Episode 208: The 30th Anniversary of "Casper" (1995)

Today marks the 30th Anniversary of the hit movie and every 90s kid’s favorite ghost…CASPER! Join Max and Chelsea as they reminisce about the iconic design of Whipstaff Manor, the influence that Steven Spielberg had on this film, the themed toys at Pizza Hut, our favorite lines and cameos that still blow our minds to this day!

All this and so much more!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, Ready to Retro listeners. Max here just want to
let you know at the top of this episode that
the standard and the quality of the audio isn't to
what you're accustomed to here on the Ready to Retro podcast.
So unfortunately, the signal of the soundboard it kept on
dropping when I was recording. So what you're gonna hear

(00:22):
is the audio from the Zoom conversation. Hey, at least
we got it, and we are happy and we're proud
of this episode. And without further Ado enjoyed the thirtieth
anniversary of Casper.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
Ladies and gentlemen, the time has come. Turn your devices
to the maximum volume, sit back, relax, and let's get
Ready to retra.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
Hey, everybody, welcome to episode two eight of the Ready
to Retro Podcast. I am one of your hosts, Max
and joining us returning to the Ready to Retro Podcast
is the Duchess of Horror, Chelsea.

Speaker 3 (01:35):
What everybody? What's it going?

Speaker 1 (01:38):
So surprise, surprise, Chris isn't here. We're like, we're like
back into the swing of things.

Speaker 3 (01:45):
Right, I mean, it's just like normal, Yes, it is normal.
He's a special guest.

Speaker 1 (01:55):
He is a special guest. So we're holding things down,
We're gonna be talking about a movie that I think
was watched a lot from your end to my end, right,
mm hmm, definitely back in the day. Yes, oh yeah.
So it's the thirtieth anniversary of Casper, which is just
wild to say, Oh my god, oh my god.

Speaker 3 (02:17):
That movie came out when I was five years old.
I don't like hearing thirty years that's horrible.

Speaker 1 (02:24):
Well, before we get to Casper, since we're recording this
right before Memorial weekend, Memorial Weekend is like the mark
of summer, but it's also the mark of summer movies.
So Chelsea, I want to ask you, is are there
any summer movies that you are looking forward to seeing
this summer.

Speaker 3 (02:45):
I don't even really know what's coming out though, I
don't know. I feel that Tomorrow, Memorial Day weekend pretty much,
I'm gonna go see Leelo and Stitch.

Speaker 1 (02:57):
Oh see, that's one of the ones I want to watch.

Speaker 3 (02:59):
Yeah, I definitely go see that with my mom. I loved,
you know, I loved the original. I don't know this,
you know, the live action Disney remakes are not very good.
They're just not and so I don't know, we'll see
how this one is. People are saying, you know, they
like parts of it, they don't like all of it.
But other than that, I mean, I've never I mean

(03:19):
I've seen like one Mission Impossible movie. It was the
second one. I've never seen any other Mission Impossible movie.

Speaker 1 (03:25):
I've the first one and I rewatched it thinking maybe
I would watch all of them before this new one.

Speaker 3 (03:32):
Yeah, because that's what's coming out Memorial Day weekend. I
think Lelon Stitch and that Mission Impossible movie, and then
I don't really know. Yeah, like what else is really.

Speaker 1 (03:43):
Well, I can tell you what's coming okay, yeah, tell
me you know, Yeah, I have the internet. So yes,
as you mentioned, uh, there is Mission Impossible, the Final Reckoning,
and Leilo's Stitch in June, we're getting twenty eight years later.
That's June twenty. Oh okay, how are you with that franchise?

Speaker 3 (04:03):
I saw the first one? Isn't there more than one?

Speaker 1 (04:06):
Is like twenty eight weeks later? In twenty yeah later.

Speaker 3 (04:09):
I have seen twenty eight days. But I do like it,
like Killian Murphy. Yeah, I don't know. I mean that,
you know, the trailer for this one looks really pretty good,
so I might I might check it out. Our apocalyptic
films kind of freak me out. I love like zombie stuff,
but something about like, yeah, I don't know that always
like it scares me.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
I'm down, it's gonna be fun. We also have Alio.
That's that Disney and Pixar movie where the kid gets
abducted by aliens. Okay, it'd be fun.

Speaker 3 (04:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:41):
John Wick Bell Arena, which I've only seen the first show.

Speaker 3 (04:44):
Oh yeah, from the John Wicky universe I've seen. I
think there's four John wick movies. I think I've seen
three of them. Dang, they're good, man, I need to
rewatch all those. I'd like to see the fourth one eventually.
But I freaking love those movie.

Speaker 1 (04:59):
They're just they're they're good. Yeah, the first one's good.

Speaker 3 (05:02):
Oh man, you should see all of them. They're awesome.

Speaker 1 (05:05):
Well, there's that one for those who are really excited
for that. There's How to Train Your Dragon the live action.
So it's interesting that dream Works is doing live action
movies now because Disney hasn't had great success, but they're
doing that. I feel like How to Junior Dragon is
like kind of gen z.

Speaker 3 (05:26):
I've never seen any of those movies. Yes, but they
did just open up Epic Universe. I think today. I
mean I think the day we're recording it is like
the official day got it's like been open. And one
of the lands is the Isle of Burke, which I
think is the place in those movies. So I kind
of it's all kind of for them. Universe is doing

(05:49):
good because like they just opened up that land. The
movie's gonna open up and like would you said, like
a month or two in July or whatever, right, so
the synergy for that is going crazy, probably pretty good.

Speaker 1 (06:02):
So yeah, So I remember just working out a school
in this movie came out like I think it was
a ground two thousand and nine, two ten something like that.
So I was in a cafeteria and I wasn't really
watching it, you know. So yeah, so but I know
a lot of people are looking forward to that. And
then Megan two comes out June twenty seventh. I'll see that, sure,

(06:28):
I'll watch it.

Speaker 3 (06:29):
Seen I saw the first one. It's fun. It's just
a real be horror movie. I don't know, I thought
the first one was really fun. I'm going to see
the next one.

Speaker 1 (06:37):
And then here's July. July is where things start to
pick up. So July second, Jurassic World Rebirth, and they
just released another trailer and it's straight out of the

(06:58):
book where there's a track chasing them in yellow raft.
That's straight out of the book. So that's gonna be
freaking awesome. Are you excited at all for that?

Speaker 3 (07:11):
No? No, really no, because I didn't even see I
see the last Jurassic World movie.

Speaker 1 (07:18):
I heard.

Speaker 3 (07:18):
It was horrible.

Speaker 1 (07:20):
It wasn't great. But going back into Jurassic Park movies,
you got me, I'm gonna I don't know, you don't know.
But after that, the next week, Superman, the James Gunn version.

Speaker 3 (07:40):
I'm probably gonna see that because my mom won't want
to see it.

Speaker 1 (07:44):
Dude, it looks good.

Speaker 3 (07:45):
I hope it's good. I hope.

Speaker 1 (07:47):
So it's been a while since like a really solid
Superman movie.

Speaker 3 (07:54):
Yeah, I mean, I like Henry Cavill, but I never
really cared much for the like that the d was
it the the DCEU or whatever we see you? Yeah, yeah,
never really cared for that style, like the ben Affleck
Batman and Yep, it's okay.

Speaker 1 (08:14):
And then July twenty fifth, Happy Gilmour two.

Speaker 3 (08:18):
Yeah, and I think but that's on Netflix.

Speaker 1 (08:19):
Yeah, that's Netflix, so that'll be cool. Well, definitely, probably,
definitely probably to talk about that, yes, yes, and then
in August. Oh, you're a horror person. I know what
you did last summer July.

Speaker 3 (08:35):
Oh, okay, that's cool. Okay, I didn't even know that
was happening.

Speaker 1 (08:38):
I have a confession, Mike, you ever seen it? I've
never seen the first one. As many horror movies as
I've seen, I've never seen that one.

Speaker 3 (08:47):
That is pretty surprising.

Speaker 1 (08:50):
It is, I don't think I have. And then August
we have Naked Gun August first with the.

Speaker 3 (08:59):
Le oh Liam Neeson, that's right.

Speaker 1 (09:02):
And then Freaky r Friday is August eighth, and that's.

Speaker 3 (09:08):
Yeah, I'll see that one.

Speaker 1 (09:10):
And that's pretty much it. Those are like the those
are the big ones. The Toxic Avenger that's August twenty ninth.

Speaker 3 (09:20):
You've got a lot of big blockbusters. You know, you
got Drastic Park, You've got Superman. You've got like kind
of big names, but nothing like for me. I don't know.
Last summer, I was so excited to see all those
horror movies like Maxine and Long Legs and everything. That's
what I was like more excited about this year. I
don't know.

Speaker 1 (09:42):
Yeah, well there it is. Let us know, listeners, what
you are looking forward to this summer season, and they'll
probably be one out there that people will, you know, oh,
catch people off guard and they'll start talking about it.
I did see Friendship. I will say that.

Speaker 3 (10:03):
I wanted to see that. How is that I want
to see it?

Speaker 1 (10:08):
Do you like Jim Robinson's comedy?

Speaker 3 (10:10):
Do I like his style of comedy?

Speaker 1 (10:12):
Then you'll probably like it?

Speaker 3 (10:14):
Yeah? Did you like it? Or no?

Speaker 1 (10:15):
Yeah I watched it, but myself I was with like
other people in the theater. But yeah, yeah, there's people
that are Yeah. Well, like I said, listeners, let us know.
You can leave a comment on our Ready to Retro
instagram at Ready to Retro, or let us know on

(10:37):
our website. We have a website Ready retro dot com.
Maybe I'll put a answer the question and well, we'll
put a question of the week or question of the episode,
since we're probably not doing this weekly, so yeah, we'll
put that and we'll read the answers the next time

(10:58):
we get around. All Right, we're gonna take a break.
I want to get back. We're gonna talk about Casper
and it's gonna be spooky, No, because Casper's as freaking
all right, we'll we wear a back. Well, we're back

(11:22):
from the break, and I'll be upfront. Our audio is
not the greatest right now. We're having some mic problems,
but it's all good because we're still gonna have lots
of fun and although it doesn't sound the best, it's
still gonna be worth listening to. All Right, So we're
gonna be talking about the thirtieth anniversary of Casper, and

(11:43):
just from the very start, Chelsea, what is your history
with Casper?

Speaker 3 (11:48):
Well, my history is I don't know if I saw
in the movie there or not. Possibly I did because
I was five, and I'm sure my mom probably took
me to it, but I instantly loved it. I remember
we got it on the HS. I watched it over
and over again. I really what I really remember is

(12:09):
the marketing campaign with with Pizza Hut, with the little
plastic little puppets that you know, would glow in the dark,
and I took I got Casper. I don't know where
it is. I'm sure I have a feeling it's gone,
but I did take it to show and tell, like
I think it was like elementary school. I don't know.

(12:30):
It was kindergarten. I was five. We took stuff that
like we liked or like and like talked about ourselves.
And I took the little Casper, the ghost little toy
from Pizza Hut, like that was like really important to
me to show people.

Speaker 1 (12:43):
That must have been like first grade.

Speaker 3 (12:46):
No, I think it was. Was it kindergarten? It was
either first grade or kindergarten? Yeah, because I was in May,
was it, like yeah, I had probably just well I
had turned five at the end of of ninety four.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
So right, yeah, so yeah, so I'm just saying it's
like May. It came out May twenty six.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
I think it was in kindergarten. But yeah, yeah, oh no,
you're right. I see what you're saying. I probably took
it to to get it really technical, you guys. I
probably took it to first first grade show until it
was like each kid got like a week that like
your stuff would be on a board and like your

(13:30):
stuff would like be sitting out and you could show everybody,
you know, what's Chelsea about. Well, Chelsea was all about
Casper at that point in time, and she still is
all about Casper.

Speaker 1 (13:39):
So I didn't want to get all technical. I was
just trying to like understand. It's like, did you take
summer school?

Speaker 3 (13:45):
So much more sense though now because I'm like, you're right,
it probably was first grade.

Speaker 1 (13:50):
First grade, Yeah, solid salid and I and I was
going to bring that up later, but I'm glad you
brought that up. I had a stretch toy. Okay, was
it like the plush Not the plush. It was plastic?

Speaker 3 (14:04):
Oh did it stritch?

Speaker 1 (14:06):
No, So the the one that you're talking about, That's
what I'm talking about, the pizza hut one.

Speaker 3 (14:11):
It was a little hand puppet.

Speaker 1 (14:13):
It was hollow underneath.

Speaker 3 (14:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (14:15):
And I just remember this distinct plastic smell, and i'd,
being a kid, would put yeah I know, in my mouth, Yeah,
like a mask or something and just smell it.

Speaker 3 (14:26):
It's that like.

Speaker 1 (14:26):
Halloween plasticky smell, because very strong scentse Yeah, yeah, I
love that, you love that. I love it.

Speaker 3 (14:36):
Give me, give me that in a candle. It's just
it's just called candle. No scent, just wax.

Speaker 1 (14:43):
Did you have the VHS of this?

Speaker 3 (14:45):
I still have the clamshell uh VHS copy of of
Casper Nice Yeah sick.

Speaker 1 (14:53):
Oh yeah, I did too until a couple of months ago.

Speaker 3 (14:56):
Yes, go to back to the previous episode.

Speaker 1 (14:59):
You underst I did have it. It was in my
game room. Oh you did.

Speaker 3 (15:04):
Huh.

Speaker 1 (15:05):
Yeah, it was like I for sure had it, so
that it was something that my sister and I would
watch a lot. But as I was watching this, I
realized I probably haven't watched it since maybe we got
a DVD player. So it's two thousand and one and two.
So I watched it a lot, like I remember watching

(15:27):
on VHS. There was some port there was some point
where like we stopped watching VHS this we're strictly DVD,
so like there's maybe a year or two where we
would do both. So probably I stopped watching it thirteen
fourteen years old. Yeah, and by then I was like
watching wrestling and you know you canna be but like you.

Speaker 3 (15:50):
Never like seen it like come on TV and you're like, ah,
I might as well. I mean that's what I would do.
It's like on TV a lot sometimes, so I would
just like, you know, I had Casper's on TV.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
Yeah, no, no, no, But this was something that my
sister and I would watch a lot together. And it
wasn't just around Halloween. It was all year round.

Speaker 3 (16:12):
Yeah, is that all year round movie for sure?

Speaker 1 (16:16):
Chelse For our listeners, can you give the plot of Casper?
Because I mean, Casper is a Harvey comics from the thirties.
It was a cartoon short and it was a really
dark cartoon, the first one. And we like, we're also
going to be talking about the movie. Yeah, the nineteen

(16:37):
ninety five movie. But what's what's the plot of castor
for those who don't know.

Speaker 3 (16:41):
The plot of Casper is how how deep are we going?
It's gone pretty simple.

Speaker 1 (16:48):
However you want, however you want to do?

Speaker 3 (16:52):
The film opens, no' just kidding, okay. So well, Kathy
Moriarty's character inherits this home whipstock manner, okay, and she
wants to get money for it or there's treasure in it.
But she finds out that it's haunted, and so she
hires she finds out that Bill Pullman's character is like

(17:13):
a therapist for ghosts, and so she gets, you know,
Bill Pullman's character to come to the house to you know,
see see if she can get the ghost to move on,
and so that she can get in there and you know,
get what she needs. And so Bill Pullman also has
a daughter. That's Kathleen kat that's Christina Ricci's character. And

(17:38):
so they move into the house. They find out that yes,
it is indeed haunted. Casper and his uncles live there,
and it's just well, Casper becomes friends with you know,
Christina Riach's character, and Bill Pullman is trying to do
his best with Casper's uncle, and that's pretty much the plot.

(18:03):
I mean, there's more to it. I don't know, we
should go all the way, but that's that's kind of
like the gist of it. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (18:10):
Yeah, and the whole time, Casper just wants to have
a friend.

Speaker 3 (18:13):
He just he's a friendly ghost and he wants to
be you know friends.

Speaker 1 (18:18):
Yeah, because they play on the trope a lot. Because
that's how the cartoon was. The one that I watch,
Casper like befriends a black cat. Yeah, nobody wants to
be around the black cat because it's unlucky. Nobody wants
to be around Casper because Casper's a ghost. So every
animal Casper would interact with, it would be like cuckoo ghost.

(18:41):
So it'd be like a bear or like a groundhog,
and they would just scream because you know, Casper and
all all cast wants is a friend. He's a friendly
ghost like Casper is like the ultimate millennial because I
feel like millennials we.

Speaker 3 (18:55):
Just want friends.

Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah, we just want a good friend. We want a
good hand.

Speaker 3 (19:00):
Yeah, like that's all we that's all we're looking for.

Speaker 1 (19:03):
We want to work. No, we don't even really want
to be rich. We just want to chill with the homies.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
And like watch stuff that we watched when we were young.

Speaker 1 (19:12):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I don't know why boomers don't like us,
you know, all right, they don't like anybody. All right,
Well it's that time of the show where Chelsea takes lead.
It is Chelsea's fool cast.

Speaker 3 (19:30):
Chelsea's cool cast. All right, So for Chelsea's cool cast.
Like I mentioned the plot of the film, Yes, Christina
Ricci is in this movie. She plays Kathleen kat Harvey Harvey,
the last name being you know the people who had

(19:53):
you know, were the Was it the cartoon they did,
Casper Harvey?

Speaker 1 (19:57):
It was it was the comics, I believe, Oh was it?
Yeah it might have been the cartoons, but yeah, for
sure the comics. Before we move on from Christina, I
know that you and I have talked offline on this,
but have you started. I have jackets yet, I haven't.

Speaker 3 (20:14):
You think I'd really like.

Speaker 1 (20:15):
It a lot? Yeah, you would like it. Yeah, yeah.
I watched the first season. I haven't watched the second season,
and I heard the third season is.

Speaker 3 (20:28):
Okay, okay.

Speaker 1 (20:30):
So, but she plays like one of the most like
iconic characters. She plays a nut job. Let's just put it.
That's awesome and it's it's great to see her like
she kind of took a hiatus. You know, she was
in Tricksie and speed Racer.

Speaker 3 (20:46):
Yeah, and that was kind of it for a while.

Speaker 1 (20:49):
Yeah, and now she like is slowly coming back, which
you know, you like to see.

Speaker 3 (20:54):
I love She's probably one of my favorite actresses because
I love like everything she did as a kid. Watching
the other night, I was watching Mermaids when she was
a really little kid, and I've just always really liked her.
My pe teacher shout out to mister Minnix. He one
time he said that he was watching TV and he's like, oh,

(21:15):
I saw you on TV. And I was like, I
don't know what you're talking about, and he's like, I
was watching Casper. I was like, I don't look like
Christina Ricci at all, and I think it's just because
we both have really big for its. But I was like, oh,
that's weird. I don't know why, but he, I don't know.
He always he was always like, yeah, you're like that
girl from Casper. I was like, oh, well thanks, So

(21:36):
I thought that was always fun. But Bill Pullman is
her dad. He's James, doctor James Harvey.

Speaker 1 (21:44):
Bill Chris is Chris was his tech techie at his
old job, remember, and his.

Speaker 3 (21:52):
And his son is like his fame is like kind
of like really going up right now because of like
thunder big thing. Oh yeah, but yeah, you know Bill Pulman,
he's the president. And uh, Kathy Moriarty is Kerrigan. Katherine Kerrigan.
I love Kathy Moriarty. She's great, funny enough. They made

(22:16):
a couple of sequels to Casper, which we probably can
we'll mention later. But in the third sequel or I
guess one of them is a prequel whatever, But the sequel,
Casper meets Wendy. She isn't it. She's one of the witches,
like one of Wendy's aunts or something.

Speaker 1 (22:31):
Right, right, She's like a blonde one. Yeah, Kathy Moriarty,
I was actually looking at like her IMBB and like
besides Raging Bull and maybe but I'm a cheerleader. I
haven't really seen her.

Speaker 3 (22:44):
Have you ever seen Mattinee with John Goodman?

Speaker 1 (22:47):
She's in that.

Speaker 3 (22:48):
Yeah, she is in that. I've always really like Kathermry.
She's got a great kind of smoky, husky voice.

Speaker 1 (22:55):
Yeah, I love her.

Speaker 3 (22:58):
She's great.

Speaker 1 (22:59):
She's I think she's in she has to be in
a very specific way with that voice and that look
and yeah. But yeah, I was like looking at her IMDb,
I was like, I haven't seen most of the things
that she was.

Speaker 3 (23:12):
I like her. Eric Idol plays Gibbs. Eric Idol of
course famous for Monty Python and other roles, but I
would I would say mostly famous for money Python.

Speaker 1 (23:24):
Oh yeah, and can I just say totally just miscast, Like,
I don't does he work in this movie? I don't.

Speaker 3 (23:31):
You don't think you don't think he was good in
the role.

Speaker 1 (23:35):
It's just he just I don't know it strange.

Speaker 3 (23:41):
Who would you want for that role instead?

Speaker 1 (23:44):
I just feel like they needed a role for him
and they just stuck him in there. I mean, he
does slapstick stuff, but like.

Speaker 3 (23:52):
Well he he's kind of like her, like Lackey, you
know kind of thing.

Speaker 1 (23:57):
You really don't know what the relationship is. Is it?
Is he her lawyer?

Speaker 3 (24:02):
Is he he's like assistant. I kind of always looked
at him like an assistant. Okay, that's what I always
looked at it, like like.

Speaker 1 (24:11):
Hell, like I figured, yeah, they're like you know, But
watching it now as an adult, I was like, what's
the relationship? You don't I just needed one line to say.
But yeah, no, nothing against Eric Idol. I was just
I don't know if he fits the tone. I don't know.

(24:31):
It was like our introduction. We were watching Casper before
we were watching My Teapots true right, and then while
we were watching The Holy Grail, we're like, oh hey,
look it's dips from Casper.

Speaker 3 (24:44):
So I used to watch I watched a lot of
Money Python as a kid, and I would watch he.
You know, he's been in like a lot of British
other British stuff, so.

Speaker 1 (24:52):
Oh yeah, yeah, I mean British comedy. Yeah, like Legend.

Speaker 3 (24:58):
Kind of John Cleese. You know, he on to do
a lot of like more American roles other than you know,
Monty Python. Brad Garrett is the voice of Fatso.

Speaker 1 (25:10):
That is true. He also played Krang later on, but yeah,
his first voice over work.

Speaker 3 (25:15):
Yeah, I was gonna say, oh, ben Stein is in
this movie. There's like a lot of random cameos that
I love that are in this film. Ben Stein plays
like the lawyer, Kerrigan's lawyer. Yeah, there's also dan Aykroyd,
isn't it. I thought that was great. I love Ghostbusters
as a kid too, So let's.

Speaker 1 (25:37):
Hold off on that way. I love that. That's what
we're talking about.

Speaker 3 (25:40):
Yeah, what about the other those other cameos that all
are kind of right in succession of each other.

Speaker 1 (25:46):
Yeah, the cameos Clint Eastwood, we have Mel Gibson, Ronnie
Dangerfield Ronnie. That's the other one. Yeah, And apparently it
was Steven Spielberg who got them, because we'll talk about
this later on, but Steven Spielberg was a producer and
the only way that he got them to make a

(26:08):
appearance on this to make a cameo was that he
said he was gonna do one too, but apparently it
was so bad that they cut it, like he's just
a terrible actor.

Speaker 3 (26:18):
Yeah, so it's a terrible actor. He's great and tiny
tunes though, so that's true.

Speaker 1 (26:23):
Yeah, that's true.

Speaker 3 (26:24):
Uh, Devin Sawa is that used to say his last name?

Speaker 1 (26:27):
Oh yeah, Devin Sala.

Speaker 3 (26:29):
Sawa is the human version of Casper at the end.

Speaker 1 (26:35):
Did you ever did you see the tweet that Devin
Sawa put He said me and Jody Sweet should have
dated because on her wedding it would have said Sweet
and Salah.

Speaker 3 (26:45):
Oh yeah, that's pretty funny.

Speaker 1 (26:49):
That's good. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (26:50):
I think I've seen him, like he's like at horror
conventions a lot. I think I've seen him like, yeah, you.

Speaker 1 (26:55):
Know what's interesting is Chris and I saw him in
twenty eighteen. He was just kind of like in the
hallway right like he wasn't he was just like, hey,
oh yeah, there's Devin Sawa. You know Stan from the
eminem music video or the kid from Final Destination. Now

(27:17):
he's had a resurgence from Chucky the TV series and
his let's just say his stock has risen. He's been
in a lot more things now. He's got a little
resurgence going on. So it's good to see Devin Sawa.
He's a he's a Blue Jays fan. He's from Canada,
but he goes to the Dodger games all the time

(27:39):
with this kid, which is cool to see.

Speaker 3 (27:41):
I'm not really familiar with the rest of the cast, but.

Speaker 1 (27:45):
Oh, I'll take it over if you want to get
in there. Oh hell yeah. All right, So let's talk
about Garrett Ratliff Henson plays Vic. You know what he's from, right, No, dude,
that's Germane from The Mighty Duck.

Speaker 3 (28:00):
Oh yeah, okay, yeah, yeah yeah.

Speaker 1 (28:04):
So you know he's got another love interest. He's always
got the girl in this movie. That's like, that's what
he does. Uh. In the very beginning, there's these two
kids that break into the mansion and one of them
you might recognize as Squints and Sam Lot Chauncey Leo

(28:25):
Party and then I just kind of mentioned that kid
on the right when they take the picture. His mouth
is so that's all I can think of it.

Speaker 3 (28:35):
Every time I watch it, I think about that. It's
so strange. Yeah, every time I watch.

Speaker 1 (28:40):
It, it's like like Emo.

Speaker 3 (28:43):
Tepe from It looks fake.

Speaker 1 (28:46):
How does someone like open their mouth that big?

Speaker 3 (28:49):
Yeah, I've always thought.

Speaker 1 (28:51):
That's ah, like he almost doesn't have a job. It's nuts,
like it just drops down. Even as a kid, I
thought it was weird.

Speaker 3 (29:01):
The the director I was gonna say real quick, is
Brad Silberling. I think that's how you say it's all same.
And I actually saw him one time because I went
to a screening of Lemony Snicket, Serious of Fortune Events
because he also directed that movie, and he was sitting
I think, in front of me, like two rows in

(29:22):
front of me, and and no one really knew who
he was. But I remember the reason why I knew
who he was was because I would watch the butts
behind the scenes like featurettes for Casper and so they
would like interview him and I'd be like, oh, yeah,
that's the guy who directed Casper. So and then another
shout out to someone who is in the movie is

(29:43):
my friend's cousin. If you're watching the film and you
get to the end scene where it's all the kids
and they're dressed up, there's one kid. When they're all
they're looking through Casper's like fait like his head goes
clear again and they're looking and they're all like gasping.
You'll see a guy dresses Fred Flintstone like one of

(30:04):
the Oh that's him, and that's Michael Paul. Shout out
to Michael Paul. He's a magician now but I guess
he did acting when he was young. I don't know,
but that's my friend's cousin.

Speaker 1 (30:15):
Cool story.

Speaker 3 (30:16):
Well, shout out, shout out to him. Anything else about
the cast? The cast, well, I guess we'll talk about
some of the Yeah, there's a more couple more cameos,
but we'll talk about it. I guess later.

Speaker 1 (30:29):
I think we'll talk about there's one big one that
we have to talk about, because when you talk about
this movie, that's what you talk about. All right, Okay,
so let's take a quick break and then when it
comes back, we have everyone's favorite intro. It's not yours anymore.
It's Facts with Max.

Speaker 3 (30:47):
Oh okay, all.

Speaker 1 (30:49):
Right, we're back here and ready, Retcher, we're talking the
thirtieth anniversary, and without further ado, it's facts with Max.
This is facts with Max, Facts with Max. This is
the part of the show where Max gives you interesting
information about the movie or TV show or album or

(31:12):
whatever we're talking about. So that further dude, take it away, Max,
Take it away, Max, and give us some facts with Max.

Speaker 3 (31:22):
Yeah, take away Max.

Speaker 1 (31:25):
Do you remember that? Do you remember that?

Speaker 3 (31:26):
I think?

Speaker 1 (31:27):
So?

Speaker 3 (31:27):
When was that? From? How old is that?

Speaker 1 (31:31):
It's well, it's from last year. We have podcasts a
lot this year. Huh, but I didn't make that up
for this one. That's it's been around.

Speaker 3 (31:40):
Yeah, it sounds it needs.

Speaker 1 (31:43):
To be better. But believe it or not, that's that
was in one tape.

Speaker 3 (31:46):
Boh my gosh. Believe it or not?

Speaker 1 (31:48):
Guys, yeah, I believe all right. You want some facts, Yeah,
you want some mother truck in facts. Here's some facts.
This movie isn't cannon to the rest of the Casper series.

Speaker 3 (32:04):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (32:05):
So the reason why that's important is because in this
movie they give a backstory of why Casper dies. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (32:15):
Kind of sad, kind of Yeah, it's like depressing.

Speaker 1 (32:18):
Yeah, he goes sledding and then gets sick and dies
of was it pneumonia? Yeah, yeah, it happens. Yeah. So
that's when I'm starting off there. There's a there's a fact. Uh.
Did you also know that the director of The Crow
turned down this movie? He was going to do it first,

(32:41):
but this was, I believe, right after The Crow and
he didn't feel so, you know, willing to do Sure. Yeah,
because of everything. Alex pro Yes is who I'm talking. Okay,
here's another cool fact, and it leads into a question.
I'm gonna ask you, but did you know that this
is the very first film where the lead is a

(33:04):
c G character.

Speaker 3 (33:09):
I didn't know that.

Speaker 1 (33:10):
That's huge.

Speaker 3 (33:11):
That is huge, and it's pretty good. I think it
still looks really good, like it.

Speaker 1 (33:17):
Holds.

Speaker 3 (33:17):
It looks really good.

Speaker 1 (33:19):
Off the top of your head, we're what are some
like awesome CG movies that are are that the main
character is.

Speaker 3 (33:31):
I don't know why, but the first thing I thought about,
I guess he's not. I mean, he is the main character.
His name is in the title, Scooby Doo.

Speaker 1 (33:39):
Sure, that's a great one, Scooby Doo. Yeah. I think
recently the Sonic movies, you know, Casper floated. Yeah, so
Sonic can run exactly exactly. But just think about that,
like think about the lead in uh Avatar. Right, the
whole freaking movie is CG. I mean even the Hulk, right,

(34:03):
Like he's a lead. It all started with Casper Roger Rabbit.

Speaker 3 (34:08):
He's not CG. He's just animated.

Speaker 1 (34:10):
He's right, he's animated, he's drawn. So this is the
first time, and I think it it's groundbreaking. I mean,
you point to this movie and you could say, yep,
he's the first ever CG lead, which is I don't
know if that's that's pretty cool. That's crazy, Casper the

(34:31):
Little Ghosts that could. So you know that that scene
where Bill Pullman's going down the steps and he like
looks like he falls, Yeah, that was real.

Speaker 3 (34:43):
Oh wow, it's not a pratfaul.

Speaker 1 (34:46):
Nope, nope.

Speaker 3 (34:48):
He did like a lot of like physical comedy in
the movie. Really.

Speaker 1 (34:52):
Yeah, he's not a very humorous guy.

Speaker 3 (34:56):
No, you wouldn't think that.

Speaker 1 (34:57):
But I don't know, did you know that if it
wasn't for JJ Abrams, we may or might not have
known about Devin Sawa.

Speaker 3 (35:08):
Interesting, so he gave him a chance, he like he.

Speaker 1 (35:12):
He gave all a chance because JJ did some ghost
writing in this script. Okay, so specifically he came up
with the can I keep you and then wrote at
the very end that cast turned into a human Okay. Interesting, Yeah,

(35:33):
that's kind of crazy. So another fact is Devin Sawa
and Christina Ritchie they were a love interest in another movie.
Do you remember what movie that is?

Speaker 3 (35:44):
Wasn't it the one with the girls m.

Speaker 1 (35:49):
Now and then now and then right? So Christina Richie,
they were like casting for her love interests, and she said,
just did Devin Sawa because I guess they were friends.
But I guess there's like a little triangle love triangle
between those two and.

Speaker 3 (36:11):
Thora Birch Oh yeah, okay.

Speaker 1 (36:17):
Because thora Birch said there was kind of a contest
between the girls for him affection. Yeah, but Sawah denies that. Yeah,
and he said that they were just friends.

Speaker 3 (36:31):
Interesting. Interesting, isn't it interesting?

Speaker 1 (36:33):
Yeah? The other thing is mentioned earlier, but Steven Spielberg
is a producer in this movie. And Steven Spielberg made
this happen with his ambulance, and I think we we
kind of forget the influence that Steven Spielberg had in
the nineties. I mean, here are two of like, what

(36:57):
your some of your favorite movies as a kid? Stones,
oh yeah and Casper, Yeah both. Yeah, it's the universal
influence that Steven Spielberg has. Oh here's another thing. So
before Casper, Spielberg almost casted Christina Ritchie in Jurassic Park.

(37:22):
Oh okay, but he ultimately went with Arianna Richards. But
that would have been Christina Ritchie in Jurassic Park would
have been wild, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (37:33):
I mean I could see it though.

Speaker 1 (37:35):
Would have just been so different. Yeah, I think it's
that movie is so iconic, like it's another like she
would have just Adam's family this, Yeah, that's a lot
Jurassic Park. She would just she would have been like
the mega nineties star. Yeah, kid star, you know she's
one of them. But yeah, the tennis balls were used

(38:00):
stand ins for the ghosts and scenes for Christina Richie,
and kudos to her. She's like, what preteen maybe thirteen
years old and she's acting alongside tennis balls, So good
for her. Do you know what The Backstreet Boys has
to do with this movie?

Speaker 3 (38:16):
I absolutely do.

Speaker 1 (38:19):
Tell us, tell La.

Speaker 3 (38:20):
It's the same set as what song?

Speaker 1 (38:25):
Is it? Though?

Speaker 3 (38:25):
Max? I forget everybody, same set with staff manor main
like you know, entry area with the swirl on the
floor rocket bye. Do you know why? I mean, I
don't know how that even.

Speaker 1 (38:47):
Because Backstreets back alright. I was listening to that yesterday.
I hear it every day?

Speaker 3 (38:55):
Yeah, oh is it.

Speaker 1 (38:57):
Day part of the every day?

Speaker 3 (38:59):
Yeah, hear it every day every day?

Speaker 1 (39:02):
My gosh, every I hear it every day. That and
the yeah you've uh that too.

Speaker 3 (39:11):
They've really gotten the millennial hits over there.

Speaker 1 (39:13):
Oh no, no, my job. It's on. That's what's on.
That's what's playing every single day at my job. No.
But the reason why is because I think that the
set was pretty expensive.

Speaker 3 (39:28):
Okay, so they were like trying to reuse it repurpose it.

Speaker 1 (39:31):
Yeah. Yeah, but that came out in like ninety nine. No,
when the Faction's Back comes out, Oh see, people are
gonna get so mad. They're gonna be like, Okay, that
was That was August nineteen ninety seven.

Speaker 3 (39:43):
Yeah, but they probably you know, worked.

Speaker 1 (39:46):
On so it sat for like two years.

Speaker 3 (39:49):
I don't know, I don't know. I'm that set was,
it's the I want to say that was. Yeah. I
was on the Universal lot in one of their backlots,
because I remember going on the tour back in the
day and they said, like Casper was filmed in there,
So obviously that's probably one of the main set. I mean,
they filmed some of it in Maine. A lot of

(40:11):
like the you know.

Speaker 1 (40:13):
Surrounding shots in that fictional city called Friendship because I
guess Stephen King.

Speaker 3 (40:22):
Maybe, I don't know, mean it's beautiful coastal, kind of
spooky area over there, but yeah, a lot of the
back law I mean, yeah, they used Universal because it's
Universal picture. And then they did have the the Lazarus
Machine was on display in Universal, Florida. They had a

(40:45):
thing called the boneyard and in the park, the Universal
Park boneyard would be like you know, they've got like
other cars and movie cars from and stuff, and yeah,
in their boneyard back when that movie came out, they
had I think the Lazarus Machine. They also had like
a walk.

Speaker 1 (41:03):
Through see only you would know this stuff.

Speaker 3 (41:05):
Attraction when Casper came out. Well, if it's theme park related,
then you're gonna get more information. But yeah, they had
they had a Casper walk through thing when the movie,
kind of in conjunction with the movie came out. There's
if you google it on YouTube, there is a little
tiny bit of video of it, but there really isn't
a whole lot of evidence. There isn't even a whole

(41:26):
lot of evidence of the Lazarus Machine being there. They
kind of like got rid of a lot of that stuff.
I don't think there was much of that going on
in Hollywood, but Florida took a lot of the Casper
stuff for some reason. But they filmed it out here
in the in the.

Speaker 1 (41:45):
Lot, all right, well, the last thing I want to
mention is how this movie got made because basically, Steven
Spielberg was watching a a TV movie or TV episode
that Brad Silberling directed, and Steven Spielberg said, hey, I'm

(42:07):
gonna give you a shot. I see your direction, I
see the heart you put into this. Thirty minutes. I'm
gonna give you ninety minutes. It's gonna be Casper. And
then I guess Silberling, yeah, Soberling yeah, and I guess
Silverling was like Casper, like that Casper, and stevens Spielberg said, yes,

(42:28):
we've had to hold off on production, but we've locked
the code with CG. What Jurassic Park. We know how
to do it now. So to go back into our
conversation about it being the first CG character leading a movie,
that was the pitch and Brad Silberling, based off of

(42:50):
uses a TV movie director interest and.

Speaker 3 (42:54):
He did TV shows about Brad Syberling. Which is actually
really sad is that his girlfriend, I don't know if
they were dating at the time or they weren't together,
was murdered. Yeah, she was like at the time, she
was like a rising stock. I can't remember he name
but she was like a sitcom star and a guy

(43:15):
went up to her in Hollywood, went to her apartment.
She opened the door and any shot her. I don't
I don't know if he was a stalker. I feel
I think from what he was. Yeah, like he went
to her door one time, he got sent to she
sent him away or something like that, and then he
came back again and then he yeah, and then he

(43:37):
murdered her.

Speaker 1 (43:38):
I remember reading something about this where they actually movie
studios have to have or there was laws that were
written about stalking celebrities.

Speaker 3 (43:47):
Now I think due to her due to that.

Speaker 1 (43:51):
Yeah, yeah, so we'd be remiss to not mention her name.
Her name was Rebecca Schaeffer, so uh yeah, awful awful.

Speaker 3 (44:01):
Oh you know what's interesting too.

Speaker 1 (44:03):
She was only twenty two. What's interesting.

Speaker 3 (44:09):
The lady who I just realized, the lady who helped
write the movie. Her name is Sherry Stoner, and she
was the like they used her as like the model
for Ariel when they were making Little Mermaid.

Speaker 1 (44:25):
Right, and she was also was one of the writers
for Animaniacs. Yeah, so another Steven Spielberg was just.

Speaker 3 (44:32):
Like a lot of like little interesting facts about this movie.
I think, yeah, little connections and stuff. Some of them
sad and.

Speaker 1 (44:37):
Some of them it's around Steven Spilberg, which is why. Yeah,
I think it's crazy how much Steven Spielberg influenced in
the nineties, Like that's why.

Speaker 3 (44:47):
So much for media, Oh my gosh.

Speaker 1 (44:50):
Yeah. And then the last thing I'll mention is that
this movie was released May twenty six, nineteen ninety five,
so that's why we're celebrating the thirtieth andniversary of Casper.
It had a budget of fifty five million dollars, which
is actually quite a lot, and a lot of that
went to CG and they had to do a lot
of cuts due to budget. It grossed one hundred million.

Speaker 3 (45:17):
It did very well.

Speaker 1 (45:20):
Yeah, it grossed one hundred million in the US and
two hundred and eighty worldwide. But for whatever reason, although
it made almost three hundred million dollars worldwide, Universal did
not see it as a big commercial success, so they

(45:41):
decided not to do a sequel, and then the sequels
kind of floundered and then.

Speaker 3 (45:46):
Critically also did not do well. Critics didn't like it.
It didn't know, well, it was for kids. Yeah, so
I mean it's it's weird. It made so much money nowadays,
I mean, I feel like if you're moving makes a
lot of money and people don't like it, it doesn't really matter.
It's just the money. Money talks.

Speaker 1 (46:05):
It made money and made more than more than Double's budget.
But Universal wanted that big, big box office. They wanted
that Jurassic Park money. Yeah. All right, Well we're gonna
take another break, and when we get back, we're gonna
talk about scenes that we like from Casper and some

(46:26):
of our favorite moments. So don't go anywhere, all right,
We're back here on ready to red shro Chelsea. You
got through all the facts and got through all the
weeds of Casper, So tell me what are some of
those scenes? Are just things you like about Casper? Oh?

Speaker 3 (46:48):
Yeah, I think when I think of this movie, one
of the first things I think about, funny enough, is
that set. I am obsessed with that set, very iconic,
so much so that I've done research on. Back in
the day, I did research on, like, well, what it's
so unique? What is that design? The windows? It's real round,

(47:13):
there's a lot of curves, and what it is is
it's like art nouveau, Art nouveau architecture, and you there's
there was a house not far from where I used
to live that had the same art style, but it's
kind of I feel like it's more of a European style.

Speaker 1 (47:34):
It's French exactly.

Speaker 3 (47:36):
Yeah, Art nouveau, and so you don't really see it
too much out here, I feel like in the West
kind of area, maybe more on the other side. But
I love that style. I love the stained glass windows.
I love the sworled ceiling which kind of comes into
play with the swirl of like the ghosts kind of.

(48:01):
I yeah, I just love that aspect of it.

Speaker 1 (48:03):
I like.

Speaker 3 (48:03):
I just love the way that the sets look. I
love the attic set that she goes up and she
cleans that up and it just so cool. I love
Haunted House movies, and I wonder if it's because of
this movie that's why I like movies that are in
old homes and old old houses and things. But I

(48:24):
just always really like that a lot as a kid.
I love the score by James Horner. I think is
the person to the score. I have the soundtrack, and
it's a beautiful score. They used it. I was reading earlier.
You probably saw too that they use some of the
music for the trailer for The Grinch. I guess. I'm

(48:45):
sure when that trailer came out, I probably was like, oh,
that's from Casper because I liked it back then.

Speaker 1 (48:52):
But funny enough, in the Casper trailer they used did
these beetlejuice these beatle.

Speaker 3 (48:58):
Yeah, they they do that a lot. But back in
the day, they would use the beetlejuice music for so
much stuff for everything. Oh yeah, totally. So I love
Christina Ricci, like I said, she's one of my favorite actresses,
so I yeah. And then it's you know, it takes
place at Halloween time. Love Halloween. Oh and of course,
like all the kids loved like the what's the machine called,

(49:20):
like the up Adam Up and Adam machine, Like the.

Speaker 1 (49:23):
Chair that was scary.

Speaker 3 (49:25):
I loh, my god. As a kid, I wanted to
be on that, Like that was so cool. It was
like a haunted house ride. It's amazing. And then you
get into that set with the Lazarus machine coming out
of the wall. It's just so cool. Like it has
great set pieces in this movie. That's like kind of
my number one favorite thing about the movie is the

(49:46):
way it looks.

Speaker 1 (49:48):
Yeah, I mean that's one of the most kind of
iconic aspects of this movie is the feel of it.
And I was thinking about, what are kids introductions to
spooky things now? I mean, wait Wednesday, But yeah, we
used to have a lot of gateway horror bumps for

(50:08):
the Dark cast.

Speaker 3 (50:11):
Yeah, there was a lot more all the Disney Channel movies.

Speaker 1 (50:15):
Yeah. I think these kids just go straight into watching
just like more aggressive.

Speaker 3 (50:20):
Yeah, yeah, it gets into the mort there isn't. That's
why there's not enough gateway horns either either Kitty super
super Kitty or you go really ramp it up to
it or whatever.

Speaker 1 (50:32):
Yeah, there's nothing in between. Just for like Freddy's.

Speaker 3 (50:36):
I would say this generation's Gateway horrores would probably be
five minutes at Freddy's because it wasn't really four kids.
But then it became dark. Yeah, well it's child murder
and things like that. And they knew what they were
doing because they made that movie PG. Thirteen. They could
have easily made that movie.

Speaker 1 (50:55):
Ar that's a good call.

Speaker 3 (50:56):
So they went into that meet, Hey, we're going to
get you thirteen. They realized that a lot of the
fan base is more younger than it probably was intended
to to begin with so, but yeah, I would say
that's urgent, this generation's version of that's a good call.
But it's way more intense than Casper. Oh my god.

Speaker 1 (51:14):
Yeah, And I was thinking, like we had Renona writer
in the nineties being like the goth horror icon than
Christina Richie, you know, doing this and Wednesday. It's definitely Jenna.

Speaker 3 (51:32):
And that's why I think Tim Burton picked her for
Beetlejuice because it was a good fit.

Speaker 1 (51:37):
But I don't know before Jenna or Tega, who was it.
Who was I.

Speaker 3 (51:41):
Mean, maybe like Millie Bobby Brown or something.

Speaker 1 (51:47):
I don't know, but she's only in stranger things, you know.
General Ortega is in a bunch of horror stuff, but
kind of like Christina Richie, She's she was in Cursed
as she like, yeah, and now she's in yellow Jackets,
Sleepy Hollow, like she's the horror queen or just we
just are familiar seeing her and that stuff. But yeah,

(52:11):
it's definitely general taking out. But I was thinking about that,
like there always has to be a baton, yeah, pass on.
What I really liked was Father Guido Serducci. I don't
know if you're familiar with him from snl Oh my gosh.

Speaker 3 (52:28):
She's a crumb cake.

Speaker 1 (52:30):
Piece of crumb cake. Dude. It's so funny. I laugh
every single talk. Problem, no problem, No, Like it's so
nineties actually, I mean that was before that. Yeah, that
was an e seventies eighties. Yeah, seventies eighties. But like
I didn't get the reference as a kid. I get
it now.

Speaker 3 (52:50):
I mean, can't they like jam packed this movie with
like so many pop culture stuff.

Speaker 1 (52:56):
Which I think is why it didn't help it so
much age Like I like it. I like it.

Speaker 3 (53:05):
But yeah, you're right where you do that? Yeah, that's true.

Speaker 1 (53:08):
Yeah, it's always a risk to do very contemporary humor
or references, which is one of the reasons why Disney
never tends to do it. And when Robin Williams did it,
it was a big deal. So when he did it
as the Genie. But yeah, even the peace soup on
the priest, like that is an homage to the ex or,

(53:29):
Like it's very subtle. But let's get to that cameo,
the dan Ackroyd you're gonna call someone else. I remember
as a kid that was crazy, Like I remember, like
what Ray's stance And it's funny because Ray has a mustache,

(53:52):
and it's.

Speaker 3 (53:53):
Just oh yeah, and he looks different. That's true.

Speaker 1 (53:55):
Yeah, Like we don't have Winston, we don't have Egon
or we don't have of Vankman. We just have stance.
We just have Rayed Stance. And Dan Aykroyd has gone
on the record to say that it is Cannon in
the Ghostbuster.

Speaker 3 (54:11):
That's awesome.

Speaker 1 (54:13):
I mean I love that. I guess he could claim
it whatever, you know, but I feel like he's you know,
just he could do it.

Speaker 3 (54:20):
It's awesome.

Speaker 1 (54:21):
So yeah, So that that is like I think for me,
that was probably my first cameo as a kid understanding like, hey,
this is from something else and it's in this uh
that in like the Tails from the Crypt the crypt Oh.

Speaker 3 (54:35):
I love that too.

Speaker 1 (54:37):
My God scared me all the time, Like I was
scared of the Oh, I love thee Were you scared
of him? I was scared of him.

Speaker 3 (54:44):
I don't know everything I was scared of as a kid.
I was so intrigued by and I'd get like obsessed
with it and then I'd like I want to get
over it and stuff.

Speaker 1 (54:54):
So another thing that I was going to talk to
you about, Chelse, is this friendship slash kind of of love. Yeah,
thing that goes on between Cat and Casper.

Speaker 3 (55:05):
He's like Casper the friend zone ghost.

Speaker 1 (55:10):
So I mean the kiss at the end.

Speaker 3 (55:12):
Yeah, but but it but like Casper like as a
ghost feels like he's like young, like a little kid,
and she seems older.

Speaker 1 (55:23):
Yeah as a kid didn't. She seemed like super old.
And you look at it and like she's like thirteen.
But yeah, I don't know, like do ghosts have hormones,
because according to this movie, they do.

Speaker 3 (55:36):
Because when he's like, there's a girl in my room
and he was like real excited about it.

Speaker 1 (55:41):
He was very excited, you know, and he's like can
I keep you He's he's in the bed with her. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (55:46):
Yeah, yeah, he's.

Speaker 1 (55:47):
Just a hormonal teenage ghost.

Speaker 3 (55:50):
Yeah, I guess so.

Speaker 1 (55:52):
But yeah, no, he does seem young because like all
his toys and stuff that she brings out, and his
treasure is like a ball and a min.

Speaker 3 (56:01):
Yeah, but I mean it's like he's from a long
time ago though too, So there's that yeah.

Speaker 1 (56:08):
Yeah, but I was just I was thinking, hmm, cas
have hormones. Yeah, I don't know, I just have hormones.
It really made me think it's kind of a weird.

Speaker 3 (56:16):
Yeah, I had is a weird aspect to that for sure.
For sure.

Speaker 1 (56:21):
So there's there's things that had me you know, watching
this last night, no two nights ago at like twelve thirty. Yeah,
and I was like, hmm, ghosts hormonest I think about
that one enough, do you?

Speaker 3 (56:35):
I do think I have to say one thing is
I love I like Eric Idol and I like Kathy mulready,
but like there are the end there are like that
whole thing kind of not great ending.

Speaker 1 (56:50):
I feel like, well, that's the thing about this movie
is it does like a really good job with the characters.
And then like the plot just is in the last act.
They introduced the plot at like act to B and
I was like, oh, yeah, my dad was an inventor
and he has this thing and now it can turn
me into human and all this stuff. You know. It

(57:13):
was like, I think the first half I enjoy more
than the second round.

Speaker 3 (57:20):
Yeah. I always felt that the beginning part was a
lot stronger that that ending. And then with I mean
the high school dance and stuff, that's cool because they're
trying to like you know, make sure that that doesn't
interfear with each other. But I just always thought that, yeah,
like her her villain arc Got is just strange and
like the dying and coming back and I don't know

(57:43):
the ending was I always thought was kind of like
one of the weaker parts of it for me.

Speaker 1 (57:48):
Yeah. Yeah, and it is interesting. I mean, it's like,
I know it brought it up, but it is a
movie in the nineties. But the IP for we didn't
call it ips back then. Yeah, but that's the terminology
now think about it. In nineteen ninety four, we had
Richie rich Floodstones Casper and Richie Rich and Casper were

(58:09):
actually both Harvey comics, right, so we had like it's
the equivalent of now seeing some of our stuff either
getting remade or being put into live action. Yeah, that's
what was happened for like these boomers, right, so our
parents were bringing us to the movies and like, hey,

(58:30):
here's Casper. You know I used to have comics when
I was a kid, and here we are like gravitating.

Speaker 3 (58:37):
I guess the version of that, kind of like what
we were talking about earlier, is them taking these you know,
Cinderella snow White from the thirties and then making them
live Disney you know, making live action again. That's like
Stitch exactly.

Speaker 1 (58:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (58:56):
I think that's sort of like today's version of what
you're talking about, is them just yeah, remaking these already
cartoon films into live action, yeah, instead of like comic
strips or whatever. I mean, I guess you could even
say that with Dick Tracy too, because that was late
nineties or early nineties and early nineties.

Speaker 1 (59:17):
Yeah, but I'm just saying like as far as like universal,
because I don't know if Richie rich was universal, I'd
have to check.

Speaker 3 (59:23):
I know Flintstones and Casper were, but.

Speaker 1 (59:25):
Yeah, because Ambulance, right, they're part of it, was part
of that. But yeah, it's just interesting during this like
mid nineties, early nineties, like a lot of the fifties stuff, yeah,
became you know popular again, And then we didn't actually
talk about the movie. We talked about like found the backstory.

Speaker 3 (59:44):
Well, I figure people who want to listen to the
episode are probably people who are fans of the movie, right, Yeah, yeah,
I'm hoping.

Speaker 1 (59:52):
I don't know, we didn't talk about the the uncles,
but you want to wait on that. You just want
to talk about them as like character.

Speaker 3 (01:00:01):
Yeah, I mean, you got stretchy. What is stretch? Can't
I remember stretch?

Speaker 1 (01:00:12):
Stinky so? Yeah, stinky fatso And apparently there were made
for this movie. They were like iterations because Casper in
the cartoon used to live with a whole bunch of ghosts,
so they kind of okay, mix and match them and
combine them into these characters and they're just total assholes.

Speaker 3 (01:00:35):
Yeah, they're so mean to their nephew and they're just
so mean.

Speaker 1 (01:00:43):
You know who? You know who else are a bunch
of a holes. How about that middle school teacher that
was like, oh, hey, yeah the gym is unavailable. Hey cat,
you live in a spooky place. Yeah, we throw our
whole law party in your house. You don't have to

(01:01:03):
ask your dad or anything but pressure. Yeah, I'd be
so pissed. I know.

Speaker 3 (01:01:09):
He was kind of kind of awful.

Speaker 1 (01:01:11):
Yeah, Okay, one last thing, Yeah, I want to run
a fan theory by you. Okay, Okay, So there's a
fan theory on Reddit because there's kind of a plot
hole in this movie, Chelsea, and we haven't really mentioned
it yet. So the whole point of this movie, and

(01:01:32):
it's kind of dark a little bit. It talks about
death and talks about, you know, losing a loved one,
what to do grief. Everyone's kind of dealing with grief.
You know, Cat lost her mom, her dad you know
obviously lost his wife. So it's talking about grief and
loss and things like that, which is, you know, pretty mature.

(01:01:53):
It didn't need to do that, and it's kind of
a mature theme. And we saw the other two Casperine
movies were more kind of stupid kids movies, but here
it gets even darker. So there is a Reddit post
the theme is, or or kind of the lore is
ghosts have unfinished business, and I think this movie really

(01:02:19):
kind of shaped my understanding of that. But like, yeah,
ghosts are just misunderstudy of unfinished business from right, So
the dad isn't a ghost, which is kind of a
plot hole, okay, because he was trying to get his
son back to life, and if he dies, he is

(01:02:43):
unfair like Casper was still dead. So that's true.

Speaker 3 (01:02:47):
I see what you're saying.

Speaker 1 (01:02:48):
Yeah, there's it's kind of a plot hole. They didn't
really hash that out, but there's a theory out there
that says that the Ghostly Trio those are the quote
unquote uncle, they weren't actually uncles. But it says in
a news paper clipping that Christina Ritchie finds in the attic.

(01:03:10):
Cat finds in the attic that the father. Caster's father
was haunted by the ghosts of his son and was
declared clinically insane before his death. So the reddit says
that Stretched Fat Sone Stinky were test subjects for the
Lazarus machine. So there's this theory that they the reason

(01:03:33):
why they're dead is because they were killed there as
his dad, Casper's dad was trying to use the Lazarus
machine to bring the Yeah, because in a mansion that big,
why would they have all their beds in one room.
You see that cat opens the door and it's kind

(01:03:53):
of the introduction to you know, the Ghostly Trio. It
has all their names there. So the theory continues and saying, oh,
the reason why they were sharing a room is because
they were all tests.

Speaker 3 (01:04:07):
Damn yeah, damn yeah. I mean so I'm not against
it's interesting, but dang, that's dark.

Speaker 1 (01:04:14):
And the other thing is that the people were so
scared of the manner and the mansion was because it
was known for the father being a serial killer. So
that's why people didn't want to go up there. It
wasn't just that the whip staff manner was ghosts, but

(01:04:38):
it was known.

Speaker 3 (01:04:39):
Yeah the dad was crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:04:41):
Yeah that was crazy and a serial killer. I don't know,
what do you think?

Speaker 3 (01:04:46):
I mean, they're interesting. I mean it makes the movie
a lot darker, but yeah, that's interesting.

Speaker 1 (01:04:51):
Yeah, because they have unfinished business. Right. Yeah, to go
back to you know Cast's father being able to cross over,
was that him being clinically insane helped him cross over?
Because I don't know, but that's where that kind of

(01:05:12):
poke some holes in that theory. Okay, so, but there
is there is a plot hole that the data is
ghost exactly. So, and the reason why the the ghostly
Trio or ghosts is because they were killed and they
felt like their life meaning and wanted to live. So interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:05:33):
Interesting.

Speaker 1 (01:05:33):
I was not thinking like that at five years old.

Speaker 3 (01:05:37):
Yeah, that's for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:05:38):
No, You're like, these are the these are the these
are the same hoboes in uh in the Haunted Man.

Speaker 3 (01:05:45):
I'm not thinking that Fatso it was like I have
to remain a ghost because I need to talk about
Oprah on hiatus. You know, I don't think he was
like this is what life's gonna mean about.

Speaker 1 (01:06:00):
Oh, all right, well, we're gonna take our last break
and we're gonna come back. We're gonna give our final
thoughts and give a rating for Casper. All right, we're

(01:06:21):
back here on Radio Retro. We're gonna give our final
thoughts and a rating. So here on the Radio Retro podcast.
The way that we rate our movies, this is how
it happens. So we take the movie and then take
a phrase or maybe a noun or something, and we

(01:06:41):
describe it out of ten. So, for example, if we
were doing Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, we
would give it ten out of ten. That's my boy,
that's my son.

Speaker 3 (01:06:58):
The most suppressing part of the film.

Speaker 1 (01:07:00):
I love I love Sugic Diggree means so much and
his dad so good. Anyways, you want to go first,
you want me to go first?

Speaker 3 (01:07:08):
You go first?

Speaker 1 (01:07:09):
All right, final thoughts, So Casper, thirty years, we're here,
We're here thirty years kind of wild. Makes me feel olden.
They did a fantastic job marketing this movie. We didn't
even mention the Super Nintendo game Where.

Speaker 3 (01:07:29):
Did you play?

Speaker 1 (01:07:31):
I have played it, but I'm not played as a kid.
So it's a kind of escort game. Those are the worst.
But you're Casper and you're trying to lead Cat from
one room in the manner to the other. They had
that They had the Pizza Hut toys. He also had
like these little figurine things that I remember having. I

(01:07:53):
remember t shirts like Casper was pretty cool, Like I
don't know, Universal had kind of these cool marketing Yeah.
So when you kind of unpack it, if you look
at the movie for what it is, it's a nineties
kids movie. But when you see kind of the layers,

(01:08:15):
like the influence of Steven Spielberg, the fact that it's
the first ever CG movie that's a lead. You see
Bill Paulman, you see Christina Ritchie. Eric Idol is in
a kids movie. You know, like the first cameo probably
for a lot of us. There's just a lot in there,

(01:08:36):
all these cameos, like Clint Eastwood is in a Casper movie.
It's wild, right, So at face value, okay, but I
think once you start to let's pull the ribbon away
and see what's like they're all together, it's kind of fun.
It's kind of like a fun nineties movie, you know. Uh.

(01:08:57):
Devin Sawa I know that. Like I was mentioning that
I was going to talk about this at my job
and a coworker is like, oh my god, I love
Devin Sola. I had such a huge crush on him
because of that movie. You know. So it's kind of
an important movie, That's what I'm saying. You know, is

(01:09:17):
it as important as like Jurassic Park. No, But for
those who watched it, I think it's important, and it's
it's a foot watch. It's solid. I'm gonna give it
a seven out of ten. It's a piece of cake.

Speaker 3 (01:09:31):
Yeah, he's a crumb cake.

Speaker 1 (01:09:34):
He's a crumb cake.

Speaker 3 (01:09:36):
Nice.

Speaker 1 (01:09:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:09:40):
My thoughts on Oh, I wanted to say shout out
to the old school show that's not on anymore that
my parents I remember as a child. My parents are
bout it constantly. Hard copy. In the beginning of the yes,
I was like, hell yeah, hard copy. My parents loved
hard copy, So that was great that like that. That know,

(01:10:01):
that just brings me back so much for hard copy.
But yeah, this has always been a personal favorite of mine.
I watched it so much growing up as a kid,
you know, Like we said, it's a little gateway into
like me liking spooky things. It was always on rotation.
I mean I would watch it any time of the year,

(01:10:21):
but it was heavily on rotation during Halloween time because
you know, the end of the movie is Halloween Party.
And yeah, I'm just always really I like the vibes
of it. Like you know what, listen, it's not a
perfect movie, it's not great whatever, but I just love
the vibes. I want to be in whipstaff manner. You

(01:10:43):
guys so bad.

Speaker 1 (01:10:45):
You should have been a backup dancer.

Speaker 3 (01:10:46):
I should have been. I should have been, you know,
but I was too busy being for so you were
seven at that at that point I was older. Yeah,
but yeah, I just loved it.

Speaker 1 (01:10:59):
Oh my guy went back again.

Speaker 3 (01:11:02):
I love And that's why I love that. That's like
my favorite music video from the nineties. I was thinking
about that just the other day.

Speaker 1 (01:11:07):
I was like, this is like my favorite you know
what's funny about that song? It's like am I sexu? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:11:17):
And it's it's like howie or whatever dress is a
werewolf or something? Yeah, and it's like, no, you're not,
You're not. They gave that line to the wrong person,
so uh, yeah, I don't I give it I give it.
I don't know, like seven out of ten Lazarus machines

(01:11:41):
or what. It's been a while, I knew what. I've
seen it so many times. I didn't watch it recently,
you guys, but I have seen it so many times.
So but I need to watch it again. But I
can quote it. I'm quoting it.

Speaker 1 (01:11:51):
The piece of cake pie is like you know this,
we say that.

Speaker 3 (01:11:54):
I say that all the time. Piece of cake. It
is crumb cake, no.

Speaker 1 (01:11:57):
Problem, crumb cake. When you said Lazarus, I was just
thinking of that sting song Lazarus, Lazarus and the Heart
Lazarus Lazarus in the huh you know? Anyways? All right,
Well that concludes episode two eight, the thirtieth anniversary of Casper. Chelsea,
is there anything you want to say to our listeners.

Speaker 3 (01:12:19):
I hope you guys are having a great Memorial Day weekend?

Speaker 1 (01:12:23):
Is that? When that's sure?

Speaker 3 (01:12:25):
We have unfinished business, so we'll probably be back at
some point at some point. But yeah, if you haven't
seen Casper, watch it with your kids.

Speaker 1 (01:12:35):
Do yourself a favor, or watch at least watch.

Speaker 3 (01:12:38):
The Backstreet Boys music video.

Speaker 1 (01:12:40):
You know, yeah, sure, do that?

Speaker 3 (01:12:42):
Do that?

Speaker 1 (01:12:42):
You know, yeah, sure. All right, Well, we are going
to conclude this episode, and like we've mentioned, you know,
we're we don't have a weekly schedule right now, just
with what's going on in my life and you know,
just Chris and Chelsea, we all have stuff that's went on.
You know, we'll see what the future holds as far

(01:13:05):
as having more of a regular schedule, but at this
point we're just gonna pump them out when we can.
So we have some things in the fire. We have
some guests, yes, let's do some guests. We have some
guests that are on the doc. We'll say, guests that
have never been on Ready to Retro yet. So I
know I tease that last time, but I'm gonna tease

(01:13:25):
it again. All Right, We'll see you next time. Ready
to Retro listeners, and like always, we're Ready to Retro.

Speaker 3 (01:13:35):
Are you?

Speaker 1 (01:13:42):
We're listening to episode of two eight of the Ready
to Retro podcast. If you are new too Ready to Retro,
you can listen to our whole library episodes that covers
a variety of topics about the eighties, nineties, and so
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(01:14:04):
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(01:14:27):
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