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110: “Who Is Your Daddy And What Does He Do?” – Kindergarten Cop & Junior

If you thought we had just one bun in the oven for our lineup of Arnold Schwarzenegger comedies about birth and child-rearing – surprise! This topic is actually twins!

In our previous episode, we cooed over 1988’s Twins, in which Schwarzenegger popped his cherry as a humorous leading man and wowed us with his lack of vanity in getting laughs. In this episode, we carry our “Schwarzepreggers” topic to term, seeing if Arnold’s final two collaborations with Ivan Reitman are what we’re expecting – and if they still deliver.

In KINDERGARTEN COP (1990) Arnold stars as Detective John Kimble, a grim cop who learns that the only way to bust a drug dealer is to go undercover as a kindergarten teacher. (Don’t ask.) There’s plenty of deception, betrayal, yelling at children, gunplay on school grounds, and even a feral ferret – but are the laughs here, or absent? This bizarre blend of kiddie hijinks and deadly police drama just might have to stay after class. 

Then, Arnold teams back up with Reitman and Danny DeVito for JUNIOR (1994), a movie about how becoming a single parent affects a man’s love life, friendships, and career – because he has inseminated his new work crush Emma Thompson’s secretly stolen ovum, implanted it in his own abdomen, and become pregnant himself. Junior is notorious for pushing high concept star vehicles to their extreme, subverting Schwarzenegger’s tough guy persona as he contends with morning sickness and kooky cravings instead of the usual cyborg nuclear attack. But nearly 30 years later, does Junior fill our bellies with laughter as easily as it fills Arnold’s belly with a viable infant? Grab some forceps, because the chuckles may not come so easily this time around!

Follow When We Were Young on Twitter and Instagram at @WWWYshow, on Facebook at Facebook.com/WWWYShow and email episode suggestions to wwwyshow@gmail.com. Don’t forget to subscribe and review us on Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts (or wherever you get your podcasts) so more folks check out the show!

Help us defray the costs of creating this show, which include recording remotely, purchasing movies/shows/music to review, delivery food to eat our feelings, and producing & editing in-house at the MFP Studio in Los Angeles, California by donating to our Patreon account at patreon.com/WhenWeWereYoung

108: “The Big Orange Couch Is in Place, So Hop On!” – SNICK

If you were a ’90s kid, chances are you wanted just two things in life: for Nick to take over your school, and a spot saved for you on the big orange couch synonymous with SNICK.

Nickelodeon’s Saturday night programming block for pre-teens launched in 1992 and became an instant hit with the demographic who was still awake at 8pm but had nowhere to go. Now that we’re all grown up, is there anything worth revisiting in any of the many shows that graced the SNICK lineup?

Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society, we take a look back at CLARISSA EXPLAINS IT ALL, ALL THAT, ARE YOU AFRAID OF THE DARK?, THE SECRET WORLD OF ALEX MACK, ROUNDHOUSE, THE ADVENTURES OF PETE & PETE, and some of the other shows that made us feel like we finally had something to do on a Saturday night. Plus, we try and figure out why Super Soakers had such a monopoly on children’s advertising in the ’90s.

Follow When We Were Young on Twitter and Instagram at @WWWYshow, on Facebook at Facebook.com/WWWYShow and email episode suggestions to wwwyshow@gmail.com. Don’t forget to subscribe and review us on Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts (or wherever you get your podcasts) so more folks check out the show!

Help us defray the costs of creating this show, which include recording remotely, purchasing movies/shows/music to review, delivery food to eat our feelings, and producing & editing in-house at the MFP Studio in Los Angeles, California by donating to our Patreon account at patreon.com/WhenWeWereYoung

106: “…And Start Getting Real” – MTV’s The Real World Part 2

In Part 1 of our look back at MTV’s The Real World, we were impressed with how quickly the show defined the tone, format, and style that reality television would use for the next thirty years (and counting). But it was the show’s third season, with the infamous slob Puck facing off against courageous AIDS activist Pedro, that made The Real World a real sensation, ushering in a wave of reality shows at the turn of the millennium that hasn’t died down since. (Listen to Part 1 here if you haven’t caught up: https://themfp.org/wwwy-105-mtv-real-world-1/)

For Part 2, we look back at that groundbreaking (and heartbreaking) San Francisco-set season, which aired in 1994. Then we fast forward to one of the show’s other major scandals and reveal who we side with regarding the infamous Seattle Slap. Finally, we revisit personal favorite Real World seasons from our teen years and talk about the cast members who made the biggest impressions on us.

As The Real World turns 30 this May – and is therefore way too old to be a cast member on The Real World – it’s time to celebrate the series that just might have had a greater influence on the TV landscape than any other show of the 90s.

Follow When We Were Young on Twitter and Instagram at @WWWYshow, on Facebook at Facebook.com/WWWYShow and email episode suggestions to wwwyshow@gmail.com. Don’t forget to subscribe and review us on Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts (or wherever you get your podcasts) so more folks check out the show!

Help us defray the costs of creating this show, which include recording remotely, purchasing movies/shows/music to review, delivery food to eat our feelings, and producing & editing in-house at the MFP Studio in Los Angeles, California by donating to our Patreon account at patreon.com/WhenWeWereYoung

105: “Stop Being Polite” – MTV’s The Real World Part 1

What do RuPaul, Guy Fieri, Jennifer Hudson, Ozzy Osbourne, Honey Boo Boo, and the Kardashians have in common? They all owe a debt of gratitude to MTV’s THE REAL WORLD, which popularized the tone, format, and style most reality shows still adhere to today.

In 1992, a show that followed regular people in their ordinary lives was groundbreaking. So extraordinary, in fact, that many contemporary critics thought reality television was a laughable fad aimed exclusively at brainless teens. The Real World’s first season, set in a New York City loft, got the formula down surprisingly quick, featuring all the partying, pranks, and heated debates we came to expect from the series in later years.

For this podcast, Chris, Seth, and Becky reminisce about their own experiences “being taped,” discuss their memories of the reality TV boom that blew up right around the millennium, then check out The Real World’s most memorable – AKA most notorious – episodes in honor of the show’s 30th anniversary. This era of the series covered topical social issues ranging from AIDS to abortion to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” so there’s a lot to cover here!

Pack your bags for a whirlwind trip through one decade in America, with stops in New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, New Orleans, San Francisco, Chicago, and Hawaii. Controversial opinions are mandatory, but clothing is optional!

Follow When We Were Young on Twitter and Instagram at @WWWYshow, on Facebook at Facebook.com/WWWYShow and email episode suggestions to wwwyshow@gmail.com. Don’t forget to subscribe and review us on Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts (or wherever you get your podcasts) so more folks check out the show. And donate to the National Network of Abortion Funds at AbortionFunds.org

104: “I’m Gonna Get Medieval On Your Ass” – Pulp Fiction

McDonalds, TV pilots, Elvis, and foot massages – just the usual topics of conversation between gangsters, drug users, hitmen, and criminals, at least in Quentin Tarantino’s world. The release of the writer/director’s heavily-lauded PULP FICTION in 1994 was a groundbreaking moment for both Tarantino and movies, and its pop culture-obsessed characters and narrative-jumbling structure influenced the next decade or so of cinema (for better or worse).

Do Pulp Fiction’s accolades remain as bright and shiny as whatever’s in that briefcase? Or are we right in striking down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger? Join us for an expletive-filled adventure back to the ’90s – seriously, make the kiddos cover their ears for this one.

This is Part 2 of our Tarantino-thon! Listen to Part 1 where we revisited NATURAL BORN KILLERS and RESERVOIR DOGS here: https://themfp.org/wwwy-103-naturalbornkillers/

Follow When We Were Young on Twitter and Instagram at @WWWYshow, on Facebook at Facebook.com/WWWYShow and email episode suggestions to wwwyshow@gmail.com. Don’t forget to subscribe and review us on Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts (or wherever you get your podcasts) so more folks check out the show!

Help us defray the costs of creating this show, which include recording remotely, purchasing movies/shows/music to review, delivery food to eat our feelings, and producing & editing in-house at the MFP Studio in Los Angeles, California by donating to our Patreon account at patreon.com/WhenWeWereYoung

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