The anniversary of a horror movie classic. 1980s boys' obsession with Transformers. Some of the most pointless features from 1990s internet.
Episode 195 brings the buffet when it comes to Gen-X nostalgia.
It kicks off with a look back 45 years to the debut of the slasher movie staple Friday the 13th. Dubbed the scariest movie ever before a script was even written this classic spawned countless sequels and eventually one of horror's most enduring villains, Jason Voorhees.
We go way back in the day to a favorite of mine and countless other 1980s boys, Transformers. Robots in disguise these toys were a massive success and led to tv shows, movies, and a spot in the zeitgeist of several generations.
The internet changed the world as we know it. For all of the good that it has brought there has also been some downright pointless. This week's Top 5 will look back to some of the most useless internet features from the 1990s.
There is as always a brand new This Week In History and Time Capsule centered around the ill-fated westward journey of the Donner Party.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 02 (00:00):
Hello, world, and welcome to the In My Footsteps
podcast.
I am Christopher Setterlund,coming to you from the vacation
destination known as Cape Cod,Massachusetts, and this is
episode 195.
We're diving into the deep endof the weird and wacky world of
(00:22):
Gen X nostalgia.
We're going to kick it off witha look back 45 years at the
debut of the Friday the 13thoriginal movie and the legacy of
that franchise.
We're going to go way, way backin the day and look at some of
the toys and characters thathelped define my childhood in
the 80s, and that was theTransformers.
(00:44):
There's going to be a brand newtop five.
These are the top five...
useless early internetfeatures.
Did you have these on yourgateway computer?
And there'll be a brand newThis Week in History and Time
Capsule looking back at theill-fated Donner Party and their
attempts to move out west.
All of that is coming up rightnow on episode 195 of the In My
(01:10):
Footsteps podcast.
So what are we going to talkabout this week?
Eagle-Eyed listeners willnotice the rundown for this
episode does not match up withwhat I had said was going to be
on the show at the end of lastweek's podcast.
I was going to talk about 1985,the year in movies, number one
(01:32):
movies, what it was like to goto the movies back then.
And then this morning, on theday that I'm recording the
podcast, I had a memory pop upon my Facebook page where I said
I was going to be watching theoriginal Friday the 13th movie
to celebrate its anniversary.
So I was like, oh, wait aminute.
Is that today?
And yes, the day that I'mrecording the podcast, the
(01:54):
Friday before, May 9th, 1980,was the debut of the original
Friday the 13th.
So I decided it was too good topass up a chance to talk about
Friday the 13th, Jason Voorhees,horror movies.
So we're going to do that thisweek.
Next week I will have 1985'snumber one movies.
For those of you that werereally looking forward to it, I
(02:17):
do apologize.
I feel bad a bait and switchlike that, but this will be a
really good segment.
I can't wait.
Of course, we all know I can'tstart this episode off without
thanking my Patreon subscribers.
Lori, Mary Lou, Ashley, Kevin,Marguerite, Neglectoid, Crystal,
(02:37):
Mike.
Thank you all so much for beingmy biggest supporters, my
biggest backers.
I hope you have gone in andstarted voting on the polls for
episode 200.
For those of you that aren'taware, episode 200 is going to
be listener's choice.
All of the polls, as far aspicking what you want to hear on
that show, they're up onPatreon.
(02:59):
I'm layering them in.
They're for all members, sofree or paying members can vote
in the polls, but you do have tobe a member.
And if you want to be a payingmember, $5 a month gets you
access to bonus podcastepisodes, It gets you access to
the remastered Without a Maplivestreams.
(03:21):
And also up there on the freetier is my long-form audio
podcast.
It's about 26 minutes long,where I discuss my race from
last week that I promised Iwould talk about this week, so I
can.
The race, the Dennis Chamber 5Krace, was so much better than I
(03:42):
anticipated.
My expectations were very lowfor myself, for my time.
I thought I had a chance tobeat my time, which I wanted,
which was 35 minutes, which isnot a really fast time.
I thought I might be able tobeat that by a minute.
Little did I know I would beatthat time by six and a half
(04:02):
minutes, which meant not onlydid I surpass my expectations, I
actually beat my time from myprevious race from last year.
I beat that time by 45 seconds,and that might not sound like
much, but considering that onNew Year's Day this year, I was
the heaviest I'd ever been in mylife, and I'm in my late 40s,
(04:24):
so it's hard enough getting intoshape or back into shape when
you're in your 20s and 30s.
But when you're staring down50, it's like you've got to work
twice as hard to get half asfar.
And that leads to a lot ofdisappointment and giving up and
resigning to the fact that Iguess that's it.
That part of my life's over.
It was such a fun race.
(04:45):
It really made me feel goodabout myself to the point that
I've already signed up for asecond race, which will be less
than seven weeks now from whenthe podcast goes live.
I'm in training for that.
I'm quote-unquote serioustraining.
We'll see if that leads tofailure.
As I said, though, the LongForm Podcast is up on the free
tier on Patreon.
(05:06):
So if you go become a freemember, you can listen to the
in-depth story.
And if you need a teaser or areason to go listen to it, I'll
just say I got a unique sunburn.
I'm going to leave it at that.
So you're going to have to goand listen to the podcast to
find out what the hell kind ofcryptic comment that is.
Oh, but now it's birthday time.
(05:29):
It's anniversary time.
I get to talk about one of myfavorite movie franchises.
I couldn't pass up that chance.
So let's start the podcast offas we look back 45 years to the
original Friday the 13th.
Let's kick it off in style.
Ooh, it didn't spill.
(05:50):
That's a good sign for the restof this show.
I love horror movies.
As a kid in the 1980s, I grewup on horror movies.
You might say I saw thesehorror movies when I was too
young, but I didn't grow up andbecome a serial killer, so I
(06:14):
think everything's good.
Many were the times that Iwould walk the half mile or so
to the corner store near where Ilived.
It was a little strip mall.
There was a restaurant and pub.
There were actually twodifferent convenience stores.
And there was a video store.
I would walk to the videostore.
(06:35):
That's a very 80s, 90s thing tosay.
But I'd go and rent horrormovies when I was 10, 11, 12
years old.
It's like I don't appreciatehow different of a time it was
back then until I say thatsentence out loud.
Being 10 or 11, walking to thestore and renting R-rated horror
movies like it was no big deal.
(06:55):
I was a big fan of all theclassic franchises.
Nightmare on Elm Street,Halloween.
I was terrified by TexasChainsaw Massacre.
But honestly, for me, thefranchise, the movie, villain...
that stood out to me most wasFriday the 13th and Jason
(07:15):
Voorhees.
When it popped up in myFacebook memories about the
anniversary of the originalFriday the 13th, I had to talk
about it.
Fun fact, the original Fridaythe 13th was not the first movie
in the series that I watched,so I, like probably a lot of you
who grew up at the time or evento this day, thought that Jason
(07:39):
Voorhees was the killer fromminute one in the series, but
it's not true.
But I'm spoiling things.
Let's go back to the beginning.
The idea for the originalFriday the 13th was conceived by
producer and director Sean S.
Cunningham.
He had previously worked withhorror master Wes Craven on The
(08:00):
Last House on the Left, whichcame out in 1972.
That is a movie that if you aredisturbed by psychological
horror and such, you might notwant to watch it.
But it's also a movie I sawwhen I was probably 12, and I
turned out okay.
Cunningham was also inspired bythe runaway success of John
(08:21):
Carpenter's Halloween, whichcame out in 1978.
Cunningham set out to create asimilar low-budget slasher film
that could tap into the sameteenage market.
Interestingly, the title Fridaythe 13th came first, so he had
the title because he thought thename sounded ominous and
marketable.
(08:41):
In fact, before there was evena script written or completed,
Sean Cunningham took out an adin Variety magazine boasting
that Friday the 13th was themost terrifying film ever made,
and he hadn't even finished thescript yet.
I mean, that's a lot ofpressure.
I couldn't imagine writing abook or something and putting an
ad out when I was 10% throughthe first draft and sending an
(09:05):
ad out and saying this is thegreatest book ever.
It's like there's a lot ofpressure there.
But it did generate interestand help to secure financing.
The screenplay for Friday the13th was written by a man named
Victor Miller, and he drewinspiration from classic
whodunit mysteries and infusedthe story with elements of
teenage rebellion and campfirehorror.
(09:27):
Unlike the later films in theseries, the original Friday the
13th was more about suspense andthe iconic twist ending than a
supernatural killer.
Oh, don't get me wrong, it'svery bloody still, but it's far
different from what you wouldsee in parts 3, 4, 5, and
(09:48):
forward.
The plot outlined the bottomline for it.
It's a group of youngcounselors who are murdered one
by one while preparing a summercamp for reopening.
Cunningham cast mostly unknownactors to keep the budget low,
which was roughly $550,000.
Or about $2.1 million whenadjusted for inflation to 2025.
(10:12):
So not a big budget.
The only established name atthe time was Betsy Palmer, who
would play the film's surprisekiller, Pamela Voorhees.
Despite getting her to work onthe film, she was a former
television actress.
She has said she only acceptedthe role because she needed
money to buy a new car, andfamously dismissed the script as
(10:35):
a piece of junk.
Yes, the movie did have KevinBacon in it, but he was still
pretty unknown.
Filming for Friday the 13thtook place in the town of
Blairstown, New Jersey,primarily at the Camp Nobibosco,
which was a real Boy Scoutscamp, and it's still open to
this day.
The shoot lasted about a monthduring the summer of 1979, with
(11:00):
the tight schedule and budgetmeaning that production relied
on practical effects andcreativity rather than complex
setups.
And when you talk aboutPractical effects in the late
70s, early 80s.
The biggest name that comes tomind is Tom Savini.
He was and is a special effectswizard, known for his work on
(11:23):
Dawn of the Dead.
Savini brought grisly realismto the kills, creating
unforgettable moments like thefamed arrow through the throat
scene with Kevin Bacon.
Which, if you go back and watchit, fun fact, when the blood is
just squirting out of his neck,it wasn't supposed to be like
that, but Tom Savini was underthe bed, and he was supposed to
(11:46):
pump the blood out kind of slow,and I guess it was stuck, so he
had to blow through the hose,which caused the blood to come
spurting out.
Sorry for those of you eatinglunch.
Can you visualize bloody neckinstead of everywhere?
I'm sorry.
Also, if you haven't seen thismovie, there's obviously
spoilers all through this.
(12:06):
And it's been out for 45 years,so I don't feel like I'm
spoiling something that came outlast week.
Speaker 01 (12:12):
Friday the 13th.
You may only see it once, butthat will be enough.
Friday the 13th.
Speaker 02 (12:32):
The film follows a group of teens reopening Camp
Crystal Lake, which is a camphaunted by the memory of a boy
named Jason Voorhees who drowneddue to counselor negligence
years earlier.
In fact, the movie begins withthose counselors that Jason's
mother perceives as the onesthat allowed her son to drown.
(12:53):
It starts off with them gettingkilled.
All the counselors areintroduced and one by one they
are picked off.
You never see the killer.
So it's that classic whodunit.
Although I'm sure some of youthat have seen it, did you think
that Crazy Ralph was thekiller?
I don't know.
When I first saw it, that's whoI thought it was.
But he was too interested inpreserving the memory of the
(13:14):
murders that happened there.
But no, it is not Crazy Ralph.
It was not Jason Voorhees.
It was Jason's vengeful mother,Pamela Voorhees.
That final girl scene withAlice, who was played by
Adrienne King, and PamelaVoorhees is excellent.
The chase all through the darkcamp, and it ends with Alice
(13:36):
decapitating Mrs.
Voorhees with a machete.
Even if you've never seen theoriginal Friday the 13th, I
think you know the twist ending,the shock that comes at the end
where Alice is in the canoe,this beautiful music playing,
the scenery of the calm andstill Crystal Lake.
And the cops have arrived andshe seems to be saved.
(13:58):
And then here comes Jasonjumping out of the lake to pull
her out of the canoe.
What's interesting is thatscene wasn't going to be in the
film.
The film was going to just beover.
It was a last-minute additionsuggested by Cunningham to add
one more final scare, kind oflike the end of Carrie, but also
leave the door open for asequel.
(14:20):
And boy, were there sequels.
The movie, when it was releasedon May 9th, 1980, had lukewarm
critical reviews, with many ofthese critics dismissing it as
derivative and extremelyviolent.
But despite that, Friday the13th grossed nearly $60 million
worldwide on that budget of$550,000.
(14:41):
The $60 million is equal toabout $233 million when adjusted
for inflation to 2025.
So it was, it was a monsterhit.
The original Friday the 13thproved that there was
profitability in horror films,especially slashers.
It was perfect for teenage datenights.
(15:02):
And obviously later on in the1980s, loads of kids rented
these movies from the videostore or watched them on cable
TV, HBO, Showtime.
The film became kind of ablueprint for the countless
imitators of slasher filmsthroughout the 80s.
The formula, sex, drugs, anisolated setting, inventive
(15:25):
kills.
It also cemented the final girltrope which went on to define
horror cinema for decades.
The biggest irony of the Fridaythe 13th franchise was that
Jason Voorhees, who thecharacter that's most associated
with the series, wasn't thekiller in the original.
And that scene of him jumpingout, like I said a minute ago,
(15:46):
that was only added in at thelast minute.
There is a real chance in analternate timeline that Jason
never becomes the pop cultureicon that he did.
Oh, but he did, though.
Part 2, Jason returns as thekiller.
He takes care of Alice, who wasthe survivor of Part 1.
This is the movie where he waswearing the sack on his head
(16:08):
with an eye hole.
And he sure seemed like he wassmaller than what Jason would
be.
Like, Final Girl Ginny in Part2 beats the hell out of him a
few times.
It was Part 3, which came outin 1982, which was in 3D.
That is where Jason got theiconic hockey mask.
That solidified his place as ahorror icon.
(16:30):
To this date, there are a totalof 12 films, including the
Freddy vs.
Jason crossover from 2003 andthe 2009 reboot, which, it's not
awful, but it combines thefirst three Friday the 13th
films kind of stuffed into onemovie.
Over the course of the series,Jason Voorhees evolved from...
(16:53):
A silent, vengeful woodsman inhis flannel shirt to a nearly
indestructible supernaturalforce.
He's like Zombie Jason.
He's got tons of merchandise,comic books.
He's been in video games.
Some really good, like the morerecent PC Friday the 13th game.
(17:13):
Some terrible, like the 1980sNintendo one where he's purple
and green.
Friday the 13th was a series,one of the horror series, that
proved that horror movies couldthrive without A-list stars or
massive budgets.
Yes, it has been oftencriticized for glorifying
violence, where the MPAA, theyfamously cracked down on the
(17:37):
Friday the 13th sequels fortheir graphic content.
If you go online, you can finda lot of the outtakes from the
film series showing the uneditedkills.
With me, I'm one of those.
It's like, if you don't likeFriday the 13th, don't watch it.
If you don't want your kids towatch it, don't let them watch
it.
But it's like, don't take themaway from everyone because you
(17:57):
don't like them.
Try as they might, some ofthese holier-than-thou groups.
Friday the 13th today isregarded as a seminal film in
horror history.
45 years ago this week, itdebuted and changed horror.
Interestingly, and some of youwho are fans of the series might
know this, but there has been abattle for years between Sean
(18:20):
Cunningham and Victor Millerover the rights to Friday the
13th and Jason Voorhees.
That's a big reason why therehasn't been any sort of film.
There hasn't been a new Fridaythe 13th in now 16 years.
Then again, though, at the endin Jason X, they had him in
space, so maybe they needed sometime off to get some better
(18:41):
ideas.
Are you fans of the originalFriday the 13th or the series in
general?
Have you seen the original?
What's your favorite in theseries?
Mine is part three.
I think I've mentioned it onthis podcast before.
I'm pretty sure that was thefirst one in the series that I
watched.
I can tell you for sure on myitinerary for tonight is to
(19:04):
watch the original Friday the13th and celebrate its 45th
anniversary.
This week in history, we aregoing back 179 years to May
(19:25):
12th, 1846, and the beginning ofthe journey for the infamous
Donner Party.
In the spring of 1846, a groupof nearly 90 people, primarily
from Illinois, set out forCalifornia in search of a better
life.
Like thousands of others, theywere lured by tales of fertile
(19:46):
farmland, sunshine, andopportunity.
Among the leaders of this groupwas a man named George Donner,
who was a prosperous farmer, andalso James F.
Reed, who was a businessmanwith ambitions of finding a new
life on the West Coast.
The group followed thewell-traveled California Trail,
(20:06):
a route that wound through theGreat Plains, across the Rocky
Mountains, and into the SierraNevada Mountains.
However, in Wyoming, they madea fateful decision to take an
untested route called theHastings Cut-Off, promoted by
Lansford Hastings, theadventurer who claimed it would
shave weeks off of the journey.
(20:27):
Instead, the Cut-Off proveddisastrous.
It took the party through theunforgiving Wasatch Mountains
and across the Great Salt LakeDesert in modern-day Utah.
The terrain was rugged, waterwas scarce...
and the path was barelypassable.
That shortcut ended up addingnearly a month of grueling
(20:49):
travel and depleted the group'ssupplies and livestock.
By late 1846, the Donner Partyreached the eastern edge of the
Sierra Nevada, perilously latein the season.
A sudden early blizzard nearTruckee Lake, which is now
called Donner Lake, trapped themin the mountains under heavy
(21:09):
snow.
Unable to proceed andill-equipped for the
high-altitude winter, they builtmakeshift shelters and tried to
survive on dwindling foodsupplies.
Weeks turned into months andstarvation set in.
They slaughtered theirremaining oxen, ate dogs and
hides, boiled bones for soup,and eventually some of them
(21:33):
resorted to cannibalism.
There is a debate amonghistorians whether the people in
the Donner Party only ate thosewho had actually died, or if
they actually killed people toeat them.
In early 1847, multiple rescueparties were mounted, with the
first relief team reaching thestarving survivors in February.
(21:55):
Over the next two months,rescuers managed to bring out 45
of the original 87 members ofthe group.
The rest perished, some fromstarvation, others from exposure
and illness.
The last survivor was rescuedin April 1847, nearly a year
after the party had set out.
(22:16):
The horror of what hadtranspired in the Sierra Nevada
mountains shocked the nation.
Newspapers covered the gruesomedetails with a mixture of
sympathy and sensationalism.
It seared the Donner name intothe American psyche.
The tragedy of the Donner Partyhad several lasting effects on
(22:37):
westward migration, includingroot choices becoming more
conservative, no more randomcutoffs and shortcuts, a greater
emphasis on timing andpreparation, and governmental
and private support expanding.
The Donner Party's ordealbecame a symbol of both the
(22:58):
perils and the spirit ofAmerican expansion.
Their name is attached togeographic landmarks Donner
Lake, Donner Pass, and DonnerMemorial State Park, which is
located in Truckee, California.
They've been the subject ofliterature and pop culture,
documentaries, films, books,focusing on the psychological
(23:21):
and moral challenges of theirsurvival.
And to this day, historians andanthropologists continue to
debate the finer points.
Were all the acts ofcannibalism committed only after
death?
Could the tragedy have beenaverted with better leadership
or timing?
And was the real villainLansford Hastings with his
ill-advised shortcut?
That's all still up for debate,but one thing that can't be
(23:45):
debated is that the Donner Partystarted its journey west 179
years ago this week in history.
One thing I can tell you, youwon't have to travel very far or
eat any of your family membersto enjoy this new time capsule.
(24:07):
We're going back 48 years agoto May 12th, 1977.
What was going on in the worldof pop culture back then?
Well, let's find out.
The number one song was When INeed You by Leo Sayre.
This was off of his albumEndless Flight.
(24:28):
And the song went to number onefor only one week, this one
we're talking about.
It was also Leo Sayre's secondconsecutive number one song, as
his song You Make Me Feel LikeDancing also went to number one.
That song, You Make Me FeelLike Dancing, actually won Leo
Sayre the Grammy for Best R&BSong, which is interesting.
(24:50):
The number one movie was TheCar.
And you could get into thetheater with a ticket costing
$2.23.
This is a horror movie about ablack, unmanned, self-driving
car that goes on a murderousrampage, running down people in
a small town.
(25:10):
The film is 30% fresh on RottenTomatoes, and it got a lot of
terrible reviews.
But like I said earlier aboutFriday the 13th, if you say a
horror movie is bad, thatusually will lead to a lot of
teens wanting to go watch it.
And I think that's why The Carwent to number one.
In 2019, there was a spinoffsequel called The Car Road to
(25:34):
Revenge.
It also got terrible reviews.
The number one TV show wasactually a movie, High Plains
Drifter.
This was a western that cameout in 1973 and starred Clint
Eastwood.
It's 94% fresh on RottenTomatoes, so way more successful
(25:54):
than The Car.
It is interesting when I choosethese time capsules and I end
up finding a movie being thenumber one TV show.
It's such a rare occurrence.
But then again, I'll take itover me complaining about All in
the Family being the number oneshow again in the 70s, or Cosby
Show again in the 80s, or ERagain in the 90s, etc.
(26:18):
And if you were around backthen, May 12th, 1977, maybe you
just went to see The Car, andthen you're getting into your
car, and you realize yourstereo's crap, you need a better
stereo.
Well, if I got some deals foryou this week at Leechmere,
there's two different stereos.
(26:40):
One's got a cassette player.
One has an 8-track player.
Your choice, $79.88.
That's about $421 when adjustedfor inflation to 2025.
Or if you really want your carto scream 70s, you can get a
stereo complete with a23-channel CB radio attached to
(27:04):
it.
That's really 70s.
That one's on sale for $99.88.
And if you're curious about whycars in the 70s had CB radios,
go back and check out episode161 of the podcast where I did a
segment about passing fads ofthe 1970s.
But that wraps up this week inhistory.
(27:25):
It wraps up another timecapsule.
If you think CB radios and carswere useless, well, get ready
for some early internet featuresthat are totally useless in a
brand new top five.
Oh boy, 1990s internet filledwith magic and dial-up wonder.
(27:51):
It was such a promising newwide world that when looking
back was filled with a lot ofreally stupid things.
So what we're going to do inthis brand new top five is look
at the most useless earlyinternet features.
These are the bells andwhistles that no one needed but
everyone used back then becauseit was brand new.
(28:12):
Those of you that grew up inthe 90s, a lot of these you'll
remember.
Maybe some of them you stilluse, I doubt it, but maybe some
of them you will look back onfondly.
Others you'll be like, I don'teven remember that.
Oh, but they were real, Ipromise.
So let's boot up Netscape anddive into the new top five.
As with most of these top fivelists, they are in no particular
(28:37):
order.
And of course, I've got somehonorable mentions.
All right, are you ready forthe honorable mentions and some
laughs and head shaking?
Honorable mentions for mostuseless early internet features
include the under constructiongifs.
This was usually every websitehad a stick figure digging or a
(28:59):
caution sign and it just stayedthere forever because the page
never got finished.
Another honorable mention.
is WebRings.
It's a bunch of related siteslinked in a never-ending loop.
It's supposed to help you findyour community, but did it
really?
I don't know.
Another honorable mention wasSplash Pages, because nothing
(29:22):
says welcome to my website likean extra page that makes you
click enter before you seeanything.
And you got bonus credibilityif it had flash animation and
took forever to load.
But I guess most things tookforever to load in the late 90s.
Another honorable mention wasEmbedded MIDI Music.
(29:43):
MIDI stands for MusicalInstrument Digital Interface.
This is where the websiteswould have some kind of music
playing and you couldn't findthe tab that was playing it.
There was no mute button.
You were just stuck with weirdpiano covers of 90 songs.
And the last honorable mentionfor useless features of early
(30:06):
internet was visitor counters.
Because you just had to showoff that 12 people had come to
your page.
And I mean, come on, be real.
10 of those 12 were probablyjust you refreshing the page.
I wish I had built websitesback in the late 90s.
That would have been my way toget my visitor count up.
Just sit there on the gatewaycomputer and refresh it for
(30:29):
hours until it looks like mycontent has a large audience.
So there's the honorablementions.
Do you remember any of thosefeatures from the internet back
when you first started?
It's like, cut us some slack.
It was all brand new andexciting.
Let's get into the actual topfive.
We're going to start it offwith number one, guest books.
(30:52):
Boy, this was like the originalcomment section under any video
on YouTube or blog.
You'd want people to come toyour site and tell you where
they were from or, I don't know,heap praise on you.
Wow, your website's amazing.
I can't believe you had theflying toasters with the wings
and the dancing baby.
(31:13):
But usually it would end upbeing either People giving you
praise and linking to their sitethat was probably equally as
terrible.
Or it would be like how it istoday.
Lots of spam and bots whereyou'd click on the comment.
Ooh, where's this person from?
And it's instant blue screenfor your computer.
Trojan virus everywhere.
(31:34):
I get that in the years beforesocial media was a thing, people
were looking to connect throughthe web.
The guestbook just didn't work.
It probably was filled withcobwebs after a few months.
Number two is mouse trailingeffects.
This is one of those thatseemed cool and interesting for
(31:57):
about five seconds.
This was where you could set upeffects so that when you were
moving your mouse, your cursor,so the little white arrow on the
screen or whatever, it wouldleave trails of stars or
sparkles that would follow themouse around.
I never was into anything likethis.
It sounds like it would besomething that teenage girls
(32:18):
would have used in the late 90s.
Or it might have been somethingthat teenage boys would have
put on the computer if youshared it with the rest of the
family.
So then if your parents werescrolling a news site or
something, there was justsnowflakes or glitter following
the mouse around so they'd getfrustrated and not know what to
do about it.
If you're someone who's longingfor the days of having things
(32:41):
follow your mouse around thescreen, or if you're younger,
wondering what in the world I'mtalking about, I found a website
called Tholman.com,T-H-O-L-M-A-N.
And they have a series of thesecursor effects that as you
mouse down the page, it willshow you.
It's got rainbows, clocks,fairy dust, all that.
(33:04):
I'll link to it in thedescription of the podcast if
you really want to check thatout.
It'll be just like it was inthe 90s.
Five seconds of fun and thenjust like, what am I thinking?
Number three is floating orscrolling text marquees.
These were kind of like digitalbumper stickers, scroll across
(33:26):
the screen messages that weresupposed to look futuristic.
These were things, they weresuper annoying.
Typically these HTML scrollswould have some kind of breaking
news maybe, not like a newsticker at the bottom of any news
network or ESPN, but justpointless stuff.
I'm no web designer.
(33:46):
I know a little bit about HTML,which is why if you ever visit
my blog, I'm pretty good atembedding things, especially
links to the podcast in there.
So I could see where creatingthese scrolling text marquees
would be something that when youlearned it in the mid to late
90s, you'd want to put iteverywhere.
but it didn't really make thepages stand out.
(34:08):
It just made it look like acontinually flowing ransom note
made by someone who justdiscovered HTML and caffeine.
Number four is Frames.
This allowed for the divisionof the browser window into
multiple sections.
It was created by NetscapeNavigator in the early 90s.
(34:31):
It was usually centered aroundnavigation with the menu in one
frame and then the rest of thepage in another frame.
But there was a huge problembecause they would never be
sized right.
They would break thebookmarking and would confuse
everyone that got to the page.
A lot of those frames onamateur-created websites, they
(34:53):
looked more like scrapbooks orphoto albums on a computer
screen.
And finally, number five on thelist of useless early internet
features is flash introanimations.
This is where you'd go to awebsite you wanted to visit and
you'd be accosted by a 30 secondanimation video with swooshing
(35:17):
text and swooshing sounds andswooshing everywhere.
It's like you just wanted to goto some store website and check
their hours, but nope, you'vegot to sit through this weirdly
put together video trailer forthe store that doesn't include
anything about the store.
It was kind of like movietrailers before YouTube, except
(35:38):
you couldn't skip them.
You just had to deal with it.
How badly do you want the infothat you want?
I would typically disable AdobeFlash so I wouldn't have to see
these things.
They wouldn't start.
But then that would impact likeevery other website I went to
where they'd say you need tohave Flash running.
So then I'd have to start itagain and I'd get suckered into
(36:00):
these videos.
But there you have it.
useless internet features fromback in the day, back in the
90s.
Are you guilty of using any ofthese on any page you made?
Which one annoyed you the most?
I mean, I have to go to theAdobe Flash intros because
that's the only one that made mechange my computer settings
(36:21):
just to get rid of it.
It makes me wish, though, thaton my homepage,
ChristopherSetterlin.com, I wishI had installed a guest book or
a visitor counter.
Because I've had that sitesince 2008.
Maybe I'd be up to a fewhundred signatures and visitors.
I don't know.
I think it would be hard for meto overstate how big of a part
(36:52):
of my childhood Transformerswere.
It's like getting one of theTransformers toys was the reward
for everything good I did.
Good report card, get yourselfa Transformer, hit the
game-winning home run in LittleLeague, get a Transformer.
But then it was also the way tosoothe me after bad things.
(37:16):
I got stabbed in the eye oncewith a pencil by my sister,
Lindsay.
She was a baby.
This was not on purpose.
She always feels bad when Ibring it up.
There are so many pictures ofme with this eye patch.
It didn't blind me, so I don'twant to make it sound like it
was so malicious.
I do remember the picture Ihave of me with my eye patch.
(37:39):
I was probably nine years old,and I'm holding my snarl patch.
Transformer Dinobot, he was theStegosaurus.
This is one of those topics,you remember a few weeks ago on
the show I talked aboutGarfield, and how big Garfield
was in my childhood, and how Iwas shocked that I got this far
into the podcast without talkingabout Garfield.
(38:00):
It's the same for Transformers.
Boys who grew up in the 1980shad no shortage of amazing toys,
action figures...
Besides Transformers, there wasG.I.
Joe, there was He-Man, therewas all the LJN WWF wrestling
figures.
I can only speak for me,though, because Transformers
(38:22):
were head and shoulders aboveeverything.
I loved the WWF action figuresjust as much, but Transformers
was everything.
I would always play with them.
As much as they're associatedwith growing up in the United
States in the 1980s, at leastfor young boys...
Transformers began in Japan.
It was a combination of twoJapanese toy lines, Diaclone and
(38:46):
Microchange, both produced bythe Japanese company Takara, now
Takara Tomy.
These toys were exactly whatTransformers are.
Robots that could transforminto vehicles, weapons, everyday
objects.
That immediately is what makesTransformers stand out.
It's like you're getting twotoys in one.
(39:07):
In 1983, American toy companyHasbro was looking for new
properties to bring to Westernaudiences.
They discovered Takara'stransforming robots at the Tokyo
Toy Fair.
Hasbro licensed the toy molds,rebranded them, and launched the
Transformers toy line in theUnited States in 1984.
(39:29):
In order to create a coherentbackstory and market the toys
more effectively...
Hasbro enlisted the help ofMarvel Comics to develop names,
personalities, and a narrativeuniverse, much like they had
done recently with G.I.
Joe.
So you combine the storytellingability of Marvel Comics with
(39:52):
these transforming robots, twotoys in one, it's a runaway,
it's a juggernaut of success.
It wasn't just the toy line,though.
Transformers also in 1984debuted as an animated
television series.
This is probably where I firstwas acquainted with
(40:29):
Transformers, the battle betweenthe noble Autobots led by the
heroic Optimus Prime, who was asemi-truck 18-wheeler, and the
evil Decepticons, who were underthe command of the ruthless
Megatron, who was a jet.
The show's sci-fi action wascomplemented by the memorable
(40:50):
voice acting.
Peter Cullen was the man whowas the voice of Optimus Prime,
Frank Welker was the voice ofMegatron.
Peter Cullen has been the voiceof Optimus Prime basically from
the start.
He's the voice of Optimus Primein all the movies that have
been out recently.
And Frank Welker, he's one ofthe most prolific and profitable
(41:12):
voice actors ever.
As someone who's thinking aboutdoing some voice acting or
voiceover work in the nearfuture, I'd kill to have 1% of
the financial success that FrankWelker had.
The Transformers animatedseries was on from 1984 to 1987
with 98 total episodes.
(41:33):
There was also an accompanyingMarvel comic book series that
was also launched in 1984 thatwas initially planned as a
four-issue limited run.
And it became so popular thatit ran for 80 issues continuing
until 1991.
Seriously, Transformers was acash cow for Hasbro.
(41:54):
I never read the comic books,but I don't think I was missing
much considering that I watchedall the TV shows.
I watched the animated moviefrom 1986.
It was meant to be the bridgebetween season two and three of
the television show set in thefar off time of 2005.
That'll never be a year.
(42:15):
But that was the one thatscarred a lot of us kids in the
80s where they killed offOptimus Prime in the first act.
That's something you wouldnever see in animated shows.
A main character being killed.
Just think about that if youwould watch the Flintstones in
the 60s and Fred Flintstone washit in a car accident.
(42:35):
Or if they killed Bart Simpsonor Peter Griffin on Family Guy.
I mean, they did kill Kenny onSouth Park hundreds of times,
but that's the exception, notthe rule.
The reasoning behind killingoff Optimus Prime was actually
designed to introduce a new lineof toys.
And it's also known for havingOrson Welles in his final film
(42:59):
role voicing Unicron, who was aTransformer so big he could
transform into a planet.
I just remember that afterOptimus Prime was killed, they
brought in this Rodimus Primethat's not supposed to be
related to him, but it was, tome as a kid at the time, it was
like replacing Bo and Luke Dukeon the Dukes of Hazzard with
(43:21):
their cousins Koi and Vance.
That's a very 80s referencethere.
Transformers toys were some ofthe best-selling toys of the
1980s.
I had so many of them.
Autobots, Decepticons,Dinobots.
I love the Dinobots.
I was a big fan of dinosaurs,so dinosaur robots, you couldn't
(43:44):
go wrong with that.
Grimlock, the T-Rex leader.
Like I said, I had Snarl, theStegosaurus after my sister
gouged my eye out with a pencil.
Fun fact, I actually had my eyewrecked twice, including a few
years later, so my sisterstabbed me with a pencil, and
then it was almost like shedidn't finish the job, so she
(44:07):
threw a Godzilla toy at me a fewyears later.
At least I think it was thesame sister.
I don't know.
This is what Transformersbrings up.
It was the first thing Ithought of when I was putting
this segment together, was thepicture of me with my eye patch
with my Dinobot there.
And just the story behind howwe got to that point.
Anyway, enough attempted murderfrom family members.
(44:29):
By the early 90s, interest inTransformers started to wane.
Hasbro retired the originalGeneration 1 line.
They attempted several reboots,including Generation 2 in 1993,
Beast Wars Transformers in1996.
The Generation 2 Transformerssold well, but it was the Beast
(44:53):
Wars ones.
They were entirely newcharacters that transformed
robots into animals instead ofvehicles.
The Beast Wars Transformerswere the ones that introduced
computer-generated animation,complex storytelling.
This appealed to older fans aswell as a new generation of
kids.
And this period of the late 90slaid the groundwork for the
(45:16):
Transformers franchise long-termviability that could reinvent
itself while honoring its roots.
By the early 90s, my tastes hadchanged.
I was no longer collectingaction figures.
I was into the grunge culture.
So I never got into the BeastWars Transformers.
(45:37):
But as I've said numerous timeson this show, nostalgia is very
powerful.
And so when the Transformersmovie came out in 2007, I was in
line at the theater to get tosee it.
This was a live-action filmwith CGI Transformers produced
by Steven Spielberg, directed byMichael Bay.
(46:00):
It was a way to reintroduceOptimus Prime, Bumblebee,
Megatron, It had explosiveaction sequences.
It was critically mixed, but Icouldn't have cared less what
critics thought.
It was a big-budget movie basedon the Transformers that
influenced my childhood so much,so I couldn't have cared less.
(46:22):
The only way they could havegotten me to not go see
Transformers is if they said thetheater blew up at the end of
the movie, and even then I mighttry to go and escape before it
happened.
The movie ended up making about$130 million at the box office,
which unfortunately, becausethe budget was so high for this
movie, it actually lost money.
(46:44):
In total, there have been sevenmovies in the Transformers
universe franchise, with thenewest one being 2023's Rise of
the Beasts.
The franchise in general hasmade more than $5.3 billion at
the box office, making it a hugesuccess despite the original
(47:04):
film being kind of a little bitof a money loser.
It's incredible to think, forme as a child of the 80s, that
there are so many kids today,the same age that I was back
then, that have no idea aboutthe original figures, the
original animated show.
but yet they're still giganticTransformers fans based just on
(47:27):
the movies.
To this day, Transformerscontinues to thrive with toys,
with Hasbro still producingthem.
There are still cartoons, stillcomics.
There are extensive fancommunities, conventions.
At its core, Transformers isabout identity, transformation,
(47:47):
literally with the robotstransforming to different things
and metaphorically.
and the eternal conflictbetween good and evil, Autobots,
Decepticons.
Think about all the generationsnow that can say they grew up
on Transformers.
I'm a Gen Xer that grew up withthe first generation of
Transformers and Optimus Prime.
(48:08):
Millennial kids grew up withthe Beast Wars.
Gen Z has the live-actionmovies.
There's even Generation Alphakids today that are discovering
the Earthspark animated shows.
There's literally a version ofTransformers for four different
generations.
And it all started with theserepurposed Japanese robot toys
(48:32):
in the early to mid-1980s.
For me, I still associateTransformers with my childhood
in the 80s.
Like I said, rewards for goodthings in my life or things to
soothe me after bad things in mylife.
Or just getting them on randomdays.
Going shopping on a Sunday withmy Nina and going to visit my
(48:54):
grandpa at his donut shop andthen going to tons of toys or
Child World and picking out myfavorite Transformer to bring
home to fight the rest of thecrew I had.
Or maybe wrestle some of my LJNWWF figures.
After...
Over 40 years, though, onething is clear.
Transformers are not justrobots in disguise.
(49:15):
They're cultural icons that arehere to stay.
But until next week, I'm goingto transform this podcast from
in progress to done.
So that wraps up episode 195.
We're getting closer and closerto episode 200.
If you haven't yet, Go toPatreon.
(49:38):
All you got to do is become afree member.
Vote in the polls for episode200.
Listener's choice.
People on Patreon are going toget to vote for everything
that's on the show.
Except for me.
I'm still the host.
You can't put in a vote for meto have my buddy Steve host the
show instead.
Although that would be prettyfunny.
Guest host.
(49:59):
That's when you know I've runout of content.
When I start having otherpeople host the show.
That's like in the...
80s when Johnny Carson wasgetting ready to leave the
Tonight Show and he would haveguest hosts on there like Joan
Rivers all the time.
I am not Johnny Carson though,although my hair is getting kind
of as white as his was.
Not close, but it'll be theresoon enough.
(50:22):
Thank you all for tuning intothe show, for making it this
far.
I hope I satisfied your cravingfor Gen X nostalgia.
We'll do it all again next weekwith episode 196.
That will be where we will talkabout 1985 in movies, all the
number one films, and some aboutwhat it was like to go to the
(50:45):
movies in 1985.
We'll also be talking aboutwhat was considered cutting-edge
technology in the 1970s.
Back in episode 179, I did asegment on cutting edge tech
from the 1960s.
So if you want to go check thatout, that'll give you an idea
of what's coming next week.
I hope all of you moms wholisten had a great Mother's Day.
(51:09):
By the time this episode goeslive, I will know if my mother
liked the Mother's Day gift Igot her, which was a butterfly
bush for her yard.
I'm figuring she liked it, butwho knows?
Maybe next week on the show,I'll be telling you that she dug
it up and threw it in the trashas soon as I left.
If you enjoy my content, if youenjoy what I do and want to
(51:32):
support me, like I said, you canbecome a member on Patreon for
$5 a month.
You can always buy me a coffee.
Those are as little as adollar, which won't buy me a
coffee, but it's the thoughtthat counts.
But the best way, if spendingmoney is not feasible, the best
way you can support me or anycontent creator is sharing our
(51:54):
work, spreading the word.
In a time where there's optionoverload with everything, it
means a lot when people sharethe work of creators because
it's a lot of work.
It's hard work.
I love doing all of this,podcasting, creating the videos
for YouTube, blogging, and allmy writing.
(52:15):
It's all fun, but it takestime, especially with a
full-time day job.
I spend, you know,conservatively somewhere around
15 hours, usually more, per weekdoing work on my content.
It's just me.
I don't have any team.
I haven't hired an intern tocome in and do work for me.
I think I enjoy being incontrol of my stuff too much to
(52:39):
give it to someone else andtrust them.
Like, edit this podcast and doit right.
I wouldn't trust they could doit.
Happy birthday this week to myUncle John.
The only one who knows moreabout family history than me is
my Uncle John.
And I never expected to be afamily historian.
That was kind of just gifted tome.
So I hope you have the bestbirthday possible.
(53:01):
Hopefully this podcast madeyour birthday a little more fun.
And before I overstay mywelcome with this podcast going
too long this week, I will wrapup by saying, remember, in this
life, don't walk in anyoneelse's footsteps.
Create your own path and enjoyevery moment you can on this
journey we call life because younever know what tomorrow
(53:24):
brings.
Thank you all again for tuningin to episode 195.
This has been the In MyFootsteps podcast.
I am Christopher Setterlund.
You already knew that.
And I'll talk to you all againsoon.
Hello, world, and welcome to the In My Footsteps
podcast.
I am Christopher Setterlund,coming to you from the vacation
destination known as Cape Cod,Massachusetts, and this is
episode 195.
We're diving into the deep endof the weird and wacky world of
(00:22):
Gen X nostalgia.
We're going to kick it off witha look back 45 years at the
debut of the Friday the 13thoriginal movie and the legacy of
that franchise.
We're going to go way, way backin the day and look at some of
the toys and characters thathelped define my childhood in
the 80s, and that was theTransformers.
(00:44):
There's going to be a brand newtop five.
These are the top five...
useless early internetfeatures.
Did you have these on yourgateway computer?
And there'll be a brand newThis Week in History and Time
Capsule looking back at theill-fated Donner Party and their
attempts to move out west.
All of that is coming up rightnow on episode 195 of the In My
(01:10):
Footsteps podcast.
So what are we going to talkabout this week?
Eagle-Eyed listeners willnotice the rundown for this
episode does not match up withwhat I had said was going to be
on the show at the end of lastweek's podcast.
I was going to talk about 1985,the year in movies, number one
(01:32):
movies, what it was like to goto the movies back then.
And then this morning, on theday that I'm recording the
podcast, I had a memory pop upon my Facebook page where I said
I was going to be watching theoriginal Friday the 13th movie
to celebrate its anniversary.
So I was like, oh, wait aminute.
Is that today?
And yes, the day that I'mrecording the podcast, the
(01:54):
Friday before, May 9th, 1980,was the debut of the original
Friday the 13th.
So I decided it was too good topass up a chance to talk about
Friday the 13th, Jason Voorhees,horror movies.
So we're going to do that thisweek.
Next week I will have 1985'snumber one movies.
For those of you that werereally looking forward to it, I
(02:17):
do apologize.
I feel bad a bait and switchlike that, but this will be a
really good segment.
I can't wait.
Of course, we all know I can'tstart this episode off without
thanking my Patreon subscribers.
Lori, Mary Lou, Ashley, Kevin,Marguerite, Neglectoid, Crystal,
(02:37):
Mike.
Thank you all so much for beingmy biggest supporters, my
biggest backers.
I hope you have gone in andstarted voting on the polls for
episode 200.
For those of you that aren'taware, episode 200 is going to
be listener's choice.
All of the polls, as far aspicking what you want to hear on
that show, they're up onPatreon.
(02:59):
I'm layering them in.
They're for all members, sofree or paying members can vote
in the polls, but you do have tobe a member.
And if you want to be a payingmember, $5 a month gets you
access to bonus podcastepisodes, It gets you access to
the remastered Without a Maplivestreams.
(03:21):
And also up there on the freetier is my long-form audio
podcast.
It's about 26 minutes long,where I discuss my race from
last week that I promised Iwould talk about this week, so I
can.
The race, the Dennis Chamber 5Krace, was so much better than I
(03:42):
anticipated.
My expectations were very lowfor myself, for my time.
I thought I had a chance tobeat my time, which I wanted,
which was 35 minutes, which isnot a really fast time.
I thought I might be able tobeat that by a minute.
Little did I know I would beatthat time by six and a half
(04:02):
minutes, which meant not onlydid I surpass my expectations, I
actually beat my time from myprevious race from last year.
I beat that time by 45 seconds,and that might not sound like
much, but considering that onNew Year's Day this year, I was
the heaviest I'd ever been in mylife, and I'm in my late 40s,
(04:24):
so it's hard enough getting intoshape or back into shape when
you're in your 20s and 30s.
But when you're staring down50, it's like you've got to work
twice as hard to get half asfar.
And that leads to a lot ofdisappointment and giving up and
resigning to the fact that Iguess that's it.
That part of my life's over.
It was such a fun race.
(04:45):
It really made me feel goodabout myself to the point that
I've already signed up for asecond race, which will be less
than seven weeks now from whenthe podcast goes live.
I'm in training for that.
I'm quote-unquote serioustraining.
We'll see if that leads tofailure.
As I said, though, the LongForm Podcast is up on the free
tier on Patreon.
(05:06):
So if you go become a freemember, you can listen to the
in-depth story.
And if you need a teaser or areason to go listen to it, I'll
just say I got a unique sunburn.
I'm going to leave it at that.
So you're going to have to goand listen to the podcast to
find out what the hell kind ofcryptic comment that is.
Oh, but now it's birthday time.
(05:29):
It's anniversary time.
I get to talk about one of myfavorite movie franchises.
I couldn't pass up that chance.
So let's start the podcast offas we look back 45 years to the
original Friday the 13th.
Let's kick it off in style.
Ooh, it didn't spill.
(05:50):
That's a good sign for the restof this show.
I love horror movies.
As a kid in the 1980s, I grewup on horror movies.
You might say I saw thesehorror movies when I was too
young, but I didn't grow up andbecome a serial killer, so I
(06:14):
think everything's good.
Many were the times that Iwould walk the half mile or so
to the corner store near where Ilived.
It was a little strip mall.
There was a restaurant and pub.
There were actually twodifferent convenience stores.
And there was a video store.
I would walk to the videostore.
(06:35):
That's a very 80s, 90s thing tosay.
But I'd go and rent horrormovies when I was 10, 11, 12
years old.
It's like I don't appreciatehow different of a time it was
back then until I say thatsentence out loud.
Being 10 or 11, walking to thestore and renting R-rated horror
movies like it was no big deal.
(06:55):
I was a big fan of all theclassic franchises.
Nightmare on Elm Street,Halloween.
I was terrified by TexasChainsaw Massacre.
But honestly, for me, thefranchise, the movie, villain...
that stood out to me most wasFriday the 13th and Jason
(07:15):
Voorhees.
When it popped up in myFacebook memories about the
anniversary of the originalFriday the 13th, I had to talk
about it.
Fun fact, the original Fridaythe 13th was not the first movie
in the series that I watched,so I, like probably a lot of you
who grew up at the time or evento this day, thought that Jason
(07:39):
Voorhees was the killer fromminute one in the series, but
it's not true.
But I'm spoiling things.
Let's go back to the beginning.
The idea for the originalFriday the 13th was conceived by
producer and director Sean S.
Cunningham.
He had previously worked withhorror master Wes Craven on The
(08:00):
Last House on the Left, whichcame out in 1972.
That is a movie that if you aredisturbed by psychological
horror and such, you might notwant to watch it.
But it's also a movie I sawwhen I was probably 12, and I
turned out okay.
Cunningham was also inspired bythe runaway success of John
(08:21):
Carpenter's Halloween, whichcame out in 1978.
Cunningham set out to create asimilar low-budget slasher film
that could tap into the sameteenage market.
Interestingly, the title Fridaythe 13th came first, so he had
the title because he thought thename sounded ominous and
marketable.
(08:41):
In fact, before there was evena script written or completed,
Sean Cunningham took out an adin Variety magazine boasting
that Friday the 13th was themost terrifying film ever made,
and he hadn't even finished thescript yet.
I mean, that's a lot ofpressure.
I couldn't imagine writing abook or something and putting an
ad out when I was 10% throughthe first draft and sending an
(09:05):
ad out and saying this is thegreatest book ever.
It's like there's a lot ofpressure there.
But it did generate interestand help to secure financing.
The screenplay for Friday the13th was written by a man named
Victor Miller, and he drewinspiration from classic
whodunit mysteries and infusedthe story with elements of
teenage rebellion and campfirehorror.
(09:27):
Unlike the later films in theseries, the original Friday the
13th was more about suspense andthe iconic twist ending than a
supernatural killer.
Oh, don't get me wrong, it'svery bloody still, but it's far
different from what you wouldsee in parts 3, 4, 5, and
(09:48):
forward.
The plot outlined the bottomline for it.
It's a group of youngcounselors who are murdered one
by one while preparing a summercamp for reopening.
Cunningham cast mostly unknownactors to keep the budget low,
which was roughly $550,000.
Or about $2.1 million whenadjusted for inflation to 2025.
(10:12):
So not a big budget.
The only established name atthe time was Betsy Palmer, who
would play the film's surprisekiller, Pamela Voorhees.
Despite getting her to work onthe film, she was a former
television actress.
She has said she only acceptedthe role because she needed
money to buy a new car, andfamously dismissed the script as
(10:35):
a piece of junk.
Yes, the movie did have KevinBacon in it, but he was still
pretty unknown.
Filming for Friday the 13thtook place in the town of
Blairstown, New Jersey,primarily at the Camp Nobibosco,
which was a real Boy Scoutscamp, and it's still open to
this day.
The shoot lasted about a monthduring the summer of 1979, with
(11:00):
the tight schedule and budgetmeaning that production relied
on practical effects andcreativity rather than complex
setups.
And when you talk aboutPractical effects in the late
70s, early 80s.
The biggest name that comes tomind is Tom Savini.
He was and is a special effectswizard, known for his work on
(11:23):
Dawn of the Dead.
Savini brought grisly realismto the kills, creating
unforgettable moments like thefamed arrow through the throat
scene with Kevin Bacon.
Which, if you go back and watchit, fun fact, when the blood is
just squirting out of his neck,it wasn't supposed to be like
that, but Tom Savini was underthe bed, and he was supposed to
(11:46):
pump the blood out kind of slow,and I guess it was stuck, so he
had to blow through the hose,which caused the blood to come
spurting out.
Sorry for those of you eatinglunch.
Can you visualize bloody neckinstead of everywhere?
I'm sorry.
Also, if you haven't seen thismovie, there's obviously
spoilers all through this.
(12:06):
And it's been out for 45 years,so I don't feel like I'm
spoiling something that came outlast week.
Speaker 01 (12:12):
Friday the 13th.
You may only see it once, butthat will be enough.
Friday the 13th.
Speaker 02 (12:32):
The film follows a group of teens reopening Camp
Crystal Lake, which is a camphaunted by the memory of a boy
named Jason Voorhees who drowneddue to counselor negligence
years earlier.
In fact, the movie begins withthose counselors that Jason's
mother perceives as the onesthat allowed her son to drown.
(12:53):
It starts off with them gettingkilled.
All the counselors areintroduced and one by one they
are picked off.
You never see the killer.
So it's that classic whodunit.
Although I'm sure some of youthat have seen it, did you think
that Crazy Ralph was thekiller?
I don't know.
When I first saw it, that's whoI thought it was.
But he was too interested inpreserving the memory of the
(13:14):
murders that happened there.
But no, it is not Crazy Ralph.
It was not Jason Voorhees.
It was Jason's vengeful mother,Pamela Voorhees.
That final girl scene withAlice, who was played by
Adrienne King, and PamelaVoorhees is excellent.
The chase all through the darkcamp, and it ends with Alice
(13:36):
decapitating Mrs.
Voorhees with a machete.
Even if you've never seen theoriginal Friday the 13th, I
think you know the twist ending,the shock that comes at the end
where Alice is in the canoe,this beautiful music playing,
the scenery of the calm andstill Crystal Lake.
And the cops have arrived andshe seems to be saved.
(13:58):
And then here comes Jasonjumping out of the lake to pull
her out of the canoe.
What's interesting is thatscene wasn't going to be in the
film.
The film was going to just beover.
It was a last-minute additionsuggested by Cunningham to add
one more final scare, kind oflike the end of Carrie, but also
leave the door open for asequel.
(14:20):
And boy, were there sequels.
The movie, when it was releasedon May 9th, 1980, had lukewarm
critical reviews, with many ofthese critics dismissing it as
derivative and extremelyviolent.
But despite that, Friday the13th grossed nearly $60 million
worldwide on that budget of$550,000.
(14:41):
The $60 million is equal toabout $233 million when adjusted
for inflation to 2025.
So it was, it was a monsterhit.
The original Friday the 13thproved that there was
profitability in horror films,especially slashers.
It was perfect for teenage datenights.
(15:02):
And obviously later on in the1980s, loads of kids rented
these movies from the videostore or watched them on cable
TV, HBO, Showtime.
The film became kind of ablueprint for the countless
imitators of slasher filmsthroughout the 80s.
The formula, sex, drugs, anisolated setting, inventive
(15:25):
kills.
It also cemented the final girltrope which went on to define
horror cinema for decades.
The biggest irony of the Fridaythe 13th franchise was that
Jason Voorhees, who thecharacter that's most associated
with the series, wasn't thekiller in the original.
And that scene of him jumpingout, like I said a minute ago,
(15:46):
that was only added in at thelast minute.
There is a real chance in analternate timeline that Jason
never becomes the pop cultureicon that he did.
Oh, but he did, though.
Part 2, Jason returns as thekiller.
He takes care of Alice, who wasthe survivor of Part 1.
This is the movie where he waswearing the sack on his head
(16:08):
with an eye hole.
And he sure seemed like he wassmaller than what Jason would
be.
Like, Final Girl Ginny in Part2 beats the hell out of him a
few times.
It was Part 3, which came outin 1982, which was in 3D.
That is where Jason got theiconic hockey mask.
That solidified his place as ahorror icon.
(16:30):
To this date, there are a totalof 12 films, including the
Freddy vs.
Jason crossover from 2003 andthe 2009 reboot, which, it's not
awful, but it combines thefirst three Friday the 13th
films kind of stuffed into onemovie.
Over the course of the series,Jason Voorhees evolved from...
(16:53):
A silent, vengeful woodsman inhis flannel shirt to a nearly
indestructible supernaturalforce.
He's like Zombie Jason.
He's got tons of merchandise,comic books.
He's been in video games.
Some really good, like the morerecent PC Friday the 13th game.
(17:13):
Some terrible, like the 1980sNintendo one where he's purple
and green.
Friday the 13th was a series,one of the horror series, that
proved that horror movies couldthrive without A-list stars or
massive budgets.
Yes, it has been oftencriticized for glorifying
violence, where the MPAA, theyfamously cracked down on the
(17:37):
Friday the 13th sequels fortheir graphic content.
If you go online, you can finda lot of the outtakes from the
film series showing the uneditedkills.
With me, I'm one of those.
It's like, if you don't likeFriday the 13th, don't watch it.
If you don't want your kids towatch it, don't let them watch
it.
But it's like, don't take themaway from everyone because you
(17:57):
don't like them.
Try as they might, some ofthese holier-than-thou groups.
Friday the 13th today isregarded as a seminal film in
horror history.
45 years ago this week, itdebuted and changed horror.
Interestingly, and some of youwho are fans of the series might
know this, but there has been abattle for years between Sean
(18:20):
Cunningham and Victor Millerover the rights to Friday the
13th and Jason Voorhees.
That's a big reason why therehasn't been any sort of film.
There hasn't been a new Fridaythe 13th in now 16 years.
Then again, though, at the endin Jason X, they had him in
space, so maybe they needed sometime off to get some better
(18:41):
ideas.
Are you fans of the originalFriday the 13th or the series in
general?
Have you seen the original?
What's your favorite in theseries?
Mine is part three.
I think I've mentioned it onthis podcast before.
I'm pretty sure that was thefirst one in the series that I
watched.
I can tell you for sure on myitinerary for tonight is to
(19:04):
watch the original Friday the13th and celebrate its 45th
anniversary.
This week in history, we aregoing back 179 years to May
(19:25):
12th, 1846, and the beginning ofthe journey for the infamous
Donner Party.
In the spring of 1846, a groupof nearly 90 people, primarily
from Illinois, set out forCalifornia in search of a better
life.
Like thousands of others, theywere lured by tales of fertile
(19:46):
farmland, sunshine, andopportunity.
Among the leaders of this groupwas a man named George Donner,
who was a prosperous farmer, andalso James F.
Reed, who was a businessmanwith ambitions of finding a new
life on the West Coast.
The group followed thewell-traveled California Trail,
(20:06):
a route that wound through theGreat Plains, across the Rocky
Mountains, and into the SierraNevada Mountains.
However, in Wyoming, they madea fateful decision to take an
untested route called theHastings Cut-Off, promoted by
Lansford Hastings, theadventurer who claimed it would
shave weeks off of the journey.
(20:27):
Instead, the Cut-Off proveddisastrous.
It took the party through theunforgiving Wasatch Mountains
and across the Great Salt LakeDesert in modern-day Utah.
The terrain was rugged, waterwas scarce...
and the path was barelypassable.
That shortcut ended up addingnearly a month of grueling
(20:49):
travel and depleted the group'ssupplies and livestock.
By late 1846, the Donner Partyreached the eastern edge of the
Sierra Nevada, perilously latein the season.
A sudden early blizzard nearTruckee Lake, which is now
called Donner Lake, trapped themin the mountains under heavy
(21:09):
snow.
Unable to proceed andill-equipped for the
high-altitude winter, they builtmakeshift shelters and tried to
survive on dwindling foodsupplies.
Weeks turned into months andstarvation set in.
They slaughtered theirremaining oxen, ate dogs and
hides, boiled bones for soup,and eventually some of them
(21:33):
resorted to cannibalism.
There is a debate amonghistorians whether the people in
the Donner Party only ate thosewho had actually died, or if
they actually killed people toeat them.
In early 1847, multiple rescueparties were mounted, with the
first relief team reaching thestarving survivors in February.
(21:55):
Over the next two months,rescuers managed to bring out 45
of the original 87 members ofthe group.
The rest perished, some fromstarvation, others from exposure
and illness.
The last survivor was rescuedin April 1847, nearly a year
after the party had set out.
(22:16):
The horror of what hadtranspired in the Sierra Nevada
mountains shocked the nation.
Newspapers covered the gruesomedetails with a mixture of
sympathy and sensationalism.
It seared the Donner name intothe American psyche.
The tragedy of the Donner Partyhad several lasting effects on
(22:37):
westward migration, includingroot choices becoming more
conservative, no more randomcutoffs and shortcuts, a greater
emphasis on timing andpreparation, and governmental
and private support expanding.
The Donner Party's ordealbecame a symbol of both the
(22:58):
perils and the spirit ofAmerican expansion.
Their name is attached togeographic landmarks Donner
Lake, Donner Pass, and DonnerMemorial State Park, which is
located in Truckee, California.
They've been the subject ofliterature and pop culture,
documentaries, films, books,focusing on the psychological
(23:21):
and moral challenges of theirsurvival.
And to this day, historians andanthropologists continue to
debate the finer points.
Were all the acts ofcannibalism committed only after
death?
Could the tragedy have beenaverted with better leadership
or timing?
And was the real villainLansford Hastings with his
ill-advised shortcut?
That's all still up for debate,but one thing that can't be
(23:45):
debated is that the Donner Partystarted its journey west 179
years ago this week in history.
One thing I can tell you, youwon't have to travel very far or
eat any of your family membersto enjoy this new time capsule.
(24:07):
We're going back 48 years agoto May 12th, 1977.
What was going on in the worldof pop culture back then?
Well, let's find out.
The number one song was When INeed You by Leo Sayre.
This was off of his albumEndless Flight.
(24:28):
And the song went to number onefor only one week, this one
we're talking about.
It was also Leo Sayre's secondconsecutive number one song, as
his song You Make Me Feel LikeDancing also went to number one.
That song, You Make Me FeelLike Dancing, actually won Leo
Sayre the Grammy for Best R&BSong, which is interesting.
(24:50):
The number one movie was TheCar.
And you could get into thetheater with a ticket costing
$2.23.
This is a horror movie about ablack, unmanned, self-driving
car that goes on a murderousrampage, running down people in
a small town.
(25:10):
The film is 30% fresh on RottenTomatoes, and it got a lot of
terrible reviews.
But like I said earlier aboutFriday the 13th, if you say a
horror movie is bad, thatusually will lead to a lot of
teens wanting to go watch it.
And I think that's why The Carwent to number one.
In 2019, there was a spinoffsequel called The Car Road to
(25:34):
Revenge.
It also got terrible reviews.
The number one TV show wasactually a movie, High Plains
Drifter.
This was a western that cameout in 1973 and starred Clint
Eastwood.
It's 94% fresh on RottenTomatoes, so way more successful
(25:54):
than The Car.
It is interesting when I choosethese time capsules and I end
up finding a movie being thenumber one TV show.
It's such a rare occurrence.
But then again, I'll take itover me complaining about All in
the Family being the number oneshow again in the 70s, or Cosby
Show again in the 80s, or ERagain in the 90s, etc.
(26:18):
And if you were around backthen, May 12th, 1977, maybe you
just went to see The Car, andthen you're getting into your
car, and you realize yourstereo's crap, you need a better
stereo.
Well, if I got some deals foryou this week at Leechmere,
there's two different stereos.
(26:40):
One's got a cassette player.
One has an 8-track player.
Your choice, $79.88.
That's about $421 when adjustedfor inflation to 2025.
Or if you really want your carto scream 70s, you can get a
stereo complete with a23-channel CB radio attached to
(27:04):
it.
That's really 70s.
That one's on sale for $99.88.
And if you're curious about whycars in the 70s had CB radios,
go back and check out episode161 of the podcast where I did a
segment about passing fads ofthe 1970s.
But that wraps up this week inhistory.
(27:25):
It wraps up another timecapsule.
If you think CB radios and carswere useless, well, get ready
for some early internet featuresthat are totally useless in a
brand new top five.
Oh boy, 1990s internet filledwith magic and dial-up wonder.
(27:51):
It was such a promising newwide world that when looking
back was filled with a lot ofreally stupid things.
So what we're going to do inthis brand new top five is look
at the most useless earlyinternet features.
These are the bells andwhistles that no one needed but
everyone used back then becauseit was brand new.
(28:12):
Those of you that grew up inthe 90s, a lot of these you'll
remember.
Maybe some of them you stilluse, I doubt it, but maybe some
of them you will look back onfondly.
Others you'll be like, I don'teven remember that.
Oh, but they were real, Ipromise.
So let's boot up Netscape anddive into the new top five.
As with most of these top fivelists, they are in no particular
(28:37):
order.
And of course, I've got somehonorable mentions.
All right, are you ready forthe honorable mentions and some
laughs and head shaking?
Honorable mentions for mostuseless early internet features
include the under constructiongifs.
This was usually every websitehad a stick figure digging or a
(28:59):
caution sign and it just stayedthere forever because the page
never got finished.
Another honorable mention.
is WebRings.
It's a bunch of related siteslinked in a never-ending loop.
It's supposed to help you findyour community, but did it
really?
I don't know.
Another honorable mention wasSplash Pages, because nothing
(29:22):
says welcome to my website likean extra page that makes you
click enter before you seeanything.
And you got bonus credibilityif it had flash animation and
took forever to load.
But I guess most things tookforever to load in the late 90s.
Another honorable mention wasEmbedded MIDI Music.
(29:43):
MIDI stands for MusicalInstrument Digital Interface.
This is where the websiteswould have some kind of music
playing and you couldn't findthe tab that was playing it.
There was no mute button.
You were just stuck with weirdpiano covers of 90 songs.
And the last honorable mentionfor useless features of early
(30:06):
internet was visitor counters.
Because you just had to showoff that 12 people had come to
your page.
And I mean, come on, be real.
10 of those 12 were probablyjust you refreshing the page.
I wish I had built websitesback in the late 90s.
That would have been my way toget my visitor count up.
Just sit there on the gatewaycomputer and refresh it for
(30:29):
hours until it looks like mycontent has a large audience.
So there's the honorablementions.
Do you remember any of thosefeatures from the internet back
when you first started?
It's like, cut us some slack.
It was all brand new andexciting.
Let's get into the actual topfive.
We're going to start it offwith number one, guest books.
(30:52):
Boy, this was like the originalcomment section under any video
on YouTube or blog.
You'd want people to come toyour site and tell you where
they were from or, I don't know,heap praise on you.
Wow, your website's amazing.
I can't believe you had theflying toasters with the wings
and the dancing baby.
(31:13):
But usually it would end upbeing either People giving you
praise and linking to their sitethat was probably equally as
terrible.
Or it would be like how it istoday.
Lots of spam and bots whereyou'd click on the comment.
Ooh, where's this person from?
And it's instant blue screenfor your computer.
Trojan virus everywhere.
(31:34):
I get that in the years beforesocial media was a thing, people
were looking to connect throughthe web.
The guestbook just didn't work.
It probably was filled withcobwebs after a few months.
Number two is mouse trailingeffects.
This is one of those thatseemed cool and interesting for
(31:57):
about five seconds.
This was where you could set upeffects so that when you were
moving your mouse, your cursor,so the little white arrow on the
screen or whatever, it wouldleave trails of stars or
sparkles that would follow themouse around.
I never was into anything likethis.
It sounds like it would besomething that teenage girls
(32:18):
would have used in the late 90s.
Or it might have been somethingthat teenage boys would have
put on the computer if youshared it with the rest of the
family.
So then if your parents werescrolling a news site or
something, there was justsnowflakes or glitter following
the mouse around so they'd getfrustrated and not know what to
do about it.
If you're someone who's longingfor the days of having things
(32:41):
follow your mouse around thescreen, or if you're younger,
wondering what in the world I'mtalking about, I found a website
called Tholman.com,T-H-O-L-M-A-N.
And they have a series of thesecursor effects that as you
mouse down the page, it willshow you.
It's got rainbows, clocks,fairy dust, all that.
(33:04):
I'll link to it in thedescription of the podcast if
you really want to check thatout.
It'll be just like it was inthe 90s.
Five seconds of fun and thenjust like, what am I thinking?
Number three is floating orscrolling text marquees.
These were kind of like digitalbumper stickers, scroll across
(33:26):
the screen messages that weresupposed to look futuristic.
These were things, they weresuper annoying.
Typically these HTML scrollswould have some kind of breaking
news maybe, not like a newsticker at the bottom of any news
network or ESPN, but justpointless stuff.
I'm no web designer.
(33:46):
I know a little bit about HTML,which is why if you ever visit
my blog, I'm pretty good atembedding things, especially
links to the podcast in there.
So I could see where creatingthese scrolling text marquees
would be something that when youlearned it in the mid to late
90s, you'd want to put iteverywhere.
but it didn't really make thepages stand out.
(34:08):
It just made it look like acontinually flowing ransom note
made by someone who justdiscovered HTML and caffeine.
Number four is Frames.
This allowed for the divisionof the browser window into
multiple sections.
It was created by NetscapeNavigator in the early 90s.
(34:31):
It was usually centered aroundnavigation with the menu in one
frame and then the rest of thepage in another frame.
But there was a huge problembecause they would never be
sized right.
They would break thebookmarking and would confuse
everyone that got to the page.
A lot of those frames onamateur-created websites, they
(34:53):
looked more like scrapbooks orphoto albums on a computer
screen.
And finally, number five on thelist of useless early internet
features is flash introanimations.
This is where you'd go to awebsite you wanted to visit and
you'd be accosted by a 30 secondanimation video with swooshing
(35:17):
text and swooshing sounds andswooshing everywhere.
It's like you just wanted to goto some store website and check
their hours, but nope, you'vegot to sit through this weirdly
put together video trailer forthe store that doesn't include
anything about the store.
It was kind of like movietrailers before YouTube, except
(35:38):
you couldn't skip them.
You just had to deal with it.
How badly do you want the infothat you want?
I would typically disable AdobeFlash so I wouldn't have to see
these things.
They wouldn't start.
But then that would impact likeevery other website I went to
where they'd say you need tohave Flash running.
So then I'd have to start itagain and I'd get suckered into
(36:00):
these videos.
But there you have it.
useless internet features fromback in the day, back in the
90s.
Are you guilty of using any ofthese on any page you made?
Which one annoyed you the most?
I mean, I have to go to theAdobe Flash intros because
that's the only one that made mechange my computer settings
(36:21):
just to get rid of it.
It makes me wish, though, thaton my homepage,
ChristopherSetterlin.com, I wishI had installed a guest book or
a visitor counter.
Because I've had that sitesince 2008.
Maybe I'd be up to a fewhundred signatures and visitors.
I don't know.
I think it would be hard for meto overstate how big of a part
(36:52):
of my childhood Transformerswere.
It's like getting one of theTransformers toys was the reward
for everything good I did.
Good report card, get yourselfa Transformer, hit the
game-winning home run in LittleLeague, get a Transformer.
But then it was also the way tosoothe me after bad things.
(37:16):
I got stabbed in the eye oncewith a pencil by my sister,
Lindsay.
She was a baby.
This was not on purpose.
She always feels bad when Ibring it up.
There are so many pictures ofme with this eye patch.
It didn't blind me, so I don'twant to make it sound like it
was so malicious.
I do remember the picture Ihave of me with my eye patch.
(37:39):
I was probably nine years old,and I'm holding my snarl patch.
Transformer Dinobot, he was theStegosaurus.
This is one of those topics,you remember a few weeks ago on
the show I talked aboutGarfield, and how big Garfield
was in my childhood, and how Iwas shocked that I got this far
into the podcast without talkingabout Garfield.
(38:00):
It's the same for Transformers.
Boys who grew up in the 1980shad no shortage of amazing toys,
action figures...
Besides Transformers, there wasG.I.
Joe, there was He-Man, therewas all the LJN WWF wrestling
figures.
I can only speak for me,though, because Transformers
(38:22):
were head and shoulders aboveeverything.
I loved the WWF action figuresjust as much, but Transformers
was everything.
I would always play with them.
As much as they're associatedwith growing up in the United
States in the 1980s, at leastfor young boys...
Transformers began in Japan.
It was a combination of twoJapanese toy lines, Diaclone and
(38:46):
Microchange, both produced bythe Japanese company Takara, now
Takara Tomy.
These toys were exactly whatTransformers are.
Robots that could transforminto vehicles, weapons, everyday
objects.
That immediately is what makesTransformers stand out.
It's like you're getting twotoys in one.
(39:07):
In 1983, American toy companyHasbro was looking for new
properties to bring to Westernaudiences.
They discovered Takara'stransforming robots at the Tokyo
Toy Fair.
Hasbro licensed the toy molds,rebranded them, and launched the
Transformers toy line in theUnited States in 1984.
(39:29):
In order to create a coherentbackstory and market the toys
more effectively...
Hasbro enlisted the help ofMarvel Comics to develop names,
personalities, and a narrativeuniverse, much like they had
done recently with G.I.
Joe.
So you combine the storytellingability of Marvel Comics with
(39:52):
these transforming robots, twotoys in one, it's a runaway,
it's a juggernaut of success.
It wasn't just the toy line,though.
Transformers also in 1984debuted as an animated
television series.
This is probably where I firstwas acquainted with
(40:29):
Transformers, the battle betweenthe noble Autobots led by the
heroic Optimus Prime, who was asemi-truck 18-wheeler, and the
evil Decepticons, who were underthe command of the ruthless
Megatron, who was a jet.
The show's sci-fi action wascomplemented by the memorable
(40:50):
voice acting.
Peter Cullen was the man whowas the voice of Optimus Prime,
Frank Welker was the voice ofMegatron.
Peter Cullen has been the voiceof Optimus Prime basically from
the start.
He's the voice of Optimus Primein all the movies that have
been out recently.
And Frank Welker, he's one ofthe most prolific and profitable
(41:12):
voice actors ever.
As someone who's thinking aboutdoing some voice acting or
voiceover work in the nearfuture, I'd kill to have 1% of
the financial success that FrankWelker had.
The Transformers animatedseries was on from 1984 to 1987
with 98 total episodes.
(41:33):
There was also an accompanyingMarvel comic book series that
was also launched in 1984 thatwas initially planned as a
four-issue limited run.
And it became so popular thatit ran for 80 issues continuing
until 1991.
Seriously, Transformers was acash cow for Hasbro.
(41:54):
I never read the comic books,but I don't think I was missing
much considering that I watchedall the TV shows.
I watched the animated moviefrom 1986.
It was meant to be the bridgebetween season two and three of
the television show set in thefar off time of 2005.
That'll never be a year.
(42:15):
But that was the one thatscarred a lot of us kids in the
80s where they killed offOptimus Prime in the first act.
That's something you wouldnever see in animated shows.
A main character being killed.
Just think about that if youwould watch the Flintstones in
the 60s and Fred Flintstone washit in a car accident.
(42:35):
Or if they killed Bart Simpsonor Peter Griffin on Family Guy.
I mean, they did kill Kenny onSouth Park hundreds of times,
but that's the exception, notthe rule.
The reasoning behind killingoff Optimus Prime was actually
designed to introduce a new lineof toys.
And it's also known for havingOrson Welles in his final film
(42:59):
role voicing Unicron, who was aTransformer so big he could
transform into a planet.
I just remember that afterOptimus Prime was killed, they
brought in this Rodimus Primethat's not supposed to be
related to him, but it was, tome as a kid at the time, it was
like replacing Bo and Luke Dukeon the Dukes of Hazzard with
(43:21):
their cousins Koi and Vance.
That's a very 80s referencethere.
Transformers toys were some ofthe best-selling toys of the
1980s.
I had so many of them.
Autobots, Decepticons,Dinobots.
I love the Dinobots.
I was a big fan of dinosaurs,so dinosaur robots, you couldn't
(43:44):
go wrong with that.
Grimlock, the T-Rex leader.
Like I said, I had Snarl, theStegosaurus after my sister
gouged my eye out with a pencil.
Fun fact, I actually had my eyewrecked twice, including a few
years later, so my sisterstabbed me with a pencil, and
then it was almost like shedidn't finish the job, so she
(44:07):
threw a Godzilla toy at me a fewyears later.
At least I think it was thesame sister.
I don't know.
This is what Transformersbrings up.
It was the first thing Ithought of when I was putting
this segment together, was thepicture of me with my eye patch
with my Dinobot there.
And just the story behind howwe got to that point.
Anyway, enough attempted murderfrom family members.
(44:29):
By the early 90s, interest inTransformers started to wane.
Hasbro retired the originalGeneration 1 line.
They attempted several reboots,including Generation 2 in 1993,
Beast Wars Transformers in1996.
The Generation 2 Transformerssold well, but it was the Beast
(44:53):
Wars ones.
They were entirely newcharacters that transformed
robots into animals instead ofvehicles.
The Beast Wars Transformerswere the ones that introduced
computer-generated animation,complex storytelling.
This appealed to older fans aswell as a new generation of
kids.
And this period of the late 90slaid the groundwork for the
(45:16):
Transformers franchise long-termviability that could reinvent
itself while honoring its roots.
By the early 90s, my tastes hadchanged.
I was no longer collectingaction figures.
I was into the grunge culture.
So I never got into the BeastWars Transformers.
(45:37):
But as I've said numerous timeson this show, nostalgia is very
powerful.
And so when the Transformersmovie came out in 2007, I was in
line at the theater to get tosee it.
This was a live-action filmwith CGI Transformers produced
by Steven Spielberg, directed byMichael Bay.
(46:00):
It was a way to reintroduceOptimus Prime, Bumblebee,
Megatron, It had explosiveaction sequences.
It was critically mixed, but Icouldn't have cared less what
critics thought.
It was a big-budget movie basedon the Transformers that
influenced my childhood so much,so I couldn't have cared less.
(46:22):
The only way they could havegotten me to not go see
Transformers is if they said thetheater blew up at the end of
the movie, and even then I mighttry to go and escape before it
happened.
The movie ended up making about$130 million at the box office,
which unfortunately, becausethe budget was so high for this
movie, it actually lost money.
(46:44):
In total, there have been sevenmovies in the Transformers
universe franchise, with thenewest one being 2023's Rise of
the Beasts.
The franchise in general hasmade more than $5.3 billion at
the box office, making it a hugesuccess despite the original
(47:04):
film being kind of a little bitof a money loser.
It's incredible to think, forme as a child of the 80s, that
there are so many kids today,the same age that I was back
then, that have no idea aboutthe original figures, the
original animated show.
but yet they're still giganticTransformers fans based just on
(47:27):
the movies.
To this day, Transformerscontinues to thrive with toys,
with Hasbro still producingthem.
There are still cartoons, stillcomics.
There are extensive fancommunities, conventions.
At its core, Transformers isabout identity, transformation,
(47:47):
literally with the robotstransforming to different things
and metaphorically.
and the eternal conflictbetween good and evil, Autobots,
Decepticons.
Think about all the generationsnow that can say they grew up
on Transformers.
I'm a Gen Xer that grew up withthe first generation of
Transformers and Optimus Prime.
(48:08):
Millennial kids grew up withthe Beast Wars.
Gen Z has the live-actionmovies.
There's even Generation Alphakids today that are discovering
the Earthspark animated shows.
There's literally a version ofTransformers for four different
generations.
And it all started with theserepurposed Japanese robot toys
(48:32):
in the early to mid-1980s.
For me, I still associateTransformers with my childhood
in the 80s.
Like I said, rewards for goodthings in my life or things to
soothe me after bad things in mylife.
Or just getting them on randomdays.
Going shopping on a Sunday withmy Nina and going to visit my
(48:54):
grandpa at his donut shop andthen going to tons of toys or
Child World and picking out myfavorite Transformer to bring
home to fight the rest of thecrew I had.
Or maybe wrestle some of my LJNWWF figures.
After...
Over 40 years, though, onething is clear.
Transformers are not justrobots in disguise.
(49:15):
They're cultural icons that arehere to stay.
But until next week, I'm goingto transform this podcast from
in progress to done.
So that wraps up episode 195.
We're getting closer and closerto episode 200.
If you haven't yet, Go toPatreon.
(49:38):
All you got to do is become afree member.
Vote in the polls for episode200.
Listener's choice.
People on Patreon are going toget to vote for everything
that's on the show.
Except for me.
I'm still the host.
You can't put in a vote for meto have my buddy Steve host the
show instead.
Although that would be prettyfunny.
Guest host.
(49:59):
That's when you know I've runout of content.
When I start having otherpeople host the show.
That's like in the...
80s when Johnny Carson wasgetting ready to leave the
Tonight Show and he would haveguest hosts on there like Joan
Rivers all the time.
I am not Johnny Carson though,although my hair is getting kind
of as white as his was.
Not close, but it'll be theresoon enough.
(50:22):
Thank you all for tuning intothe show, for making it this
far.
I hope I satisfied your cravingfor Gen X nostalgia.
We'll do it all again next weekwith episode 196.
That will be where we will talkabout 1985 in movies, all the
number one films, and some aboutwhat it was like to go to the
(50:45):
movies in 1985.
We'll also be talking aboutwhat was considered cutting-edge
technology in the 1970s.
Back in episode 179, I did asegment on cutting edge tech
from the 1960s.
So if you want to go check thatout, that'll give you an idea
of what's coming next week.
I hope all of you moms wholisten had a great Mother's Day.
(51:09):
By the time this episode goeslive, I will know if my mother
liked the Mother's Day gift Igot her, which was a butterfly
bush for her yard.
I'm figuring she liked it, butwho knows?
Maybe next week on the show,I'll be telling you that she dug
it up and threw it in the trashas soon as I left.
If you enjoy my content, if youenjoy what I do and want to
(51:32):
support me, like I said, you canbecome a member on Patreon for
$5 a month.
You can always buy me a coffee.
Those are as little as adollar, which won't buy me a
coffee, but it's the thoughtthat counts.
But the best way, if spendingmoney is not feasible, the best
way you can support me or anycontent creator is sharing our
(51:54):
work, spreading the word.
In a time where there's optionoverload with everything, it
means a lot when people sharethe work of creators because
it's a lot of work.
It's hard work.
I love doing all of this,podcasting, creating the videos
for YouTube, blogging, and allmy writing.
(52:15):
It's all fun, but it takestime, especially with a
full-time day job.
I spend, you know,conservatively somewhere around
15 hours, usually more, per weekdoing work on my content.
It's just me.
I don't have any team.
I haven't hired an intern tocome in and do work for me.
I think I enjoy being incontrol of my stuff too much to
(52:39):
give it to someone else andtrust them.
Like, edit this podcast and doit right.
I wouldn't trust they could doit.
Happy birthday this week to myUncle John.
The only one who knows moreabout family history than me is
my Uncle John.
And I never expected to be afamily historian.
That was kind of just gifted tome.
So I hope you have the bestbirthday possible.
(53:01):
Hopefully this podcast madeyour birthday a little more fun.
And before I overstay mywelcome with this podcast going
too long this week, I will wrapup by saying, remember, in this
life, don't walk in anyoneelse's footsteps.
Create your own path and enjoyevery moment you can on this
journey we call life because younever know what tomorrow
(53:24):
brings.
Thank you all again for tuningin to episode 195.
This has been the In MyFootsteps podcast.
I am Christopher Setterlund.
You already knew that.
And I'll talk to you all againsoon.
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