Would you buy a ticket to see Jason Bateman in Teen Wolf Three? You kinda would, wouldn't ya? With all the interest in Bateman these days because of the new Arrested Development series, you'd think someone would ask him about his days in 1987's Teen Wolf Too.
Well, in 2011, someone did. Cinemablend.com kidded Bateman about his hirsute take on the franchise and asked about the possibility of a Teen Wolf Three.
"We're very excited about the latest draft," Bateman told the interviewer, probably with a wink of his eye. Bateman actually did meet the cast of the MTV Teen Wolf series about the same time.
"They came up and introduced themselves to me at the MTV Movie Awards," Bateman said. "They were really, really nice. They were like, 'Oh my God, there's number two!' They're so in their world right now."
Actually, if you really want to know what's up next for Bateman, he has three movies in the works: Bad Words, This Is Where I Leave You and Horrible Bosses 2.
As the ‘80s became stereotyped by Yuppies and mantras like “Greed is Good”, who would have believed that in 1987 a band of out Australia would take the world by storm singing about the injustices to native Aborigines?
After the success of their first single, Beds Are Burning, off the Diesel and Dust album, Midnight Oil released The Dead Heart, which peaked at No. 53 on the US charts. The Dead Heart is about the government “giving back” Uluru (or Ayers Rock) to the Aborigines. The beginning half minute of The Dead Heart video is a majestic time-lapse view of the red rock of Uluru.
Because of its unique Australian focus, Diesel and Dust is widely regarded as the best Australian album of the ‘80s and perhaps of all time by many publications.
Sinbad, who has been bouncing around TV and and the big screen since the mid '80s, is finding out that showbiz life these days is a different world. The comic has filed for bankruptcy protection, the second time he's used the courts to help him out.
Sinbad (real name: David Adkins) filed for Chapter 13 last month, TMZ reports. He owed $10 million (including $8.3 mil to the IRS) but has assets totaling only $131,000. According to court documents, he only makes $16k a month now.
Sinbad got his start in the '80s, appearing on TV's The Redd Foxx Show, Keep On Cruisin' and A Different World. In 1987, he "survived" rumors on Wikipedia that he had died.
Did you catch Star Trek: Into the Woods, or whatever it's called, over the weekend? Sadly, I missed it. I was unpacking boxloads of Tribbles as I moved from Orlando to the nearby 'burg of Longwood. I moved into a house built in 1985, and it clearly hasn't been updated since that year. Could anything be more perfect?
At least one website had their head in the game and provided us this interesting, if slightly deranged, ranking of the best Star Trek movies of all time. And I'm happy to say the '80s fared better than expected.
Screencrush's list has fondness for Star Trek III that frankly is not logical, but otherwise, I'd largely agree with it. Go here for the full rationale of their ranking. I'm only going to give away their top six here.
1. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: "Out of all the classic 'Trek' films, it's the only one that stands alone as a great movie. You don't need to have seen the original series."
2. Star Trek: "It's easy to the list the problems with JJ Abrams' 2009 reboot of the 'Star Trek' franchise. It's dumb, it's full of plot holes, nothing makes sense, etc. However, Abrams is a magician -- he makes sure you don't see any of these problems until much, much later." …
With more than 30 million copies sold worldwide, it’s a stretch to say that Dire Strait’s Brother in Arms album is "lost" since it was released in 1985. While the No. 1 smash Money For Nothing is a constant on the radio, the title track, Brother in Arms, is uncommon on the radio.
The single for Brothers in Arms only charted in the U.K. with a peak positon of No. 16. The video combines grainy yet beautiful cartoon-like imagery with the senselessness of war to create one of the most unique videos of the ‘80s.
For trivia hounds, Brothers in Arms was the first recording to sell a million copies on CD and is credited for the growth and acceptance of the CD format in the ‘80s. Dire Straits last recorded in 1991 and broke up for good in 1995, while leader Mark Knopfler keeps busy with his solo career.
After scoring multiple hits in the ‘70s with his band LTD, Jeffrey Osborne went solo and went on to chart eight Top 40 hits in the ‘80s. While most of his singles were slow R&B ballads, Osborne still could hit the dance floor with songs like 1983’s Stay With Me Tonight.
Stay With Tonight peaked at No. 30 on the charts and has a thumping bass line and excellent guitar solo. Osborne stills performs occasionally, mostly on the casino circuit.
"It's not fun ... being an illegal alien." I was only 16 when this song by Genesis was released in 1983. All I thought at the time is that it was semi-catchy, and semi-stupid. But was it actually one of the most racist songs of the '80s?
That's one argument we hash out in this week's Stuck in the '80s podcast, which honors three albums from 1983. Download the show here. It's free. You can find all our shows here.
Depending on who you ask, the most racist song of the '80s might be a tune from NWA or Public Enemy. Though I'd argue their raps were ABOUT racism - a not-so-small difference. If you ask the New York Times, they'll say David Allan Coe produced "the most racist, misogynist, homophobic and obscene songs recorded by a popular songwriter."
As for Genesis, check out the oddly insulting video and ridiculous lyrics. Phil Collins and his bandmates would argue that the song was just a light-hearted look at the frustrations facing Mexican immigrants. Blender magazine, meanwhile, called it the 13th worst song of all time.
As ‘80s music started to become more slick and overproduced in the last half of the decade, there was a small revival of American roots rock coined The Paisley Underground. One of the soldiers of that movement was The Long Ryders. Taking their name from the 1980 western The Long Riders, The Long Ryders gained some minor radio and video airplay in 1985 for Looking for Lewis and Clark.
The song name drops folk heroes Gram Parsons and Tim Hardin who both died of drug overdoses. Hardin is the author of songs such as Reason To Believe (most recently made famous by Rod Stewart) and If I Were a Carpenter. The video showcases Sid Griffin’s uber-long sideburns in a decade were sideburns were not that fashionable. In 1987, like all old cowboys, The Long Ryders decided to hang up their spurs and fade into the sunset, but not before releasing a live album and several anthologies.
Axel Foley, take a seat. Deadline.com reports that CBS has decided against airing the Beverly Hills Cop reboot, which was backed by Eddie Murphy.
Rumor has it that Murphy, who appears in a cameo in the pilot along with former co-star Judge Reinhold, was outshining star Brandon T. Jackson, who plays Axel's son. Oh, that's a shocker. Come on, Eddie. Find your OWN project to star in.
Lest you think this is it for Axel, fear not: Multiple sources say the TV series will be shopped to other networks.
TOP 5 FORGOTTEN LINES FROM BEVERLY HILLS COP:
5. "This is not my locker!"
4. "I don't think cost is the issue here, sir. I think the issue should be my blatant disregard for proper procedure."
3. "Jenny, don't worry about me. We got cocaine and coffee here. We're gonna get wired and have a big party."
2. "Is this the man who... wrecked the buffet at the Harrow club this morning?"
1. "You know, it says here that by the time the average American is fifty, he's got five pounds of undigested red meat in his bowels."
If Steve Spears has ever tried to convince us of one thing on the SIT80’s blog and podcasts, it is that we should all revisit the movie and soundtrack to Valley Girl.
One of the many fine songs on the soundtrack is Felony’s The Fanatic. 1983 was the year of The Fanatic as it first was a single that reached No. 42 on the pop charts and then appeared on the Valley Girl soundtrack only to be featured in the Pia Zadora movie The Lonely Lady at the end of the year.
While Valley Girl has enjoyed cult status, The Lonely Lady has also been immortalized by winning the Razzie (which began awarding in 1980) for Worst Picture of 1983 and was a nominee for Worst Picture of the last 25 years only to lose out to 2000’s Battlefield Earth. Pia Zadora also easily won the Razzie for Worst Actress of 1983 and also won the Worst New Star of the Decade for the ‘80s.
Without the notoriety of the movies it was featured in, Felony only released one album in its career and lead singer Jeffrey Spry commited suicide in 1992.
In 1982, the German band Trio had a big European hit with a little 14-word titled ditty called “Da Da Da I Don’t Love You You Don’t Love Me Aha Aha Aha.”
Thanks to a popular 1997 Volkswagen commercial, Americans now know the song just as Da, Da, Da.
Trio was a minimalist band used very few instruments as the video for Da, Da, Da so cleverly shows. Trio broke up in 1985 after not gaining much of an audience outside of their native country, but Da, Da, Da still lives on and always makes lists of most memorable songs used in commercials including the lists that SIT80s published in April 2012.
Dan Fogelberg will foremost be remembered for tender ballads like Longer and Leader of the Band, but Fogelberg also knew a guitar power chord or two. In 1984, the Illinois native reached No. 13 with The Language of Love, a rocker that would end up being Fogelberg’s last Top 40 Hit.
One of my favorite Fogelberg tunes, The Language of Love has back vocals by Timothy B. Schmit, nice guitar, pipe organ and of course, cowbell. The video features Fogelberg’s great beard and a perky bass player who looks like he’s ready to hop on the next starship out of Tatoonie.
Unfortunately, Fogelberg succumbed to prostrate cancer at age 56 in 2007.
So after many weeks of serious effort, I finally made it all the way through all four seasons of Battlestar Galactica on Netflix. No, not the late '70s version, which by the way is also available there. (And which I'd watch now if I weren't afraid it's screw up my Netflix auto-recommendations for the next decade.) It was the fairly new version with Edward James Olmos.
Verdict: Two great seasons. One fairly decent season. And one final season that was so depressing that I wanted to jump out an airlock.
As long as we're remaking sci-fi series from ye olden days, why not Space: 1999?
This British series, about the chaos that follows when the moon (and its inhabitants) are thrown out of orbit with Earth, aired from 1975 to 1977. Yes, pre-Star Wars. I still get nightmares from some episodes. And like Battlestar, it used its opening credits to give fans a quick look at scenes coming up in the show. …
What’s that she’s singing? Huh? Is that English? Is there a lyrics sheet?
That’s what it’s like when you listen to the Scottish band Cocteau Twins. Vocalist Elizabeth Fraser didn’t mumble her lyrics the way REM’s Michael Stipe did in the early days. She did something different. She broke up words in an odd fashion, or added sounds that made it nearly impossible to understand what she was singing. But, so what? Her voice is great and the way she sings fits the Goth tinged music perfectly.
Today’s Never Found entry is from their critically acclaimed 1984 release Treasure and it is called Ivo. Although in the late '80s Cocteau Twins did find some charting success on the U.S. Modern Rock charts, mainstream popularity just wasn’t in the cards.
Recording and performing together for nearly 20 years, the band called it quits in 1997 while recording what would have been their ninth album. The band sited “irreconcilable differences” and that the material recorded for that album would likely never be released.
Relive the '80s music, movies and culture with Tampa Bay Times correspondent Steve Spears. A teen during the greatest decade ever, Steve is obsessed with everything from Duran Duran to Journey, John Hughes to John Cusack, and parachute pants to big hair.
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