Annette Haven was considered and tested, contributed dialogue and advice, but Griffith’s test was stronger; Haven’s intelligence is contrasted with the role’s need for comic energy. — Bill Simmons
Linda Hamilton reportedly declined Holly for The Terminator, prompting speculation about swapping the careers and whether Griffith could have played Sarah Connor.
Curtis reportedly declined after Griffith introduced her; Fisher and Tatum O’Neal are less certain possibilities. Fisher’s cynical intelligence might fit Holly and break her Star Wars image.
Sylvia Kristel was reportedly wanted for Gloria but unavailable; discussion of her drinking problems raises doubt about the fit. — Bill Simmons
The unranked early movie-nudity roster includes Melinda Dillon, Lacey Underall in Caddyshack, the Shining bathtub woman, the Animal House women, Airplane’s faceless topless woman, Phoebe Cates, Jamie Lee Curtis, Linda Hamilton, Apollonia in Purple Rain, Joyce Heiser (ASR) in Just One of the Guys, Apollonia Corleone and Total Recall’s three-breasted woman. The Shining room number is corrected from 217 to 237. — Bill Simmons
Jason Alexander was initially cast as Weinberg but reportedly withdrew after Seinfeld’s second-season renewal. — Bill Simmons
Alexander is preferred over Pollak by one participant and rejected by two others; his Seinfeld association and squirmier screen persona are debated, with Larry David offered jokingly.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is a yes, with agreement: after four straight hits and this, he could have been believed in anything, even as governor. — Bill Simmons
A son remarked while watching that Schwarzenegger was the best bodybuilder, a big movie star and then governor. — Bill Simmons
James Cameron is a no because his peak is still Titanic; Avatar is offered only to be contrary. — Bill Simmons
1991 is an insane-asylum year with this and Silence of the Lambs, taking the title from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. — Bill Simmons
Chin-ups are raised with Cape Fear from the same year; the answer is ambiguous. — Bill Simmons
No actor has sprinted better; Cruise runs in every movie but never did it like this. — Bill Simmons
Pre-CGI sci-fi is a no, with Aliens and Star Wars ahead. — Bill Simmons
Arcades may peak here after Tron and The Last Starfighter, the last time one worked in a movie, offered with 'I guess'.
One-liners get a maybe, with The Matrix's 'I know Kung Fu' as a rival. — Van Lathan
This is Apex Mountain for summer blockbusters as an event; Speed as the first intentional summer blockbuster and Jaws as the unintentional first are debated, and T2 with Jurassic Park is the first movie onslaught of film plus prepackaged promotion. — Bill Simmons
T2 is also Apex Mountain for the Terminator franchise, since later time-travel sequels got convoluted and reboots never got back there.
The film was delayed by CGI limits and a rights dispute: Hemdale owned half and didn't want a sequel, Carolco did, and Mario Kassar paid the struggling Hemdale $5 million for the franchise before it made 520.
80s action producers seemed like arms dealers; Mario Kassar and Andrew Vajna were covered on the First Blood episode.
The shoot itself cost about $51 million inside a roughly $100 million budget because of payments to Arnold, Cameron and rights holders. — Van Lathan
A national search picked the dormant Kaiser steel mill in Fontana, California for the climax. — Van Lathan
The overacting award is definitely Hamilton, for her rant to the doctors ('You're already dead ... August 29, 1997').
Aside: Cameron and Hamilton were later married, and she got a big payout when it ended; he then fell for an actress from Titanic, blamed jokingly for partly ruining Blown Away. — Bill Simmons
Furlong's performance is an uneven basketball box score, with a few threes, turnovers and LaMelo-like flashes, occasionally delivering a great pocket pass.
Furlong gives glimpses of what could have been one of the best if the consistency held, but creatively and personally could not get out of his own way. — Van Lathan
Two years earlier Leo from Growing Pains could have played John and taken it to another level; around 1985, River Phoenix or Christian Slater. Furlong was about 13 playing 10 and does not hurt the movie. — Bill Simmons
The Arnold-is-the-good-guy reveal aged worst in that nobody remembers how huge it was; nephews are instead surprised Arnold is the villain in the first film. — Bill Simmons
The 'why do you cry' exchange is corny and would have been cut despite its later payoff. — Bill Simmons
Furlong aged during the shoot: his voice broke and a growth spurt forced reshoots, looping, and standing in a hole to keep his height below Linda Hamilton's. — Bill Simmons
Little else aged badly; the movie is called pretty flawless and the others have nothing to add. — Bill Simmons
The combination of Terminator, Beverly Hills Cop, Fletch, and the Lakers makes mid-1980s Los Angeles a defensible local summit.
Titanic is chosen as Cameron’s strict apex, though the cheap 1980s hotel sex scene gets a joking category peak. — Chris Ryan
The simple one-way naked time-travel rule is praised against later films’ increasingly elaborate mechanics, but the discussion stops short of a firm all-movie victory. — Chris Ryan
Top Gun beats this film for sunglasses, while Tech Noir may be the apex of Pico-area 1980s nightclubs. — Bill Simmons
One participant does not buy Pfeiffer as a Marine, contrasting Demi Moore in G.I. Jane and Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor; another buys it because she does not back down.
Why she has no friends or dates is answered in-film: a recent divorce from an abusive husband, and a fellow teacher as her only friend. — Bill Simmons
Why she chose the fussiest French restaurant is questioned; one reading says it reflects treating whiteness as the center of everything, another that it pushes the kids out of their comfort zone, as in The Wire.
The third dinner invitee misses the dinner and gets no leftovers while Callie does; it is noted Callie told her ahead and Raul told her he could not make it. — Shea Serrano
The hosts say Schumacher had to push for the three Breakfast Club actors, and that Emilio wanted to play Billy (called a potential disaster) before settling for Kirby. — Bill Simmons
The hosts say C. Thomas Howell (transcribed 'See Thomas Howe') auditioned for Kirby but was too young, and that Rob Lowe was only 20 when cast as Billy. — Bill Simmons
The hosts say Robert Downey Jr. was considered for Billy before Lowe won it after three auditions; one host loves Lowe as Billy and still sees Downey as Kevin as the sweet spot. — Bill Simmons
Emilio's Kirby is like his Breakfast Club character five years later, yet he had one of the better careers with Young Guns, his own films and Stakeout. — Chris Ryan
Charlie Sheen is called a bit too young and reportedly skipped his audition; one host says he could have played Alec, as he basically does in Wall Street. — Chris Ryan
The hosts say Demi Moore was cast after Schumacher saw her storm out of a John Hughes audition on the Columbia lot; she was on General Hospital, which one host watched. — Bill Simmons
The hosts say that when Moore went to rehab, moving Jenny Wright into the role of Jules was discussed. — Bill Simmons
Madonna stories are uncertain; Madonna as Jules is a good runner-up, but Moore was perfect, and Madonna may not have managed the Jeep scene, possibly Moore's best acting. — Chris Ryan
Mid-80s ensembles seem to have had about 40 actors going up for the same eight parts. — Chris Ryan
What happened to Toretto's Market? Did Jesse deserve to die? Was Brian a bad or an atrocious undercover cop? Did the franchise have a deal with Corona? Who joins Letty on the Mount Rushmore of female action heroes? What happened to Leon? What is Mia studying?
What happened to Toretto's Market once the crew was stealing hundreds of millions from Brazil by Fast Five? Who makes the roast beef and buys the tuna; maybe Danny Trejo's uncle character works it, maybe Dom let the lease expire, or the government repossessed it along with the house and the cars.
Did Jesse deserve to die? One host answers no but holds that racing Johnny Tran at Race Wars and driving away gets you shot; the other points out Jesse did not know whom he was racing until the window came down and could not back out, and that Johnny overreacted, trying to kill four people over a car instead of waiting two hours, which is why he cannot be respected despite his own speech about respect.
Was Brian O'Connor a bad undercover cop or an atrocious undercover cop? Bad rather than atrocious, since he at least taught himself to drive at a really high level in the Dodger Stadium lot.
Did they have a deal with Corona, a question raised by Craig the producer and already in the notes? No; a Ringer story by Andrew found the beer was all gratis.
The Letty Mount Rushmore of female action heroes is thrown to the show's Facebook group: Letty is a lock, then Furiosa from Fury Road, Sigourney Weaver in the second Aliens movie (an action movie if Total Recall counts) and Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2, chiseled and doing pull-ups before working out for a movie was cool; an actress may appear only once, so Atomic Blonde is out.
Linda Hamilton's character, prepared for years, still panics and falls to the floor when the Terminator shows up at the hospital, likened to the Halloween remake's forty years of preparation ending in 'you're in my house'.
What happened to Leon, who was part of the family and just did not make it? Nobody could find out, so a theory is built live: every crew member had a specific job, like a basketball team with Dom as James Harden and Vince, the muscle, as PJ Tucker, while Letty makes every other character better; Leon's only job was the scanner, waiting on the sideline during the races.
In the final chase, when Vince is caught up, Leon's is the only car that hangs back listening to the scanner instead of helping, and he goes to get Letty only because Dom's tire is blown; so he was exposed as the most dispensable, dumped from the family, and maybe reassigned to Toretto's Market cutting roast beef and reordering Coronas while the others globetrot and steal billions.
Letty is called a true female action hero and an all-timer, probably on the Mount Rushmore, a question saved for later.
Teased during what aged worst: did Jesse deserve to die, met with an instant no and a promise to mull it over.
At the party after Brian saves Dom, Mia is in her room with a textbook open, clearly studying and maybe taking notes; is she in college, in high school, doing the bookkeeping for Toretto's Market, or studying restaurant management?
Putting Jessup on the stand; Caffey calling Jessup a son of a bitch in court; whether Joe Galloway was a terrible lawyer; who should have played Joe Galloway
Putting Jessup on the stand was insane: they gamble six months and their careers on a fake-out with the two airmen whom Sam almost fails to get to court in time, a huge bluff that, like Rounders, is fun to rewatch even knowing how it ends.
Cruise's 'Don't call me son. I'm a lawyer and an officer in the United States Navy, and you're under arrest, you son of a bitch' would not really happen in court, though another notes the formality had already gone once Nicholson was screaming his own threats.
Was Joe Galloway a terrible lawyer? A prepared list argues she is good: she knows what a code red is, a quote from her advisors calls her a hell of an investigator, and she memorizes extensive biographical details.
The list continues: she believes in due process, unlike Caffey's '12 years and out in six' deals, and at the Gitmo lunch she angers Jessup into admitting off the record that he condones code reds and will take any bait, which becomes the winning strategy.
Further points: being a lawyer is client services, she is not friends with the prosecution, she has the idea to put Jessup on the stand, and she is never held in contempt; she is not a litigator in a film about litigation as performance, so she gets no credit, but he would not win without her and she motivates him.
Non-legal points in her favor: her jeans are back in style, she has great taste in bar-and-grills such as the crab shack, her hair, the business suit she wears off duty on the first night with the tower logs and Chinese food, and Malcolm X glasses worn in one scene.
The 'twice as hard as you' dynamic is called a good foil for Cruise's character and an honest picture of a woman in that workplace, making her one of the best Sorkin female characters despite the disrespect; 'I strenuously object' is bad, but she earns credit for the 'exceptional lawyer' speech that pumps Cruise up, and a host wishes Ringer colleagues gave speeches like that.
The case against her: she is blamed for Downey, having befriended Aunt Ginny without learning Downey was not in the room; the reply is that Weinberg did witness prep, Caffey was lead counsel, and the defendants never volunteered anything they were not asked, which is when Cruise freaks out.
'Strenuously object' is her scarlet letter, before she was in The Scarlet Letter, along with saying 'we're going to win'; one panelist calls it a bad performance with Demi Moore miscast.
Julia Roberts is floated as better, though she could not have been cast for the same reason as Bacon's haircut; Roberts and Cruise never made a movie together; asked to split the blame 65 to 35 between Demi Moore and Sorkin or blame 1991, the answer is that it is majority Demi Moore's fault.
In a 2017 version the character could not just be stuck in middle-management paperwork; one suggestion flips it, making Caffey a woman and Joe Galloway a man.
Jodie Foster was also up for the role, with one other name forgotten; Foster with Cruise is mocked as having no chemistry, measured against McConaughey and Foster in Contact and Helen Hunt with Nicholson in As Good as It Gets.
The Galloway question is left unsolved but seeds are planted; with Julia Roberts getting every part back then, Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2 shape is suggested as a good alternative.
