Quantum Recast: Your Favorite Films, Recast In Different Years
We are a time-traveling film podcast that journeys through time to take classic films, blockbusters and cult favorites, to recast them in different years!
Quantum Recast: Your Favorite Films, Recast In Different Years
Space Jam - ?!?!: A Looney Change-Up to the Michael Jordan Juggarnaut
What if 'Space Jam' was recast with another NBA star?
While the rest of the crew are out enjoying summer, Cory and Nick go on their own trip down memory lane as they reminisce about the 1996 Looney Tunes classic. After shifting gears to reflect on the recent NBA Finals, the rise of the WNBA, they dive into the lasting influence of "Space Jam" on our culture, all while contemplating a creative challenge: reimagining the film without Michael Jordan (but no LeBron James this time).
Peek behind the curtain as we explore the fascinating production details of "Space Jam." Discover Michael Jordan's initial hesitations about acting, the clever screenplay that blends his real-life journey with a fantastical narrative, and the disputed directorial credit between Joe Pitka and Ivan Reitman. We also contrast the original film with the sequel "Space Jam: A New Legacy" and delve into the technical marvels of merging live-action and animation, drawing comparisons to "Who Framed Roger Rabbit." Our discussion also covers the film's critical reception and the enduring magic it holds for our two 90s kids.
Finally, Cory takes the film to 1989/90, for "pre-Jordan" version, while Nick takes it forward to 2021, to reimagine the movie in different eras. They brainstorm potential storylines and comedic gold of certain NBA stars teaming up with the Looney Tunes. We even dream up an updated soundtrack featuring artists of the times we're jumping to. Tune in for a lively blend of basketball nostalgia and movie magic, celebrating the timeless charm of "Space Jam" and envisioning its future.
(00:01:00)Intro
(00:09:38)About the Movie
(00:20:49)Useless Critic Stats
(00:38:28)Casting Rules
(00:41:04) New Soundtrack?
(00:44:34)Recasting Michael Jordan
(00:55:46)Recasting Stan
(00:59:42) Recasting Bill Murray
(01:03:31) Discussing Lola and the Looney Tunes
(01:06:36) Cory's Monstars - 1989
(01:13:58) Nick's Monstars - 2021
(01:17:50) How Does It End??
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Linktree
Tapbio
Hosts:
Cory Williams (@thelionfire)
Nick Growall (@nickgrowall)
Co-Hosts (Season 5):
Aly Dale (@alydale55)
Ash Hurry (@filmexplorationah)
Cass Elliott (@take5cass)
Terran Sherwood (@terransherwood)
Voice of the Time Machine:
Kristi Rothrock (@letzshake)
Editing by:
Nick Growall
Featured Music:
"Quantum Recast Theme" - Cory Williams
"Charmer" - Coat...
1996., Is Sunday. A piece, Do you recall? Austin 316 said Buck Bunny likes scary movies. I'll be the money.
Nick:Welcome to the Rock. I'm the minister Jordan. Can I have your autograph? Yeah, your John Hancock. What's going on here? You heard of the dream team. Well, we're the mean team, ho ho, I don't play defense.
Cory:Warner Brothers presents Jordan Bunny Special Delivery. Together, they just might save the world Space Jam.
Nick:Has anyone here ever played basketball?
Cory:Welcome to another episode of Quantum Recast.
Nick:I'm your host, Corey.
Cory:I haven't been here in a minute. Hot minute Hot minute, and with me, as always, is Nick. It's just us today. It's just us dudes being bros. Ash is married, allie's gallivanting around California.
Nick:Or Oregon, oregon, oregon, my goodness, pacific Northwest, yeah, all right, west Coast.
Cory:West, my goodness Pacific Northwest.
Nick:Yeah, All right. The East West Coast.
Cory:West Coast, Bigfoot country, Bigfoot country.
Nick:Send out, send out your love and hopes and prayers and hopes, and prayers or whatever you either that she finds Bigfoot or that she doesn't find Bigfoot, if she, finds Bigfoot, that he's peaceful and cool, like Harry and the Hendersons. Sure, sure, sure.
Cory:But you know, came back with confirmation.
Nick:That's all we're hoping for. And then Cass is on the East Coast.
Cory:Cass is just doing Cass things.
Nick:She has a pool. Now she has a pool, she can be cool.
Cory:So she's probably by the pool. So it's just us. Yeah, so it's just us. We don't have cool lives. But hey, if you clicked on this episode, we're talking about the movie Space Jam. Yes, the Michael Jordan version version I believe that was 1995 6. Yes, 1996 1996 masterpiece that is, space jam. We will not be really going into any depth of the lebron james version, not really so if you're gen z or alpha gen or gen alpha, you're probably not going to be that excited um sorry to all the bronze sexuals out there.
Cory:Sorry as they're talked about so but we just came out of the nba finals we did, we're in that weird time in between the finals and the draft. You know it's summer, it's a weird time, you know there's at least there's the wmba's hot.
Nick:Now you know, it's, it's, it's thriving, you know just weirdly played at two o'clock in the afternoon right yeah, everyone's at work.
Cory:They're still still fighting for those prime time spots, you know. But we'll get there, we'll get there. They just got private planes. We're all kind of paying attention now.
Nick:We're like this is kind of good hey, actual espn segments on a daily basis. Yeah, it's great, we're all for it um and then there's like the ufo and soccer, and the olympics are coming. The olympics are coming. That's mainly what we're all waiting for.
Cory:It's just this weird dead space where we watch a wmba highlights. If you like golf it's on on thursday through sunday, so we're talking basketball.
Nick:I did watch golf with my dad. I've never seen him watch golf. We watched the ending.
Cory:Nick. People would be shocked to learn how much golf I watch.
Nick:I'm shocked that you even watch any golf.
Cory:It's weirdly relaxing to just watch golf.
Nick:Are you at that point where you start falling asleep while you watch it? Are you in that mode yet?
Cory:No, actually I don't watch day one, two or three, I watch day four on sundays and I usually turn in the last like two hours of it, sure, when it's like coming down when it counts. You know, like the us open came down to the last hole this last week and it was great. I was like in it. My wife's like hey, we gotta go. I'm like hold on, mackerel just needs to make this putt and he screwed it up. And he screwed it up. Uh, but yeah, we're not talking about golf no, save it for the caddyshack.
Nick:Right, right, right shack. Yes, focus, or have you got more episode? Happy thoughts, the 90s basketball yes, yes the finals just happened.
Cory:The celtics won to uh. I don't know if you're from boston.
Nick:That was exciting for you.
Cory:For everyone else it's just kind of like oh great, yeah, okay um, it was, uh, it was an up and down playoffs for me. I rooted for everyone but dallas until the finals and I was like all right, fine, um, I'll get on the luc train, not enough.
Nick:Here we are.
Cory:All I get out of this is that the Lakers fans are mad. That's all I get out of this.
Nick:And that's enough sometimes.
Cory:It really is. It's fun to watch them go. Well, we have an in-season championship. It's like no, that doesn't count.
Nick:We promise we're not a sports podcast, we're just. This is like one, three episodes this year that we've covered all three sports this year. What's the third one? We did baseball. Oh, we did. Think of their own. Think of their own, yeah, alright, look at us being sports guys. Yeah, we're jocks.
Cory:Oh man, no, but for real, we are going to talk Space Jam, though we're not going to do our normal thing. We're not taking it to one year, no, no no, we've actually taken it to two different years pretty much, yes, yes, you've chosen a post jordan year to take it to with a essentially we're gonna.
Cory:We're gonna replace michael jordan in these movies impossible, but continue yes but jordan's or nick, has chosen a post jordan player to build a movie round that is not lebron, I'm assuming, because that movie's been made. That's already happened and then I've chosen a pre, like jordan era yeah, player. Yeah jordan was playing, but he wasn't jordan, but he wasn't the monster he was right, yes, um and uh, that's what we're gonna do today, but I'm here for it.
Cory:But you know, before we do that, um house cleaning, we're on social media, but the surgeon general is about to tell you that it's not healthy for you, it's not they're about to put warning labels on social media. It's full of plastics so it's like don don't, don't do it. It's literally going to be like when you open Instagram, you're like Attorney General, just like don't do this.
Nick:We are at Quantum Recast Instagram, facebook, tiktok X, twitter, whatever you want to call it, we're there.
Cory:But since you're already addicted to it, yeah, we're on the social medias.
Nick:For sure At Quantum Recast, follow us.
Cory:Like yeah, but your grandkids will not be into us because they'll know what's unhealthy. Yeah, that's true, that's true. But yeah, we're there. But before we jump into Space Jam yeah, like our new versions yes, our new versions of Space Jam. We have to talk about Space Jam. That's right 1996 is Space Jam. Nick, tell me about this movie.
Nick:Corey, what is there to say about Space Jam? It's magical, it's chaotic, it's insane. It shouldn't exist.
Cory:Corey, it's really the best words I can explain to you, but I'm so glad it does. I can say this, and without exaggeration, for our generation. It was a moment.
Nick:It was the moment.
Cory:Corey.
Nick:It was a massive moment. I think a lot of people want to point to a Phantom Menace menace coming out as like oh, this was the childhood moment, or you go a little earlier for something. I'm like, no, no, no, this was looney. Tunes were back. They were cool again. We've been raised on them through cartoon network and other stuff and we were in the middle, the freaking middle quarry, of the reign of michael jordan, his air does himself, and somebody had the crazy idea of let's make a movie with both of them what?
Cory:what the thing is is like jordan on his own yeah by 96 is three peated once yes um, and he's like mid second three, peat right, or he's about to start the second three they shot this before the season that he officially came back.
Nick:There was the, the playoff run that he had, where he lost to the magic, and this is shot over the summer before him.
Cory:Rodman and pippen go on their three peatat of terror For any non-basketball fans who just have to know Michael Jordan quit basketball in the middle of his career at the height of his career honestly to go play baseball.
Nick:For his dad.
Cory:Yeah, his dad was murdered right.
Nick:Yes.
Cory:And so he wanted to honor his dad.
Nick:His dad was a baseball player, or really into baseball, really into baseball, really loved it, wanted him to play it imagine being the best basketball player that's ever lived.
Cory:Your dad's like yeah, I would have been better if you were baseball baseball player dad, I'm six foot six my batter, my batter's box is way too big. Erin judge is a freak. Oh, but, um so, but like. What people have to know is like so michael jordan's the biggest thing in the world, yes, 96 yes, but like for our generation, that's really into michael jordan's the biggest thing in the world.
Cory:Yes, 96. Yes, but like for our generation, that's really into michael jordan because we're like 10, like 8, 9, 10, 11 years old right in there um, we're also the generation that brought back looney tunes because of a little network called cartoon network. You're welcome world like generation x, abandoned looney tunes they were dead on arrival.
Cory:Gen z abandoned them right after we did right after we brought them back it's true, it's true, but we got cartoon network we thought it was the greatest thing ever in the early days of cartoon network, it was nothing but looney tunes and hannah barbara reruns and we were like this is solid, this is this, this is the life this is pretty good, and so you're welcome.
Nick:Yeah to say this was like the perfect amalgamation of all my interest as an eight-year-old would be an understatement of the century.
Cory:Yeah, like the hype building for this movie was was at all-time high levels because I'll ask you this do you think there was any um interest from disney? From disney about making, I think they were like jordan come play basketball with mickey mouse um, I don't know if they had the madness to think about that, so you also have to remember that, like in 96, disney less about Mickey Mouse and Goofy the doll duck and far more about Aladdin and Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast.
Cory:They're just riding high at the box office they have their new IP and Warner Brothers is just leaning on.
Nick:Hey, the Looney Toons, you guys love these guys, right?
Cory:they're doing solid numbers on Cartoon Network.
Nick:We're gonna put them in 90s gear and make them look really cool and hip. And then, 20 years from now, that shirt's gonna say old school.
Cory:It's gonna make you feel really old we just bought six flags, bugs you can go see bugs bunny now it was. It was a good time for those two things to. I think just it's literally for our generation. It was the two possible biggest things yeah that could have come together. The only way this is bigger is if Michael Jackson records.
Nick:I believe I can fly instead of he who should not be named.
Cory:Redacted kelly, yeah so if michael jackson had put out that, instead of the free willie song, perfect trifecta no notes the biggest pop culture thing that's ever happened to millennials this was.
Nick:This was the incident yeah so let me, let me give you the rundown cory, real quick, some factoids about the movie, just to dive into this a little bit more. So Space Jam was released on November 10th 1996. It was directed by a guy named Joe Peitka Okay, the extraordinary director, joe Peitka, corey, do you know him?
Cory:Nobody does.
Nick:Corey, Don't answer that question he directed one other movie in 89 called Let it Ride, but he was mainly known for music videos and commercials all through the late 80s and 90s. A lot of Pepsi commercials, this dude he. So the reason he got tied into it.
Cory:Please tell me how this guy got this gig.
Nick:So a lot of you might be asking the question how do you, how does a movie starring the Looney Tunes and Michael Jordan come together? So in 92 and 93, there were two Super Bowl Nike ads Hair Jordan and Aerospace Jordan and they aired on TV and they featured Michael with Bugs Bunny. And they conceived this idea following the popularity of advertisements where Jordan played with Mars Blackman, spike Lee from the character he had from.
Nick:She's Gotta have it. So the creative director, jim Riswold, he's the one that kind of pushed it forward and he chose Bugs Bunny for the next campaign because the character was his childhood hero Logical. So Joe Pitka's just the commercial guy. They shot this the first one, hair Jordan six months is how long it took and a million dollars to make, because Warner Brothers was constantly pushing back because they didn't want Nike to modernize Bugs' character.
Nick:However, the commercial success of both ads kind of was a nice bit of research for Warner Brothers to kind of understand that Bugs has relevance still and there's a lot to do, that you can tie it in with Michael. So this led to the company green lighting a film featuring Jordan and Bugs which came out of a plane meeting between Nike executive and and then and producer Ivan Reitman of the Ghostbusters fame. Jordan was offered movie deals previously but his manager, david Falk, turned them down because he felt like Michael Jordan could only act as himself, which is fair because, like, if you see michael jordan in a movie or a tv, it's michael jordan. He can't. He's also an athlete, like athletes, turned actors. They they're here and they're hit and miss. A lot of the time.
Nick:We have some wrestlers that are doing okay, but that's a different mold yeah you're trying to get an athlete to do something other than play a sport yeah, this is pre-rock yeah, um, this was written by leo benvenuti and steve rudnick. They're a writing duo that's done things like the santa claus okay and kicking and screaming okay, and then also timothy harris, who did trading places falling down and twins falling down like the hardcore michael douglas losing it.
Cory:Yep, that's it, yep, all right.
Nick:So if you need to know what space jam is about, if you're new to this, I don't know why you're clicking on at this point, because we're about to just spoil the crap out of it.
Nick:But you know, in a desperate attempt to win a basketball match and earn their freedom, the looney tunes seek the aid of retired basketball champion michael jordan naturally naturally, um, this is obviously a fictionalized account of what happened between michael jordan's retirement in 93 and when he came back to playing basketball in 95, like we talked about as far as we know, as far as we know, it's a I I'm, it's a documentary corey as far as I'm concerned this is what happened the looney tunes came out of retirement the looney tunes brought back his love for the game, and that's why we're here right now.
Nick:That's why he has six instead of three titles. It wasn't because he was bad at baseball no, never.
Cory:No, he was, he was doing. Well, you know, all right he's doing minor leagues everybody loved him.
Nick:That team was selling a lot of tickets. They were. That was tons of tickets. So, but and but. That's the thing I think a lot of people don't touch on, and I think that's why one of the magic ingredients for why this movie works is because they played with reality.
Nick:Yeah, they played with his timeline Because to compare Space Jam and New Legacy, the LeBron movie not trying to hate on lebron, but the problem was is that they didn't. If he had made it about, you know, his last season in miami and it was about him deciding to go home and try to win the title for cleveland and make that down from three.
Cory:One run that would have been so much better.
Nick:That would have been a lot better, because we're invested in the reality right, it's the melding and it's putting it in this very specific moment in this athlete's life yeah and kind of playing with that fantasy level of it.
Cory:I think that's why space jams lore kind of like blends into the jordan mythos instead, it's about a father son bonding between him and a fake kid right, I made it. I guess it's based off his, by the way none of lebron's kids are computer geek nerds that want to build video games.
Nick:They're both tremendous athletes they tried this, they tried to update it, they tried to make it cool for the gen z kids and stuff.
Cory:The gen z didn't buy it look my kid's just like all you nerds. It's like your son is brawny james, we know he's about to go into the draft unwarranted your other kid is like six foot three already and he's like 12 and he's probably gonna be better than brawny.
Nick:It's a little bit ridiculous. So, yeah, basically gory. The answer is they made commercials and they said this is a fun pairing, let's make a movie about it. And there is some discussion about whether the director, joe Pitka, made it or Ivan Reitman made it.
Cory:I love these stories. I love the fake director.
Nick:So a lot of people who worked on the film, mostly the voice actors, have all said that Ivan was the one who was the actual director and that. Joe Pitka was only a director for the animation, so for whatever reason, pitka got the main credit. Reitman was only credited as producer.
Cory:I would believe Ivan Reitman made this movie over the guy I've never heard of, right, because it's a well-made movie.
Nick:I feel like Pitka is the one that, like helped transition it, because he's like he probably had a good working relationship with Jordan and on the commercials and stuff, allegedly he's the one, he claims to be the one also that convinced jordan to allow for the uh, the pickup of dennis rodman, because they were just having a conversation about it. And he's like what you, you don't want the guy who's going to rebound the ball, so you can shoot it all the time.
Cory:And jordan's like I just don't see jordan taking advice from a guy who's never made a movie before, or he's made the one movie before. Come on, you don't believe it commercial guy that's I don't know. And also the last dance tells us anything. It's the chicago bulls office didn't listen to jordan a whole lot?
Nick:that's true, not at all. Yeah, I feel like they just saw a guy who had a bad reputation and they went this guy's cheap and he's really good at rebounding. We just lost a rebounder to the magic.
Nick:We should make this deal all right, yeah, no, I agree, I agree so the thing about beyond this, from a technical standpoint the production of this movie is interesting. So it's kind of up there with like, who framed roger rabbit as one of those live action animation combos? Even reitman phoned up robert zemeckis and was like, hey, we're making this movie, do you, do you have any advice? And he just said don't do it.
Cory:It nearly killed me. This is a pain in the ass.
Nick:Because the classic animation faction of Warner Brothers. They were the ones that were supposed to just be responsible for Space Jam. However, Corey, after only one week, the animation work was so complicated that Warner Brothers contacted more studios and reassigned people from the other movie. They were making quest for camelot to space jam. So if you're wondering why quest for camelot suddenly dips in quality, it turns out, bugs bunnies are really hard to animate along.
Nick:Playing basketball apparently is stupid hard um production quarry total around 19 months in 10 of those were the actual filming. The rest of the animation is what I'm reading here more than 700 workers in 18 studios in london, canada, california and ohio that's wild that's insane, I mean. And they complained about pitka's uh camera style because he would use a lot of those dutch tilted angles and stuff and it made it really hard for them to like and he was shooting with tons of cameras so they just never.
Cory:It was making it hard to like animate as they were going along and stuff yeah, but I like the dutch angles because it's like in toonville, yeah, and it shows you. It's wacky, right if anything.
Nick:If pitka is the director, like he gets it, he gets the concept that this is looney toon land there's. This isn't. This isn't cinema cory. This is bugs, bunny and michael playing against aliens and I, I get, I get that.
Cory:Just to end the whole pitka thing. He probably directed the movie to some degree. It's just like the Cosmatos tombstone thing. Cosmatos is there, he doesn't know what he's doing. So you have this. Actors that are like, well, we've been on 100 sets before, we'll just kind of self-direct and kind of shove him there. And Reitman's made Ghostbusters and stuff. He's like hey, if you have questions, I'm right here and I bet Pit a lot of questions he's just like how do I make a movie?
Nick:he's like glad you asked that question. Let me step in right here and, uh, make, push some gears and stuff let me tell you something.
Cory:Uh, none of those ghosts were real. What? So I know a lot about filming a live actor.
Nick:Next, something that's not really there so just let me, let me take the reins here for a little bit here. So the other thing about this movie, like we're talking about it did the dual live action cartoons. It's also one of the earliest animated productions to use digital technology and this is kind of one of the first of it was that it was filmed in a virtual studio. Michael jordan filmed in this 360 degree green screen room with motion trackers around him, green suited nba players and improv actors from groundings, theater and school served as uh placeholders for the looney tunes and stuff, and then he just had. The backgrounds of stuff were keyed in later.
Cory:So okay.
Nick:So I say that also to think about. You know, we talk about actors, athletes turned actors and stuff, and if anyone is trying to rag on this movie or try to be like, well, michael Jordan's not a good actor, it's like, well, he's not an actor, but the fact that he was playing against green people, yeah, says a lot about michael jordan's natural charisma, I think, and that's really what they were basing it off of.
Nick:Like we talked about earlier, it's like you can't put michael in a movie. It's why it's why they didn't cast michael jordan in the air movie that came out last year, because it's like you see somebody that isn't michael jordan, that you're completely thrown out of the movie, and vice versa. Like you have to have michael jordan because he just has his own natural charisma and just leans into it. And I do think that the commercials kind of acted as like prep work for him to kind of get ready for such a big thing. I mean, six months on a commercial, I feel like you're going to be ready for whatever they throw at you and I mean like I think they work to those like the weaknesses of an athlete.
Cory:It's most of his lines are kind of one-liners it's just responding. Most of the Looney Tunes are doing all the heavy lifting and it's just. It works.
Nick:It does.
Cory:You know, I think it works. I don't think I've seen it even as an adult and never felt like, ooh, this didn't age well.
Nick:It's kind of like Hook, where I hear a lot of people say like it's bad. Who the hell says Hook is bad? People say it's bad, critics said it was bad.
Cory:They do. I mean, like you have to. You have to bash shit as a critic or you don't have a job.
Nick:You can't just be the five-star guy. No one's going to listen to you.
Cory:But who the hell today that isn't just being a contrarian on the internet hates Hook?
Nick:I don't know, Corey. There's nothing wrong with the movie Hook. There's nothing wrong with it, I agree. But there's some weird pocket where it's like the millennials Hook and we love Space Jam and everybody else scratched their heads and went what are you talking about?
Cory:People who hate Hook now are probably the same people that will watch Back to the Future and be like I don't get it. This is stupid.
Nick:Probably they're also just a bunch of adults that grew up and they're lame now.
Cory:Yeah, what the hell, get it together, people. I would honestly if someone told me they hated Hook and they were an adult in my age, even like if an 18 year old, that's whatever gen alpha. I'm never talking to you again. What value is there in holding a conversation?
Nick:depart from me. I never knew you exactly. It's just like get out of my face satan.
Cory:You're just some contrarian hipster. Go choke on your ipa.
Nick:We're gonna sit here and enjoy our happy meals with space jam, tie-ins with our giant coaster cups my thing is hook like space jam.
Cory:It's fine. Anyone can watch space jam and say it's not their thing. Sure hook though they're wrong, but hook it's like this is. I don't even like hook for nostalgic reasons.
Nick:It's a good, it's just a good movie, right?
Cory:yeah, it's an incredible movie, yes, 100 so if you hate hook, you're just a contrarian and you suck, and it must suck to live in a life, in a world where you have to hate things to feel like smart right, so, and you guys should go back and listen to our our first episode of the season, recasting hook but anyways, and just re-watch hook. Yeah, we know that you're wrong it's fine.
Nick:Well, core, we talk about useless critics stats. I'm gonna give you the rundown for space jam. Are you ready? Yes, okay, so sort of when this movie came out, the critics, or I guess. Just where it sits now imdb it has a 6.5. All right, kind of low. But you know it is what it is rot tomatoes. Critics gave it a 43 percent out of 100. Okay, that's audience. Audience gave it 63. All right, so metacritic, better 59 critic and I'm not even gonna do the stupid, it's 71, 71 of 100 is what the?
Nick:grade is for uh regular film goers okay letterbox 3.2, 3.2 cory all right um, I had it listed as a four have I ever rated it?
Cory:you have never rated it, but in your mind.
Nick:What would? What would you put it at um? I would give it space jam space jam, the michael jordan. I'd give it three and a half.
Cory:Okay, sure, out of five, right, yeah, out of five.
Nick:Yeah, three and a half I was gonna note these quick two because letterbox is full of just fun like-length reviews that people have. But somebody else pointed out these two fun things. Courtney B said Michael Jordan is so noble that he offers himself into slavery in order to free the Looney Tunes, despite having met the Looney Tunes half an hour ago and having a wife and three kids at home.
Cory:Yeah, but I mean it's like Jordan knows who they are. He's aware.
Nick:He knows what the stakes are. If we don't have Looney Tunes, then we don't have joy in the world, Corey.
Cory:It's true. I'm just saying it's not like he met them.
Nick:I mean, he met them, but he knows them. It's not like this is his introduction to the.
Cory:Looney Tunes, it's like if Michael Jordan walked in right now.
Nick:I would be meeting him for the first time, be like sure, like if and if michael jordan walked this room and said I need you two guys to go play baseball with me to save the world, I'd be like, all right, this isn't great odds, no, we're not gonna do well, I trust you. And then the other one, so patrick fiscar fiss, fissackerly. Patrick fissackerly said look, all I'm saying is you write a movie where the looney tunes kidnap michael jordan, force him to play basketball against aliens. You do a better job, go ahead.
Cory:I mean, I just it's fair, so I feel challenged but, no, I'm just going to say it doesn't need to be touched. Yeah, it does. I don't think it does.
Nick:I think it fits where it does, perfectly in the 90s. There's this perfect storm of everything. Are you ready for Ebert's thoughts?
Cory:thoughts am? I don't know you tell me am I wild? Guess I'm gonna say he gave it. I don't know he's so unpredictable. Yes, um, I'm gonna say he gave it three, three point five.
Nick:Damn so, ebert had a good time he gets it, he gets it he had a wonderful time at the box, he said space jam is a happy marriage of good ideas three films for the price of one court, giving us a comic treatment of the career adventures of michael jordan, cross with the looney tunes cartoon and some showbiz warfare. The result is a delightful family movie in the best sense, which means adults will enjoy it too. Hey, and even siskel. He focused on his praise for jordan's performance, saying he wisely accepted as a first movie that builds nicely on his personality. In an assortment of tv ads, the sound bites are just a little longer hey, you know what we can also credit Jordan for doing?
Nick:What's that?
Cory:Getting the hell out of Hollywood. He, just he did it. He came, he did his thing.
Nick:He dipped and left I'm out. He didn't feel like I gotta be on every Fast and Furious movie.
Cory:And I guarantee you someone was there and was like hey, we can make more, and he's like no, they tried.
Nick:There was a plan in place, but Michael didn't sign for a second movie Space Jam 3?
Cory:Or Space Jam 2. Sorry, just recently following LeBron, no, no, no. Someone said LeBron made one and people are saying it's better Jordan's like what the hell.
Nick:That's when I took it personally Corey.
Cory:He's like I'm going to call Scorsese.
Nick:He would probably pick up. He'd be like holy shit, michael Jordan just called me.
Cory:I've make this movie, Looks at his wife and is like this is quite a pickle.
Nick:I can de-age Michael Jordan. I don't know if I can.
Cory:I don't know if I believe in the project, but I also don't know if I can say no to this.
Nick:So the only person that I found generally so, chuck Jones, famous animator, made a lot of Looney Tunes back in the day. He actually had some critiques of the movie. He had some critiques of the movie. He said it straight, too far from the source material, in particular saying that bugs his main, yeah, yeah, yeah, his main. His main complaint, cory, was that bugs would never openly recruit others in his battles, that he would just wipe the floor with the monster himself no way jojo, this is like.
Nick:This is like all those star wars fans that are mad that luke skywalker got old and didn't pull down the Star Destroyers himself.
Cory:Is Chuck Jones the creator of Bugs Bunny? He's not the creator. He's the guy that in the later days after the classical era.
Nick:But yeah, I get that he was a huge part of the Looney Tunes.
Cory:But I, like you know what I respect the opinions he has that he watched this movie and was going hmm, this doesn't work.
Nick:This is illogical.
Cory:I don't think Sylvester would have joined this team.
Nick:Not my Bugs, Bunny Corey.
Cory:Or he's just like his wife just hears him yelling and he comes to her and he's like what is this? They ruined it. Daffy and Bugs would not be on the same team In 50 years. When have they ever been friends?
Nick:Daffy would clearly join the Monstars because there's money involved. He figures out that it's a huge thing. He'd sell out all the Looney Tunes for it.
Cory:Morphin the Martian he's an alien.
Nick:Why is he on the team? That's why he's the referee, Corey. Oh, he's like neutral. Yeah, he's Switzerland in this. All right, all right.
Cory:He's just his opinion. Bugs. Bonnie would not have needed michael jordan, but I would ask chuck, give me the source material where he's ever played basketball. That's true? I don't think it's there it's not so yeah, bugs might just be like man. If this was blowing up a hunter or something, then yeah, I've got this.
Nick:I'm in, yeah, but this is a sport. Yeah, we're going to add some violence to it because we're Looney Tunes, but we've got to follow some rules here. There's some guidelines.
Cory:He would hate what they're making now, where they're all you know.
Nick:They're friends. Yeah, they share a lease together. Where's the dynamite? So, corey, so the budget? So the budget for this movie was 80 million, which is a lot for back in the day in the 90s, yeah, but domestically it debuted at 27.5 million, topping the box office. It ended up making 250 million worldwide. Yeah, they got their money back. It's the highest grossing basketball film of all time, corey, are you serious? And it's also the highest grossing Looney Tunes film.
Cory:Suck it, lebron, suck it. This is another thing Jordan can call him. That's why he's the scout, I hope. Oh, michael Jordan just called LeBron when all the numbers came back in for Space Jam 2 and said Still not on my level.
Nick:Call me when you get that top, that top spot and LeBron's like can I make another movie? What are the? What's Mickey Mouse doing? What are the Muppets doing?
Cory:and, like I respect LeBron, he is playing better basketball than any 40 year old should, yeah, absolutely. But I love that it this probably ate at him a little bit just couldn't quite get there. Mj hangs up.
Nick:He's like so in other media. So yeah, so this thing, it was a big deal cory it was, it was an event, for I mean our age, for beyond the movie there was, there was merchandise being delved out. I mean this movie. Cory the space jam franchise is estimated to have generated six billion in total revenue. This includes air jordans, bugs, bunny shirts, happy meals, bugsy bogues, jerseys and like kids stuff for tweeters probably wasn't selling, probably not.
Cory:It boosted his sales a lot and that's why not sean bradley.
Nick:Huh, no, sean bradley. Well, I mean it wasn't listed in the small amount of things, like I couldn't list everything that it made money off of it, but even the legacy of this movie, cory. Even the film's website, space jamcom, was created 96, along with promotion of the movie. It remained unchanged but active for years, and it got re-brought up because ofa resurgence around 2010 as a historical artifact of the early days of the web, because this thing's like if you made your own website geo city.
Nick:Yeah yes, it looks like something a middle schooler made in their computer science class with gifs and stuff and everything like. It's insane that's awesome um, the accompanying video game. It was a PS1. I'm surprised I didn't just rent the crap out of this game, but it's a clone of NBA Jam and you basically play through the game and there's also mini games at the ends of quarters and stuff.
Cory:Oh, okay.
Nick:It's pretty fun. Corey, I'm going to ask you real quick what does Space Jam mean to you?
Cory:Again, it's just an event. Man, I was like 11. I was 10 going on 11 in 1996. And I was just, by the way, 1986 when I got into basketball heavily Like, obviously, jordan's a big thing, jordan's a big thing, but I live in Oklahoma, on the border of Texas and the. Dallas Cowboys were a bigger thing.
Nick:Like, I feel like in the In the region.
Cory:In. Like my parents, they weren't in football, so it's like I didn't really care that much. You know, I was like alright and I think I liked the Steelers, just despite my parents in fifth grade. And they're still, to this day, my favorite football team. It's never changed but, like you're aware of Jordan, right.
Cory:And then, like in 1986, that draft class happens and, like my favorite player gets drafted, I got really into Allen Iverson in fifth grade and then, like, obviously, kobe bryant comes out of that, steve nash comes out of jason kidd ray allen, you know come out of that draft class and so um and uh. So I got really into basketball. So this was a big deal it was an event. I remember it very much.
Cory:You watched it in theaters I absolutely watched it in theaters and anyone who missed out miss seeing it in theaters missed, like the quintessential experience of being a millennial kid cory, uh, I have a story to tell you.
Nick:Shoot.
Cory:I may have told this story before on the podcast, but since it's the space, since it's the space jam podcast, I feel this is the biggest betrayal that ever went through, possibly in his life, possibly ever.
Nick:This is long story short. Basically, I don't get to go to movies very often as a kid, cory, because you were from a shelter, because I was from a sheltered upbringing cory and my buddy that I went to church with for his birthday he would take his friends to go watch a movie.
Nick:Year before this we go see toy story perfect, awesome awesome amazing, caught that moment, got it, nailed it and this year space champs coming out cory cory. When I'm hyped for a movie as a kid, I'm buying the magazine, I'm begging for the magazines or I'm reading them on the shelf while I'm waiting I'm parents are like talking rabbits.
Cory:What is this? What's going on? Looney tootie michael jordan.
Nick:I don't know I, cory, I bought the because I had to wait till it came out on VHS, and I'll get to why. Because I bought like the scholastic read along book, like from like those old.
Cory:That was a good loophole, if you wanted a book that your parents weren't like. Cool about. I bought.
Nick:Like those scary story like the most banned book ever, those scary story books.
Cory:I got them in the scholastic and I was like I got these from school because, like I, could.
Nick:I could tell you Toy Story, space Jam and Phantom Men. I had like novelization, kids novelization of all three of those, because I had to wait till all those movies generally came out on VHS. But I saw Toy Story because of my friend and then Space Jam was coming out. We were all so hyped. I was so hyped about it Getting ready Love Looney Tunes, love Michael Jordan, the week before Corey he changes his mind. It turned out. It was a good movie. It's a holiday classic.
Cory:You hated it. I was, like that whole time, so upset. Probably hated Arnold Schwarzenegger more than anyone's ever had. My mom's, like my mom's like it's his birthday.
Nick:He has to. You gotta let him choose. And I'm like you're right, no movie but, and I remember he's like, see guys, it was good, right, and we're watching people walk out of space and they're like dribbling on each other, like that was so cool.
Cory:Oh my gosh. And we're just like space jam man, but space jam. But you know I okay. When arnold schwarzenegger's wife found out he knocked up and impregnated their nanny, I bet you still hated arnold schwarzenegger more than she. No, that's his like, real life.
Nick:Oh, okay, I was like I remember that part of Jingle all the way.
Cory:But I'm just saying you probably hated Arnold more Weirdly.
Nick:I didn't hate Arnold, I just, I was just upset at the situation you had to be seething.
Cory:I was seething in my eight-year-old body, were you wearing like a Jordan jersey just at a protest, if I just, oh man, turbo man, all right, hey, we've cast recasted that too. Go check that out.
Nick:Yeah, for sure, but in too many movies but to wrap it all up, it has a happy, glimmerous ending because, you know, when it did come out, my mom rented it on pay-per-view back when he had to get the box and watch it, and my cousins came over we had pizza. It was a perfect 90s night and it was. It was legitimate. So there was some justice in the end there, for sure. But yeah, this is kind of a big deal for us growing up.
Cory:It was a massive moment a little bit.
Nick:So we're on a little long here on the front end, but we have a lot to talk about.
Cory:Yeah, it's space jam, so let's not kid ourselves the legacy of space jam.
Nick:They've. Obviously they had space jam uh, a new legacy with lebron, but before that there were other movies they tried to make in the Space Jam franchise. Corey, are you ready for these?
Cory:yes.
Nick:So, after Space Jam 1, they, like I said, they talked about Space Jam 2, where Jordan would come back with the Looney Tunes and play Against an alien villain named berserk. Oh they, he did not agree to star in the sequel and they just canceled plans. So then they, so then their idea.
Cory:It's like right here guys.
Nick:So he says they pivot instead into this movie called spy jam starring Jackie Chan.
Cory:That did not get made I'm aware I would have seen it.
Nick:We would all seen it, but that became looney tunes. Back in action with brendan frazier um, a prop it's I. I liken it to the muppets, you know, in the 90s they had christmas carol, the muppet treasure island. They had this formula add popular actor into this timeless tale, classic. And then after that they were like no, we're just gonna go back to like, we're not gonna do this again.
Nick:And it's kind of the problem that Space Jam is having. It's like they have the ideas, are like we're going to do Race Jam with Jeff Gordon or Golf Jam with Tiger Woods or Skate Jam with Tony Hawk, and all those were discussed, never happened. And then LeBron gets Justin Lin, the director famous for Fast and Furious movies, to make Space Jam a new legacy in 2021. Space Jam, a new legacy in 2021. I will also throw out that a tie into this. For the original Space Jam they had the Teen Titans show. Teen Titans Go did like this movie where they literally just watch the movie and commented on it. So it's kind of like the what's that? The show where they watch all the old horror movies and mystery science.
Cory:Thank you.
Nick:Mystery science theater. I was thinking. I was like what is the name of that? I can't remember. So they did that. But that's pretty much the legacy of Space Jam and currently I don't know if it's current, current or it's the last couple years, but director Malcolm Dealy, known mainly for Undercover Brother, if you watch that classic has discussed a sequel moving into the professional wrestling world with Dwayne the Rock Johnson.
Cory:I mean at this point, I think they've missed that. I think they did too Rock's making A24 movies.
Nick:He's in his Please take me seriously face of life.
Cory:You could do cena, john cena maybe, but he's perfect, other than he says fuck a lot now in peacemaker shows. So does michael jordan. Um yeah, but at the time no at the time.
Nick:No, he was very squeaky clean. Yeah, they're really good on that. We'd bet we silence button on live games we don't want to talk about that gambling addiction. Nothing at all, nothing at all, nothing at all. See here Awards-wise, corey. It won an Annie Award for Best Individual Achievement and Technical Achievements and it got Grammys for Best Song for a Motion Picture. I Believe I Can Fly.
Cory:It didn't win the Oscar for Best.
Nick:Song. It didn't win the Oscar for Best Song.
Cory:Listen again, despite the horrible connotations that come with it now I mean that's, it's a cory.
Nick:This song was big. Space jam was big. This was the other piece of it core. The soundtrack was just as big it was. I'm gonna look that up it because core this is and this is the. You know we've already talked about r kelly and sat infamously.
Cory:Now is uh canceled, as he should be, and he committed horrible crimes and filmed them, so it's not really up for debate, it's not there's no discussion about it, but this song and it's so.
Nick:I think the reason it's so painful is because this song has like been played in churches. People have covered it like it's a big deal, like it's one of those like feel good songs of the 90s and it's it's a shame that when it comes on you're like am I okay to sing this? Are we okay to sing this? Is it okay? What did you find? Did you find anything?
Cory:yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. Man, it wasn't even nominated for Best Original Song.
Nick:And you're talking about the Oscars for that year, right?
Cory:Yeah.
Nick:Because it would have been in 97 was when the Oscars would have happened.
Cory:Yeah, that's right, I'm in 97. Yeah, yeah, yeah, the 69th Academy Awards, yeah.
Nick:What are the nominees?
Cory:They have me. Okay, listen straight up. The hell, I'm mad. It's that's. How does it not get nominated? That song was everywhere, okay, well, just to tell you that thing, you do got robbed by a vita.
Nick:A vita, oh my god. Yeah, you must love me in a vita. That's madonna, right?
Cory:yes, yeah is that a madonna movie no one saw, I mean we didn't, because we were.
Nick:We were eight and eleven. It's fine, it's fine, it's fine it's not seriously.
Cory:I don't even know what.
Nick:The mirror has two faces, one a song from one fine day got nominated, which is a fantastic movie.
Cory:Oh, is it okay, but it's a rom-com, right like a romantic it's kind of like almost a dramedy okay, all, right, okay but I'll say this I couldn't tell you the song, and I've seen that movie at least a dozen times, but I don't know the song. Okay, but I know I believe I can fly.
Nick:Yes, we all know it.
Cory:I don't even know the Aveda song. That's not coming to my head.
Nick:Don't cry for me. Argentina Is that it.
Cory:No, it's called you Must Love Me. Oh, okay, never mind, I apologize you ass.
Nick:Anyway. I mean, the English patient won best picture from that year and Jerry Maguire was popular Vargo was nominated.
Cory:This is okay, alright, we gotta move on. We gotta move on. That was like indie time. We were really in indie time.
Nick:For sure, for sure. Needless to say, the other element of this was the music was huge. They literally played through the whole soundtrack at the end because they're like we have so many good songs we can't pick just one. It's a great movie. I love it to death Because it does. It brings that childhood love of the Looney Tunes with Michael Jordan which kind of acted, I think, for a lot of 90s kids, especially in our area, as a gateway to the NBA, to basketball, when we were growing up, and now you and I will reference basketball on the podcast and stuff and we felt like it was a necessity to recast it and talk about it on here. Yeah, so before we dive into the casting, casting cory.
Cory:Yeah because we, since we take it to two different years, we're not going to break down any right, we're not, definitely not gonna break down two years.
Nick:No, no, not at all.
Cory:Also since we're in a basketball season, we have to break down two years a piece.
Nick:Yes, yeah, not doing that, not doing that sorry about you, but we're running, we're trying to give this decent time length, not three hours later, so what we're doing, cory. So do you want me to break it down for everybody?
Cory:Yeah, break it down.
Nick:Break it down so normally we have our cast list. We go through it. We have a lot of smaller cast people that are 30 seconds or less that we quickly run through. Today again, corey and I have picked a NBA superstar from past and present, from different eras, beyond Michael Jordan's time, and we're going to build a Space Jam roster around him. He's still playing with the looney tunes, they're still playing against the monsters, but we're picking our for lack of a better discussion, our michael jordan of that of that period, and then we're picking the five players that are turned into the monsters. And then we've got two people from the real world that we're casting in bill murray and wayne knight's character, stan podlak yeah.
Cory:so like, mainly what we're doing is we are straight up saying what is we're doing? What we did on normal podcast, but instead of saying, like, what would the Matrix look like in 1971? Yeah, it would be terrible because there's no Internet. But we're saying what would Space Jam look like in this other star's era?
Nick:if it's made around that person. Yes, exactly, for sure. Yeah, because that's what we do here on Quantum Recast we take movies forwards and backwards and sideways in time.
Cory:So yeah, because that's what we do here on Quantum Recast we take movies forwards and backwards and sideways in time. So again, a brief rundown of Space Jam. What we need, nick, is we need an all-star basketball player to carry this film and put us in seats. Right, we need to cast a comedic assistant that's just faithfully loyal to him, that he literally goes into a cartoon land. You got it. We need a famous friend.
Nick:Yes. A famous celebrity friend, that we need a famous friend, yes, a famous celebrity friend that nobody asks the question why he's playing golf with michael jordan, larry, bird and charles, not none other than I know bill murray does love golf. That's true, I'm aware of that, but that is the only reason, yeah I can think of that.
Cory:He's in this movie. It's as weird as dan akroyd being a part of we are the world yes it's no one ask why we just let it have. The ghostbusters are just allowed to go where the hell they want. Yeah, and we just don't ask yeah, and so and then we need five other players that were rivals to our respective All-Star to be the villain basketball team. You got it. That's what we need. Yes, okay, and we don't have to do anything else.
Nick:Nothing else.
Cory:The Looney.
Nick:Tunes stay as is. We're just going to say Danny DeVito. He's been around almost as long as the Looney Tunes, so no matter where we took it, he could still be Swaghammer, he could still voice it. Man, yeah, he could still be the bad guy. Take it back to the 70s, he's in Taxi. Jesse is fist pumping right now somewhere.
Cory:Danny DeVito is, was and always will be Swaghammer.
Nick:Swaghammer forever. But one thing I was going real quick yeah, I, I had some, some free time strangely in my life and I asked myself the question I was like what would the soundtrack look like in the respective years we're going?
Cory:to without telling me who your all-star is, because we're not casting yet. What year are you?
Nick:in. I'm going, so I'm doing a weird thing. I'm going to 2021. Okay, most people that are space jam fans will go. Well, nick, that's when lebron made space jam was like space jam legacy doesn't exist in our alternate reality.
Cory:It doesn't.
Nick:Because this is where this is, as if Michael never made it. This is as if it's being made right now, so I'm taking it to 2021.
Cory:Okay.
Nick:Now my soundtrack. I'm sitting there trying to redact all this stuff, so I'm sitting there thinking you know, Space Jam by the Quad City DJs it's on Jock Jams for the past 30 years.
Cory:That's also a big deal. It's a big deal.
Nick:Yeah, it was on everything. Every basketball game played it.
Cory:Whoop there it is it's not from this movie, right? No, it's not. I was like jeez.
Nick:But I thought you know you take the DJ group Justice and you let Rihanna sing the song over it.
Cory:Okay, yeah.
Nick:I think it fits pretty well. Fly Like an Eagle. You gave me the Weeknd to sing it instead of Seal.
Cory:Fly Like an Eagle is from this sound track that was supposed to be the big hit.
Nick:He thought that was going to be the one, and then R Kelly had some words of inspiration.
Cory:I believe I Can Fly came out.
Nick:Now if we were playing this super safe, corey, given the allegations, not the allegations, the convictions that have happened. I would give you Kirk Franklin.
Cory:Okay.
Nick:And just hopefully and everybody's fine. But I'm gonna go frank ocean okay, because he's also great and people should listen to him more. But the real one I jumped into was the hit them high monster's anthem. That nobody talks about is the raps single on it that pretty much has five different people on it. It has be real coolio method man ll, cool j and buster rhymes. You can't find it on spotify, you gotta find it on youtube because I guess of copyright and stuff like that. But it's, it's basically their theme. If you hear it it's when they come out in the game as well. But if I was giving you my lineup for that song, cory, I'm giving you denzel curry, little wayne tyler, the creator, k dot, kendrick lamar himself and of course, shady eminem, because it's the monster's.
Cory:So okay that's who I'm giving you um thoughts and concerns I don't have any okay, it seems like you really gave that a lot of thought.
Nick:I did. That's how my mind works, Corey. I'm sorry.
Cory:I did not do this.
Nick:That's okay.
Cory:But I can tell you right now I'm an 89-90.
Nick:Okay, cool.
Cory:So you're looking at an album just Vanilla Ice, mc Hammer, and probably we're going to let one of the hair bands get a rock song in there before nirvana kills them.
Nick:In two years it'll be a very different space jam album.
Cory:Thank you, we're talking like poison or bon jovi probably gets a song because kurt cobain hasn't murdered their careers yet that's true.
Nick:So well, I think you could go with a lot of like that late 80s. I mean, they're not gonna let nwa I feel like nwa would be perfect first of all, I think they're broken up. Mainly ice cubes out by now I mean I, I think Hit Em High is literally just, it's an NWA style song, just for a PG cartoon.
Cory:I mean they wrote Express Yourself Like they can do this. For sure, for sure. Yeah, it's just like hey, can we tone it down?
Nick:Or you do like some mix mash of the remaining members of NWA, the Beastie Boys and Run DMC.
Cory:I like the idea of NWA doing this in 90, because Ice Cube's gonna tear them a new one on his next album for being involved in this. So, honestly, dre may not have a career. His credibility might just be gone if he does this so it'll be fine. I don't know, if it's fine, then we don't get Eminem, we don't get cool headphones, oh you're right, we don't, yeah.
Nick:Okay, all right, we don't even get Kendrick Lamar potentially yeah so like, let's, we'll just Never mind.
Cory:Yeah, corey, stop talking, you're off the record.
Nick:Okay, so let's actually dive into the casting here. So we're going to do it differently. So obviously, everything is built off of who we are picking for our superstar.
Cory:Yes, we're actually going to start there, right.
Nick:Yeah, we're going to start there and build from there, so turn off after this movie's got to be built around this, yeah you got to hear why we put the people around this individual, exactly, exactly casted everyone else first it's like, it's, it's like okay, you can probably just guess what we're right.
Cory:Yeah, for sure then it'd be anticlimactic yes.
Nick:So, corey, I'm gonna let you go first. Who is your?
Cory:nba superstar. Now you're going post or pre jordan era, or at Michael Jordan, who is your NBA superstar.
Nick:Now you're going post or pre-Jordan era, or at least the dynasties, right?
Cory:So is this where I can talk about some of my considerations? Sure, All right, Because we kind of talked we didn't want to land in the same era.
Nick:Yeah yeah.
Cory:So we said like we need to do at least one pre one post or go outside of the box.
Nick:Yeah, yeah.
Cory:I tried to do two outside of the box ideas first, okay One, I thought same fricking year, but we don't do Jordan.
Nick:Like, what if we just don't have the budget? He's really focused on baseball, that kind of attraction.
Cory:You know, like or like, this might be more of a 97, 98, you know, type of thing. Taking my all-time favorite basketball player, allen Iverson, one rookie of the year in 96, destined for absolute greatness. Unfortunately he's on that list of all-time greats that didn't win a ring.
Nick:Hey Barkley's there. He's in great company.
Cory:He's part of this draft class. That's probably the best NBA draft class of all time. I know there's some 2003 purists out there, but this was Allen Iverson, steve Nash, kobe Bryant, ray Allen Kidd. I mean it's just a massive.
Nick:You can keep going and add things like HS, stoyakovich, jermaine O'Neal.
Cory:Stefan Marbury.
Nick:Derek Fisher, Sharif Abdul-Rahim All of our movie fans are just losing. They're like I don't know who they're talking about.
Cory:We've lost all credibility, All of our sports fans are like yeah, 96 was a solid draft class.
Nick:And they just you know they clink their Budweiser's together.
Cory:But you didn't go with that I didn't, because it just seemed it's just in the same era and I don't know. It's just, it would have been weird, that's fair. I don't know if Iverson can act. He turned out to be a really cool guy who is the most humble. He has this massive legacy. He has this massive legacy. He's probably gotten the closest to recreating a jordan, one type of shoe, in terms of an iconic shoe. We talked about this it's him and jordan there's really not a third person checknosis.
Nick:And then you have kobe and lebron shoes, but that's more because they're just because they're lebron and kobe, but all the shoes look way different. It's just so weird.
Cory:Whereas like, iverson's question just has a thousand different colorways yeah like the jordan one and so, but like again, it's just kind of like I don't know. So then I said, what about the WNBA?
Nick:It's getting hot right now. We're all in.
Cory:Let's see this happen. Caitlin Clark has been fed to the lines, like I mean they have just thrown her out there.
Nick:We don't hate her. Elbows are in the ring I don't know what you're talking about.
Cory:ESPN the only clips they ever show. It's not her hitting threes. She has amazing stats, she does rookie she does. We don't see any of that. They're like, hey, look at this, this is kelsey plum. Just like punched her right in the jaw. It's like angel reese clothesline, you know. And it's just like. It's like okay, we're concentrating on the negative, you know but again it would be like if you were gonna do it now like there is actually like a world where you're like, hey, wmba, we've got a lot of traction, let's make, make a movie.
Cory:But the problem is I don't know if you do Caitlin Clark. Okay, she's still like unproven, she's still a rookie, she's just honestly, probably the most famous WNBA star right now.
Nick:Yeah, yeah.
Cory:But of course now we're digging in and we're going like oh, kelsey Plum's good, oh nice. She just got to do the three like maybe one of them, rihanna stewart might have been one of.
Nick:You know the one to go.
Cory:Britney grinder's definitely a monster, you know like she's the sean bradley monster because she's huge yeah so she's like seven feet tall, so um, but like it's just too soon, it's too soon and I don't know enough I'm still.
Nick:I'm like everyone else. I'm learning, we're learning, we're progressing, we're getting, we're learning about all these new people and all the older veteran players the Cameron Brinks we knew about, dion Taurasi, the Becky Hammonds of the world.
Cory:But I'll say this. Let me ask you this one on the subject Did you have a subscription to Sports Illustrated for kids?
Nick:I did not. Our school library did.
Cory:I did. I don't know how I swung that with my parents.
Nick:It's probably one of the best gets. I got as a kid somehow, and so I remember the wmba okay being created because sports for kids was behind it. Yeah, hard. Okay, I do remember that that they really pushed it hard, like girls play basketball and you're like yeah, they do.
Cory:Partly our fault, it didn't catch on I guess so and also the fact that the games came on while we were in school also. Yeah, also so um, but so I decided all right, I'm not gonna be outside the box, nick. I went pre Okay, pre-jordan 89-90?, but not before he's drafted.
Nick:Okay.
Cory:He's in the league he's going through his Caitlin Clark runs. He is he's like.
Nick:Well, at that point he's won. I believe he's won an MVP, he's won scoring titles, he's taken the Boston to the limit.
Cory:But it's too good, right? How can we destroy magic and burn or not done? Who the hell is this guy and who does he think he is? Is the narrative? Yes, in the late 80s, with jordan for sure like this guy is overstepping his damn boundaries, you know and uh, no one's seen anything like him. However, one of my all-time favorite. I'd put him in my top five okay players yeah, still stood in the way. It was the last thing that stood in Jordan's way oh. Isaiah Thomas.
Nick:Okay.
Cory:Michael Jordan probably hates more than life itself.
Nick:He does. He hates him more than Kendrick hates Drake. Hates this man, yes.
Cory:But probably one of the greatest point guards of all time is Isaiah Thomas. He was part of the Pistons in the late 80s.
Nick:Yes.
Cory:The Bad Boy Pistons, which is my all-time favorite NBA team, is the 89 through 91 Pistons. Dennis Rodman's there. It's his rookie team. It's Bill Lambeer. I love Bill Lambeer. He's just a weird preppy white dude who was just an absolute dick. His entire play style is just throwing elbows and just taking people to the ground. He played so dirty and I love it and so, like, I love this team and if you need to know anything about the pistons is they created this thing called the jordan rules which is essentially beat the shit out of michael jordan comes in the paint, he's not.
Nick:He's not going to take him out, he's not landing on his feet yes, it was trying to hurt the guy, which it's yes, which only made him stronger. This is the thing they created, the jordan rules, which in turn created michael jordan so if anyone's mad about the 90s run by michael jordan, point to the detroit pistons made the monster that would go on to win six almost consecutive almost if he didn't do baseball right the guy may be looking at seven, eight, maybe eight straight championships wild so they created the man yes he got past, he, he transcended bird magic and then, all of a sudden, this tiny point guard got in his way and won two championships and beat magic for him too.
Nick:Yes, yep, he went through everybody.
Cory:Yeah, no, isaiah thomas went through bird yep, he went through everybody. Yeah, no, isaiah thomas went through bird jordan and magic, which is crazy to think about phenomenal. And then he almost beat magic johnson in 88 on a bum ankle he did?
Nick:he essentially played on one foot, nearly beat. If anybody other than jerry west deserved an mvp on a losing team oh, it was him.
Cory:It was isaiah thomas. Yeah, it was him.
Nick:So okay, so I don't want to dive too deep into that because it's intriguing, but I I gotta hear. Hear the rest of it first. But I'm going to give you mine before we dive into that. So I moved to 2021. I'm giving you not LeBron, I'm giving you Steph Curry, corey, who arguably the best player of lebron's era.
Cory:The best is the meme. The meme is the best player of lebron's era, which is hard to argue. It's the. Thing is it's an actual debate right.
Nick:But the logic behind it was obviously I don't want to pick lebron because he's already had his movie come out and stuff. I could have gone down that path and be like if I was going to do it the right way, this is the way I would have done it. We kind of were discussed that with the cleveland thing yeah, and you're a jordan, acolyte?
Nick:yeah, yes, this is a jordan house, corey, in case you haven't noticed, um, but I think kind of playing into the same ideas with with jordan, where steph has already come out of three titles, one without kd2 with him and in this period of time in in 19 he loses clay to injury, he injures his hand for a while and is out and then kd leaves for the, for the nets. So it's kind of a low period for him. So I think that this is a great moment for him to uh, it's great for a story in terms of that character being at their lowest point and having to come out of it. And if we remember, there was the doubts that were going on, the pundits and all them were saying like, well, he's won three titles, but is he part of a system he's never won the finals mv. Two of those are because KD was there. They already had the winningest team in history that lost to LeBron. So I want to put it in that spot and kind of like before he wins the title in 22.
Cory:Before he gets his title, where they shut everyone up, gets his groove back basically is where I'm going to, for sure, other ones that I considered.
Nick:You know, I did think about Kobe, but I thought more about Kobe and Shaq, so about kobe and shack.
Cory:Ah, so I thought maybe it's a thing either before they win their first title. The narrative is it's about how they can't get along, right? Yeah, exactly in the looney tunes make them friends.
Nick:You got it yeah, or you flip it and make it more and it's after they've left. Then they hate each other and looney tunes like we have to get the best teammates of all time, and so they pull them together and they in it. They, you know, begrudgingly pull together to help the looney tunes win the game and at the end they have a more of a respect for each other at the end. So now.
Cory:So shack has turned out to be a pretty cool guy yeah in his later, like he's very humble he obviously gives a lot of his money away and all this stuff and he's really cool dude. Now um, but back in his days he was very self-confessed, petty right you could make it to where they get kobe and jack's.
Cory:Like they chose kobe and he goes and joins the team he's the villain and they're like you realize, the end of the world and humanity is like enslaved, if you, if you win. And he's like I don't care, I'm beating kobe bryant, I'm the best laker it's there's a lot of of fun options with those two that you could have.
Nick:but I thought like the feel good kind of ending or like the post now that we don't have Kobe anymore, like having a moment where they're like respecting each other again and they kind of are friends again, is nice, cause they did come to terms at the end before it was over. But the other, the third option I kind of thought of, was more of the individual accolade kind of thing, you thing. You know, there's the yana story, the dirk nowitzki story. The one that I thought was most fun would be kawaii, just because it's kawaii and he's hilarious, like he's so awkward is all get out and you just put him in the looney tune world he would not, I don't know.
Nick:He seems like he might be calm right and if you're like look around going, all right but it's like he gets a little bit of looney tuneness and that's what helps him win that game. Seven shot against the Sixers that bounced like six times for winning the rim. And that's the story you kind of build it to when he goes to Toronto.
Cory:I just see the scene where he sucked through the golf hole ends up in like sees all the chaos like watches Sylvester Stallone or like Sylvester the cat, sorry, like hit something with a hammer and him just go. It does this weird laugh?
Nick:I think you it's like 2019 and you lean hard into like the weirdness and then he's just super weird. Yeah, you, nicholas cage, koala and like, and you make things, you make since he's in toronto, you make his assistant drake, who's just going out of his way, to like. Try to do everything for him he's like I can play basketball.
Cory:I guess I'm good. I'm slow and that's fine because we're before tendrick lamar right destroys him and and outs him yes, but anyway.
Nick:So you've picked isaiah thomas, I have picked steph curry. So before we pick the monsters, tell me who is the assistant that you're going with.
Nick:I may not be very tall, but I'm slow and large and it's dark way night plays stan podolak to just a great effect. He's so miserably like, doing whatever he can to make jordan's life easy. He literally like, is trying to drive him in his crappy car but he, he literally follows him to Looney Tunes land to try to help him and save him. And does join the team, gets flattened and blown up. He's the most Looney Tunes human I've ever seen. At this point, yeah. But Wayne Knight does a good job.
Cory:And he's on a run here, he's in Seinfeld and he's Jurassic Park, and so he he's definitely a recognizable face and name yeah, some notes I wanted to just point out about this particular character.
Nick:You know was, according to pitka, it was difficult to get most actors involved just due to the odd premise of space jam. Um, his choices were michael j fox or chevy chase, but warner brothers rejected both of them for some reason. Jason alexander also turned down the role speaking of seinville people and matthew broderick was ivan reitman's second choice for stan I don't see that I don't see I don't see a lot of those for that character well, especially not the.
Nick:I feel like they really leaned into the desperate, like kind of dweebish side of things when wayne knight took over the character.
Cory:Okay, I'll give you my two or I. I was down to two okay okay, I thought initially I just said I'm gonna pull someone else from tv at the time that's on a good TV show.
Nick:And.
Cory:I thought Dave Coulier it's Joey from Full House who in the movie is obsessed with the Looney Tunes, does a lot of voices.
Nick:It could be a lot of fun.
Cory:But Full House is only in its first season. That's the problem, it's not caught on yet, so I went with Paul Rubens Pee Wee Herman himself not as Pee Wee, by any means, but playing just a fun like crazy but he's going to do have a ton of fun when it gets to like Toon World and he's got a jersey on.
Nick:I just feel like there's going to be some point that you have to make some Pee Wee reference. Oh yeah absolutely, because like it would be a lost opportunity if he's not either in the suit or it's just something, or just as the voice.
Cory:yeah, at some point yeah, and so like I think that's what it is okay you know, and so, um, I I went with paul rubens because at this point he is established, he is. It is at the height of pb herman. He has not been. He is still a year from being arrested in the theater from the incident, um, but yeah okay, okay.
Nick:I almost wish you had picked him as the bill murray character and it was just him being like. Perhaps I could be of some assistance that would have been good too.
Cory:Um, you're gonna find my uh bill murray uh choice slightly odd.
Nick:Okay, actually it's not bill murray, right it's not okay, that's good.
Cory:I don't play that game. Got it got it well, okay.
Nick:So initially I thought, yeah, like a character actor, comedic character actor like Dan Fogler, who's known for like Good Luck Chuck, fantastic Beasts he's just the big guy in those and I was like that would probably be, he would do well.
Cory:Tony Award winning. Tony Award winning Dan Fogler, I believe, oh excuse me.
Nick:Pardon me, sorry, mr Fogler, excuse me.
Cory:But I went with because I just thought it'd who doesn't love paul. It's a good one, yeah, which is also weirdly like a guy that like, I think, a lot like dan fogler and josh it's weird, we're in a weird, not even cycle I don't even think it's weird. I think it's like maybe just appropriate that we're in this era of the fat comedic actor, you're only we pick one.
Nick:All brilliant.
Cory:Yeah, they're all great they're like josh gatz producing things with like mel brooks and like he, like he has his own production. Paul Walter, he's gotten Oscar nominations.
Nick:He was in a Clint Eastwood movie.
Cory:Incredible dramatic actor.
Nick:And then Dan Fogler's won a Tony. That's wild. Yeah, Cheers to the big boys.
Cory:I love it. I love that we're in this era where it's not just like happy fat dancing clown in the small jacket.
Nick:Chris Farley crawled, so these men could run.
Cory:Exactly, and Paul Walter.
Nick:Hauser's playing him and Paul Walter Hauser's playing him. I think both of those are going to be fun in different ways. I just think Paul Walter Hauser. I was going through the list and I was like, yeah, who doesn't want some more? Paul Walter Hauser.
Cory:You know how badass of the guy that is. He pulls out of a Tarantino movie to go make the Chris Farley biopic and Tarantino has to pivot.
Nick:That's amazing. Okay, so we've got that. So who is your Bill Murray? Perhaps I could be of some assistance.
Cory:That's our fifth guy Now you get to live up your dream. Okay, it's weird because I was unaware of his attachment to the other role.
Nick:Okay.
Cory:But I chose Michael J Fox. Oh.
Nick:It's 89-90.
Cory:Okay, we're coming off of the Back to the Future trilogy.
Nick:He's massive Post-Teen Wolf as well, and that's the thing when he's in Toonville.
Cory:I want him to go into Teen Wolf.
Nick:Like he becomes a Teen Wolf. Yes, so he's like channels.
Cory:Michael J Fox has played weird basketball before.
Nick:I'm not mad about it.
Cory:He's going to show up in Toonville and because it's Toonville, he can become Teen Wolf.
Nick:He goes and talks to the witch, or somebody says, hey, listen, so how can you give me? And he comes at the end of the game and he's just like perhaps. I could be some assistance.
Cory:They open the thing, and it's the moon, it's Michael J Fox. He's going to say how can I be of assistance? They're going to, they're gonna look at him because he's five foot three right, you know, and even maybe isaiah thomas, who's? Not tall though, but he's like I don't know if this game's for you. Yeah, this, the roof opens, the witch does something and he's like well, I've played basketball before. Maybe you've heard of a little high school team called the beavers, and then he better teen wolf 2.
Nick:No no, yes, no notes, no notes. Beautiful, oh my god. Because cory also knows I'm a big back to the future fan.
Cory:So yeah, yeah, we're riding that, that train that wave.
Nick:You know, you got to get marty mcfly, you got to get michael j fox.
Cory:While you can, because, sadly, you know, his career was short. Yeah, he picked some weird ones in the 90s he did. Hey, hey, doc, hollywood's great. Honestly, a lot of his movies are good. It's just it was hard to see him as an adult.
Nick:Yeah, it's true, spin city was fun yeah also touching on bill murray.
Nick:Uh, they didn't. This is what bill murray's known for, though, like the filmmakers were unable to book him until filming starting, but he was already written into the script, so they basically again didn't know if he was going to show up for the movie or not until it was time. But there's more. I could talk more and more about it. He wears the jersey 22. Uh, it's a. It's a nod to groundhog day. He accepted the role because he regretted missing out on who framed roger rabbit. There's a lot of connective tissue there, but uh, thanks, bill murray for making our childhood great again. Yeah, all right. So it. Had it been any period of time before, like the 2021, I would have given you Adam Sandler, probably naturally naturally and I even thought about like the storyline.
Nick:I was like, oh, you could throw Ryan Reynolds in there because Adam Sandler is notoriously good at best right. Strangely good at basketball for being the man that's overweight and wears big t-shirts and chubby guy apparently can ball and ball I'm giving you Jason Sudeikis, who has had apparently really good all-star game. Showing good all-star game. Showings celebrity all-star game showings. Oh, I've seen like viral clips of him just nailing threes and so he's going to fit right in with Steph Curry, you know, but this is right in the middle of his Ted Lasso run.
Cory:I've still never seen an episode of Ted Lasso. I haven't yet either, but I know it's massive and people love it.
Nick:And you know, if you don, jason sudeikis is from that. Uh, I don't know where you've been the past three years, but he's also in. We're the millers. Horrible bosses I have run into jason sudeikis on you have in maui, and he thought I was famous. He did it for a second.
Cory:He double-taked me. He was like I thought you're, as a guy and I know the ultimate respect. Yes, yeah, I know who.
Nick:He thought it's not me, but no, I I just, I just think he's gonna you lean a little into the, the Ted Lasso-ness of it, but it's still Jason Sudeikis. Obviously he's just kind of playing that chummy bro character that he does on. Snl and stuff.
Cory:Okay, I like it. It's kind of fun. It is fun. It's not as fun as.
Nick:Michael J Fox turning into Teen Wolf. But I was just right there man, the arrow was right there. It presented itself.
Cory:I mean, if we're making this movie, if I did the Iverson, one.
Nick:I probably would have had Air Bud, the golden retriever, but okay. So before we get okay, I keep teasing the Monstars I do want to, really quick, just give you some quick tidbits about the Looney Tunes themselves, because there's a couple things we haven't talked about. So we talked about Swackhammer. He was supposed to be a live action character. Dennis Hopper was potentially going to play him as a live action character, but the Looney Tunes themselves were voiced by Mel Blanc. If you don't know that, that's the guy who pretty much did most of the voices, but he passed away. His last movie was actually the Jetsons movie that we talked about previously. Who, mel Blanc? Okay, yeah, and so his son was originally booked, but him and Warner Brothers couldn't agree on a contract and that's where Billy West came in. Billy West is a voice actor. Most people know him from Fry on Futurama, but he's done a lot of different other roles beyond that.
Nick:Yeah, he's Doug and stuff in the 90s, but he learned a space jam through Reitman on the Howard Stern show who was producing Stern's film Private Parts, and he just and Ivan signed him on. He plays the voice of Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd. Now the other piece of this that we haven't talked about is Lola Bunny.
Cory:Don't ever call me doll Shit, okay.
Nick:Lola Bunny is an interesting character in the Looney Tunes pantheon because this is her first movie. This is her first appearance of all time. Madonna, cyndi Lauper and Paul Abdul were considered to voice Lola Bunny, but the part was given to Kathy Sochi a voice actor, I'm assuming, which is great if it's a voice actress that's getting a part In the LeBron movie. I forgot about this completely. She's voiced by Zendaya and I think it was fine, but in the first Space Jam she's definitely sexualized, I would say.
Cory:Yeah, yeah, it was weird I think a lot of kids our age had a weird feeling about lola bunny.
Nick:Yes, it's that's. And then they kind of tried to like pivot on that with the lebron movie, which I don't know if it was like a necessary thing per se, like you could still make her like the bombshell of the looney tunes was curvaceous. She was in 1996, it's like voluptuous yeah yeah, not, not that she was overtly, but they definitely she's not bad.
Cory:They drew her that way. Yeah, she curves yes and you were, as a child, like okay, I have.
Nick:Why is lola bunny doing this?
Cory:jessica rabbit and lola bunny yeah, just grab it, there's the connection there as well.
Nick:But uh, she was actually. They had a different character in mind. That was just some. It was like bugs bunny's other girlfriend, that was only like comic books and like had appeared in like a video game Bugs Bunny, crazy Castle 2. But they were as they were developing it. They were like it was a completely different character of that point, okay, and she was given several names, including Bunny Bunny, lola Bunny with that I Lola Rabbit and even Daisy Lou, because they thought about giving her a southern tomboy personality. Okay, and I don't really think like she's, I don't. I think it's more our retrospective thoughts on lola bunny, because re-watching the movie it's like, yes, she's, there's a sexual component.
Cory:Yeah, it's all. Joking aside, I think as a kid you never actually noticed.
Nick:Yeah, when you're an adult you're like oh, they did okay bugs is fawning over her, but they definitely make her like her own woman, basically because, again, you don't call her dolls because she's the second best basketball player on the team, yeah, but I just want to throw a shout out to lola bunny, a quick discussion about that, along with other voice actors and stuff, because you know this is a animated movie. We should talk a little bit about them, um, so, all right, it's time to round this thing up, cory. So who do you have? You got isaiah thomas, so explain to me the monsters and what's going on. Time to play a little basketball.
Cory:Little titsqueaks just turned into superstars. They're monsters Suffering succotash. They're Monstars. So I mean, like, what it is is like Isaiah Thomas. For me it was like also trying to figure out again why I didn't do Caitlin Clark, because it would have been hard to make a Monstars without sounding like an idiot.
Nick:Okay.
Cory:I don't know enough Whereas Isaiah Thomas has this really impressive rivalry, like almost Rogue's Gallery of Rivals, throughout his career. Sure, you know, and so I couldn't tell you the names of the Monstars you want me to just give you my five.
Nick:I will give you the names of them, but you don't have to name them by that. So the names were Pound, newt, bumpkus, bang and Blanco. They originally took over the powers of Charles Barkley, muggsy Bogues, larry Johnson, patrick Ewing and Sean Bradley. I'm learning now that they even had names. They are not mentioned in the movie.
Cory:Oh, okay, so it's just a credits only thing.
Nick:Neither is the word their team group name. They're called Nerdlux. Wait what?
Cory:Nerd, like that's what their species is, I guess. Oh, okay, I was like their team name's Monstars. Yeah, they're the Monstars, yeah you're correct, but anyway you need five. Give me five, corey. Okay, you know I can do this. Actually, sure Is John Stockton Perfect, whose rivalry with Isaiah Thomas goes all the way back to high school.
Nick:It's bloody.
Cory:And it was in it's the two best point guards of their time.
Nick:Yes, by all means, undoubtedly, other than if Magic Johnson but he kind of was this all around player, but he was also huge. Yeah, I'm talking about like a traditional point guard.
Cory:Yes, and so, by all means, and so Johnson would probably be my orange guy.
Nick:Okay, pound, you know, pound the Charles Barkley.
Cory:Yeah, he would be the Charles Barkley. Okay, I got Larry Bird coming in for like Murderer's row right now.
Nick:Yeah.
Cory:Larry Johnson, because these are all guys that stood in his way. Yeah. You know like at least he had to go through magic in Bird Bird humiliated. Actually, they both beat him in the years prior Bird famously like getting an inbound pass and a steal and a last shot to send him home.
Nick:Even the Celtics when they lost, they walked out off the court before the Pistons did it to the Bulls.
Cory:Yeah, so yep, they didn't shake hands, only Kevin McHale. He didn't get the memo. Oh, we're leaving. Okay, my bad. Hey, you played great Good game guys. And so, and then I guess, my green guy who was originally patrick ewing, yes, bang um, that would. That's michael jordan okay I'm making. I'm making michael jordan bad guy here.
Nick:This is young, freakishly athletic, michael jordan. Okay, he has to be in this. Okay, yeah, at the time.
Cory:Again, he, I agree he is universally hated by the league for being way too good, too soon yeah but like he's not michael jordan yet, yeah, people are gonna know him, which you should.
Nick:We should also note that they did not pick the five biggest names right, it was more kind of a yeah, charles barkley would have by far been the biggest name it's like him then ewing and then larry johnson, because he was in those commercials playing a grandma playing basketball and then mugsy bogues and john bradley's just a circus thing.
Cory:They're like hey, look at this, seven foot seven guy.
Nick:This guy's a freak five foot two guy who's in the nba.
Cory:It's like, so that's what that is, yeah, um and so uh. And then I'm bringing home my sean bradley, my center.
Nick:Uh blanco, bring me akeem lajwan oh, wow, yeah, okay he was in the league and he was on the up because? Because you're not picking like kareem. And was kareem still going on or was he done? Kareem was at the end. Yeah, he's not.
Cory:Kareem was. I don't even know if he. I don't know if Kareem was on the Lakers team that they eventually beat In that year following, I don't know. I don't know if he was on the 90s Lakers.
Nick:Yeah, I mean, he played to 89, so it's probably. Yeah, he's on top. Yeah, I'm going okay. So you're, you're definitely giving like the murderous rule, the who's, who, you know what. Like we talked about like it was more of like, well, we want a tall guy and kind of a small guy charles barkley's here but and but you're giving like isaiah's greatest enemies against him. Yeah, like you.
Cory:You have a poster in your living room of michael jordan. It's from the back yeah facing 30 something players which would be considered his biggest rivals or notable players in his era. I just kind of did the same thing like. I'm just saying like who was isaiah thomas's in each position? Who would have been like a pain in the ass yeah, you know I could have done kareem, but he was retired so to to touch on kareem.
Nick:So kareem's last title win with magic was in the 87 88 season so it would have followed would have been my last 80 like 88, 89 would have also been uh I think the lakers won 88 89 because, uh, I believe the pistons first one is 89, 90 and then 90 91 um, no, no, it's the pistons.
Cory:The pistons won in 89 and 90, okay, in the 91, okay, okay so yeah, kareem would have been that last game he retired on top yeah so interesting.
Nick:So any other thoughts about that? Like, I think it's just interesting because it's going to be isaiah who's viewed as somewhat of a villain. So what's the logic? I guess because they, because the monster stars, have taken the talent of the best players. They're like what about isaiah thomas?
Cory:isaiah thomas is, yes, he got vilified, but at the same time he's probably the heart of the bad boy Pistons. He's, like, weirdly, almost guilty by association yeah he's not Lambert, he's not Rodman. No, what he is is. He got a lot of crap for saying that people only care about Larry Bird because he's white.
Cory:He said that in a press conference and Larry Bird is one of the greatest basketball players ever ever but I don't think he was meaning that as much as he was saying like people just concentrate him on because he's white yeah, you know like it's like he's just, that's one of the things that sticks to larry bird. It's like look at this white guy who's really good in a sport that's mostly dominated by black athletes, right and so. But they like made up and they're fine but that was like the most villainous thing he did other than you know, also not shaking the bull's hands right, yeah but you know it's like come on so in this, in the period of time it's, this is so.
Nick:They've lost in 88 to the lakers. They won in 89 and 90 to the lakers and then the portland trailblazers respectively. So is this during their title run, I guess?
Cory:yeah, this would have been like the repeat, okay, repeat. In between there he's gonna have the cred for um bugs money to come get. I think.
Nick:And I think that's the thing. He's on top of the world. He's won the title, but it's the bad boys piston style. Everybody kind of hates him.
Cory:So even though he's won, it's like I would say that's the history of it. It's just like, hey, he's been deemed this bad guy.
Nick:Yeah.
Cory:You know and stuff like that, and of course he'll go on cost him a spot on the dream team yes, that's infamously so.
Nick:I think also it's interesting because it's not like the players you're talking about are the monsters themselves. It's that their talent is being taken. So what will be great for isaiah is this is almost like this redemptive story for him of like I'm, I've beaten the monster as we got your talent back and I'm giving it to you, yeah, so like.
Cory:So maybe that's my thing you can have like like bill andbert, like to like crush it like say destroy, yeah, like you know.
Nick:And rodman, and like do it, and then he says, no, yeah, exactly. That's the. That's where my thinking, that's the end he chooses to give his biggest rivals their game and they still don't put him on the dream michael jordan's, like f you do you think that they put him on the dream team if he saves them?
Cory:I mean they would be dicks, not to, it'd be kind of rude.
Nick:So no, I like that that's. It's not what I expected. You know, we were kind of throwing around ideas and you mentioned magic and maybe bird being the one to come in at the end to save him.
Cory:I kind of thought about it and played around with it, but it just felt like I like the isaiah thomas story. Yeah a lot I really do so cool, cool, well for mine.
Nick:So steph curry, we're in that 2020 2021 season right before the 2022 run. He's. He's come out of injury. Clay's still injured. He's kind of on his own, he's at his low point.
Cory:Like the Warriors, have been counted out yeah, and they're.
Nick:This is where they actually get to develop their younger players and stuff, and it's really where Steph's going. Like I have to ball out and prove myself that I'm still that guy, and I think that's the storyline that the Monstars show up, they take the talent from the people I'm about to describe you to, and then he has to go out with the looney tunes and kind of find his groove back and remember I'm steph curry.
Nick:That's right yeah and that will propel them, in our narrative, into the 2022 championship. So I'm going to give you the murderer's row of my own, because I thought about if this was, if this was made in 2024, this year, I would be tempted to pick the next generation of stars. So you're anthony edwards, your sga, your luca, kind of as like as step Steph's, like trying to prove himself one more time against that talent kind of thing. Ok, but I'm giving you a ghost of girlfriend's past. Corey, all right From the bottom to the top, I'm going to reverse you.
Nick:So for Blanco, the blue tall one, kevin Durant it's got to be, it's got to be, it's got to be. He's left. He thinks he can do it on his own. They take the talent from him, but but that's the attention with.
Cory:Yeah, yeah, but I think that's the.
Nick:The other fun element is like, even if steph is seeing the talent, like he sees the monsters, but he's noticing their moves, I think in this version and he's going they, that's kevin. And it's like the flashbacks of like things are like well, you're not as good without kevin and I kind of like that.
Cory:I like that as a scene like he doesn't know whose talent's been stolen, but he's figuring it out. But then he starts seeing them and he's like that's Kevin Durant, yeah.
Nick:For Bang the green one, originally Patrick Ewing Draymond Green. Everybody says you can't do without Draymond.
Cory:Took his own teammate man.
Nick:You're a team player, you're a system player. You can't do without.
Cory:Draymond. I considered that with the center about giving them Bill Lambier instead of Akeem Olajuwon.
Nick:Oh, that'd purple. Larry Johnson, kawhi Leonard, who beat them in the finals. He stopped their three Pete when Steph couldn't do it on his own without Clay or KD, so it's.
Cory:Katie went out. Because Katie went out face turn final and clay got hurt too. Yeah, that was the face turn because the Warriors were kind of the villains, yeah they were yeah.
Nick:So I got that for Newt, the small one I thought about, like Kyrie and Russell Westbrook, like all those guys, john Moran, if we had gone younger. James Harden, because he's still it's his last time in the Rockets, he's transitioning to the Nets and he's always been a thorn in Steph's side this whole time. So you're getting the end of James Harden's peak run where he's just scoring 30 plus a game and he's the step back three my gut would say Westbrook, but Westbrook's a good guy and Harden's not, so it works better.
Cory:Yes, absolutely, he's the Barkley.
Nick:And for Pound the Charles Barkley role, and I'll explain this kind of like you did LeBron James.
Cory:Yeah.
Nick:Because, again, like we talked about, lebron and Steph are going to forever be etched in history as the two best players of this era, and the argument's going to be LeBon's arguing as he should be considered for the goat and everybody's going.
Nick:But the warriors won four titles while you played basketball, yeah, in your peak prime and towards the end. That's the argument that everybody always has. So I think you can't have one without the other. It's lebron made the movie, but it was more like the people he knew in the new legacy and so his friends. I guess he should have had steph in that movie.
Nick:I don't know why he didn't pop in. They had damien lillard, kind of the smaller point guard type. But the also the fun of this is it allows lebron to have fun because like in the charles berkeley role where he loses his powers and you see the montage of him like going to church, being praying, like I'll never go out with madonna again, or like he's going to the therapist and stuff, where he goes to play basketball with the girls and it's like this girl, five foot nothing, block my shot. Like, I think, lebron, who's shown that he has comedic chops in in movies and stuff, I think he can have a lot of fun in that role yeah and I just think it'll be again kind of the same thing with isaiah, of like do you really want to give these guys their power back?
Nick:it's I mean, it's what mj had to do at the end of the original space gym was like I could keep these and I could. I could run even worse on the rest of the 90s without you guys in the picture. But I just think that that the ghost of steph's past coming back to kind of haunt him one last time would be a fun idea of him getting while he gets back into being steph curry. The other thought of this too is like so you have isaiah thomas, I have steph.
Cory:They're not known dunkers no, oh, anybody could do that, doc.
Nick:Even you watch this, no sweat, this is so the concept at the end of the movie Well, yours is easy, mine's easy. He has to just shoot a three pointer from like space. Basically, yes, like the monster, chucks him, because it's like 10 seconds left, you're not going to make anything.
Cory:Steph Curry is the closest thing that there's ever actually been to a Harlem Globetrotter.
Nick:Yes, in the NBA. Yeah, it's just like bam. I do this every day because that's gonna be the moment that he remembers he's steph curry, basically, and like, and then these reminder you're in looney tune lane, you can do whatever. So like, yeah, something like the monsters try to throw him out of bounds, like you're never gonna make the shot and he just goes, throws the hill mary up and makes it and they just watch it.
Nick:It's almost like maybe a force type thing montage, like it's going through all this crazy stuff trying to not touch anything. Okay, but it was isaiah. I guess it's like he. He would have to just kind of like involve his team to get them to be. He would have the. He would have that half time speech and be like you guys need to toughen up. We're gonna play some jordan rules here. I'm gonna introduce.
Cory:It's gonna be the speech. It's gonna be the like you know.
Nick:Maybe you bring the bum ankle into it, maybe his ankle goes, or something like that I would actually say it could be your mighty ducks, the thing he becomes the coach he can't go back out on the fourth quarter or, like on the last play. Hurt the jordan rules, get put on him.
Cory:Yeah, oh, that's great, yeah, maybe michael jordan's guy like, just like, says take him out you know blah blah blah and maybe it's like he has to will the looney tunes to believe in themselves. And then I think you have like a yosemite sam like say, should we play dirty?
Nick:and he said no, we don't we we win clean, but they have to play like looney tunes.
Cory:Cory, that is clean in looney tune land that's true, but like maybe don't shoot anyone, we don't get the well, it is too early for the pulp fiction reference with him and Elmer Fudd. So but like, yeah, I think it's like some probably a little bit, which is more 80s cliche anyway, yeah, no, we got to do the right thing. And even like it's even, like he even benches J-Fox.
Nick:Yeah.
Cory:Teen Wolf. He says they need to win this. Come on, I'm ready to go.
Nick:He's just covered in fur and he's like come on um quick notes. The scuff basketball used at the end of the film is a treasured souvenir owned by joe pitka the director when playing basketball.
Cory:Yes, jordan is wearing the air jordan 11s.
Nick:It's like most famous shoe and bill murray's wearing the jordan twos okay so, uh, larry bird also appeared in celtic pride in the same year as 96, so two movies, which is a wonderful movie.
Cory:I need to watch it. I need to about it.
Nick:But yes, apparently there were attempts to replace Michael Jordan's character with a more experienced actor, but they couldn't find anyone better and I'm like there's no one else you pick for this movie.
Cory:Like to play Michael Jordan.
Nick:To play the lead.
Cory:So it'd be like. I'm guessing they're talking about like athletes or something. Like the Damon Wayans character in Celtic Pride, he's playing a fictional greatest of all time Something I was like this movie.
Nick:It doesn't exist again without the combination, the coming together of the Looney Tunes peaking in the 90s and Jordan peaking in the 90s.
Cory:No, you have to have it. This concept doesn't happen. It's a perfect storm, yeah.
Nick:And I think that's just the thing. I don't know if anybody outside of the 90s just doesn't everything and it was like amazing and it's just one, and maybe it's not this most critically like great movie, but again, I watch it, you watch, we both go. I had fun, I enjoyed it. That's looney tunes. That's michael jordan making the shot at the end, yep and it. And weirdly it all just worked like on paper. It probably shouldn't, but it does I think it's great.
Cory:I like our cast, I like I like.
Nick:I like how we played with it and again, I think the precipice, the thing that makes it work, is playing into the character's real lives and making it like part of it, and I think that that's what makes it stand out versus have they just again LeBron tried to do where it was just like a storyline, you know, instead? Well, that's it, corey. That's all I got for Spaceship.
Cory:I could keep talking about it, but I was very excited.
Nick:Trying to find a way, and we did it.
Cory:I like how you put your movie in a format where we couldn't wreck it. You kind of protected your movie.
Nick:I guess. But how would we have done it with like a cast? I don't know. There's no way to possibly do it, I feel like you've kind of just protected your movie from us getting to mess with it. I guess we could have gone to a year and had Ali or Cass or somebody odd and like picked, but they don't know basketball. They don't know ball Corey.
Cory:I mean, for all we know they do. I don't know, ali's like a deep basketball fan. Yeah, that's true, yeah we'll do it.
Nick:We'll do a touchdown jam or something.
Cory:Yeah, a whole movie of kid actors. That'll be fun. So we'll go ahead and apologize to normal listeners. Sorry if basketball's not your thing and we've outed ourselves as sports fans.
Nick:We're not the typical sports fans no we're a very small demographic no, we are.
Cory:So that is space jam. Um. Look what it looks like in two different eras yeah, past, present. Um, I, I okay hopefully we'll get to.
Nick:Maybe maybe down the road we'll do a future one with caitlin clark.
Cory:We'll see where she's at yeah, yeah, we'll give her a few years, yeah, yeah, I mean, I think, she's destined for greatness so it'll be, it'll be fine, yeah so everyone will come around on her. Yeah, we'll do it when, inevitably, her and angel reese end up on the same team, because that'll happen, it'll 100 happen and it'll just be this massively dominant thing.
Nick:So I'm here for it all right.
Cory:Well, that was space jam. Can't say a year like I normally do, I want to. So bad. That was space jam 90 2001 pretty much yeah, 2021 yeah so all right um well, just make sure to subscribe.
Nick:Tell them to go to the places at quantum recast like and subscribe.
Cory:Follow us for more episodes yeah, check us out on the social medias at quantum recast. Uh, don't spend too long on the internet though, um it'll kill you um and uh say good night, nick good night nick.