How Did This Get Made? - Battlefield Earth w/ Rob Huebel (HDTGM Matinee)

Episode Date: September 16, 2025

2000's Battlefield Earth, based on a novel by L. Ron Hubbard and starring John Travolta, is one of the most famous bad movies of all time. Rob Huebel (The Dark Web, The Sex Lives of College Girls) joins Paul, Jason, and June to cover all the slo-mo horses, the rumored Scientology connections, Travolta's many accents, the un-sexiness of the characters, all the inconsistencies throughout the movie, and so much more. Plus, we play YOUR Battlefield Earth Razzie nomination pitches. (Ep. #6 Originally Released 03/15/2011) • Go to hdtgm.com for tour dates, merch, FAQs, and more• Have a Last Looks correction or omission? Call 619-PAULASK to leave us a voicemail!• Submit your Last Looks theme song to us here• Join the HDTGM conversation on Discord: discord.gg/hdtgm• Buy merch at howdidthisgetmade.dashery.com/• Order Paul’s book about his childhood: Joyful Recollections of Trauma• Shop our new hat collection at podswag.com• Paul’s Discord: discord.gg/paulscheer• Paul’s YouTube page: youtube.com/paulscheer• Follow Paul on Letterboxd: letterboxd.com/paulscheer• Subscribe to Enter The Dark Web w/ Paul & Rob Huebel: youtube.com/@enterthedarkweb• Listen to Unspooled with Paul & Amy Nicholson: unspooledpodcast.com• Listen to The Deep Dive with June & Jessica St. Clair: thedeepdiveacademy.com/podcast• Instagram: @hdtgm, @paulscheer, & @junediane• Twitter: @hdtgm, @paulscheer, & msjunediane  • Jason is not on social media• Episode transcripts available at how-did-this-get-made.simplecast.com/episodesGet access to all the podcasts you love, music channels and radio shows with the SiriusXM App! Get 3 months free using the link: siriusxm.com/hdtgm Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, it's time for How did this get made? We're going to have a good time, celebrate some failure. Not just be a hater because you know you wonder, how did this get paid? Let's follow in the mediocrity of subpar art. Perhaps we'll find the answer to the question, how did this get made? Hello, people of earth. Welcome to How Did This Get Made.

This is the podcast where we try to make sense of the movies that make no sense. I'm Paul Shear. You might know me as Andre from the TV show The League or from my star turn as Rango, the lovable old rest lizard in Rango. I am joined by Jason Manzuka, who you might recognize as Rafi from the league. What's going on, Jason? How are you, Paul?

Very good. And of course, June, Diane, Raphael, who you've seen on Party Down and Flight of the Concordes, June. Hi, Paul. This is a, this movie we have today. I'm fucking furious. Yes. I mean, we love... Jason's good-to emotion is anger. No, this...

This movie enraged me. It's warranted. I mean, this... You know, we love crappy movies, and I don't think they're... is one crappier than Battlefield Earth. It's like if Star Wars farted on the planet of the apes, it would become this film. Here's the basic premise, and I had a hard time distilling it.

Don't bother. Fuck this movie. The movie takes place in the year 3000. Earth has been conquered by aliens. Wait, is that true? It takes place in the year 3,000? Oh, come on. The subtitle of the movie. Now I'm even angrier that those fighter planes fly? Yeah. Oh, fuck you, movie.

Well, we won't get to where. Basically, Aliens have been taken over by, or aliens from the planet Cyclos, have taken over the remaining humans left on Earth. One of the villagers who is still alive, living far away, is captured after being caught in an abandoned mall and brought to the Human Processing Center in Denver, where he meets Turrell. When those fucking Kairons come up and it's like Human Processing Center, and then it's Planet Cyclone.

I was like, really? I need to know the... But you know what? as I'm even explaining it, it's a terrible idea. So basically, a caveman is captured by an alien. The alien wants this caveman to mine gold for him so he can get back to

his home planet, but guess what? It messes up for him. They steal gold from Fort Knox, steal nuclear weapons and harrier jets, and blow up the aliens' mining operation. That's the basic premise. Why did the aliens need the gold? Why does gold hold value throughout the universe?

Well, let's find out these questions. The universal currency is based on gold. It is not. No way. Every planet's currency is based on gold. All right, let's us hear a clip from the movie. This is just give you an idea of the movie. This is when Terl finds out he has to stay on planet Earth

a little bit longer. I don't need to second guess. The home office. But surely I could be a better service to the corporation. Home office is well aware of your academic achievements and obvious talents. That's why we've decided not to keep you here for another five cycles.

It's a joke. Oh, thank you, sir. I don't know if I could have kept my sanity to be another five cycles. We've decided to keep you here for another 50 cycles with endless options for renew, with endless options for renew, with endless options for renewal.

That is the movie. Now here to help us make sense of of this movie is our friend. You've heard him here on Earwolf on a show called Mike Detective. You've seen him on Human Giant and on Children's Hospital. Please welcome Rob Heubel. Thank you. I'm leaving.

No. I'm leaving. No, this is why I'm leaving because I agree with Jason. I agreed to do this podcast before I watch this movie and about three minutes into it. I wanted not only that three minutes back, I wanted the future time I was going to give up back. It's an hour and 57 minutes. And there's nothing you can do, Shear, to get. get me back that time.

Well, I'll tell you this much. It's an hour and 57 minutes, but if the movie didn't have the slow-mo, it would probably be about 45. There's more slow-mo in this movie. Why would you take- Because they couldn't make the action scenes work. So the only way to make the action scenes look good

was to do them in slow-mo. They look terrible. Like, anything that's supposed to be action-y, they cut to slow-mo. It's like, fuck this. If you like slow-motion horse scenes, then you'll like this movie. I haven't seen more slow-motion horses.

But that horse's journey was one of the most developed I'll go out on a limb and say best acting in the movie done by that horse. When he came running back into town into camp, yeah, that was good. That was like, I was like, oh no, he did the road.

How did he find his way back? Well, I couldn't, here's what I couldn't get over watching the movie. I couldn't feel worse for the, for the costume people and the art director and the like the set, because there's so much work that went into actually building like what that world, I mean, a lot of it is crappy CGI.

But, like, all the costumes and, like, just those sets, it's... Can you imagine? Can you imagine getting that fucking makeup every day? Every day to deliver lines that make no sense. Listen here, rat brain. Your skullbone is definitely skullbone. Can you talk for one second about John Travolta's accent? Where would you place it? We could talk for one hour about John Travolta's accent.

It changes from scene to scene. Sometimes it's colonial British or something like that. And then other times it's, oh, like, I mean, there's four or five distinct different voices, right? Yeah, yeah. This, I wrote, like, I was writing notes as I was watching it. And, like, the first beat happened. And then in the course of the next scene, I just started writing, this movie instantly makes no sense.

I have no idea what any of these people are talking about. And then I just wrote, why did these actors take this job? Forrest Whitaker is the only person who has come out and said, I made a huge mistake. Is he really? There's a long sequence where they let the man animals, again, that's a fucking dumb name.

That's the other problem I have is like the, but the language is so unimaginative. It's lazy. They say words like vaporize. Like, I'm going to vaporize you. Like, that's what a little kid would say. Although there are some phrases, which was interesting to see like,

okay, in 3,000, these are the phrases that stood the test of time. Piece of cake was in. Grass is always greener. Grass is always greener. Let's get the hell out of here. Those phrases held up. Leverage.

Leverage is so many times in this movie. They have that whole... I hope you got some leverage. They have that whole sequence where they want... where John Travolta wants to get leverage over that... Yes. ...over the prisoner guy. So they let him go so that they will watch him eat his favorite food.

Rats. Yeah, so that they can... So that they can figure out what the fucking guys favorite food is and feed it to him as a treat. They talk about his favorite food. I wrote that time, too, for like 15 minutes. That sequence that Cubel is talking about. And they're just going, see, that's his favorite.

He could have chosen anything, but that is, you're like, what? And meanwhile, he couldn't have chosen anything. He's an abandoned warehouse. There's no food to be found. And it's like, he loves raw rat. This movie, I looked it up online. It costs $73 million to make. And who knows what they spent on advertising.

Well, here's a thing. Apparently, there's a huge lawsuit because the company that made it inflated the budget by $40 million. So that's 75 went to some French guy's pocket. Oh, really? They lost a gigantic lawsuit. I didn't do any research on this. Did Scientology themselves have anything to do with the making of this movie? Elron Hubbard was supposed to direct this movie in 1985 when the book came out.

Did he direct other movies? He directed, like, training videos for the Church of Scientology. I'm not kidding. Just videos. Just training videos and pamphlets. And John Travolta was supposedly being the young man, the caveman. Yeah. But then he aged out of that role and then took the role of Terrell.

And did you notice that Kelly Preston is in the movie, too? What does she do? She's the bald, sexy woman with the big tongue. Yeah. Who says the best line in the movie. She goes, I'm going to treat you like a baby on a straight diet of Frondango. That was. What does that mean?

A straight diet of Frondango. This entire alien race appears to come from a planet where, like, all they're ever taught is maniacal laughter. Like, every single character has crazy, broad laughter as a part of their everyday speech. All the aliens have broad laughter, and all the slaves have, like, tribal screams. Like, yeah. No. That was my favorite. I love when they devolved into Jim Christ.

But it makes no sense. They're like, now we have to get out of here. We have to come up with a player. Wait a minute. Why do you sometimes grunt and sometimes speak perfect English? Here's why I actually do think that a lot of times they would sort of signal each other. Like this is when the revolt is going to begin by barking. And I think that was kind of a fuck you to the cyclones or whatever they were called.

Cyclos. You think we're man animals like, we'll show you. But the cyclones. One of the most amazing things is language. Yes. Everybody is speaking English, but they're meant to be speaking languages that the other cannot understand. Exactly. So inexplicably, then.

Barry Pepper, right? That's who it is. Yeah, Barry Pepper has to go in and get like a fucking mind-meld, like a Matrix-style, like, download of the cyclo-language. Which is my favorite scene of the entire movie. Why does that happen?

Okay. He has to go- Why does that happen? Because they're trying to train him to go out and get the gold. Okay, well, here... Yeah, they wanted him to go mine gold for them. Oh, my God.

He's already proven to be the most resistant, strongest, like, rebel in the whole case. Exactly. Let's give him more power. Why are you guys so against Scientology? That's what I want to. I knew that you guys wouldn't even give it a chance, and I want to talk to you guys about this.

This character, this is my moment of the movie for me. This language machine is what they called it. I actually pulled a clip of it because I had to rewind it when I heard it. This is what the language machine sounds like. Excuse me, but I am your instructor if you will forgive such arrogant for I do not have the honor to be a cyclone. I am but a lowly can go language slave. As you are listening to me,

I most likely do not exist. This is the dumbest thing. Well, that's like a hologram that shows up. It looks kind of like Jar Jar. He's like he's very low status and he's like apologizing that they're not as good as the cyclos. But somehow he's going to teach them language.

And then it just shoots into his brain anyway. They just shoot laser beams. into his eyes. And then he learns like calculus. And geometry. And he's like, he goes back into his cage and he's telling the other slaves like, this is a triangle. And they're like, who, what is it? He's like, it's the strongest thing in the universe.

We thought you were going to help us get out of here. And he's like, this will help us get out of here. It's the craziest fucking gobbledygook nonsense. And I don't understand why give him this power? Why give? I'm like, I was so angry at this movie. I didn't understand this movie. I had to look on Wikipedia to understand what was happening because I was very confused

and so who directed this movie oh I know the they asked Quentin Tarantino and he said no I wish he had said yes and then he was given right after Pulp Fiction yes and it was 2000 so it was a couple years after and then

but then they got the assistant director of a Star Wars movie to direct it wow is that why they have those terrible dissolves between scenes like the holy cow The Star Wars. It looks like what you could do in I-Movie on the Mac. It was like, it looks like my acting reel.

If you've ever looked online at like Turkish Star Wars, you know, like our Hungarian Star Wars, those like rip-off movies, this movie is 10 billion times worse and more complicated to understand. This reminded me of, you know what, Comic-Con, have you ever seen at Comic-Con where all of the Klingons get together and they have like, they put on that sort of like, that sort of presentation. where they're like talking back and forth. It's like a cling on play. Yeah, yeah. And it's very over theatrical and overdone, but way, way better than this movie. Way better than this movie.

I just love, there's so many things wrong about this movie, too, because, like, why are they even on Earth? They conquered human civilization in nine minutes, and now they're there to mine? But what are they mining against gold? There is a shocking lack of, like, at a certain point, Like, Barry Pepper and the other rebels are, like, running around doing stuff. Yeah.

And there are no cyclos anywhere. Yes. Like, the whole planet, it has, like, about 15 cyclos around. Well, the cyclos only live in that glass facility. Right. In Denver. Yeah, in Denver. Denver.

Where they have special oxygen. But yet, Barry Pepper needs to wear the special oxygen mask, too. I don't understand that. I just love that, like, even in 3,000, I guess there are sort of state lines where people know, this is Denver, this is Kentucky. Yeah. This is Texas. Did you notice that one sequence where they go to Aspen?

Oh, yes. There's just a really rusty sign that says, welcome, or thank you for visiting Aspen. It's where they're on top of that waterfall and they're about to, like, jump off. And then right before they do, that spaceship flies up and they get out and they, like, choke the guy and they throw that one. Humans can fly. They must be able to fly. Humans can fly. There's a lot of bad green screen in this also.

There is? No. There's so much, I mean. Seameless. Oh. Oh, my gosh. The fact that, I mean, just the fact that he went to the library, read a couple books about Fort Knox, the White House,

and a secret military base underneath the world. Fort Hood. They go to a library and he reads, like, he's looking at paper, and then he turns it over, and it's the Declaration of Independence. Which is not giving him clues to anything. It is useless. And it doesn't even really pertain to what they're doing here. I mean, does it?

I mean, is he... Guys, there is a sequence in this movie. A thousand years from now where cavemen sit in a flight simulator at Fort Hood and learn to fly Harrier Jets. And then do. And these are cavemen who only a day before were literally grunting. They are wearing pelts for clothes

and then learn to expertly fly F-18s and then wage war. Exactly. They are a precision machine. Absolutely. It is flawless. It is, without a doubt, one of the most insane sequences I've ever seen. Barry Pepper is told, after he tries his fight machine once, you make another mistake again, and I'll smash you a puny skull. And he's like, okay.

Then the next time he flew it, flawless. Like, oh, that was all it takes is some good threatening. Someone just yelling at you. June, let me ask you this because you're the only woman in the room. So far as you know. Were there any man, Anna? that you were attracted to. Oh, that's a good question.

Like, do you ever think what it would be like to be in a slave situation like that where you're with a bunch of man animals? Well, I do think that I was curious as to why they did all look like cavemen because this is not cave time. But they didn't. But they didn't. They were clean shaven. They were well kept. And also. It's just kind of long hair and sort of pelt.

But also, like, if we are, if these are modern men and women, I mean, there are. They're way more modern than any of us. They're living in 3,000. Why did all of the women in the movie, like when Kelly Preston, Kelly Preston was so excited to have a house. Yes. And then when the other cave girl...

Well, Kelly Presson is a cave person. No, I know. She's a cycle. But when the other cave girl found her cave boy and he said, you know, we're going to have children or something like that, her face lit up. It's like, their motivations are so old-timing.

So crazy. Do you guys realize that there are two movies that we've done? in which a person is carrying around a rough drawing of the person they love. Yes. It's not a picture because there are no pictures. Exactly. But like, like when the cave woman is captured, she has a rough drawing of Barry Pepper.

And that's how they identify that she must know him. Just like in stupid fucking season of the witch, right? And then also Season of the Witch, inexplicably Ron Perlman and one of the guys in this one both say, let's get the hell out of here. As if, like, people in, like, cavemen. People are cheering. Like, let's get that. Those are timeless phrases.

Yes, they are not timeless phrases. This movie is bullshit. Do you think Barry Pepper will ever do a movie where he runs around more? I mean, you could not have more scenes where the, I'm sure the director is like, okay, Barry, so I think you got the gist of it. You're going to go out there, you're going to run the fuck down the block and then take a left. We're going to really slow it down. Yeah, and then run down that block and then run around that street.

We're going to then run back this way. We're going to blast debris at you at any corner. He's always getting debris blasted. I love the, I love, though, when he was ready for the final battle, that hair went back in a ponytail. I was like, I got to really. Did anybody else notice?

I got to focus up here. Did anybody else notice that for about 10 minutes in the movie while he becomes the revolutionary leader, he has bangs? Yes. I did. Yes. He just, for some reason, has bangs.

He was doing another movie. He was definitely off shooting, like, you know. That baseball movie. I also love during that, during that five. final attack that in the middle of it, John Travolta says, someone calls in and says they're under attack while he's got,

and he says, you're going to have to deal with them. I'm too busy for these kind of teetown. John Travolta is like, in this movie, John Travolta's character is like Darth Vader, if Darth Vader was like a personal trainer. Yeah.

Like there is no, like, he's like, God, can't deal with you, rat brain. Always drinking, they're always drinking. Always drinking glow in the dark. We have a straw. And his signature move is only throat grab. all he could do is grab somebody around the throat

and lift them off the ground. Also, this is just a small thing, but like very bad like laser bullets that shoot terrible. You know, like when people shoot each other with guns, like the laser beams, like fucking... They might as well be spending some fucking money. Yeah, they really should. When Forrest Whitaker got his hand cut off and he just shot his hand, his hand disappeared

and Forrest Whitaker just looks at it for a long time. And at the end of the movie, when Travolta's arm gets blown up, I was like, do these people not have nerve endings in their They have no... They literally just looked at it like, huh. Now, let me ask the group... My arm just got blown up by a bomb. Leverage, Jason, leverage.

Leverage. Let me ask the group this. I don't know if you guys normally talk about this on the podcast, but how difficult was it for you guys to masturbate to this? So easy. Very difficult. This is easy. So difficult.

I like green things and I like... Yeah, Paul had no trouble at all. You like long dreadlocks. I love long dreadlocks. I love Rasta aliens. So this is easy. This is actually a home run for me in many ways. Rasta aliens.

We've talked about a lot of great moments, but we're going to cut down to our biggest what-the-fuck moment. This is our moment that I feel like we need to discuss every one of us. We may have a moment that really calls out to us as being just a moment that is crazy. For me, it was the fact that this entire race of cave people did not move more than a mile outside of their cave dwelling because there was a miniature golf course there. They were frightened by the dinosaur in the miniature golf course. Yeah. That was it.

That was the only thing keeping there. It was a dinosaur also covered in like moss. It was not intimidating at all. That was the block. Just a giant golf ball and a small dinosaur. And that was like kept all of humanity back at a base. Well, I don't know if we've talked about the breathe right strips. These were definitely.

Definitely the influence for that product came from this movie. Why were they wearing them? Because they couldn't breathe. Who fucking knows? All right. Honestly, who fucking knows? Jason, all right. It made me so angry.

There's a line in the movie where somebody arrives on the planet and goes, I hate these puny undersized planets. The gravity is so different. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that is a perfect line. It like, it makes no sense. And then all the cyclos are supposed to be like these big giant, like 12-foot-tall creatures. And they're just wearing stilts and giant boots.

And they look, all of the special effects, both digital and practical, are fucking garbage. Terrible. Like, Cirque de Soleil looks more real when they do shit than this does, you know? I also love the misrepresentation of what the history of the world was, you know, like where the cyclos are like, oh, dogs were the leaders of this planet. And they were much more amenable than these stupid man animals. But they weren't good at manual labor. That was it. Yeah, the dogs could do manual labor.

And then for some reason... How many dogs live in the nuclear holocaust, by the way? Right. That's the other thing. Then at a certain point, Travolta is like, bonks his head in his office, and it's like, get a team in here to... I want this ceiling different. And then, of course, the team that gets brought in is the exact people we've been following the whole time.

So now Barry Pepper, downloaded with the knowledge machine, can hang out in the office of Travolta unsupervised. And we take all of his information to blackmail Forrest Whitaker. Why? Why would any of that happen? Because any plan needs a patsy as Travolta explains to Force Whitaker

in like a 10-minute scene. He records him with that fucking camera. By the way, isn't that Scientology recording you with a camera so that you can have leverage over somebody? Leverage. Leverage. Isn't that like the knocking?

I want you guys to think about coming on board. I don't know what your aversion to this is. I also wanted to say one of my favorite scenes was when all the slaves were in prison

and they have those hoses that shoot the slop into the trough. Oh yeah. And then they all got into the fight because that one guy that was in prison was like no one eats until I eat and then they said,

no, that's bullshit. We're not doing it. And so then Barry Pepper got in a fight and smashed his head into the slop trough and then it was like from now on we all eat together.

And then this little slave girl comes up handful of slop and eats the slop. And the slop is coming out of this giant hose. It looks like when you're emptying out

like a port-a-john like just shit is a shit. I want to talk about this one thing I found out apparently there was a toy of Turl that was released,

11-inch toy of Turl and these are the lines that he would say. That's a perfect size to go in your butt. These are the lines that when you pressed his chest

you go, exterminate all man animals at will. You wouldn't last one day at the academy. man is an endangered species and rat bastard that's not a toy that you would want to give a child

do they ever show the because I may have gotten drunk in the middle of this I don't and blacked out but did they ever show this academy that they keep referencing no there's one there is a shot where on the planet Cyclone which just exists to show

that the leader has teleported back there yes yes right there was no reason for that they It was useless. They show, like, I was like, oh, yeah, I thought there something was cut out. Basically, they show this whole teleportation scene. Their leader comes down. They have an overly wrought scene.

And then he goes back, and that was it. He doesn't even say anything, right? When he goes back to the planet, yeah. It's just like, oh, I guess they got home safe. Yeah, that was. That's literally, I felt like why it was done. It was like, oh, he's there now. And they blew up Planet Cyclos at the end?

It seemed to be that there was a genocide at the end. Okay, because that was a crazy thing. Like, how did they get to Planet Cyclone? Cyclos. They keep talking like, you know what we're going to do? We're going to go back and blow up their planet. How? What? Come on now, man. That's not a plan.

Get there. It makes no sense. You guys, they've gone through flight simulators. They know how to do that. And Barry Pepper knows how to dismantle a nuclear bomb. Yeah. Does a knowledge machine teach him that? Well, first of all, it was a language machine. So, technically, by all intents and purposes, it only gave him the language, not the knowledge.

No, it was knowledge, because it taught him. math and all that other stuff. Oh, you're right. That's what I think we're meant to believe. But yet they called it language machine. Yes. Yes. So even though it taught him knowledge, it was called language machine. Can you, I don't know how long

this movie took to actually make. I'm imagining it probably took like it. But I mean, you know, it would take months. It takes months to make a movie. And so can you imagine fucking waking up, because you'd have to go there and get there so early to put on this makeup. Put in those contact

lenses that they're all wearing. Get your fake teeth in. You're standing on stilts every day. Forst Whitaker. For four months, for five months, whatever it was. They must be, they must fucking hate each other. Oh my God. He must have blown a real head gasket.

You're fired. I also think when you see movies like this, like we all know this was Trouwoldes Pet Project. And like you know he wasn't getting any direction at all. Like they, he was just unleashed on the upset. He's like, I got it. I got it. I heard that the food, the craft service on it was so bad.

that Travolta flew in his own chef and only served the actors from his own... There is a... Not to endorse another podcast, but there is an episode of the NPR show, or the public radio show, The Business, in which she just interviews the guy that wrote this movie.

Oh, who sent out an apology this year when the Razzie's nominated him for being, for the worst screenplay of the decade. This is Battlefield Earth. Worst screenplay of the decade, and this guy came out and said, like, I'm sorry, I apologize. He couldn't write scripts anymore. He had to change his name on

scripts to get them sold after this movie because he was just done in Hollywood. Unfortunately, he changed his name to Terrell, whatever, whatever. Turrell. Oh, man, it is, there's so many, it's also one of those movies that's been a lot of time talking about business

and politics. Like, every, like, those boring scenes in like all the Star Wars where it's like, oh, well, the trade the trade federation must be very upset about the way. The home office won't be pleased. Oh, that's another thing. Everything that's what they came up with for the term is the home office.

That's got to be in the Elron Hubbard stuff. I assume. I've never read any of his books, but... Apparently, this is the first one, right? It was supposed to be made into two. This is the whole thing. This movie is based only on 436 pages of a thousand page book. And this is supposed to be the first of a trilogy.

Yes. And fingers crossed. You know what? And John Travolta recently said that second one is being worked out. We can only hope that Amnite Shyamalan directs the rest of the trilogy. Oh, my God. That would be the best. I could masturbate.

I could masturbate. I would come and kill myself instantly. What was the? Oh, I love the other term I like, too, was. It was last airbender, not Season of the Witch. I just remembered in which the person had the drawing of their family. But it could have worked in Season of the Witch. Yeah, I could have.

We don't want to be a bunch of arrogant greeners here, right guys? What was that? The grass is always greener. That was there. Piece of cake. The cavemen refer to each other as Eric and Greening. Why do they keep saying piece of cake? I miss that.

And then I was like, why are they keep saying piece of cake? They're not eating cake. No one's eating cake then. What is cake? They don't have a concept of cake. It is the year 3,000. But yet, I guess those jets are all gassed up, ready to fly. Jets are gassed up.

Fort Knox is ready to go. White House burnt out and golf course is kind of destroyed. But all the books are cool to read. Books are pretty good. Books are pretty good. Books did not burn. Even though they're made out of paper books. The guns still work the fuck.

It's 3.000. I had no idea that it was the year 3000. So what did you think it was? I just thought it was indeterminate near catastrophic future. Isn't it the full title Battlefield Earth? Yeah. When you click on it on Netflix, it says Battlefield Earth. I can't read.

I do want to, do you guys, I'll play the clip of Travolta saying something in his language, which is English, and then making Barry Pepper translated. Here we go. You will soon be. relocated to a new mining site. And if any of you get any bright ideas about escaping, just keep in mind that although you know nothing about firearms,

I certainly do. I graduated top marksmen in my class, and I can kill any one of you at over a thousand paces. Tell them what I've said. You try to run, he'll kill us. And then Travolta goes, that's it? And then Travolta, to prove his point, shoots a

cow's leg off. Just a cow in the field. Also, why are there cows? Wasn't there a nuclear Holocaust? They're cows just roaming around? Oh my God. This movie is infuriated. I half believe they're like, well, this is where we're going to shoot. Well, there are those cows over there.

Let's shoot them. Well, let's keep them in here and maybe we'll see you how the legs getting shot off. I wonder where this was filmed. It was shot in Canada, the most expensive production ever in Canada at that time. Really? Yes. Now, we always go to the audience to get a little bit of viewer mail. You've got mail. Hold on. Is that your song? That's your theme song. For you got mail. One here again?

I'll do again. You've got mail. There it is. Pretty good, right? Who wrote that and composed it? We created that. We created that. That sounds very familiar.

It's catching on. The director of Battle of Field Earth actually created that. He created that. Basically, this movie got the most razzing nominations of all time. And so I said to you guys, come up with another category that this can win. And obviously this won worst actor, worst screenplay, worst director. Didn't win worse supporting actor. supporting actor, Forrest Whitaker escaped that

one. So I asked you guys to come up with your own worst of categories. And let's see, I'll give you an example here. Some of these are best of also. Yeah, they can be best of, I guess. They can be best of. Here we go. Norman writes, worse eyes in any film,

Forrest Whitaker. Worst eyes. He had these ugly yellow eyes. Marshall makes a good point. Best clean-shaven caveman. I see I said that. Yeah. Barry Pepper. he also had least explain use of gold as a plot device Marshall also had most inebriated cinematographer That's right all the shots were on these weird

It's always tilted It's always like that Dutch angle Which is just like the very first thing you would ever think to do with a camera Like oh let's just turn it a little bit I like this dude Mike Morrison writes Best Use of the Down leverage And then he's counted how many times people say it in the movie Travolta eight times

Barry Pepper three times, Forrest Whitaker two times. And there's gotta be more, right? No, I mean that's, even that, that's high. Looks like somebody found some leverage. I've taught you well. Bob Waters said that this is the worst choice of video editing software and because it was done on Microsoft PowerPoint. It really is, it's just like the fucking dumbest edits.

Dumbest of all time. This one was, this one I think was again written by Norman. This is, most informative public library goes to the Denver Public Library. They have the nuclear, they have information where the nuclear stockpile is and how to break into Fort Knox. Robin has best performance by nostrils, Barry Pepper's nostrils, battlefield Earth. They are pretty good. The Earth, man, oh, man. This was, this was as bad as I heard it was.

I saw it in the theater and I had forgotten how bad it. You did? You saw this in the theater. What are you talking about? I was invited to a premiere of it in New York City, and I saw it in the theater. And I remember going like, oh, this is. Was that an event? Was that a Scientology event?

Rob, we just had a bunch of great people got together, and we just saw a movie. But, I mean, were they, I'm asking you, were they all Scientologists? I don't know. Hey, look, I don't know who they are. We just have a great time, and we took some stress tests afterwards. Sounds like you're covering up for the fact that they were all science. You mentioned stress test. We took a stress test.

I was really stressed out, and I went in there not liking the movie. And then after I left, I loved it. I thought was great. So you saw this in the theater with a crowded room full of people? Yes. How was it received? Poorly. Yeah.

I would hope so. I don't fall asleep in movies, and I do remember falling asleep in the 25-minute-long ending scene, which is like a bad version of the Star Wars trench fight scene. Terrible. Really, really terrible. Well, go watch this on Netflix instant. It's two hours of your life that you'll never get back, but it's worth it for watching the curtain reveals.

Which is also, do we talk about the curtains? The curtains actually come in. So at the end of the movie, curtains close. Oh, I didn't get that far. Curtains close. Like, oh, you're done watching this stage play. Good night, little ones. A small little stage play.

Roll credits. Oh, man. Well, that has been, how did this get made, Battlefield Earth? Thank you so much for listening. Big thanks to our engineer Doug. You can follow the majority of us on Twitter. I'm at Paul Shear. at Rob Pheubel, at Miss June

Diane. Jason is not on Twitter, but... Don't do it. I don't do it. Do you want to plug anything? Not really. Okay, great. Check us next Monday for the next mini episode. Thanks so much. Bye-bye.