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Howard the Duck (1986)
195 Plays1 year ago
Nic Baldwin comes back to torture Perry with another terrible movie. This time, it's Howard the Duck, the movie that almost bankrupted George Lucas. Although there are some moments, this ultimately turns out to be a mess.
And yes, we talk about the duck boobs.
Listen to Nic on the In Love With Movies podcast or follow him on Twitter
Want to tell us what you think? Have any questions or comments for Perry about superheroes in media or comics? Leave a voice message to play on the show. You can also apply to be a guest on the show.
PARAGONS OF EARTH is a comic book project I’m developing with Thomas Deja and Eric Johns. You can support the project by visiting crowdfundr.com/paragonscomic.
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Transcript
Introduction to Paragons of Earth and Crowdfunding
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey guys, before we get into the episode, I wanted to tell you a little bit about Paragons of Earth, the exciting new superhero comic I'm working on with Thomas DJ and Eric Johns. For this comic, we've unearthed a number of obscure and forgotten Golden Age superheroes, plucked them from the depths of the public domain, and completely redesigned and reinvented them for the modern day. It's an exciting cast of characters, and we're throwing them up against the threat of a Lovecraftian apocalypse.
00:00:24
Speaker
It's got action, it's got drama, it's got alternate dimensions and alien worlds, and it's even got a giant shark and Hawaiian shirt. What else could you want? But in order to make this comic a reality, we need your help. The comic is crowdfunding now, and you can help support it by going to crowdfunder.com slash paragonscomic.
00:00:42
Speaker
That's Crowdfunder Without the E dot com slash Paragons Comic. You'll be able to find that link in the show notes, so please double check if you didn't quite get it. Please help make this comic a reality. We are counting on your support. And now, on with the show.
00:01:11
Speaker
Maybe you should be on there, ain't you? Wait a second. Maybe you're just the kind of bizarro influence we need. Forget it. No more jobs here. Uh-uh. I think you'd be a great manager. I'm going to suggest it to the girls. I've given up trying to assimilate. I've got to get back to my own kind. Although...
00:01:36
Speaker
I have developed a greater appreciation for the female version of the human anatomy. How would you really are the worst? Come on, let's watch David Letterman. Come on. Okey-dokey. You know, I got a feeling my life's really gonna change since you fell into a ducky. Yeah, well, I'm glad somebody's happy. If I could just get my career back on course, I'd only have the old standard worry left. What's that?
00:02:06
Speaker
Just can't seem to find the right man. Maybe it's not a man you should be looking for. Ah. You think I might find happiness in the animal kingdom, Ducky? Like they say, doll. Love's strange. We could always give it a try. Hmm. Okay. Let's go for it, Mr. Macho.
00:02:35
Speaker
What do you mean? Okay, it was a joke. Listen, I'm pretty tired. It's just that you're so incredibly soft and cuddly. Beth, let's be realistic. I mean, my apartment's zillions of miles from here. You're three feet taller than I am. I just can't resist your intense animal magnetism. Whoops.
00:03:03
Speaker
Anyway, where will it all lead? Marriage, kids, a house in a suburbs? Let's just face it. It's fate. No, it's not. I've got a headache. And I've got the Asper. Be gentle. Just one good night kiss, sweet Ducky. Come on, Howard, I was just kidding.
00:03:31
Speaker
Good night.
Guest Introduction and Film Choice Humor
00:03:45
Speaker
Welcome to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. I'm your host, Perry Constantine, welcoming back a returning guest who I'm very angry with for making me watch today's movie. And that is Nick Baldwin. Nick, how you doing?
00:03:58
Speaker
I'm doing all right, Perry. I will say you had it on your list, man. I mean, that's true. That's true. Um, it, you know, it was funny. Uh, someone had asked to do Howard the duck a while back and I'm like, I don't have it though. And then, um, like a month later I found it and I'm like, okay, well, and that guy and I had lost contact. So I decided to just put it on the list anyway. So, um,
00:04:21
Speaker
I will say- That's true. I did open the door. Yes, it weren't for this podcast. We could blame each other, because I would have never had it on my list of things to get to, so. Well, it's funny, because we were talking, last time you were on, we talked about Superman II, and I was pointing out what a nice treat it was that you picked a movie that I actually enjoyed for once, and then you come back, you're like, I want to do this instead.
00:04:43
Speaker
I think when we first scheduled this, the response that I got when I gave you the answer to which one was, oh, so back to bad movies then. Exactly.
00:04:55
Speaker
All right, so if you guys heard anything in the background there for a minute, my son was playing with one of my daughter's toys and she decided to push him. Oh, hold on. You got it? Okay, let's try that again. My kids are trying to kill each other right now. So that's always fun. This is what you got to look forward to in a little bit, buddy. I was just gonna say, yeah, if we go for a second, you know, or if we ever get kids over, I'm sure, or not, you know, kids will find a way to be disruptive regardless of whether they have some other kid to be disruptive with.
00:05:25
Speaker
The hardest part is when they start walking because it is so hard to keep an eye on them. Like everyone talks about how the the first few months, right? It's like, oh, it's so hard, but it's easy. They just they wake up, you feed them, you change them, you put them back to bed and that's it. It's when they start moving around that it starts to become a hassle.
Parenting Challenges During Recording
00:05:43
Speaker
Yeah. Um, we have another friends that just recently had a kid that's I think, like nine months old now or something like that. But anyway, uh, they sent a video recently that was like, we're about to be in trouble. And it was like the kid just almost able to crawl reaching for something. Like, yep, ambulatory. You're in, you're in for a treat. So first time I saw Helena starting to climb over the baby gate, I'm like, Oh shit.
00:06:14
Speaker
And then once they reach the size of anthropomorphized ducks, then you're really in trouble. Then you're really in trouble. Yeah, which we'll be getting to today. But before we talk about too much of that, what have you been into lately? Anything that's grabbing your interest these days?
00:06:31
Speaker
Yeah, so I think kind of some of the typical stuff, you know, been watching Bake Off with my wife and we've been watching the Beckham documentary. That's been interesting. Just finished Loki last night. I was a little bit behind in terms of, you know, release schedules and things, but I still gotta watch the last episode of that. I haven't had a chance to.
00:06:49
Speaker
So I kind of figured that might be the case. I know you and I tend to be on a later schedule that we're not, we're no longer the midnight warriors who are like logging into Disney Plus, you know, right when it drops or anything like that. Yeah, yeah. No, unfortunately not. Well, also a big part of it is just cause I've had a bunch of stuff, a bunch of podcasts scheduled these like past, this past week. So it was like every day I've had to be watching something different to prepare for the upcoming episode. So I haven't had a chance to sit down and watch Loki.
00:07:19
Speaker
I think it was this morning that you were messaging me about Howard the Duck, right? Where you were like, damn you. Well, yeah, it was, yeah, it was last night for me because I was, yeah, I was, it was sat down. I started watching it. And so obviously we are going to be talking about Howard the Duck, but, and we got to the scene when there is the female duck bathing and you see her duck boots very prominently. And I just like,
00:07:44
Speaker
I, and so I, I looked it up on Google. I said, I sent Nick the image. Uh, and I'm like, I'm like, I can't believe you'd maybe watch this. Oh man. Yeah. Yeah. There's lots to go with it. I will say not to know. We want to try and go back to other things, but I remember I remembered there was duck boobs and when he's first like looking at a magazine and he kind of unfolds the folder, I was like, Oh,
00:08:09
Speaker
Yeah, this must be that that's that's not that bad. I mean, it's not like you see anything. And then, you know, two minutes later or whatever it is, you see the one woman bathing and you're like, I was like, oh, no, that's the ones. Yeah. I was not expecting that. I heard about the quote unquote sex scene, but I'd never heard about the duck boobs thing. So I was not expecting that at all. But
00:08:32
Speaker
Uh, for, for my, my point part, what I've been into is, again, cause I've been doing all these podcasts right after another. I don't have a whole lot to talk about, but, um, last episode I talked about how I did see the Marvels and it was good. It was a lot of fun. Um, and, uh, well, it's a, it's a great, there's a great mid credit sequence. I think, uh, I think you'll be very excited about that. Uh, hopefully it hasn't been spoiled. Stay off of social media, stay off of like the news aggregators until you see it, because
00:08:58
Speaker
they have been spoiling it. And I got the John Krasinski cameo in Multiverse of Madness spoiled by, cause I was reading Google news and it was right there in the headline, like just like two days after it came out.
00:09:12
Speaker
Yeah, I think I remember people having that problem too. I haven't had anything spoiled yet, knock on wood. Yeah, I've been staying cautiously away from certain likely sources. But the other thing that I got to do was I, so the other day, like things like two weeks ago, they had a sale on the PlayStation store and they had the Batman VR game for,
00:09:35
Speaker
It was like two bucks or something. So I bought it and I have not been able to use my VR, my PlayStation VR since probably since before my son was born. So it's like, oh, that's like over almost it's been like a year and a half almost. Yeah, a year and a half since I've been able to use it just
Superhero Film Spoilers and Viewing Habits
00:09:52
Speaker
because whenever I take it out.
00:09:54
Speaker
the kids want to play with the cords so it's impossible. With other video games it's fine because the controllers are wireless but the VR it's got all these cables connected to it the kids are always wandering around the room so it's very hard to to do it unless they're not in the they're not in the house so my wife had had taken the kids out to the park or something so I'm like okay good this I can finally play VR for a change so I loaded up Batman VR and
00:10:19
Speaker
And it was too short. Like it was such a fun experience, but it was like, it's just like one story basically. It takes like, you know, maybe 30 minutes to an hour to complete the story. But it was fun. It was a pretty cool experience. I mean, for two bucks, it definitely was worth the experience.
00:10:38
Speaker
I was going to ask because, yeah, I don't have a PlayStation VR currently, but I've had it. I've played VR on some other people's headsets before. I think I played the first chapter of Vader immortal or whatever that was called. And, yeah, sometimes they can be very, very brief. And sometimes you're asked, you're expected to pay like, you know, full game price. Yeah. Yeah. 60 bucks for something like that. So, yeah, I'm with I'm with you. It sounds like, you know, 30 minutes of any kind of VR fun, let alone an awesome Batman adventure is definitely worth two dollars. So.
00:11:08
Speaker
Well, I mean, the coolest thing, I think the coolest thing for me was when you're going down to the Batcave and you suit up as Batman and everything. And then when you see the cave all around you, like that was really cool. That was a really cool moment. Was there like a moment when you're lowering the cowl on over your eyes too? Yes. Yes. In fact, there's, you know, you have to put on the gauntlet. There's like this automated bat suit thing that comes up. And so you like grab the symbol, you put it on your chest and it like puts most of the suit on. You grab the gauntlets and it loads them up.
00:11:38
Speaker
And then that shows the cow and you pick up the cow, you turn it around, you put it on and then a mirror comes down and you see Batman in the mirror. That's awesome. It was cool. And it was a it was a pretty cool prologue to Arkham Knight. OK.
00:11:53
Speaker
And there are lots of little like collectibles and stuff like that you can get throughout the game, which I haven't done all of them, but I've done some of them. And the story was a nice prologue to Arkham Knight. It kind of fills in some gaps in the story or at least makes things a little bit more clear for what happens in the story. So it's basically when he finds out that he's been poisoned by the Joker and he's like being infected by the Joker virus. So that's kind of what the story is all about.
00:12:19
Speaker
Interesting. Yeah, it's been years, but I really enjoyed Arkham Knight. So I don't remember the details of the storyline, but I remember really liking it. Yeah, I like every now and then I'll fire it up again. And it's a lot of I, I still got a problem with the the tank stuff. But other than that, like the the Batman portions of it are just so much fun. Yeah, yeah, I completely agree. Completely agree.
00:12:42
Speaker
But yeah, the VR stuff, it's it's fun, but it is. It's very cumbersome to use sometimes, especially when you have kids. You got to have a completely the room has to be really dark to for the camera to work properly, too. So that's another thing that can be kind of challenging because we've got these big windows right by one side of our room. So when you're playing things that are non VR, have you gotten a chance to play the new Spider-Man game yet? No, I have not because that's that's PS5, so I don't have a PS5 yet.
00:13:11
Speaker
Okay. Okay. Yeah. I keep checking the sites and it's like, you can get a digital used version of the PS5 now for about under, it's probably about like 450 American. It's like just under 50,000. That's about probably about like 450 in US dollars. Wow. It's not quite where I want it to be. I want it to be lower, but I've been watching it.
00:13:39
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's what I got in a bundle from, uh, it's about that that I paid. I think it was 500 with the bundle total. Oh, okay. You got a good deal then on that. Yeah. And I know it was back when it was still tough. Cause part of the reason I get, you know, some got notification on GameStop as a member or something like that.
00:13:59
Speaker
Well, I didn't mean to stir up ill feelings that night. No, no, not at all. Not at all. It's, it's, you know, another problem too is just like, it's so hard to find the time. Like I'm, I figure once the kids get into preschool, that'll be, and once I finished this comic book project, then I'll have more free time to actually, you know, get into gaming a little bit more again.
Crowdfunder Campaign Flexibility
00:14:18
Speaker
Yeah. And how long have you extended that for now?
00:14:23
Speaker
It's an indefinite extension for the comic book project. So yeah, it's, people can donate. That's one of the nice things about Crowdfunder is you can make the campaigns run and they call it extended time. And they just say like, you know, whenever you want to finish it, you can finish it, but you can keep it going as long as you want. So, and then if you do want to end the campaign, you can also transition the Crowdfund into a store. So people can still go there and buy stuff, even if the campaign is over.
00:14:48
Speaker
I, well, listeners, I know I'm already supporting it. The art looks amazing. The, the brief storylines, uh, you know, are, are sound interesting as well. So I'm, I'm eager for my copy and hoping that we get a second volume. So if you're listening to this, go, go find it on crowd funder and, and yes, that is, uh, for Kickstarter as well. Yeah. So it's a, it's crowd funder.com with no, we slash paragons comic, the links in the show notes. Um, but the plug this as often as I get the chance to, um,
00:15:18
Speaker
But today we're here to talk about something less fun, and that is- It's very true. Yes, and that is Howard the Duck, the 1986 film that was supposed to be George Lucas's way to get out of debt. It did not quite work out that way for him.
00:15:39
Speaker
I always love pointing out to people this I have this note like some of my favorite things to point out is that a this is a Marvel property which I don't think is as shocking for people anymore because there was the marvel of the duck in Guardians of the Galaxy but I mean back in 1986 or whatever you know since then
00:15:59
Speaker
Absolutely, people were shocked like, what? That's the same thing as, you know, you know, when Iron Man was popular or then the second thing I always love to tell people is like, yeah, and this is what George Lucas followed up Star Wars with. Yeah, yeah. Always blows people's minds. So before we dive too much into the movie, what's your what history, if any, do you have with Howard as a character?
00:16:26
Speaker
Howard as a character is pretty much just this movie or his other appearances. I've heard people talk about him in the comics. I know that he's existed in the comics. I've maybe read a couple of panels working in some kind of larger storyline that was happening, but I have never picked up like a Howard the Duck comics. This movie and other appearances are pretty much it.
00:16:48
Speaker
Yeah, I'm pretty much in a slightly similar boat. I'm a little bit more familiar with him in the comics. I haven't read any of that classic Steve Gerber series, but I do have it. I picked up the Epic Collection and one of those sales on Comixology, which a little bit of a rant. I just got the email right before we started recording that Amazon is now ending the Comixology app and they're merging it into Kindle and it just,
00:17:15
Speaker
And from the responses I've seen on Reddit, the merger is not going well for a lot of people's comic libraries. So it's just, digital comics was nice while it lasted, but it looks like it's ending now.
00:17:29
Speaker
I so this is it's so funny to me you and I've had enough conversations about getting into digital comics. I finally transitioned and for my birthday I got an iPad and have the candelab and have comics ology and regularly like I've only not gotten so far into it enough and now I'm like just confused about which one is where and where it appears then you've got your marvel unlimited on top of that so
00:17:50
Speaker
Hearing that it's going poorly does not make me excited. I will say for non-big property ones, I don't know if you've ever heard about this app called Omnibus.
00:18:02
Speaker
I just heard about that today. Yeah, I was actually just looking at researching it before we started up, jumped on here. But yeah, I just started looking at that. There's also Global Comics is another one that's been making a lot of waves lately. They just released an app version too. So yeah, I'm interested in checking out more of those. I've actually got, there's a preview of Paragons of Earth on Global Comics actually.
00:18:25
Speaker
Okay. So yeah, I'm gonna have to look up, see like what the publishing situation is on that. Well, I'm looking up global comics later. Hopefully Omnibus works out better for you in terms of some of those other comics that you want for yourself and also maybe in terms of Paragon.
00:18:44
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so that's disappointing. But anyway, so yeah, I haven't read any of that classic Steve Gerber series. Derek was a huge fan of that. I do remember he loved Howard the Duck. He talked about that a few times on the show. That's awesome. Yeah, and I believe that he did not have fond memories of this movie as well. If I'm remembering correctly, I could be cooling you off on that. Of the comics, this has to make you even more angry.
00:19:11
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I can definitely see that. I have read, I've read one of the stuff, one of the Howard series that several years after, this was back in like the early aughts when Marvel launched their Max line, their like adult oriented comics line. And they did have, they did bring Steve Gerber back to do a Howard the Duck mini series for that. And so I read that, I've read that and that was pretty, that was, it was okay. It was not the best, but also, you know, it's tough to go back to the well.
00:19:39
Speaker
And then I had read a fairly recent one, I think it was, it might've been Chip Zardzky was doing it, but it was like Howard is like a private detective. And I remember, I don't have very strong memories of that, but I remember it was pretty entertaining at the time I was reading it. I can totally see how Chip Zardzky would fit into, I think we've talked before on this podcast about sex criminals occasionally, which was something I'm very entertaining, especially the first two thirds, so.
00:20:11
Speaker
Sorry, go ahead. I said, and it's in the same vein as how are the doc, like adult themes, absolute absurdist, that type of stuff. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, so I had never seen this movie, but it is, you know, infamous, right? It had a, the budget was about $37 million and it made about,
00:20:37
Speaker
$38 million worldwide and only about half and like $16 million domestically. So it made less than half its budget in the US and didn't even and just barely broke even it looks like.
Howard the Duck's Box Office Failure
00:20:51
Speaker
Yeah, was not not a big seller. I was having fun looking up the different ratings. I don't know if you did this at all beforehand, but a 4.7 out of 10 on IMDB.
00:21:05
Speaker
then this is the one that cracked me up on Amazon, which is like purely, you know, people who've watched it rating it a 4.5 out of five. Wow. But then don't worry, Rotten Tomatoes brings it back down with a 13%. So yes, I watched this on my on my Plex server. And on Plex, it shows you the Rotten Tomatoes scores, it shows you the the critic score and the audience score. And yeah, both the critic, the critic score was like,
00:21:32
Speaker
something ridiculously low and the audience score was not much higher. Usually the audience score is much higher than the critical score. That was not the case with this movie. Yeah, I think it was in the twenties. Yeah. So what were some of your thoughts? What's your history with this movie? When did you first see this movie? I remember seeing pieces of this movie at least probably
00:22:00
Speaker
at a very early age, like maybe as young as even like seven or eight, you know what I mean? Like well, before I probably should have been considering it has duck boobs and pseudo sex scenes, you know, at different times. I can remember, for example, it wasn't this time was the first time it ever clicked to me, but I do remember at some point asking sort of what is that thing that she pulls out of his wallet? And then in one of my previous watches since then when I was young,
00:22:30
Speaker
I know what a condom is like. But it was something I was watching it at an age where I had no idea what that was. And so that gives you an idea of like how long this has been. I realized as I was rewatching it this time, from those early memories, I only have bits and pieces and glimpses like I remember the diner scene really heavily so might have
00:22:48
Speaker
like one of the only things I really watched. But I just remember the imagery and I remember being impressed by, and this is still true, the puppetry and like the sort of craft, which is a very George Lucas thing for that to be a case more so than lots of other pieces. But yeah, other than that, it's just kind of like, I've like a lot of memories of it being like that guy in this movie, because you've got
00:23:13
Speaker
Jeffrey Jones, who plays like the eventual villain, you know, which was that guy from Ferris. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Scandal noted with him, by the way. But really.
00:23:26
Speaker
Oh yeah, he, I will let you and your listeners Google it. Cause I don't want to be like speaking out of turn or, or just literally Google his name with the word scandal. And you'll see, you'll see a little bit older now, but I think that's part of the reason. Oh yeah. Yeah. It's right on his Wikipedia page. So yeah. Um, pleaded no contest to soliciting a minor to pose for nude photographs and subsequent arrests for failing to update his sex offender status. Oh Jesus. Oh, I didn't know that he had the subsequent arrests. I just knew of the, the,
00:23:55
Speaker
sort of original pedophilia and being, yeah, yeah. But also, you know, Tim Robbins in this too. And that was the second one I was going to say is I think somewhere along the lines I knew Tim Robbins face. And so it must have been like,
00:24:12
Speaker
I also saw Shawshank probably earlier than I should have, but in my head, like I remember that guy from Shawshank was what Tom Robbins was to me. So that's kind of like my memories of this movie. Oh, and you know, you can't, I mean, Leah Thompson is like a goddess who can do no wrong even in this movie, even though she may or may not do wrong in this movie, but she can't, you know, that girl, so to speak, from Back to the Future. So it was one of those movies for me. Yeah.
00:24:41
Speaker
So yeah, I, Jesus, you know what? One of the things that drives me nuts about this movie is that it's the first half of it actually, it's not bad. The first half is actually not too bad. I think the biggest complaint I had in the first half was Chip Zine as the voice of Howard. Like that voice just doesn't,
00:25:04
Speaker
fit my vision of Howard. I think you need someone more acerbic and someone who's got a little bit more of a harder edge to their voice, who can pull off sarcasm a lot more. I mean, he gets a little bit better as the second half moves on, but still, I kept feeling like you need someone
00:25:25
Speaker
you know, I guess kind of like a Robert Downey Jr. type to do that kind of role. Like you need someone who's got that kind of like acerbic wit about them to really pull off Howard's character. Yeah. Sort of a quiet confidence instead of, and it's no criticism of this voice actor and anything else they've been in, but at least how it's played here is a bit sort of like a whiny, you know what I mean? Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And it's, I get, maybe they were trying to make it sound like, you know, like the quack of a duck.
00:25:53
Speaker
It's not at all a sort of likable sound, and there's certainly not a protagonist that you find yourself just innately wanting to root for. Right, right. But funny thing, do you know who was originally cast as Howard and who quit after production had started? I don't think I do know this, tell me. Robin Williams. No! Yes, Robin Williams was originally going to be the voice of Howard, but
00:26:21
Speaker
the way that the duck's bill moved, it was too slow for his usual type of speech. And so he wasn't able to really kind of get the kind of
00:26:33
Speaker
you know, effects that he wanted to do the kind of voice that he was usually doing. So that didn't work out so well for him. So he ended up leaving production. And then after that, they called up. So on set, they had the puppeteers was actually doing the voice on the set. And then later they brought in Chip Zine who had auditioned but didn't get the part at first. And then they brought him in after the fact to double over the dialogue.
00:26:56
Speaker
that is mind-blowing and I totally make sense in terms of like, cause it's, it's, it's heath, the chipsine fits the bill movement quite well. So much so that I assumed it was done that way, that it's, you know, that somebody was speaking the lines on set and then the voiceover was completely separate because it is clearly meant to match that. It also makes sense though that like,
00:27:18
Speaker
Robin Williams would have sounded way better, but yeah, his sort of cadence and the fact that he kind of like talks and big and then slow and then also like really quick and you know, it would have been virtually impossible to try and do with that particular part.
00:27:33
Speaker
Well, I'm also not sure if Robin Williams would have been the best choice for Howard. I think he's a little bit too over the top. I mean, I know he can do more subdued, well, he was able to do more subdued stuff as well, but I think at this point in his career, I'm not quite sure if he would have been the right choice for that. I can understand that too, for sure, for sure. He's definitely got more than that. Just confidence that- Oh yeah, absolutely. Smoothness to his speech.
00:28:01
Speaker
Although funny story, this actually, this movie actually kind of in an indirect way led to the creation of Pixar. I do think I know some of this that there was like, go ahead, go ahead. Cause George Lucas, he just finished building Skywalker Ranch and it was like, you know, $50 million. And this movie was intended to get him back into the black and you know, completely bombed. So he had to start selling off assets.
00:28:27
Speaker
And so, Steve Jobs offered to buy Lucas films CGI animation division, and the price was well above market value because him and Lucas were friends and, and, you know, Lucas was, you know, it was such dire straits that he agreed and that division eventually became Pixar.
00:28:49
Speaker
But I was thinking about this in my head as I was watching this, I was comparing it, I was thinking of who framed Roger Rabbit.
Animation Style Alternatives for Howard the Duck
00:28:56
Speaker
And I was thinking like, this probably would have worked a lot better if you had done like that approach where you'd mix like 2D animation with live action. I think it would have worked a little bit better in that instance.
00:29:07
Speaker
Yeah, I would never have actually necessarily thought of that, although I'm like, Who Framed Roger Rabbit came up as the very next thing that my team was recommending to me. Because I think it's that same vein of sort of a fish out of water tale of someone coming from a different world type of thing and paired with someone else and trying to uncover the mystery and all that jazz. And I do think that would have been better. I think that it might have been more difficult, I guess,
00:29:35
Speaker
really George Lucas's thing. You know what I mean? He tends to want to try and make it
00:29:41
Speaker
as realistic looking as possible which is you know so but uh yeah no that that's interesting imagining the world where that's the case or and unfortunately like if they were to do this in the mcu now a and we can get into this but i don't think that i don't think that the character of uh howard the duck the way that he actually is and he's kind of supposed to be a little bit of an in my opinion outdated uh character without making an update he he doesn't fit
00:30:10
Speaker
in a modern movie but even if he did i would wish that they would not do the cg that they've already done where they look realistic i think doing something cool like that where it's like well they're from an alternate universe basically or at least an alternate planet like whatever you know make that that would have been really pretty cool actually i mean i i've been curious if they would ever do something with howard because he's appeared in all the guardian stuff and
00:30:32
Speaker
know in the background he was in the I think he was also in the in the Christmas special if I recall correctly and so he's appeared in the background of all of the Guardians movies and obviously that's only in there because James Gunn has an affinity for the character there's no other way to do it um and I think if you had James Gunn doing a Howard the Duck movie I think that would be amazing I mean now I don't know how likely that is with him heading up the DC stuff but
00:30:57
Speaker
I, he would have been, or even, or not even like a movie, like even just like a Disney plus special, like they did with the guardians Christmas special or, um, the, the werewolf by night special. I think if you did a Howard the duck special, it would go over really well. I will eat crow enough to say that, yeah, I could see that some, especially some sort of special, maybe 40 minutes, you know, not even a feature length, let alone a series. And if there was anyone that could have managed to pull off the sort of.
00:31:24
Speaker
off beat, in poor taste, humor of it, but like in a way that's tongue in cheek and weaking at the, like that you can just sort of tell the movie makers themselves know that this misogynistic thing that this cartoon duck is saying like is a misogynistic thing that this cartoon duck is saying. And yet it still would come across as earnest. Like I think about Peacemaker and you know, Gunn's work on that. So yeah, I would agree that if one person who could pull it off, it would probably be him.
00:31:53
Speaker
And I don't even think like the misogynistic aspect would really need to be there at all. I think you could easily take that out of the character because the whole thing about him is just more his acerbic wit and the kind of satirical approach. And with superhero movies being so big now, I think you could do something really interesting with him, you know, basically parroting superhero movies.
00:32:14
Speaker
Yeah, I could see that actually. See, this is why you're like an awesome comic book creator who comes up with these stories yourselves. And I'm just someone who likes to talk about them because I could never cope with something like that myself. Well, because I think one of the problems with this movie is it's satirizing something that doesn't really exist yet.
Missed Satirical Opportunities in the Film
00:32:33
Speaker
I mean, it's like the
00:32:35
Speaker
you know, Howard the Duck did a lot of satire of superhero comics, I believe, back in the day. And there's not really any, this was Marvel's first, this is the first theatrical film that had, that featured a Marvel character since the original Captain America serials. So there was like, nothing at all. Like, what are you gonna satirize? This is before, this is before Burton's Batman, even. Yeah, yeah. It's very interesting. It's like,
00:32:58
Speaker
Like you said, it was supposed to be the kind of the saving grace and it's sort of what Lucas wanted to do, you know, and to a certain degree of like after, I mean, I know it had to do with like he was going through the divorce and everything and there was stuff like that and he needed money, but there's also, you know, kind of like the, this is what you choose to follow up something as amazing as Star Wars with. And it's just like, what was the, like who thought this was going to be the money maker? Who thought that this was the, how? Like, you know, like, it,
00:33:28
Speaker
as you and I are even talking about it as two huge comic book fans, comic book movie fans, we're on a podcast that's literally all about the fact that they exist because in the last 30 years, there's been a lot more of them. But even we are like, well, it's kind of a stretch. And I'm still not sure if it would be able to, you know, hold up to a higher feature film. And this was what they chose to just come out of the gate with. And I'm just like, who decided? You know what I mean? I got it's got to be just the fact that it was all people like these sort of
00:33:58
Speaker
you know, odd ball comedies or I think about, you know, the, the sort of, uh, what's the one where they like create, uh, the perfect woman or something like that weird, weird science. Yeah.
00:34:10
Speaker
Like, you know, it's got to be coming out of that vein of let's just, let's just pair some bizarre thing, sci-fi premise with a babe. And, you know, we'll be able to make that work on basically nothing other than the fact that it's got babes and it's got sci-fi and it's got oddball comedy. Like, right. Yeah. That seems to be the entire thrust of this movie. In fact, one of the one of my favorite reviews, I'm looking at Letterbox. There are
00:34:40
Speaker
This one review, I think this is the best one. If you just imagine how many people in Hollywood had to sign off on a talking duck movie this horny, the whole thing gets a lot funnier. I totally agree. And even though I have seen this since I was younger, I can't remember the last, like I've probably seen this maybe in full three times in my entire life, including the one that I most recently watched it for. But somewhere along the line, I always forget how horny this movie is, because it is,
00:35:09
Speaker
all horny all the time. I will give it credit. It is not as horny as Batman forever. I think Batman forever gets the gets the gets the the Oscar for horniest movie ever made. I don't know. I'll have to go rewatch that one. I do know we've got bat nipples and you've got Jim Carrey in a leotard. Oh my god. Go back and listen to the episode we did with with Mark Buskett talking about Batman forever. It is
00:35:39
Speaker
Super hoarty. It is extremely hoarty.
00:35:43
Speaker
Every character is horny for something in that movie. But go to this movie though, I mean, like you mentioned the condom scene, you know what I kept thinking about that the entire time I'm watching it, I'm just like, there's no wrapper on that condom. Is this a used condom he's keeping or does he just keep unwrapped condoms in his wallet? I had no idea. This is how weird this movie is. I'm thinking about the logistics.
00:36:10
Speaker
a raw condom in someone's duck's wallet.
00:36:14
Speaker
Well, and that's where I say like, it's supposed to be either some commentary, I think on him being kind of a womanizer. Because there's also when we first are introduced to Howard, you've like, you're listening to, you know, some sort of like answering machine message with some girl that's, you know, all about him. And then it shows him reading a postcard from someone with a different name. And it's like, Oh, how I love you so much. So that's the other thing is like, they've set this character up to
00:36:40
Speaker
Also, when, uh, when Beverly's looking at his wallet, there's a picture of him with, at the beach with two other duck ladies. Yes. Yes. And so you've set him up as this like weird horny character, which, and I have something to come back to the condom thing too, but so bizarre then that, uh, when he does finally have a chance with her, he like freaks out and is like, dude, it's like, dude, you've set this character up as being someone who clearly pulls tail. And now all of a sudden he's afraid of it after having made all these innuendos.
00:37:10
Speaker
But I think that the kind of person that took you a minute to catch that one. Oh, man. And also the number of like duck and bird puns, like so many times people are like bird brain or, you know, just so many comics or like the I assume you saw the Breeders of the Lost Stork. Yes, yeah.
00:37:39
Speaker
such a great, ridiculous, terrible easter egg at the beginning. And the kind of thing I think is supposed to be like, he's like, he's the kind of guy that would have just like a loose condom because he's always ready, but he's always dirty too. You know what I mean? And I'm like, that's a message you're trying to send that is against so many of the other things that you've done to make him a likable character. And it just doesn't
00:38:05
Speaker
And the only other thought I had about it is when you make me think about duck penises, I think about the fact that they are barbed and therefore, how does that kind of work? You made the point about the barbed duck penis and that made me think of, were you a supernatural fan?
00:38:23
Speaker
No, never did get into that one. Okay, so I love the show. And there's this one scene where the angel character, Castiel, who came in in like season four, I think. And like, there's this one point where he'd like kind of gone crazy. And he was like in this mental asylum. And then he was talking to Dean, Jensen Ackles character. And he just makes this random comment. And he says, did you know that a cat's penis is barbed along its shaft? He's like, I happen to know for a fact that the females were not consulted about that.
00:38:58
Speaker
Yeah, I'm sure there's some kind of animal kingdom reason where this makes sense for certain species. It's to stop them from escaping. Right. No, that's literally what the purpose is, because they can't escape them. Oh, man.
00:39:14
Speaker
Oh, yeah. But yeah, that that sex scene was so weird, then, because it felt like they were doing like, OK, well, this is an adult movie. We want to show them being intimate. And he's like all horned up. But at first, she's like, oh, no, no, no, we can't. And then she starts getting into it. And then and then he's like, oh, wait, I was just kidding. I was just kidding. I'm just like, it feels like.
00:39:36
Speaker
They were filming that scene and someone from legal was standing on set and it's like, wait, what the hell are you doing? You cannot have bestiality in this movie. So then they had to, all right, all right, quick, rewrite, rewrite, rewrite. Yeah, I had the thought too of that it sounds like maybe like as they were writing it, that that's what happened. It's like, you could just see two people back and forth and like, oh yeah, and then this happens and then this happens. And then they're like, oh, we're both getting a little bit too turned on by this stuff. I'm just kidding. You wanted to take it this far.
00:40:08
Speaker
It's absurd, but it also, again, it's one of those many places, I think, where this movie is inconsistent. It's just like, yeah, I get it. Okay, you want to be the adult movie? You don't have to show anything. They even have the silhouette setup where it's like... Yeah, exactly.
00:40:26
Speaker
only show anything through there. You know what I mean? You know what?
Absurdity and Sexual Innuendos in Howard the Duck
00:40:30
Speaker
Put your lips on his duck bill. I was half expecting when they walk in and you see the silhouette that we were going to see like this massive erection and silhouette or something. I mean, that would have felt like it was more in vain with other portions of this. Exactly. Yeah. Well, I mean, like this is a I think this whole movie is just an example of why you should take cocaine away from executives, just give it to the writers instead.
00:40:59
Speaker
I mean, and again, another letterbox review. He said, he was pointing out the fact that there have been a lot of people on letterbox who have called it a fun, guilty pleasure. He said, now I have a few questions for you all. What kind of sick bastard would put tits on a duck? How can a duck fuck a person? How can a duck fuck? What the fuck? I mean, that pretty much sums it up right there. That's I mean, we could just die.
00:41:30
Speaker
And the other thing that gets me is it's like, this movie wanted to have that because I think that's what's maybe true to the character from what I gather. And you could correct me if I'm wrong, you've read at least a little bit more than me. But then they also someone decided that they had to have some kind of a like,
00:41:49
Speaker
big super villain battle or big part. And so this movie is just like, this movie could have been like a straight 75 minutes. You know what I mean? Barely hit the feature length, get these certain things out of there. You could have even had some of the stuff, like the whole part in the middle where it's like, we're trying to establish this relationship, I guess, between him and her, like the part where he like becomes her manager or fights the manager.
00:42:17
Speaker
All of that was just like, this serves no purpose. I do not feel any of the emotional stakes. You are not giving me additional, like, deep knowledge about these characters. And it ends up not having anything to do with the long term big bad of the movie. So no, absolutely. I mean, like, when Jeffrey, when they bring in that whole thing about the Dark Overlords, I'm just like, what?
00:42:39
Speaker
what where did this come from this just it just seems to come completely out of nowhere it is totally incongruous with the rest of the movie because i think what this movie would have been best served is if you just did it as like a wacky 80s comedy about this this anthropomorphic duck landing on earth and how he deals with being on earth and in fact if you made the story about like
Potential for 80s Satire Success
00:43:01
Speaker
him becoming her manager and like the trials they go through and I think that would have been a lot more entertaining and it would have been a much better way to to use Howard the Duck for satirical purposes. I completely agree. I completely agree. I mean especially in the 80s when you had the you know the commercialization of music and everything you had the you had the punk scene in the background too is like this response to it. All of this stuff it
00:43:27
Speaker
It is perfectly set up for all that stuff. And, but it's as like a, in a way, kind of like a counterpoint to the whole greed is good thing from wall street, which, and I think that it could have been so much, it could have been such a better, but one of the problems too is you got George Lucas doing this and George Lucas is not really big on, is not really, I don't really think George, I don't think biting social satire when I think George Lucas.
00:43:53
Speaker
Oh, yeah. I think spectacle and effects when I think George Lucas. Yeah, cutting edge stuff when it comes to that, which is so fascinating to me because he's also obviously the the sort of original architect of what is one of my favorite worlds and story places. But yeah. Well, I mean, even to that point, like the original director that Lucas wanted was John Landis and, you know,
00:44:24
Speaker
his own issues aside. Like, I think if you have John Landis doing this movie, I think it could have turned out a lot better. Yeah, I agree. I completely agree that I think it would have been more of sort of his sensibilities. I wrote down the director's name at some point, but I don't think I really recognized him from much when I first looked at it. No, I didn't recognize his name either. But yeah, it was directed by Willard. Fuck.
00:44:52
Speaker
I'm not sure I'm pronouncing that right, but it's funny that they get a guy whose name rhymes with duck, it looks like. That's probably why he got the job. Okay, he was married to Gloria Katz and she was one of the producers on this film, so I wonder if that's probably why.
00:45:13
Speaker
But yeah, I don't see a whole lot of stuff on here. I mean, he was a writer on American Graffiti. It looks like he was mostly a writer. He was one of the writers on Temple of Doom. And then he directed Messiah of Evil, and he directed a movie called French Postcards, and then Best Defense, and then this, and then nothing else after this really, other than like, no, that's all he did. Just director, just directing those four movies. So this must have been like,
00:45:44
Speaker
his friend within his social circle who knew him from writing on other projects together. Right, yeah. I mean, you know, he was married to Gloria Katz. He had worked with Lucas on American Graffiti. He had done some rewrites on Star Wars as well. So yeah, I think that's exactly why. They're like, we'll give you a budget. You know, you're at that stage of your career. And then he did not do well. So I wonder if he like, you know, maybe he didn't, he was doing as best as he could, could have been studio notes and all that other jazz. And then he just decided like, nah, I don't want to mess with that anymore.
00:46:15
Speaker
Well, it turns out that this was the second consecutive financial failure for him. So like at best defense also was a box office flop. So that basically killed his directing career was after this movie. Yeah, yeah. What are some other things that stood out to you about this movie? Well, for one thing, the fact that he lands in Cleveland as a man from Ohio that stood out to me and made me chuckle.
00:46:45
Speaker
I did write down that line in my notes. If I had somewhere to go, I certainly wouldn't be in Cleveland. The music that she first is singing to, I thought that was genuinely pretty good. Honestly, that Howard the Duck song at the end? Slaps. Pretty banging, yeah. I was getting into that. I'm like, okay, this is not that bad. I like this.
00:47:12
Speaker
Yeah, I think my wife and I watched it like two or three nights ago and like all the like while we were getting ready for bed. And then when we woke up the next morning, we're just both like Howard the Duck. But yeah, it gets stuck in your ear, man. It does. Yeah. It was not a bit. The music was not bad, especially for the for the type of the era it was made in.
00:47:34
Speaker
Let's see, what other notes do I have? We already talked about, it's very impressive, I thought, how the puppeteer and the voice actor's voice lined up. I don't love the voice actor's voice, but it really did line up pretty well. And so if that was the sort of important piece, that man nailed it when it comes to that. Apparently, also people who had, other people who auditioned for the voice, John Cusack and Martin Short,
00:48:03
Speaker
Wow, Martin Short. Martin Short would have been, I think he might have been able to pull out, but I think John Cusack actually could have done a pretty decent job at that. Like you think about him in high fidelity, I think he would have probably done a, he probably could have done something like that in this. And I think it would have, would have worked at least better than Chip Zine worked. Yeah. Yeah. I could see that sort of, yeah, exactly. And he's in a little bit of that talking to camera sometimes. Yeah, exactly. Oh yeah.
00:48:32
Speaker
I could see that. Okay. Okay. Um, we've already talked about the horniness, but like one of my notes here about, I never understood like how many, like when I first watched this movie, I never understood how many sexual references there were. And some of these, uh, some of these we've not mentioned in one of them at least makes me think of something completely new, but the duck condom we've talked about the sex scene that's almost there, but with the hair feathers, like I didn't really know what an erection was the first time I saw it.
00:48:59
Speaker
He so didn't get that. And I also, the whole hot tub sequence, which brings me back to things that didn't need to be in this movie. We have this whole like 20 or 30 minute section where he looks for a regular person job. And that includes getting a job working at a hot tub place that is slated. I like, I don't know that this, even in the eighties ever existed, this like,
00:49:22
Speaker
I love that you go to that everyone sits in a hot tub and they're all running around making out with and clearly having sex with each other. I think the whole idea was, and I wonder if this was a script change or something mandated by the studio, because it feels like they were supposed to be in a bath house, which back in the 80s were infamous as hookup spots for gay men.
00:49:43
Speaker
And I wonder if maybe that's what it was supposed to be. And the producers or someone was like, no, no, no, we can't have we can't have gay guys in this movie. So we got to make it a straight bathhouse. That's the only thing I can think of because otherwise it just because, yeah, I.
00:49:58
Speaker
I've never heard of anything like that. I mean, the closest thing you have is the soap lands in Japan here where they're basically, you know, basically erotic massage services, but it's not like this referral thing. It's a private room type of thing. Okay. I did not know about that, but...
00:50:19
Speaker
Oh yeah. The topic of prostitution in Japan is an interesting thing to look into because it's a very, very interesting way that they utilize loop, very effective use of loopholes in the law there. Interesting. Yeah, but I mean, that is what it feels like as a brothel. I mean, it feels like a brothel. It does. It totally feels like that. And so I'm just like, it also too, like.
00:50:45
Speaker
How is the, if it is a brothel, why are they looking for people through the employment office? I feel like that would get you into some legal situations. We're gonna have this government agency be the one.
00:51:01
Speaker
those people to work for as an illegal or operation. Yeah, it was so weird. And on top of that, what purpose did it serve? There was like nothing that like, it really did feel like you just go from scene to scene being like, I don't know. Like you said, the writers almost, it was like, what's happening? Because
00:51:23
Speaker
Later on, when he discovers this almost deux machina laser beam that exists conveniently at the same research laboratory, and it's like the whole movie is that. It's like, here's this random thing that this duck was doing, and then it ends with something that's sort of like, well, we had to go to the next scene, so...
00:51:47
Speaker
Yeah, even even we're like the sex scene we were talking about earlier and the what's his name brings over Jeffrey Jones's character and just like they just walk in while this is happening. We've done nothing to like show them coming in. We like they they're just there all of a sudden and it's the same thing of like we're at this place. We're fighting the bad guys and oh well, you know over in that closet there there's this uh this laser beam that you know we have available to us and it's like
00:52:14
Speaker
Was there any foreshadowing, any setup? No, nothing. There was nothing. Give me the Chekhov's gun. Why is there not just a single line the first time that we see that lab about this laser beam that exists? What the F? Also too, I'm trying to figure out how is a lab assistant? Because it's obvious that Tim Robin's character is not someone high up in this research facility. He's not even a researcher. It's a museum. So I'm just like, what?
00:52:43
Speaker
Why is a museum science lab sitting around with astrophysics? I mean, why would a museum have an astrophysics department? None of this makes any sense, even before you get into the duck stuff.
00:52:55
Speaker
Yes, and that's just it. It's like, you know you're in trouble when the anthropomorphized duck coming to Earth is the least nonsensical thing. It's the only thing that actually makes sense in this movie is the fact that a duck from another world landed here and he's very sour about it. Yeah.
00:53:13
Speaker
Cool, I'd be pretty pissed too. Like there was some line with her where she's like, oh, why are you so salty or something like that? And he's like, Oh, I don't know. I just got teleported away from my home. I'm in a land with no other way to get back. I think you'd be pissed off too. It's like, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
00:53:30
Speaker
But also when he's, when Tim Robbins is like going through all these, trying to test his superpowers and he was like, can you tell me what's going to happen in the future? He's like, yeah, I'm going to walk out of this fucking room. I'm just like, yeah, exactly. Like the way he talks, I think that is maybe my favorite scene in the movie is when he's talking back to Tim Robbins and just humiliating him completely. Yes, yes. And I loved the line I wrote this down too. It was like, you're all descended from hairless apes? Yeah. Disgusting.
00:54:00
Speaker
I mean, that's what those, if they had had more of that in the movie, it would have worked a lot better. I'm like, even the whole idea with him, like trying to find a job and all that, that, if that was more of the focus of the movie, I think it would have been so much more entertaining than this stuff with these space alien, I don't know, there's space demons or whatever
Tonal Inconsistencies and Discomfort
00:54:20
Speaker
the hell they are. And they've got these weird tentacle things and that, speaking of that, that scene when the tentacle comes after Beverly, I'm just like,
00:54:29
Speaker
That was genuinely disturbing. I wrote that down too when you like plug it in. I was like, oh my God, this is like some shit out of the thing. Yeah, that's like some that's like some, you know, hentai tentacle rape shit right there. Because he is also talking about how like the only way to for us to come into this world is to be inside you. And I'm just like, OK, whoa, whoa, whoa. Yeah. And then, of course, you've got the they're wanting to, you know, take the
00:54:57
Speaker
fair maiden whose clothing is starting to fall off as the one that we're tying to the table to take her over. I will say the other note that I think might give us a little bit more to talk about too is she was done so dirty with the dialogue in this movie. Not like dirty in a sense of like, oh, she had to say like nasty things. No, it just, it was terrible. Like she did not have any good lines. She sounds like such a,
00:55:24
Speaker
just not even vapid like it i don't even know so bad just like the dumbest thing you could think of it was like nobody even tried it's it's it was really disappointing yeah
00:55:38
Speaker
Yeah, her dialogue was terrible. I mean, she does the best, all credit to Leah Thompson. She's a worker. She does the best she can with this terrible material. She almost makes it work. She almost makes me forget how bad the dialogue is because she does do a pretty good job. And she looks great in this movie too. Oh my God. I mean, yeah, I forgot how much I had a thing for Marty McFly's mom.
00:56:06
Speaker
you know, she looked she looks very good in silk underwear getting ready for bed. So yeah, yeah. Yeah, this was this was the the first and last up until blade there had been no other theatrical releases of Marvel movies.
00:56:26
Speaker
Since this one came out and you know so it was like you had like you know what like 50 years or something since the first Captain America serial and then this came out and then and then it would be another 10 years before we got blade.
00:56:39
Speaker
Yeah, I thought I remembered that being the case, but I wasn't 100% certain. Part of me was like, well, what about there was like a Punisher movie? And, but I realized, I think either everything had come sort of before this, but also a lot of it was like made for TV. Like this was. Yeah. Cause I don't think, I don't think Punisher, cause I was thinking about Punisher. I I'm guessing maybe Punisher wasn't theatrical theatrical release, the Dolph Lundgren one.
00:57:02
Speaker
Yeah, don't think I think of. And then there was the Captain America movie that was direct to video from 1990. I think that was. And then the Fantastic Four movie, you know, that Roger Corman did was was never released at all officially. Yeah. Google that kids. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we did talk about we did an episode on the Captain America one. I'm thinking about maybe two years ago now, but
00:57:29
Speaker
Yeah, Marvel had some problems with movies back then. And the other ones, you can understand why they had problems. It's like, you guys were not managing your properties in a very intelligent way because you were just kind of selling them off to anybody who came off the street and said they can make a movie. But with this one, they must have gotten, I imagine they must have been so pissed when this came out because they had,
00:57:56
Speaker
You hired George Lucas. And you think like, okay, we got George fucking Lucas. Mr. Star Wars himself. Yeah. There is no way this movie can fail. Jokes on you. Yeah. Yeah. Other than that, you know, Tim Robbins was at an 11. I had that. Yeah.
00:58:25
Speaker
Leah Thompson's doing the best with what she has, and Tim Robbins just goes gangbusters. He just decides, oh, they told me I'm in a comic book movie, so I'm just gonna act like an absolute caricature of a human being.
00:58:40
Speaker
Also, Jeffrey Jones, when he does the whole Dark Overlord bit, I thought he did a pretty decent job of his facial expressions and the different things he was doing with his voice. I thought it was actually completely senseless in the context of the movie, but it was pretty entertaining to watch.
00:59:00
Speaker
It was. What he did with it was impressive. Like, yeah, this is another place where it's like, came out of nowhere. Like, okay, we see he's alive and then all of a sudden the next thing he's saying is like, you know, doctor, whatever, is not here anymore. And it's like, what? Again, no setup. No reason to believe that would be the case. What the hell is a dark overlord? Overlord, yeah.
00:59:24
Speaker
There was something else there. There was some other word. What's the because I remember being like, why is it extra words? Dark something overlord or something like that. Anyway, because I think I think it was a long name in the comics is what I believe. So I think they're trying to include the whole thing in there or something like that, because it was kind of like I think in the comics, it was trying to satirize that trend of villains to like over monologue. But here, it just comes off as an over model hugging. It doesn't come off as a satire of it at all.
00:59:52
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, and that's just it. Well, that's another problem, right? Most people are going to go to the movies. They don't have that context to understand what the movie is trying to do there. So you're trying to satirize something when the audience isn't aware it's a satire. So it just comes off as bad.
01:00:08
Speaker
And that diner scene too, I mean, I think that's another good idea, terrible execution, right? The idea of the hero and the villain sitting down in a diner and talking about the evil plant. Okay, yeah, I'm down with that. One of my favorite moments in, not one of my favorites, but one I really enjoyed in the Spider-Man comics was Paul Jenkins did this, I think it was like Return of the Green Goblin or Revenge of the Goblin or something like that, where
01:00:38
Speaker
Spider-Man and the Goblin are fighting, and then they kind of get exhausted. Spider-Man falls on the ground, the Goblin is like coming out, he's about to attack him, and he just collapses next to him, because they're both exhausted. And then they just have a brief conversation about it. I thought like, okay, yeah, that's pretty good.
01:00:56
Speaker
Yeah, there's definitely the capability to do something interesting there. I mean, that's the true theme of like every one of these bad movies that you and I get to talk about is it's like, there's this kernel of something that would, and that's what's so much more disappointing is it's like, there was something there and you just
01:01:16
Speaker
somehow you completely whiffed it and missed the mark. And, you know, when you have a random, you have that cool opportunity, like you said, where it's these two sitting down across from each other, and instead you decide to take five minutes out of that to have the rest of the restaurant goers chase him around and tie him down like they're gonna cook him alive because he's a duck. Like, what? Yeah, yeah. Which is why I kind of like the scene when he goes backstage and he meets her band performers and they're,
01:01:45
Speaker
There's like, oh, you're the Howard she's been talking so much about. Like, we thought she, we didn't think you were real. And it's like, like, it, it felt a little bit more realistic in the fact that, you know, if this had happened, you'd probably be like, what the hell? But then be like, okay, I guess this is real. I guess we just kind of go with it then.
01:02:03
Speaker
Yeah, and it's like, you've got characters all throughout that it's this disparate, some react as if he's horrific and then others react as if he's just like another duck that they want to cook because you've got duck hunting season. And then others react like he's, oh, well, you know, this is cool. And then some react the way I think would be normal, which is like, what the hell? This is very strange. We thought she was imagining this, but then getting on board with it. Yeah. And I think.
01:02:31
Speaker
you know, if I saw an anthropomorphic duck walking around in a restaurant, my first thought wouldn't be let's grab him and cook him. Yeah, exactly. Like, no, would I be shocked? Yes. Would I be having questions about whether it was real? Like, there's some people that are like, oh, that's a good mask or a good, you know, costume. Like, yes, I'd have these questions. Did I miss something? But why was the waitress in the diner wearing like a kamikaze style bandana?
01:03:01
Speaker
I think it was somehow related to the theme of the restaurant, but they tried to- But it seemed like just a regular diner. In the trivia, I mentioned a sushi restaurant. I'm just like, but like, wasn't that just a regular, I am so confused.
01:03:18
Speaker
Oh, something in the trivia mentioned a sushi restaurant. Maybe that's what it was supposed to be, is it was somehow a sushi diner restaurant. I guess so. I mean, like a weird, like Japanese-American fusion or something. I don't know. And I feel like, yeah, we can just go with that and be like, that's a microcosm of the entire movie. What is it trying to be? This movie isn't trying to be.
01:03:46
Speaker
I think, yes, so much of this movie, it just feels... Again, the thing that makes the most sense here is Howard. Everything else is ridiculous. Like, if you're gonna do a movie about an anthropomorphic duck walking around the real world, it has to be set in the real world. I don't know what they're doing with all this other stuff. Yeah, if they had somehow, like...
01:04:08
Speaker
had another twist at the end where you find out at the justice things are about to close that it's not even really earth that somehow like we think it's earth but it's some you know alternate version or some another planet that's very similar earth but is off beat that would have seemed more believable absolutely yeah yeah um anything else you wanted to mention about how are the duck
01:04:33
Speaker
Nah, I think we've managed to hit all of my notes.
Reflections on Missed Opportunities in Howard the Duck
01:04:38
Speaker
Talked to silliness to death. You know, because one of the things about this show that we try to do is we try to, you know, we try to go back and look at these movies that were, you know, marginalized because of poor effects or, you know, people just didn't get it at the time or, you know, whatever it might be. And, you know, look back at them and say like, actually, there's some good stuff here.
01:04:59
Speaker
I don't wanna say this is absolutely not one of those movies, but it's not completely one of those movies, right? There's some interesting stuff here and there's some things that do work in the first half, but once you get that weird tonal shift with the Dark Overlord, it turns into a completely different movie and nothing fits together anymore and it just becomes an absolute snoozefest after that.
01:05:25
Speaker
Yeah, I would say because I always think of it in terms of percentages, if you could capture everything that makes a great movie, a lot of the stuff you and I have covered especially is those movies that were 80%, 90% of the way there, but then just were missing some element. They didn't quite hit the mark. This one is the exact flip in that there's maybe 20%, 30% maximum of good movie here, and the other 70 is, what the hell?
01:05:49
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And it's not even the stuff that you would, because I thought like the most, again, I thought, you know, it would have been going to this movie, my impression is that what makes it so bad is the bad animatronics and all that stuff in the in the duck suit. But it's like, that is not the worst part of this movie by any stretch of the imagination. Yeah, yeah, no, not at all. In fact, I would argue for the time, it was actually pretty good. So no, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Um,
01:06:15
Speaker
All right, well, I think that does it for Howard the Duck. If you're curious about watching this movie, I say just go and buy the Steve Gerber comics instead and just read those. But anyway, Nick, good having you on again. Why don't you tell people where they can find your stuff?
01:06:31
Speaker
Yeah. Uh, so my wife and I host a podcast called in love with movies. Uh, you can find that on any podcasting app in love with movies. You can also follow us on social media platforms. I think we exist on all of the ones that are happening right now, although God knows how long any of that's going to last at the letter and love with movies all spelled out. So
01:06:53
Speaker
We talk about love and relationships and we have guests on to talk about it. Perry's been on with us in the past. And then we, you know, use a movie to kind of get to know each other because movies are sort of my love language is what I like to say. You can also follow me at Nick Loves Movies. That's N-I-C-Nick, L-U-V Love. Nick Loves Movies on any social media platforms. And you'll see me, you know, sharing those things that we do for our podcast there as well.
01:07:17
Speaker
fingers crossed. Perry, we'll get Danielle on here sometime soon to discuss something with superhero wise as well. Absolutely. And if there's something there's something else on that's not on the list that she'd be wanting, she'd want to talk about, just let me know. And as long as we haven't covered it already, I'm sure we can find a way to get it. But yeah, that does it for this episode of Superhero Cinephiles. Superherocinephiles.com is the website. Supercinemapod on the socials, which mostly means blue sky and Instagram. Stay off X. Stay off X.
01:07:47
Speaker
They don't give Elon Musk any money or clout or anything like that. And also the comic book, again, crowdfunder.com slash paragons comic, crowdfunder no e.com slash paragons comic, please help support the book, please go buy the book. It's having a lot of fun working on it. And by the time this episode comes out, it should be available completely. So anyone who backs the book will definitely get a copy. It's not one of those cases where if it doesn't meet the funding goal, it will not
01:08:15
Speaker
be released, it's still gonna be released. So just, we're just trying to find, raise enough money to be able to pay the artist and my co-writer on it. So that does it for this episode. Thanks again for watching. Thanks again for listening and we'll talk to you next time.
01:08:30
Speaker
Thanks for listening to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. Superhero Cinephiles is produced by me, Percival Constantine, with the support of Zencaster. The show is created by myself and the late, great Derek Ferguson, our host, Emeritus. Visit us on the web at SuperheroCinephiles.com to listen to past episodes or find out how you can be a guest yourself. Support the show by visiting our advertiser links or click the Buy Me a Coffee link on the website to make a one-time donation. You can also support us by visiting Crowdfunder.com slash ParagonsComic. That's Crowdfunder with no E,
01:09:01
Speaker
and help support my superhero comic book, Paragons of Earth. We are SuperCinemapod on both Instagram and BlueSky, so please be sure to follow us. We'd also appreciate if you could rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts and share us with your friends.
01:09:34
Speaker
Thank you for listening and as always good night. Good evening. God bless.