, he's done Marvel stuff now, but that's a good. Okay, that's a good example But even him like not even close not even sending to the heights of someone like we can't even know
[00:21:16] Kyle: Remember his name to go to go on a multi decade run Yeah, Arnold Sly will add Keanu and Bruce Willis to that two of those of that type of star strung together decades Yeah.
[00:21:26] Of films. And you can
[00:21:27] Drew: throw Tom Cruise. Mm [00:21:30] hmm. I mean, really just actors. You could do, you could throw Tom Hanks and Denzel and like those, those guys that have run the gamut. And then when we're getting out to the action genre, but yeah, those type of actors, I think, I don't know. I just don't see that being a thing
[00:21:41] Kyle: anymore.
[00:21:42] You know, I also just had another crazy thought. Let's not just think about Arnold and Sly, but who created the worlds that they played around in. I mean, obviously Sly directed a lot of his own movies, but let's look at James Cameron. Who's, who's, besides John McTiernan, who do we really owe more gratitude to for our favorite action movies than James Cameron?
[00:21:59] But even [00:22:00] he stopped making those worlds. Think about what he's made. He went on to make Titanic. He made one alien film. He made the Terminator movies and True Lies. Left a huge impact, but he went on to make Titanic and now he's, you know, his whole world is Avatar. Um, so even he is not, I mean, I don't even know the last movie John McTiernan made.
[00:22:18] Drew: Yeah, and those guys are, I mean, no disrespect there, but they're old. I mean, they're, they're not, they don't have the youth to continue to do that. Yeah, at least in a new
[00:22:26] Kyle: way. Michael Bay kind of took the mantle, but like you said, it, it [00:22:30] didn't, Michael Bay was kind of responsible for like rejuvenating action, but it wasn't the same action that we grew up with.
[00:22:35] It was the bad boys and, and things in the rock and things like that. Those were different. Those were Nicholas cages, not Arnold Schwarzenegger. You know, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are, were almost comedians at the time. Like Will Smith hadn't yet ascended. Martin Lawrence was a comedian. So like they were making action movies with non action people.
[00:22:55] So even, even if you look at that evolution of it, it was always, I guess, now that we put it all together, [00:23:00] kind of, as we close, like putting together the pieces, like it's been kind of on this path for a while. And I think we're just kind of, kind of seeing what it is now. I don't think it's possible.
[00:23:07] Drew: I don't either.
[00:23:08] Boing, boing, boing, boing. No, I mean, But I'm fine with it. Yeah, maybe it's not a bad
[00:23:12] Kyle: thing. No, it's not, because, um, we obviously, it doesn't matter if they do, because we're just going to keep watching Arnold movies and Sly movies over and over again. You know? Once they start stamping 4Ks of all my favorites, I will just re watch them all for the hundredth time.
[00:23:26] Well, we would love to know what you think. I mean, if you're listening to this, you've been hanging with us [00:23:30] a while, you know how we love, we, uh, we love Arnold and Sly. What do you think? Will there ever be one? And we also want to know why you think I think, uh, why there couldn't be, or could be. What's your case?
[00:23:38] Make your case. Let us know. We would love to read your comments on the next podcast. Um, but, uh, thanks for flexing with us today. This is Kyle. This is Drew. Bye. Movie Wars.