Podcast: The Ride - Back to the Future: The Ride

Episode Date: February 9, 2018

Your hosts travel to the Institute of Future Technology to discuss one of Universal's classic attractions. Listen quick, or Mike, Jason and Scott will fade out of that picture you have of them! Listen to Podcast: The Ride Ad-Free on Forever Dog Plus: https://foreverdogpodcasts.com/podcasts/ FOLLOW PODCAST: THE RIDE: https://twitter.com/PodcastTheRide https://www.instagram.com/podcasttheride BUY PODCAST: THE RIDE MERCH: https://www.teepublic.com/stores/podcast-the-ride PODCAST THE RIDE IS A FOREVER DOG PODCAST https://foreverdogpodcasts.com/podcasts/podcast-the-ride Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Warning, the following podcast contains lurid details of a kitschy California sex hotel, a fictional scenario where a disgusting businessman is the president of the United States, a mouth-watering discussion of a crazy scientist's chicken restaurant, and a time-spanning conversation about the Universal Studios attraction, Back to the Future, The Ride. Great Scott! It's Podcast The Ride. Welcome to Podcast The Ride, the podcast that's an 8.3 on the Richter scale, but a 10 on the scale of fun.

That's a line from a Universal Studios brochure that I brought to talk about our topic today. But I think it's about Earthquake, the big one, but I think it applies to our podcast as well. Maybe not so much the Richter part. Yeah, a lot of people say our podcast is like an earthquake, a horrible natural disaster. I was going to say it's like a 10 because we're all dimes, right? We're all 10, right, boys? You and this slang. Look, I'm just trying to stay youthful, you know? What was your, yeah, wait, yeah, thirsty.

Thirsty is new slang that I don't know. Yes. And then dime, you're throwing out old-timey slang. Someone's a 10. And you use snack. You say snack a lot, I noticed. I say snack every now and then. Which is a thing where it's an attractive man or woman.

Is that correct? Yeah, that's right. Yeah, you look like snack. We should probably introduce ourselves. Yeah, well, you could get your Mac on in any era. Get your snack on or your Mac on. And the guy I'm talking about is Jason Sheridan. Hi.

And the guy who disagrees and objects to some of this is Mike Carlson. Hello, and I'm upset. Now, Mike, you and I were actually, we were at a very romantic spot over the weekend, though separately. We were attending a wedding at the Madonna Inn. That's correct, up in San Luis Obispo. San Luis Obispo, about three, four hours north of Los Angeles.

If you aren't in California and haven't driven along the Five to discover it, it's one of the, as a lot of things in our culture are, mainly known as the basis of a Simpsons joke. The Simpsons hotel, that's where there's like a caveman room and then ultimately the utility room. So it's this themed room hotel. It was a very grand campus

and very Disneyland-ish, I would say. Yeah, a couple people came up and was like, this seems like it's right up your alley, right? And I was like, yeah, yeah. Kitchy old bullshit? Like, yes, of course. And theming, and we were in the showboat room, which since I was not paying, like, a ton of money, was not that elaborate. It just kind

of had pictures of, like, or posters from the movie Showboat, or the musical. And then there were a couple, like, very Neverland Ranch style like cherub statues in the room and like a lighting fixture of like a little angel boy holding like a candle or something cherubs everywhere at this place it's themes all over the map there's like kind of Danish stuff storybook stuff but also uh Roman, Grecian columns and little romantic babies.

There are tons of romantic babies everywhere. Like the Love Is Babies from that comic strip. Sure, yeah. You know what I'm talking about? The naked babies. Which is another Simpsons joke. Which is another Simpsons joke. Side note, we were talking a couple episodes ago about Toon Lagoon.

Do the love is babies? I don't think. Are they here or angels? They're not in there? I don't think the love is. That's a pretty big omission there. They are not part of that particular syndicate. What is the name of the, it's like King's, no, King's World is what.

King Features, I think. King Features Syndicate Signature. That's wrong. But yeah, wherever all the comics come from in Universal's Toon Lagoon, the Love Is babies don't factor in. That sucks. Love Is, they're in weird magazines, though. They're not always in straight up.

I feel like they're not in the main comic section. So they're in the Penny Saver. When I grew up, though. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or the Inquirer or things like that, too. I believe the Sun-Times, the Chicago Sun- chicago sun times had love is at the very least if not both tribune and sometimes with the other comics or was it yes it was with the other comics it was not on its own featured love is page or in a weird interesting like sandwich so this is yeah this is a we got to

look this up listeners let us know where your love is. Are the Lockharts or Andy Cap? All right, we can't get into this now. Welcome to another Toon Lagoon. Andy Cap is, I think, but I don't know about the Lockharts. I think they're in there too somewhere. But anyway, Madonna Inn is great. What was your theme, Scott? I was in the Cabin Still room, which was like an old moonshine distillery kind of place,

where the sink mechanisms in the shower were all a bunch of crazy curly cube doodads, like you were making moonshine in a tub. Wow, that's great. With a pull-chain toilet, which I think I talked about in the last episode being a feature of Club 33 at Disneyland. Yeah, I was very delighted to do a pull chain toilet, although the pull chain toilet didn't work. There were a couple of floaters left around.

Not to reveal too much information about myself on the podcast, but I can see why they replaced pull chain toilets. That's good news that I was not in that room because at 9 a.m. Sunday morning, I threw up. I lost track of you. I was wondering if you

took a health dive. No, I didn't. It was 9 a.m., so it wasn't even a health dive. It was just that it's got weird curfew rules at this place. At 12 a.m., it's like no one can be in another room unless you're supposed to be in your own room, but then other suites.

Lockdown. It's like a choir trip or something. Even if you're trying to smash? Smash is another young person's term. Good work, Jason. Jason was not at the wedding. I'm sorry. I'm not at the wedding. I'm what's known in the casino industry as a cooler. It's bad luck. The casino industry. Yeah, the casino industry. Yeah, there's a movie where William H. Macy is a cooler. So if you were around when the garter belt was tossed to see which next eligible man would get married, it would freeze

in midair and shatter as if the garter had been shot by Mr. Freeze's freeze ray. Yes, that's right. Cooler in multiple versions. That's freezer, right? Yes, that's right. Wow. Cooler in multiple versions. That's a harsh thing to put on you. You might not be. Look, that's just my life. You don't have magic. Your cooling abilities are not such that they're magic,

I don't think. No. Here's another young person term. This intro for this episode is wild. We've been all over the map. We're all over the place. Well, when you've been to a magical pastoral land like the Madonna Inn, you want to talk about it.

Yeah, yeah. I hope it didn't change me in terms of higher venereal content in my body because it's a shady place. You get the sense if you ran a black light over the rock walls in some of these rooms that you might find a couple of spots. There's a weird mix of puritanical-ness to it because of the 12 a.m. curfew. And I went to the gift shop and was looking around and really expected it to be just like Lube City, like different sex things in there. But there was none of that.

There was like a very, very small amount of any. It was just like Trojan condoms. It's a tiny little thing toward the corner. So like I expected that Madonna, and yes, was like a sex haven, which it has to be. But they weren't sort of advertising that, and they weren't promoting it in these like very, like romantic looking gift shops.

So, but wait, the Madonna, now I've never been there. It's kind of in the middle of like nowhere, right? Like it's not in the middle of, there's not city streets. There's not like a lot of pedestrian traffic walking by it. The late night McDonald's runs that were done at this wedding were, I think,

kind of a slow struggle. It was. They took a while. There's a lot of built up township in this area. Because that's what I associate hotel, like all guests must be registered or whatever. I associate that more with where lots of people walking around or passing through public lobbies sort of thing.

Just drifters and mountain lions, I think, is what they have to worry about. Maybe that's what it is. Maybe there's a lot of mountain lions in disguise. They're concerned about guests getting bald. Knowing that with all the theming going on, reality is already askew. Well, that's true. So if a mountain lion barged in, you wouldn't have to bat an eye.

Yeah, it's, I don't know, a fun place. But did you, we were popping around to a couple of the other, I got to see a couple of the other theme rooms. Did you find any of it romantic or sensual to any degree. What does that mean, though? You know what I mean? What theme would be a turn on? To me, yeah.

What do I find sensual or romantic? I mean, I'm not saying I don't, but I'm so, I don't know, closed off. I don't even know. Yeah, it's like I'm not going to find a heart-shaped bed with satin red sheets like oh baby here we go like I don't know if it's like that's too on the nose I think only sort like a an 18 year old getting married in Kansas like the most virginal person would that would be their sexual fantasy yeah yeah the the heart-shaped bed and the satin rotating there was a time where i assumed that my my first time i was like would involve like flapping uh curtains and breeze i think i did picture like the romantic you know the the harlequin novel uh well you did grow up in

southern california and the santa ana winds are a regular occurrence uh really congested natural phenomenon that happens out here in southern california a lot of dust and the Santa Ana winds are a regular occurrence. A really congested wind. A natural phenomenon that happens out here in Southern California. A lot of dust in the nostrils. Yeah. Yeah, there was a place, I don't remember the name of it, but it would be on local TV when I was growing up in the Chicago area. And it was not hiding the fact that it was just like, come here to fuck.

Like, that's it. There's hot tubs in the room. There was just people getting paid, probably no money to be in this ad, and it was just like, come here to fuck. Like, that's it. There's hot tubs in the room. There was just, you know, people getting paid, probably no money to be in this ad, and it was on for years. That's my commercial actor talking, and I knew that they just got like some shitty buyout and didn't get a SAG scale, right?

But my mom used to go, yeah, my mom used to be like, ugh. It's like she would make a noise when the commercial would come on, but never explain it to me. I got a lot of that telling people I was going to the Madonna, and a little bit of disgust. like she would make a noise when the commercial would come on but never explain it to me i got a lot of that telling people i was going to the madonna and a little oh people discussed although i found it to be a blast i feel in good health uh yeah in the men's bathroom a uh uh like a

waterfall urinal uh that i that i was that felt like the male spa experience to be that's peeing straight into a waterfall oh wait what you're talking about the one downstairs yes yeah yeah all right so this was hyped to me that there's a waterfall urinal downstairs and i at first went that's weird but okay that sounds cool but when i went in there it seemed more like you were going into a weird like high school shower and that like the waterfall which i imagined some like very immaculate like flowing water constantly was just like sort of a a thin layer of water that would drip down once in a while to just wash away some drunk people's urine like if someone was a lot less a tiny

waterfall attached to a koi pond they didn't take good care of an An empty koi pond. Like the amount of water in the LA River. An empty storm drain. Yeah, that was a bit of a letdown. I don't know. I think I just... As a lifelong Disney fan, I love fake rocks. No matter how much water is streaming down them.

And I thought they did a good job. But yes, it is true. It required some very active working of the sensor to get the little bit of waterfall drip drop on. And yeah, it was kind of a creepy little drain down there. Yeah, and you could see the drains. And the drains really just looked like a shower from a YMCA or something. Just like a floor that you don't put your bare feet on it. Yeah, but a lot of women came in.

So I think a lot of women were very curious i think a lot of women very curious to see that people kept talking about all the women always want to see the urinal and then i was waiting outside to go or i was trying to get in and two women were like hey would you mind if we walk go in there with you and i was like oh i guess that's okay they're like well there's like an old man in there right now we don't want to like barge in on him but i was like okay so like i walked in there like look in and like they were disappointed and then they left what an experience yeah I actually didn't pee in the waterfall I went to the stall I couldn't do it oh really yeah though I did it loud and proud well that's fine I mean I've peed in the famous Chicago Wrigley Field troughs ah yeah yeah that's pretty yeah you got

no division in a baseball stadium. Which is similar to this. Yeah, so you have to be happy with what you're pulling out. Anybody's got a view. I guess I'm not happy with what I'm pulling out. Again, I'll say this intro this week is wild. Well, it is loosely tied because I think you really can see – and the fun thing about living in California is that I do think there's so many different places that clearly kind of capture the spirit of when Disneyland started. So I'm tying it back here. So there's a place called the Tam O'Shanter in Los Feliz.

And then there's, like I used to live right over where the animators used to live and the old Walt Disney Studios was. And there were little cottage houses so you get to see a lot of this fun stuff that was like the design aesthetic of the time and that obviously inspired with Disneyland and Walt Disney so that is a kind of a cool roadside attraction yes like the Madonna it was the family was called the Madonna family it was the last name and clearly they realized if we're going to attract people to our hotel there's got to be some novelty to it there's got to be some theming very it's sort of a similar landmark to the cabazon dinosaurs which are on the way to palm springs uh which is like kind of big kooky 60s dinosaurs that are in he was big adventure uh there's also the the theme park uh website

yesterland has a site as a part of the site devoted to other lands in the Orange County area. When Disneyland opened, then everything had to be called land. There was a religious concert venue called Melody Land, or even just a taco stand had to be called Taco Land.

Everything was land around that time. Shout out to Yesterland, a website I have killed an obscene amount of hours on, reading about extinct attractions. No kidding. And long gone stuff. Yeah, and they're much more researched than we are. Oh, yeah.

Much tighter. Much tighter. You can read those articles in about four minutes. They don't talk about pissing or throwing up. You don't have to hear about their- You don't know the guy who runs Yesterland, what he did over the weekend. There's no 32-year-old man trying to just stay a little youthful by using snack or thirsty. Yesterland does not.

Werner Weiss, the founder of Yesterland, I don't know anything about the man. He doesn't put his personal shit on the website. But you know what? That's what we bring to the table we put a little bit of ourselves into what we talk about uh and i i i think you you'd all give us a round of applause give us a round of applause whether you're alone or with people take a video of yourself applauding us yeah upload it and then we'll tweet it at us we'll'll... Tweet it at us. Yeah, tweet it at us.

All right, well, let's get into the main topic for today, which is Back to the Future, the ride, which in my estimation has to be one of the finest rides of all time. Yeah, I mean, it's one of the greats. I might have a controversial opinion about it at the end, but I won't say it now, I guess. A cliffhanger like in the end of Back to the Future 2. A tease of Part 3.

This, to me, is one of the rides I would call a classic. Yes. If we were going to start compiling, at some point I'm sure we will through some complicated tournament mechanism. We'll make itiling, and at some point I'm sure we will, through some complicated tournament mechanism. We'll make it as difficult as possible to determine the top ten rides of all time. But I'd have to put this in the top ten.

Yeah. And I mean, I think for us, too, we are all right around the right age of when this, we would have been kids when this first opened in the early 90s. And as always, you're maybe skewed by nostalgia. And I recognize that I could be with this because Back to the Future is my franchise for sure. I'm really not a giant Star Wars fan. I'm not a giant Star Trek fan. I'm not a giant Harry Potter fan.

Back to the Future is my thing. Probably because I don't like being taken to fantasy worlds. I like hearing exposition about almanacs and small suburban California towns with infrastructural issues. Back to the Future, just to talk about the movie, I think it is one of those, I don't know who hates Back to the Future. Even someone, like parents like it, kids like it. Yeah, a real big contrarian, I think, to find somebody who's not into Back to the Future. Right. I will, like, Back to the Future is one of those things, maybe like the Borat movie,

where I get a little annoyed at the excessive fandom of it sometimes. Oh, sure. Sometimes, like, it's a little too much. Not that that certainly can be said about most of the things I like. But there's just so much of it. And we have now lived through the celebration of Back to the Future Day of October whatever, 2015, which there was a real big spike. And I feel like there was a 30th anniversary.

There's been a lot of occasions to bring back Back to the Future to get all the cast members together, to make them dress up in the uniforms, which is an odd thing. Michael J. Fox obviously has his condition. Christopher Lloyd, he's getting up there. That being said, it was very delightful when they were on Jimmy Kimmel. I thought they really gave that sketch their all. They time traveled into the Jimmy Kimmel Theater when he did shows from Brooklyn.

Look that up if you haven't seen it, which I assume everyone has. That is one of those where I saw the clip. I saw the link of it and went, oh no. Then I clicked on it and I was like, all right, I have to admit I like this. At first you're like, oh no, I have to admit I like this. Yeah, absolutely. But at first you're like, oh, no, they're dressed up. Oh, no, what? Yeah, I was nervous. You got to be nervous about any sort of reunion callback situation, which, that being said, the big thing with this is like,

I don't have a lot of aggressive fanboy opinions, and I try to be open-minded on things, but I swear to fucking God if they ever remake this goddamn movie. As soon as zemeckis is dead though it's happening well zemeckis and bob gale have like refused like they are pretty firm on like they have i feel like it's in the contract no back to the future reboot or back to the future four like it just won't happen which i think is interesting because like this uh uh uh franchise has definitely been part of our generation

hitting our late 20s, early 30s, and having a little disposable income. So there's been a lot of like, here's the rainbow hat for sale. Here's the hoverboard for sale. Here's the sneakers for sale. Here's Pepsi in a different bottle, you assholes. And did I try to buy one? Yeah, I did. I didn't, though.

It was hard to get. Oh, yeah, there was a big Pepsi Perfect promotion at the New York Comic Con 2015. The shoe laces, the hoverboard, all of it. I own an almanac. I own just a very cheapo copy of the newsletter that says Save the Clock Tower. Jennifer's number is written on the back. Oh, that's good. Everybody catch up. I imagine if you're listening to this, you know Back to the Future Arcania pretty well.

I want to feel free to throw out obscure references as much as possible. Unlike some of those other Star Wars or X-Men or Avengers where we'll just keep getting them forever. They just won't stop. Back to the Future is like finite like it is stopped until he's dead until I guess he's dead he said that he says yes as long as I'm alive there won't be another Back to the Future but

as soon as he's dead someone's just gonna sign off whoever has the controlling rights they'll be like oh well I take 20 whatever billion dollars to make a shitty version of this and a newer, shittier version of it. People will be hovering around his hospital bed, certainly. Yes. Stay in good shape, Robert Zemeckis. You know what's a lucky thing, though, is that it is it's a universal film. And I feel like of all the with all of the chaos in the film industry currently, I think Universal is doing very well.

I think they've got a lot of big franchises. They're Fast and Furious, correct? Sure. I don't think they need it. They don't need to suck the marrow out of the bone in the same way that other, if it was a more struggling company, I feel like it would have happened 15 years ago.

Yeah, Warner Brothers is coming off a year with both Justice League and King Arthur, Legend of the Sword in one financial year. Yeah. Which, by the way, I watched about 50 minutes of King Arthur Legend of the Sword the other night and then had to, like, go out. And I was like, oh, there can't be too much of this left. And I'm like, there's two more hours of this. Wow.

It's fine. It's fine. It's not offensively bad, but it's just like i can't believe a king arthur movie is that long yeah yeah well see as soon as they figure out that like by old uh sequel rules it would have been like well how do you do it without marty and if michael j fox won't participate but now we know that franchises are about the ethereal thing. It's about like outsiders taking up, taking the mantle and like they will, they're like a new generation will rise to drive the DeLorean around.

It's going to happen. I mean, you have to brace for it now. Yeah. You should get in the bunker now. Until then. I know what's happening. Like cancer.

I want to stave it off as long as possible. Or Zemeckis might live to be the oldest world's oldest man no please yeah please 110 50 like you'll be so old at that point that it won't even matter you like you won't even know you won't be up on pop culture so you didn't hear about the new one until then we have three movies uh our memories and and footage of the ride the cartoon and a four-part Telltale Games. And I think there was like a little short for the anniversary, a little short with Christopher Lloyd doing Doc Brown. Probably.

Doing some bits about like explaining paradoxes or why the future doesn't look exactly like it did in Back to the Future 2. Okay, okay. That said, these movies made insane amounts of money. Like the first movie cost $19 million and it made over $200 million. Jeez.

And the second movie, they doubled the budget. It was like $40 million. And then that also, the second and third ones also hugely successful. I feel like this was not, I feel like the first Back to the Future was not made thinking this will be a big old franchise. They never would have imagined a ride.

I can't imagine. Because it's more of a, even more so than, although Star Wars was like, what's that weird little movie they're making in the desert? Yeah, yeah. It just felt like more, it feels like a romantic comedy that has sci-fi components. Whereas it became kind of a bigger full-on sci-fi franchise as it went on. Yeah, it's interesting how, because like, yeah, Star Wars, as you said, like that's designed to make a million movies. Like this is not designed, at least when you're watching the first movie,

it's like, oh, this is an interesting thing that happened in this young man's life. But then it's like, no, wait, no, it's all these adventures. It all happens over the course of like a week, and he's still got to go to college. Like Marty's got everything ahead of him. Yes. Christopher Lloyd was saying he always wishes there was one more, and I think he said he wished it was like in Egypt. Like he had some fantasy in his head that he wishes there was a fourth one that was like an ancient Egypt or in like way olden times. Oh, weird. Well, this is, in the ride,

you get to go to extremely olden times and it's the, it's, you know, probably the last chance to really see him, although there was the TV show and things that you've mentioned. But anyway, it was like, in a way, the like the last bit of the original trilogy. Yeah. And here, if I may,

with the aforementioned old tattered Universal flyer. Tattered, yeah, brochure, which I told Scott I have the exact same brochure. Oh, man. Probably have it here in California, and it is in the exact same shape, and it's got to be from the first opening year or two of Universal.

I think my family first went to Universal Studios Florida in 1991 1991 which would be about a year after it opened right the park opened in 1990 yeah yeah i think mine might be from 93 there's a big picture there's like pictures of all the celebrities who've recently attended uh universal studios like dan akroyd mckayle culkin and bill cosby uh a giant quote there just isn't anything like this in the world. Robert Wagner. Oh, another ooh. Yeah, yeah, another good guy to talk about.

Anyway, but the description of the ride, just to hype everyone up, brace yourself for the greatest ride in history. Buckle up. Doc Brown is sending you screaming through time, climbing, diving, blasting you into the past for an Ice Age encounter with avalanches dinosaurs and a molten volcano then rocketing you into hill valley 2015 it's a 21 million gigawatt sensu round adventure that brings the blockbuster to life and makes other thrill rides seem tame

wow that's great i think i agree uh i don't just i don't disagree with a word of that. That specific amount of gigawatts is pretty bizarre, but hey, sure, why not? This is one of my earliest memories of Universal is riding this ride. I guess if we were going through the park chronologically when my family first went there, we'd probably hit the ET ride first because you hit it first. It's on the way. But I definitely remember riding this ride probably very vividly because I think it was one of the few times I remember my family using the child swap. So I got to ride this ride twice in a row. Congratulations.

While someone sat with my little brother. That's so awesome. And it was awesome. It was great. And also I realized like once we did this I don't know how much else I would have ridden in the park. I guess King Kong and the Ghostbusters, the short-lived Ghostbusters show. And I think that's where I would have tapped out in first grade.

But if all you do, when I started, the ride was still open, I think, up through 2007 here in Hollywood. And I would have days where I'd essentially go into that ride, that's it, and then go. Yeah, it's definitely the centerpiece of both parks, probably the best attraction in both parks until some other stuff came along. Some basics about the ride. So, open from 1990, although I guess soft opened in 1990, but not really open until 1991. Officially opened in 1991 in Florida. In Florida, opened until then closed in 2007.

Opened from 1994 to 2007 in Universal Hollywood. No, 93, wasn't it? Maybe. I could be wrong. Don't get at us about the research. And from 2001 to 2016 in Universal Japan. So big, lengthy runs. No longer in operation anywhere, but it does sort of, it's a closure that I am not terribly upset about because you literally the ride takes you into a year that would have passed by the time

you were going on. Like that ride could not stay open past 2015, although it did in Japan. Yes. So you were going into the past jaws is still open in japan uh-huh oh really uh which is a thing that uh uh yeah i i why i might want to go there yeah when i go to japan there's a few of our friends anytime we talk about like oh we all kind of people have gone to japan or want to visit japan uh, there's a few of us who are like, do you set aside the time to go to Universal because they do the Jaws ride?

If they still had BTTF, I think that would seal the deal. I mean, for sure. What I was going to say, I didn't actually go, we didn't go to Universal Studios the first couple times I went to Florida. We just went to Disney. So I didn't ride this until I was a little older which also with the et right um but this ride does the similar thing to et and that it like drastically expands what like the universe it like kind of gives you all this new information and like adds another element to it like et gives you a whole nother planet

and his backstory of course we all know the flop glopple and his backstory, of course. We all know the Flop Gloppel and Botanicus, of course. But this is like there's a future institute, and this expands what Doc does and who he is. This is honestly kind of a case for, like, I wouldn't mind a movie about this institute that Doc Brown has. Sure. It has multiple branches and multiple times. It's kind of an interesting idea where he would go.

As much as we're not liking the idea, and obviously Christopher Lloyd probably can't play Doc Brown. He can, but... It'll be Alden Algenreich. Yeah. He takes them all. Young Hans, young Doc. Donald Glover as Marty.

But if it was the 90s, and the people who made the movie wanted to make another movie i was like this is kind of a fun idea yeah the stuff that they introduce in this lot in the queue and it's all just to justify why we're putting a bunch of tourists yeah in this adventure but it's similarly to et it's like this is a bunch of stuff not in the movie and that's the thing i like about universal i can't indiana jones does it a little bit at Disney but Disney is much more kind of book report as they say. Yes, which is a complaint about a couple probably might be the complaint about Little Mermaid, might be the complaint about the Nemo

submarines. Although I think some of, you know, I like Little Mermaid a lot. Nemo, I don't know. Nemo's okay. We'll talk about that in another episode. Buto, I don't know. We can get into that later. Maybe because Disney in general, probably also true with the Marvel and Star Wars properties, there's less maybe risk in terms of expanding the universe, whereas Universal

will take big old strides. Be a little... T2 3D, similar example where you have the T1000 but then you expand to the t1 million and the invention that's only been the ride yes so that's a good thing we like that but if you get that stuff wrong it can be so wrong and so off but i also but i mean as i said maybe it was on the last episode where i was saying like i at a certain point even if it's bad i like it

like i will say this like the et Green Planet doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make sense to E.T. He looks totally different than these happy characters, like, but it's great. And now it's just canon. So even if it's bad, eventually it's good. And especially if you were a kid when you saw it, it's good. Yeah, it is automatically good. But yeah, so the basic premise of this doc has opened the Institute of Future Technology

from which he can run a time travel test. But you get to see in the line examples of hover bikes and other technologies that he's exploring. I love that in the line that you see the office numbers where everybody works in the Institute of Future Technology. And it's a lot of obscure names, probably the names of people who worked on the ride, but then also Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Edison and Leonardo da Vinci. They all work somehow out of this facility. This is a thing.

So I was just looking. There's a whole, I forget. We'll tweet a link. There's somebody who put all of this together, the ride, the queue, the pre-show video. It's like an hour-long YouTube video. I watched all of it today. Oh, of course.

And the first thing I'll say is you were mentioning that. And there's a lot of great fake newsreel footage of Doc going back in time and hanging out with Edison. He's at the first plane flight, the Wright Brothers. Oh, yeah. The Beatles. He's at the Beatles. This doesn't make any sense because the Wright Brothers. Oh, yeah. The Beatles. He's at the Beatles, which this doesn't make any sense because the Beatles came to America in 1964

and Marty goes back in time into 1955. So they're acting like it's all part of the same thing where Doc is traveling through time. But I don't know why he went back. I guess maybe he didn't know the Beatles would be a thing. I think he just did it as a thing, right? He just wanted to go see them? That's what I'm saying.

It seems like Doc just kind of wandered into the Beatles press conference. And I think the joke is... And he's really concerned with disrupting the space-time continuum. This is my point. And he's standing next to the Beatles. This is my point. Oh, I see. He's in the movies.

He's very worried about, like, you cannot talk to... And that's part of the ride, is they're sending teams to the different time periods they went to in the movies just to make sure everything's copacetic. They're sending Future Institute employees to check out. Yeah, constantly. And he's hanging out with famous people. So the only thing I would criticize maybe about in this pre-show is there should be a thing where Doc realized

that when all this time traveling that they did in these movies, that didn't really matter very much. So who cares? Go back in time. Fuck around. It doesn't really matter. It didn't change the time stream that they did in these movies that didn't really matter very much so who cares yeah go back in time fuck around it doesn't really matter it didn't change the time stream that much it's a more lax doc and also at the end of part three doc has vowed to destroy the time machine no more experiments although i guess the time train is an indicator that he has reversed that decision he is going to travel through time with his wife, Clara, and his two creepy sons. The boy who points at his dick. If you haven't seen that YouTube video, or if you, you guys know this, right?

I just heard about this. We didn't talk about this last week, did we? I don't believe so. I heard about it in the last week, though, for whatever reason. Either Jules or Vern does this weird. I don't know about this, actually. Oh, my God. Oh, look it up.

Yeah, just Google creepy kid. Back to the future. Sorry if that child has grown and a good dude now. I would hope they've grown. You were creepy as a kid. I think he does this bizarre gesture where he points down to his crotch and then does a kind of like come hither gesture and it's in the movie. As you're pushing in on Doc kind of saying his final like in the future is what you make of in on Doc, kind of saying his final, like in the future, is what you make of it. There's this kid pointing at his dick.

Pointing at his dick. It's really, really weird. Which my wife interpreted. Little kids are weird. I think he had to pee, I think is what, I think he was telling someone off camera. That was the best take they got.

Somehow. But in the other ones, he just yells, I gotta pee! Or started peeing. Yeah. That's like a trick when you go to like child acting school It's like if you have to pee You signal to the first AD

Like this Point here and then wave Anytime if it's in the take it's fine So yeah so Doc is like real casual now About time travel so I would have loved like Him explaining like that doesn't really matter We just I'm just having the time of my life hanging out with these other celebrities. Cool it out, man.

It's my retirement years. Fuck them rules. You said, though, he says he's going to get rid of the time machine and stuff, but they zoom off, right? The time train zooms off at the end of that movie. Yeah, I think what I'm saying is- They zoom off to go fuck around somewhere. He says he's going to destroy the time machine.

By the time he shows up with the time train, maybe that's an indicator that he's reversed that. Right. Maybe that's true. That's a good point. Because why would you build the time train? I guess it's sort of like in Breaking Bad. You know, Mike tells Walt, no more half measures. And then everything Mike does is half measures. People have a pattern. So I

guess if I think about it, Doc constantly tells people not to fuck with time, but he built a time machine. So he's always going to fuck with time. I guess that's really, I Doc constantly tells people not to fuck with time but he built a time machine so he's always going to fuck with time. I guess that's really I guess there doesn't need to be an explanation. I guess I've solved the problem that I presented. Doc is always going to mess with the time stream.

By butterfly effect logic any if he were running over a blade of grass with the DeLorean would have some effect on something. Of course. There's no way he's making it out. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, it's fun.

Time travel is now just fun. And they present it in this really great way. And I forgot sort of all about this is they do a newsreel called Doc on the March, which is like the same kind of bit as the Indiana Jones ride, which is an old style newsreel. And it's black and white footage. And they use like stock footage of like 60s things and like they show what Doc has made as inventions like it's all this history of Doc and it's great I was so delighted watching it loved that as a kid and that kind of film

style that was like tougher to do and it was this is pre Forrest Gump like you know inserting a actor into the old footage was pretty crazy so kudos to you know in general I'm sure we'll keep coming back to it. Besides the ride film itself, which is incredible, all of the pre-show materials are so great. And there is so much of it. There's a half hour's worth of pre-show material. And credited, one of the first gigs credited to Peyton Reed, director of Ant-Man and Ant-Man and the Wasp, the upcoming Ant-Man and the Wasp. Downer Glove, a director of some of the last season of Mr. Show,

some of the best sketches they ever did. I remember hearing an interview with him, and he talked about how they really did give them a lot of freedom on this ride. I feel like he may have also directed some of the pre-show q segments he's not credited wrote it though uh but yeah he's credited as as writer um also wrote and directed the making of the back to the future trilogy with kirk cameron that was included as a bonus vhs the four-pack that I bought at Universal Studios the first time I went on the ride.

Because there was a Back to the Future-specific store, and I still have other cherished childhood memories. I still got those tapes kicking around. What an insane markup that must have had. Oh, yeah, I'm sure. Yeah, it must have been like $109 in 1995. Yeah. Yeah, so there's just so much material.

And I mean, I was writing notes down, but it's like we can't get through all of it. But there's good, there's like these funny jokes in it still. Like there's like these weird inventions he made. The flapjack maker. There's like something where you can bronze shoes and bronze your wife's hat.

And then it says like, and there's like just old footage of like somebody getting blasted in the head with brawn like some stock footage they must have found he has a bizarre like hair puff up yeah

I wrote it it's static the head static hair chair so the way you would cut your hair is like it would make your hair stand up

and then they would cut it easier and it looks like this was maybe actually a weird invention someone made and they just attributed it to Doc

oh yeah it was like kooky old house to the future kind of yeah. Yeah, like that weight loss machine that would just jiggle you with that thing around, whatever that's called. Good for Doc though. He's running through time. He's a crackpot when you meet him who nobody's heard of and he's distrusted by this local principal and then now he is beloved by the world hanging with the beatles hanging with

all the greatest inventors of all time which is a movie i would have liked to see a 90s movie where doc was hanging with like just take marty out of the equation just it's doc hanging out and where doc goes like back just far enough to kind of hang around steve jobs hear the idea, take it, come back, do his own keynote in 2000 right before he gets the jump on the iPod, on the iPad. Doc and the black turtleneck. Yeah, I think that's great. He got the whole thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

This ride has, I think, one of my favorite legitimately solid jokes in a theme park attraction when the ride is over and you are exiting the room uh then you can hear doc going hurry up get out before you meet yourself coming in like that's man such a solid time travel joke like the the ride really does a great job of capturing the humor of the movies like the basic premise of why the institute of future technology is there is doc's going to do a test where he's going to send you one day into the future because any more than that would be a too much of a shock to the system. Right. But that but until things go terribly awry. I think we said earlier, but Doc has sent his employees to the different time periods they visit in the movies to make sure everything is copacetic after he had been there. And 1950s Biff stows away with the 1955 team and now comes to the future and he has a vendetta.

Right. Which is this sort of is the least making sense part of the ride in my mind. Yeah, why is it specifically 1950s Biff? Because there's multiple Biffs you could choose from. He's an older, disheveled guy in 1985, and then a bitter old man in 2015. And then the current day is the Trump Biff, who is certainly like a savvier person. That's the alternate 1985, which, by the way, as we record this, essentially Biff Tannen is giving his presidential State of the Union.

Yes, that's happening tonight. We live deep into the alternate 1985. A worse Biff is giving his State of the Union. A little more street smart and crafty worse Biff is giving his State of the Union that is our president. A little more street smart and crafty than Biff Tannen. But this guy, he pulled off something that maybe a young Trump would have done, is stow away in an early iteration

of the Institute of Future Technology. And to do what? He says, I'm going to take it on a little joy ride. But what's really... It doesn't really... It's just going to cause chaos. Yeah, so he stows away in a DeLorean that's doing like a routine checkup. Now, it seems like Doc is running cars and time machines just to go to...

He's got a shit ton of DeLoreans. Yeah, because he doesn't take one of the new eight-passenger DeLoreans, which is what he's showing off to us, the audience. The eight-passenger convertible DeLorean, as he points out. There's a couple of mods to the DeLorean that we're getting on, but Biff is just on an old-fashioned regular one, which is also sitting around the Institute. And he's able to override all of this technology.

He locks Doc in his own office. A bunch of bars drop down he overrides whatever security system is in place at the institute Biff is just some sort of technological genius all of a sudden there's a joke just how stupid he is in Back to the Future the old Biff can't do literally anything right he doesn't know how to speak very well but he goes to 1990 and is able to override security

there's a part where he sprays paint over a security camera, but like... That concept wouldn't have been introduced in the 50s, right? When did security cameras first catch on? Or they were really archaic. Like to see one tilting back and forth. I mean, maybe he's thinking

one step ahead. Oh, of course, security cameras are more technologically advanced now but uh i don't know i'd say don't go over to that cafe 80s don't go meet that reagan and ayatollah hologram or that'll really freak you out yeah he's biff there's also a section where he talks to the audience via a security camera which i don't think they explain yeah because like doc has a two-way camera to talk to the tourists but biff uh is like always looks in a security camera and goes, well, tourists are out here.

And then it's like, come on, guys. Security cameras don't traditionally capture audio sometimes either. But it's the future technology. Yeah. There's a really funny like piece of Universal like promotional video where he says into the security camera, what are you looking at, butthead? And it cuts to a full audience like, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Like a big old laugh at just what are you looking at, butthead?

Which is one of his classic lines. But it's not in a ride that has literal jokes. That one's not particularly a joke. Although I always love the screen door in a battleship. Those jokes and insults, the biff gets wrong. I think that's a very funny thing from the movies. In this one, he says, before unleashing a bunch of ball bearings, just a bunch of marbles go on the floor, and he trips up the security guards.

He says, have a nice trip trip see you next winter and yes that's a solid again solid jokes in this ride yeah pretty good i like there's something about uh i think the the not just in the ride but in the films themselves the back to the future comedy i think is is fairly timeless and i think uh i think some of it survives better than we've talked about comedy and rides going stale very quickly. And there's something about it. It's not hard funny enough,

but it's classic enough and multi-generational enough that this stuff's going to work. Well, Doc is... Christopher Lloyd is the greatest mugger of all time also. It's just mugging is funny if it's done by a person who's good at it. And Christopher Lloyd is the best in the business. I think people don't talk about how great Christopher Lloyd is enough, I think.

Oh, yeah. As a kid, I loved him in Camp Nowhere. Remember Camp Nowhere? Of course. The movie where they make a fake summer camp? He's Uncle Fester. He's Jim Magnetowski on Taxi. Yeah.

He's great on all of these things, even stuff that's bad. It's like, well, he's very watchable. And he mugs. And mugging is a comedy language that transcends generations and countries. This had to work in America and Japan, and I'm sure it did. His face is funny. He makes funny faces. There's a really good one in the ride where he's kind of shuddering through the bars,

just like, oh, Tannen. Yeah, and it could be horrible with a worse actor doing it, but the bigness of Christopher Lloyd just really worked. He's like one of those classic Adam West-y guys where he pulled off broad so well. I feel like there's a self-awareness to the humor in the ride, too, which definitely gets heightened even more with the replacement because the simpsons ride is the most like take so many pot shots it's so self-aware it's a ride

uh also self-aware uh animated doc brown shows up in the pre-show queue of the simpsons ride yes but we should save that we'll save that for the simpsons episode but i think we're not doing i was so delighted to see that they handed off the keys, essentially, and you get to see seeing a Simpsonized Doc Brown is a lot of fun, and seeing him interact with Professor Frank. Two of the funniest scientists.

And Christopher Lloyd's voice. Yeah. Very cool. Did Christopher Lloyd do the voice on the cartoon? No, it's Dan Castellaneta. It is? Really? Is that real? Yeah, it is. That's crazy. He's filmed in as the genie, and

now he represents Robin Williams as the genie here and there, and then he played Doc Brown in the cartoon. That seems like I set you up for that perfectly, but I did not know the answer to it. I was very surprised, because he has done the voice in other stuff, like other video games and stuff.

So yeah, that's a nice little nod to it. Oh, he's Doc Brown in the Seth MacFarlane of the Western movie, I believe. They open a door and he's like an old blacksmith. He's in Old West. Oh, A Million Ways to Die in the West? There you go. Oh my god. Oh right, because he becomes a blacksmith in the third movie. What an odd nod

to the other universal Western comedy. Yeah, yeah, they all tie together. Well, God, what else? I mean, there's so much. He was, I just have to say, Jason was saying there's a lot of, it's like very self-referential. In one of the pre-show videos, I think it's when he's in the future, he's like, look at the, it's like a scale diagram.

Oh, yeah. And like, they just like, there's not any subtlety to that reference. And when you're in the DeLorean, you can see a little graph that says Zemeckis-Gale coordinates, which those are the two creators and screenwriters of the Back to the Future franchise. A little reference that I understood

when I was 10 or whatever and felt like a good goody little two shoes. Like, does everyone else in the car get this? I know who Gale and Zemeckis are. That's funny because i i don't know that a lot of people would know bob gail uh but i think uh zemeckis is on the level where like oh i know he's a hollywood guy like you know i feel like my parents would know early nine or late late 80s oh yeah maybe not probably as that 90s went on he hadn't had b Polar Express yet. He hadn't had these. Beowulf.

Beowulf. He hadn't. The Wire, White Man on Wire, right? He made that? I believe so. That's the documentary, but the film. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the real version.

We do our research, damn it. No more three stars. I'm just going to keep haranguing that single review. That single three stars. Even though we've had worse reviews since but that was the first one and the worst one it stings the most I mean it doesn't sting I don't care I don't care at all uh all right well elsewhere in the research that we've done about this right there is so much to talk about uh uh okay so you're also you're there's the video you're you're moving through

so many rooms and watching different videos in all of these rooms. You're also introduced to a woman who is kind of a receptionist or representative somehow of the Institute of Future Technology, played by an actress, Darlene Vogel, who was also Spike, the female member of Griff's gang in 2015. Griff is Biff's son.

Or wait, no, grandson, I believe. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. did you finish watching my car gramps um yeah i'm such a where do you guys land on back to the future in terms of favorite i'm such a back to the future too yeah i was a big back to the future too kid i think that we're all tomorrowland kids and i think future always won so when i was a kid i was always very big on like two is the best and my mom would always be like, two isn't the best. The first one's obviously the best. And I'd be like, yeah, but two is cool. And you go to the future.

And then I think you were the one who pointed out a year or two ago, they're in the future for like 10 minutes in two. There's not much future. And they spent most of two in the 50s. It's kind of even thirds you're in alternate 1985 you're in our that's true yeah trump world and then you're in uh 1950 you're back in the first movie but i meant but i love that uh i i love that bizarre 80s by way of future for sure a big influence on the show i got to do move peep city City, this crazy neon pastel clash of 80s and future. I could just swim in that forever.

There is a ride where you get to go into this bizarre 2015. It's more specifically a Back to the Future 2 ride than any of the other movies, really. I think that, yeah. I think as a kid, I did not care for the Old West, which is totally different now. I love the Old West. But as a kid, 3 was like fine, but I was sort of bored because it was Old West.

2, I think just because of the future stuff, always was my favorite. I think you probably have to give it up for 1 being the best movie. As a movie that stands on its own. It's almost perfect. There's a bunch of creepy stuff. Two is great, but two... It's a big, weird mess. Two is a hoverboard. As a kid, I would take...

There's so many good stuff. There's a lot of iconography that I think, as we were saying earlier, the rainbow hat and the Pepsi. I love the big, weird mess nature of it. I like that it's sort of scattered and all, and there's stuff that works and stuff that doesn't work. Oh, yeah, there's so much bizarre technology. The pizza.

Oh, the Pizza Hut. It's great. There's two ties when he's talking to Needle, Flea, when he's talking to Needles. He's got the two ties on. Television channel, that multi-channel TV that he's watching. The fax machine. Oh, yeah, yeah yeah you're

fired fujitsu son here is a fact about me when i was a kid like i was a big action figure kid i really liked action figures playing with them uh and buying them and they they are we're all pretty when action figures first really like hit hit a boom in the 90s i mean i guess they'd been around for a little while but they all came with this very thin cardboard backers, and I would take the big ones of those and try to push myself around on the carpet like it was a hoverboard, because they were always very

smooth, glossy cardboard, so they would slide around carpet, not very far, but they didn't make the hoverboard until like fucking 20 years later. People are spending $300 on hoverboard replicas or whatever. They're still not real.

They're still not real. But the current hoverboards light on fire very much in the way that a lot of Doc Brown inventions do. That's true. Oh, yeah. Even within the ride, they kind of reprise the joke from the first movie where he's got a little complicated model that he downplays and says you know forgive the yes yeah the crudity of this and then yeah he sets up a car it goes catches on fire right trying to scare you that you're gonna burst into flames on the right uh-huh and there's a lot like i i was very nervous about this right as always this being freddy cat kids i

was very nervous about this ride the first time and almost every time really because you end up in this little, this tiny waiting room once you get split off into the little eight person groups. The room that you go into right before the ride begins is very small and claustrophobic and it shakes like crazy because you're right next to the ride and the ride mechanism. Do you guys remember this? Yeah, for sure. It's still happening now on the Simpsons ride. Oh, they didn't diminish the shake? Yeah, for sure. It still happens. It still happens on the Simpsons ride. Oh, they didn't diminish the shake? Yeah, no, there's no way to diminish that shake because it really feels like you're getting bombed

while you're in that little room. It's really creepy, isn't it? Yeah, because you're like six or eight feet from a massive hydraulic arm. So the thing keeps jerking around and there's like, what, 20, how many cars on this thing? So, okay, so there's two IMAX domes

and each one has 12 cars in it. Are they called Omni-something domes? OmniMax domes, I believe. OmniMax, it's not IMAX domes, and each one has 12 cars in it. Are they called Omni-something domes? Omni-MAX domes, I believe. Omni-MAX, it's not IMAX. An interesting thing, I found out the range of movement in either direction of the car is only about two feet. But because you're getting jerked around so much, and it's queued up with different effects and the footage on screen, you think you're really getting thrown around. Most you can go, like, left to right,

you know, front to back, is like two feet of movement. Two feet, really. But also the fact that you're in these smaller vehicles that are all looking at the one giant screen, like, you're rocking around, like, so much that it,

because they're smaller, like, the smaller range of motion does more to you than a star tours cabin does oh yeah bigger room yeah uh so you have i don't know yeah and in a smaller car you're feeling those jerks and movements a lot more and there's something to the open because it's open air like star tours is a closed vehicle and like it's being open air almost feels like when i was a kid or even now in Simpsons, you kind of feel like you could fly out of it a little bit, like you could fly out of the car. In terms of motion rides looking at screens, I think this is the cream of the crop. I prefer this much more to a moving theater, or even the Minion ride.

I guess the Minion ride is separate separate cars but you can see them all in this it's kind of designed so you can just see i mean if you are on the edge and you lean out of the the car opening a little you can see the other cars around you yeah ideally like you are just seeing the screen yes like you are not looking at the other cars and that screen is so immersive that it's going in all directions. Like, if you look up, it's all the way above you. Because it's a fisheye-shaped screen, it's

all directions. I mean, it's still sort of the same, like, the newest version of this is the Avatar ride. Oh, yeah, yeah. Is that, now, I haven't been on that ride yet. Is that a curved screen? Is that, like, does that envelop you like the Soarin' rides do? But more so.

I have not looked into exactly what the shape of the screen is. But it is another one where like, if you really kind of crane your neck to the right, you see like, oh, the illusion gets broken a little bit. But it is like the, it's the latest version of this, basically. Well, if I could talk a little about some of the technology involved in this ride, because I think until I was doing research in the last couple of days, I don't think I appreciated what a step forward this ride was and what a step forward the film was itself. So the fact that it is, all right, so yeah, it's OmniMax screens, which is, it is, that is a part of IMAX, apparently. Now they call it IMAX dome. But the idea that you're looking at 70 millimeter footage shot in a fisheye way so that it's

an image that totally wraps all around you up, down, left, right. And this had only been used in museums up until this point. You know, I think like at Carnegie M mellon there was this giant imax facility the franklin institute in philadelphia uh had a huge huge imax uh and uh yeah imax now it's just imax or large format screen if we're not using copyrighted terms uh are just everywhere we're like we can walk to an imax screen from where we're recording yes but like it's not a full like so it's it's good and it's high def but it's not like the full the no we could walk the universal city walk if that's what you're saying that is a real imax screen uh but there's a one in burbank yeah there's one in burbank um spoiler alert we're

recording in burbank burbank but they uh I mean, when they went to test it, like they had to take foam cars to an IMAX in Canada. Is that right? I read something about this. Wait, I'm not sure about this. Oh, yeah, yeah. It was from a World's Fair. It was, they had a leftover giant screen

from the World's Fair in Canada. Vancouver. Yes. Yes. So they were, so Universal made the deal with OmniMax to take this technology that had only been used in an educational way, basically, and be the first to use it for entertainment. Now it's the same technology that's used in Soarin' Over California or Soarin' Over the World. This is the first use in a theme park setting.

So they made this deal with OmniMax, started building the theaters, bought the projector. It is all happening. The deal is in place. And then they start running tests of a separate movie, not the one that we all know and love today, but there was another ride film made by a different director named Richard Edlund. And they were filming, they were like testing out dailies of this thing

at this Vancouver location. And whenever, with like a little mock-up delorean but the tests went really badly and people were getting nauseous and just like the the screen itself there were a lot of problems with like you didn't know where to look it was very disorienting uh you know like showing footage in these kind of theaters is really insane because it's this it's this massive dome so if there's a really bright object up in the upper right, the light refracts all over the room and messes up the lighting on the rest of the screen. So people are getting nauseous. There's

weird lighting issues. The ride's going very badly. Universal knows they need to make a change. So they reach out to a director named Douglas Trumbull, who ended up directing the final film. Let me consult my notes here about Douglas Trumbull. He's like this amazing optical effects artist who worked on 2001 A Space Odyssey, Close Encounters, Blade Runner, Tree of Life much later,

directed this bizarre movie Brainstorm with Christopher Walken in the 80s. He's just like this, that he did that crazy space travel sequence in 2001. Just an incredible pioneer of optical. The practical effects and all the cool images from all these films before digital effects were so prevalent. Yeah, and I wouldn't pretend to know how to describe all this stuff, yeah it's all but it's it's all like like giant uh giant cells are being printed out and like hand-painted to make effects like what you see in close runners and blade runner and and and that's

that's what got me you're talking about tech on this ride the footage the ride footage is all practical it's all miniatures yes like there's no cgi get cgi had it was just a few years away from catching on but like they there are no computer effects in this ride this is a wild fact about this thing even though you're smashing through signs and like there's big time warp tunnels it's stop motion yeah it's crazy if you've ever seen like there's like one star where they were making star wars like there's these just they made the Death Star and they were just shooting little X-Wings. And like that's sort of what this is. Like when you see the videos, because there's a couple different there's some video like I watched about this this gentleman.

And they're showing a lot of like pictures from the making of it. Yeah. And it's all just models. It's all just. And they're all gigantic. Like we haven't really talked about the structure of this ride too much, but basically, if you don't know it, first you follow Biff into the future. You're in 2015. Then you end up in the Ice Age.

You're going through these giant ice caverns. Then you end up encountering a big dinosaur and going down like a lava fall, basically. And if you look at behind-the-scenes photos, and I'm sure we'll post some of these, these are gigantic sets. There is an overhead of that dinosaur set, and it goes on forever and ever and ever because they had to build a dinosaur that was big enough to swallow the camera.

Which, like, I often wonder going on it, is this like a weird little puppet dinosaur? But I didn't know it's the last few days it's it is it's it's a motion controlled gigantic rig a creature that that camera into and what's really bizarre is they had to build the IMAX camera that they ended up building was only a foot wide uh even though it's you're looking at is creating images that are being projected in beautiful quality it's seven stories it's only a looking at is creating images that are being projected in beautiful quality it's seven stories it's only a foot because it had to fit through all these miniatures

and go into a dinosaur's mouth so anyway the like the situation with Doug Trumbull he comes in and says well this technology that you're using the OmniMax you know this is really bad for this ride for this reason and this reason I think you should bail on that. And Universal says too late. We are building the buildings. We have the projector. We are not changing that. It's too late to change that. So he has to you know, weird bright thing flying by on one end of the screen and flying away to the other. You need like focal points, basically, and even lighting, which is why so much of the ride is at night. It's why it's all at night or you're in like the ice room or the lava room and that's all even. But it's also why it's a chase because Biff is like a single point to focus on yeah so he brought that idea of chase biff bump him keep him in your view that is so that you have one thing to focus on so you aren't noticing bizarro strobing on one side of the camera or the other yeah i got bugged out

by shit and getting nauseous so the narrative of the ride is that to get Biff back to the present, you need to bump him with your car. You have to bump him, which is funny. At 88 miles per hour, which will create a time vortex, will send you back to the Institute. Both vehicles hurtling back to the Institute. Sending you flying through a sign that says, Back to the Future, once you ultimately do it.

This is one of my other odd bones to pick about this ride. Why do you burst through a screen that says Back to the Future? The movie is not... The characters are not aware of the Back to the Future logo. No. Why wouldn't it say Institute of Future Technology? Yeah, I don't know. That doesn't make any sense. I haven't seen anything.

I was looking through that and I was like, there's no real explanation. Yeah, as much as it's very cool to fly through that logo because it's a badass logo um but but anyway the the other thing i glossed over this that this was the new plot uh added by doug trumbull but do you guys know about the old plot i i saw a little bit about this the old plot was that you were going over scenes from the movies is that right or no? I've heard several reports. There is that. There's conflicting information. Yes, apparently.

They considered a roller coaster very early on and they're like, oh shit, this goes too fast. You can't tell a story with a roller coaster. Nowadays, they've slowly started figuring out how to combine show scenes and roller coasters and I think we'll start to see that more. You can sort of stop a roller coaster car

on a dime a little better. Things like The Mummy, you can actually have scenes in a roller coaster. But yeah, it wouldn't have been. You would have just been passing by big arrows and clocks. So what did you read? Because I read it was like you would kind of go over scenes from the three movies. Apparently,

and this is validated by a little press release that was put out in the LA Times. Among other things, these are things that would have happened in the ride. You'll catapult to Kitty Hawk for a run-in with the Wright Brothers. Rocket to Venice for a brush with Da Vinci. Woosh through Niagara Falls. These are things stated to... Interesting.

This is what would have... And I believe some of this stuff was filmed. I think this is what they were testing in Vancouver, and this is what was bugging people out. You got the Wright brothers in a kooky old plane flying left to right, flying all over the frame, and people got sick trying to follow them.

A couple of things on that. One, sort of similar to what would go in Soren, like going through, like we're by giant waterfalls. Sure. The other thing is like, that is sort of much more along the lines of what we're talking about in the queue and the pre-show stuff,

like meeting, meeting famous people through history. It's a weird sense when you're looking at that pre-show material. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, and it's also, there's a weird more sense when you're looking at that pre-show material yeah yeah uh and it's also there's a weird i guess it's like da vinci and a flying machine and the wright brothers because they had to think of flying stuff right to get a bunch of shit whizzing around but yeah i think it was doc brown goes to stop hitler or something like doc brown and biff stops him biff b wants Hitler to succeed. Biff and Hitler. As a proponent of evil, he doesn't want to crush Hitler's legs with the DeLorean.

Christopher Lloyd back in this. Thomas F. Wilson, who played Biff, is back in it as well. Great as always. Very funny. He's fantastic. Yeah, yeah. He's really, really funny in this. Here, let me also show you.

So this notion of this version of the ride also validated by this concept art. We'll post this on the Twitter. This is from studiotour.com. Look at this crazy thing. You got flying machines. You got the DeLorean going down a waterfall. You do have a dinosaur, which ended up in the final ride, and a pterodactyl. And this is another thing you can Google.

They built this pterodactyl. And this is another thing you can Google. They built this pterodactyl. You can buy a pterodactyl used in an unused version of the Back to the Future. Wow. And you've also got, look up here. Here's another bizarre thing. It's like a Blade Runner kind of cityscape? Yes. What is that?

You've got some future building that looks like my favorite building in the world, the Westin Bonaventure downtown. This amazing pod building with the world, the Westin Bonaventure downtown. This amazing pod building with rotating restaurants at the top. It looks exactly like that. And there's a bunch of weird blimps flying around. Yes, I read about the blimps. Oh, I read about the blimps.

Yes. There was some sort of preoccupation with the blimps in an original version of this ride. Uh-huh. And no one knows why, or do you know why? I don't know. Don't know why. They're flying don't know why they're just people they're flying things i think do they note it and that is a go-to trope i feel like for like a world similar to ours but not quite most versions of gotham city in batman

comics or movies or tv shows there's a bunch of fucking blimps floating around. Even, like I said, Blade Runner, not quite blimps, but there's like some weird floating shit about the city. Also in the music video for the Spice Girls, Spice Up Your Life, there's a bunch of big blimps flying around. So the Spice Girls also into futuristic aerial technology. Sky Captain in the World of Tomorrow, a much-maligned movie that I saw in theaters and enjoyed. Indiana Jones 3, there's a blimp?

But that's a historical blimp. Oh, yeah. It's a blimp of the... I guess it's not really a blimp, then. It's a Zeppelin. A Zeppelin, yeah. But let me point out one more thing about this concept art, and I hope on Twitter you can go to our Twitter as you're listening to this to see what we're talking about.

But note one thing about this concept art. Doesn't Doc look bizarre? He looks like the Joker. He looks like Jack Nicholson Joker to me. He looks like Beetlejuice. He looks like Beetlejuice. I feel like there's a similar. He's got his arms widespread and evil glint in his eye.

Which there's likely Beetlejuice in that brochure you were showing us earlier. Which we can also take some pictures of and post on the Twitter. My tattered old brochure pics. So this one is not as validated as what I found out about the Wright Brothers and Da Vinci and all that, but according to Defunct

Land, a great video series about old theme park rides, this guy claims, and I couldn't find a second source, but this guy claims that this ride was supposed to have Doc Brown's evil twin brother yes yes i saw that too and that was very i would have loved that that's another thing where like they're just making shit up about these this universe because you know that would have been christopher lloyd just in a different wig oh boy that would have had to been like black jumpsuit black wig i wig. That's crazy black hair. He'd look like Tim Burton. He would look like his character in Roger Rabbit.

Oh, yeah. Or maybe no hair. Maybe that's the opposite. Yeah, maybe that's right. Maybe you have no hair. You are not curious. Right. You don't read.

You're not into Jules Verne. Oh, he's a Luddite. He's somehow a genius Luddite. He doesn't talk like this. Who is upset that his brother is so pro-technology. Right, that would have to be the case. Because he thinks it's sinful. So also, Doc Brown's evil twin brother is religious.

Yes, yes, a man of faith. He is just a man of faith. He's about the Lord. And he thinks Doc Brown is playing God. Yeah, and he wouldn't be wrong. I think really to develop a villain, he would have to have some interesting points to make. And that would be fair to say.

I think we go to Zemeckis with this idea, baby. I think this is how we get it back. Okay, so the Institute of Future Technology is up and running. Doc Brown is renowned all over the world, but he didn't count on one thing, his evil twin brother showing up. Presumably like be a horse and buggy yeah getting to the institute of future technology messing up the whole thing i think he's probably locked his evil brother away in some prison in time somewhere and his brother's gotten out so now he has a real bone to pick with his brother yeah because he

locked him away like you know the like the into the days of the plague or something. Put him in some weird dungeon and hoping that maybe he'd catch a little bubonic. Or like a famous prison. What's the most famous prison? Alcatraz. That's the worst prison in all of time. Well, but I think you'd have to go back to whatever the- The Count of Monte Cristo one on the island? I hate to say it, but you're probably going back to slave times.

I think slaves probably had the worst prisons. Maybe. If you consider those prisons, I think maybe he convinces a slave owner that his brother is supposed to be on a chain. So you're saying he sells his evil brother to slavery? Doc sells his evil brother to a slave owner. Here is a dumb question. Is the Bastille a prison or a palace that you store in the Bastille? I feel very dumb. If it was not in a theme park,

we don't know what irrelevant history does. I think they left that out of Impressions de France. A lot of history ignored in World Showcase. I think we can make this now. Doc Brown,

one day from retirement, about to hand off the Institute of Future Technology to his young protege, Donald Glover. All right. Very popular, right? Very hot right now. Big reboot guy right now.

And then suddenly evil Doc Brown shows up, hidden away like Rochester's first wife in Jane Eyre. That's right. You didn't expect me to drop a literature reference. There wasn't a ride about Jane Eyre, was there? There's no Jane Eyre ride anywhere. No. Maybe in Effeldling. Effeldling, get on that Jane Eyre ride.

Straight from Jason's imagination. There's no Wuthering Heights. The great novels are not represented in the theaters. The spooky's no Wuthering Heights The great novels are not represented in the theme parks The spooky house from Wuthering Heights Does not show up at Halloween Horror Nights That's a good idea though Doc Brown's opposite would have to Well I guess his last name is Brown

And he can't help that But what color is the opposite of Brown If you're looking at a color wheel He could change his name though He doesn't want to be associated with the Brown family. Yeah, because it's not black and white, but brown and... Yellow. Brown and Doc Yellow.

We have to look at a color wheel to figure this out. Whatever the opposite of brown is. I would pitch Doc Gray. Uh-huh. It's not a perfect opposite, but Dr. Gray is interesting, right? And what's the opposite of being a doctor? Uh, alderman? Professor?

Maybe I'd just be Professor Brown. Yeah, Professor's too good, though. Or Pastor. Pastor Gray? Oh, Pastor. Doc Brown's evil twin brother, Pastor Gray, shows up, hopes that the power of Christ will... Imagine, uh, uh, like, what if he showed up when he first sent Marty back in time, tried to

combat the power of the lightning bolt with the power of Christ? And you're looking at, like, interdimensional Christ rays coming out of a cross trying to push back that lightning bolt. So Christianity is now real in this, for sure. Like, the Bible is real and the powers he has are

real, I guess. I i guess i mean that's i think that's fine i bet that could tie together to the end maybe it's a hail mary doc brown and donald glover travel back in time bring christ himself to present day he says to convince pastor gray the wrongs of his ways there's a reference in the first movie i think he says where you can go back to when Christ was born, or does he say the crucifixion? Oh yeah, because he goes to Christmas. He goes to... No, no, he doesn't yet. Nobody's going to the crucifixion.

We could go to the crucifixion, Marty! But maybe that's... Although, would Pastor Gray use Doc's... Would he be able to use Doc's technology? Maybe he wishes to Christ that, can I get my brother sent back to your crucifixion and get him crucified?

In lieu of Barabbas? Barabbas gets away. My favorite biblical character, Barabbas. Do you choose this man, Jesus of Nazareth, or do you choose Dr. Emmett Brown? Dr. Brown. The more we talk about this,

the more there should have been 10 Back to the Future movies where they go everywhere. Well, we're not. Maybe we don't object to there being more movies. We object to them not being done by us. That's fair. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's good.

I did just see today the headline, and I read no further. Mel Gibson set up to make Passion of Christ sequel with original, I think with Caviezel back as Christ, which is wild. Again, a wild day. So maybe this happens in that movie. Maybe they're already on top of this.

Jesus traveling to the future. Pastor Gray. Pastor Gray. Finally, the back to the passion verse. This is the line. Finally, the back to the passion verse. This is the line. All right.

Well, that's a pretty bold expansion of the universe. But later, let's get back to this one that was actually. Let's get back to some more dry facts. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's get back into God's light where we have strayed so far from it. So the OmniMax screens are. I do have some dry facts that i wrote down well this actually is in fact this is actually uh douglas trumbull uh i was watching an interview with him talking about the ride and he was upset that the ride was not in 40 it was not 48 frames

per second and he was upset that the screen was not brighter which is up until apparently a call like a month or two ago the screen remained at this dull level of bright it was not brighter, which is up until apparently like a month or two ago, the screen remained at this dull level of bright. It was not that bright. Simpsons didn't look great. Simpsons didn't look great. This thing was not bright enough. Apparently, we have not been to Universal Studios out here yet, but they have brightened

the screens finally after 20 long years. But this was a problem that Douglas identified back then. He knew that this thing was not bright enough because when you're projecting this much up on these giant screens, you need it to be very bright. That's what the mark of a good IMAX screen is, that it's bright and giant. Well, and these screen rides, you've got to replace the screen so often.

You've got to replace the screens. I feel like in the past past a lot of the parks have let the screens go too long with uh they get a hole they get literal holes i think the future was running with like creases towards oh yeah yeah which is the kind of thing where you can't be too sad when a ride is retired because you know the new ride will be improved technologically sure you know it's a weird thing about this ride too the the speakers are all behind the screen a giant wall of speakers blasting at you so there's like so the screen is porous there's little holes all over the screen that you can't really see uh um and in addition to that like biff and doc are talking to you on the inside your delorean is it just like stacks does it

look like that like a when you see like an you see an 80s heavy metal band with just stacks of speakers on top? Yeah, it's like a cartoon fantasy of a concert that a demonic rock devil would have. Right. I bet it's something like that. These screens, if you've not been on either of these rides, if that's somehow possible, yeah, they are giants. Yeah, they are giant. It's seven stories. It is like such a, you still, when you go on the Simpsons ride, you hear a gasp when you actually get up to the top of the fake ladder

that you're climbing on that Simpsons roller coaster. And yeah, it's like pretty jaw-dropping. And really fun how they do it in the, how they like transition you seamlessly using smoke and fog machines. And then suddenly you're just, you're in it. You're in this ride. And probably, I'm sure as a kid, you're like're like i can't believe how i had no idea this thing was gonna be this huge uh i i have some uh dry facts that i think are interesting the drier the better

uh uh so uh both both of these uh anaheim or not anaheim uh california and florida both were like delayed both like were were delayed in opening like the building of both of these took so long florida cost 40 million dollars which is the same amount as the budget for back to the future 2 california cost 60 million dollars because they had so many issues with the foundation now there's a couple things going with both of these buildings one when you're building in orlando you are building on swampland and you have to deal with that in california uh this building is for one built into the side of a mountain it's a very odd shaped building it's built like on top of this universal city mountain and the other thing is when you build huge buildings,

California, there are rollers underneath in the event of an earthquake to allow for the building to shift a little. So like any skyscrapers or any buildings of a certain height, there's rollers underneath. So the building can like move a few feet without like the foundation just getting totally fucked. Sure.

So yeah, the California one costs 60 million, even more than the Florida one. They messed up the foundation just getting totally fucked sure so uh yeah the california one cost 60 million even more than the florida one they messed up the foundation they started building it and the foundation was off i think that's right yeah that's really crazy i think we've gotten a lot of emails too and thanks for talking about this because people have been asking when are you guys going to talk more about the foundations of these rides i think it's interesting potential for earthquake damage yeah uh it is kind of crazy that both of these rides. I think it's interesting. Potential for earthquake damage. Yeah. It is kind of crazy that both of these theme parks thankfully

survived the pretty intact in the California earthquake of 1994. Pretty crazy that there wasn't, you know, like how horrifying if the castle cracked apart or whatever. Sure. Well, this is a whole side note, but I mean, there's videos of people I don't know why this is a thing that note but i mean there's videos of people i don't know why this is

a thing that happens i guess but people have like what does the park look like after the apocalypse what does this look like after that and like video yeah they make cgi sort of like what does it look like when like no one lives on earth any like what it done the land is taken over back by mother nature oh no need i remind, Biff is our president. This is not something we should be letting our minds wander to. Yeah, yeah, because this is very possible. It'll be very... But like, yeah, if...

And there are videos of Disney ripoff parks that... That nature has taken back. That nature has taken back. China or whatever. Yeah, and there's a couple different ones. We should post some of these. There's one in Japan. There's one in China.

Yeah, and they have like Main Street that's very familiar and like a castle at the end, and it's just like plants and grass that's as tall as your head. And then there's like one backpack douchebag who snuck in. He's like, oh my God, I can't believe I'm here. I'm here, finally here. This is so crazy. I can't believe it. And. I'm here, finally here. This is so crazy. I can't believe it.

And then you're like, just turn it on mute and then you watch the creepiest image. Put your own soundtrack too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You just cry. There's a great photographer too who publishes these massive photo books of abandoned places.

And there are enough abandoned theme parks that he has a book of just abandoned amusement parks and stuff i think he usually gets permission because he's got a pretty that's a good idea we should probably do that that's probably a good episode now that i'm thinking about abandoned parks well yeah someone someone maybe halloween maybe that's the spooky episode yes when we hit the spooky the the there was one that was pretty much it was not doing well there was i believe it eventually had it was a six flags i think when it was occurred but there was one that got hit by katrina yeah and it was just left to rot uh yes in that one there's many videos of that and it's it's very it's terrifying

world was built apparently like that was a spot looked at as a spot oh yeah the world could have been wiped out in Katrina. Jesus. Jesus Christ. Yeah, I mean, I don't think the local governments handled it well either, supposedly. Someone either emailed or tweeted us about like, yeah, you guys should check that out because it's a fascinating story about that park and how it was already kind of mismanaged and then it was just pretty much just submerged in water. Left for dead.

Yeah. kind of mismanaged and then it was just pretty much just submerged in water yeah can i also say that this uh this brochure that i keep referring to in the earthquake section i was struck by the headline florida's most devastating ride that's a little grim that's that earthquake thing always hit a little too close to home i'll tell you i believe yeah kid in that earthquake yeah yeah you survived you did survive 1994 my own 1994 the ride uh um okay what what have we not covered in the in the in the dry let's do a little bit more of the ride itself so like the video like you first part you go through the future it's uh hildale in the future and there's like some fun big neon signs um and i noticed that there's a lot of their idea the future, and there's some fun big neon signs.

And I noticed that there's a lot of their idea of the future is that there are translucent tubes connecting buildings. That's a big feature of them. Give me some tube bridges, baby. I mean, I love that. I love that. There's another crazy thing in dry fact world. Okay, so you're shooting on these fisheye cameras where you have a view uh all directions around you where do you put lights it is impossible to light this ride because it would be in frame and sure you could today digitally erase the lights but they didn't

have they were worried they literally couldn't find an optical printer that would allow them to do effects so that so all the lights had to be hidden which is why when you're in that zone in the tube zone there's lights in those tubes there's lights in the building there's lights on biff's car so so all of the light in this ride is on camera right and it's also true in the ice section like all the lights are behind the ice and then uh and in the and in the lava the section as well uh like the lava is being like the lava is real liquid that's a bizarre thing that is being cycled right a big tank and it's being blasted with like orange light underneath so when you when you look at this ride through you are seeing all of the lights it is all is all on camera because they couldn't hide

them um yeah uh i I remember the commercial for Universal Studios, I think always the dinosaur was the last thing, maybe in a lot of those spots. That was the big, when the dinosaur tries to eat the Doraemon. One of the big things presented is a reason to come to Universal Florida. Which, funny enough, then

when Jurassic Park ride was built, also the big thing is the feature is that there's a T-Rex trying to eat you. But a very different T-Rex. That started to become weird. I think the ride started feeling a little weird after Jurassic Park was open because it was so clearly not a correct T-Rex.

The T-Rex is definitely silly in Back to the Future, the ride, but I like it. He's kind of lovable. He's a dummy. He's like a dog. He's a goofier T-rex uh but he's not uh he's a wacky t-rex yeah he's not uh not the vicious killer that the t-rex is on jurassic the dignified yeah no yeah you're right he was that one is a dignified killer yeah yeah yeah um a lot of fun though universal responsible for one of the most canny marketing moves uh

partnering with nickelodeon all of those live nickelodeon shows that were shot in florida would have the end card shot on location at universal studios florida with the big neon logo and sometimes footage of like rides and stuff and i'm just thinking back to that now i was like oh that's probably why i was always like we're doing a day at universal right if we're? If we're going to Florida. It was just ubiquitous. It was just ingrained in my mind. Propaganda got to me.

And seeing at the end of every single Nickelodeon show that it was filmed live in Universal Studios Florida. And one of the first times I was ever, wow, this seems so dumb in retrospect, but I remember you used to be able to take a walking tour of the Nickelodeon production facilities in Orlando. And at one point, they had a giant room with mood lighting, and behind glass was the orange couch from SNCC, the SNCC programming block. And as a kid, I was just like, holy cow, there's the couch.

As a kid, you dreamed of napping on that couch. There was no couch you wanted to nap on more. Being a lazy dog, rubbing your back on the famous snick couch. But I did not want to participate in the live show at the end where you could get slimed. I was like, I don't want to get slimed. These are my nice clothes. I don't. What will happen?

What is the slime made of? I am a scared, nice little boy uh and they they're like parents sit on these bleachers kids sit in these bleachers and i was like what is this like where is the non-splash zone i uh a big a big thing is that i never went to the nickelodeon studios as a child and i am still upset about it i i wish i regret it i mean it's not my fault because we we didn't go we just didn't go so it's not my fault it's my parents fault um even though i was the biggest nickelodeon fan um legitimately mournful as you yeah about this and i understand why no nickelodeon studios no alien encounter

and this explains so much yeah yeah these holes things i went next time at the therapist i think we all just had a breakthrough uh uh you know also the one cool thing about this ride being open at universal studios is you ended up with a doc brown walk around character and he would factor into untotally unrelated things such as the opening of the I'm sorry the burial of the Nick time capsule in 1992 which is an event I know all about large to me as a child

every time I've been there I went to I like I had to go like have a moment like even you know like when I went you know five years ago I had to go stare at the spot like where the where the time capsule was buried. Although the time capsule has moved. It moved to a Nickelodeon-themed hotel elsewhere in Orlando.

When is that getting open? 2020? I think it was a 50-year time capsule, so I think we're talking 2042. And I remember doing the math as a kid and thinking, will I be alive? How old will I be? 112? I like that you were going to pay your respects like it was a World War II memorial. To me, again, we don't know real history.

But I do know where the cover of Disney Adventures with Macaulay Culkin. There's an original Game Boy, I think, in there. Yeah, yeah. That sounds right. Some Gak. Some Nickelodeon Gak I think my elementary school buried our own time capsule on school property inspired by

this and I'm just remembering now that my elementary school was demolished and they rebuilt it right next to it so that time capsule might be under some rubble or under the current building I wonder what happened I think when you're back home, you should get the old shovel out

and see if you can take that and then sell what's ever in there for a little cash. I just show up, right? I don't need to tell them I'm coming. They'll know why a 32-year-old man is on his elementary school property with a shovel. Dark of night is what I'm saying. Don't do it. Don't let them know you're coming. Well, you know I'm out.

I'm out pretty early. That's a good point. I'll probably be asleep. That's a good point. I'll probably be asleep. That's a good point. When night falls. That sounds like the start of a magical coming of age story, though. That's good. That's true.

A man returns to the childhood, the school he left behind. It's a Book of Henry style heartwarming tale. Anyway, yeah, Doc Brown, I think, helped. There were a lot of Doc Browns running around at Universal and always didn't look like Christopher Lloyd, didn't really act like Christopher Lloyd. Yeah, yeah, Doc Brown, I think, helped. There were a lot of Doc Browns running around at Universal and always didn't look like Christopher Lloyd, didn't really act like Christopher Lloyd. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was weird. Even they shut down the ride and Christopher Lloyd, the real Christopher Lloyd,

went and said goodbye next to a very broad, great Scott, like a horrible Doc Brown impersonator. The thing, I don't know, maybe this is another episode, but the thing I would like to talk about, the last thing I want to talk about is the restaurant in front of Back to the Future in Hollywood. Doc Brown's chicken.

Fried chicken, right? Fried chicken, sorry. Fried chicken, yeah. Yes. Supposedly, I never ate there, supposedly so delicious and widely liked that chicken, they kept the recipe for Krusty Fried Chicken. It has now changed into Cletus's. The Simpsons character Cletus has a chicken shack, and it's the same recipe.

Apparently, chicken was served in that spot for years before this. It was a different restaurant. It was a Mrs. Knott's? It was sort of a Mrs. Knott's style chicken restaurant. Whatever, I should really go back. Again, you know, it's a universal thing. You go to a theme park in the middle of the summer. Lunchtime comes around.

I want three pieces of dark meat, two sides and a biscuit. Hot crackling oils. Hot crackling oil. Hot crackling oils. Delicious chicken gravy. The ride itself, Doc, for some reason, opening up a chicken restaurant

doesn't make any sense. But then what was funny or made me laugh, I guess, maybe it was just me, was that the Simpsons ride then was open and then this lasted for a few years. So independent of any other Back to the Future thing, just Doc Brown had a chicken

restaurant and if you came and this was the first time, boy were you confused why this is even here if you didn't know that that used to be a Back to the Future ride. Also, like 10, 20 feet away from that was the shark from Jaws, was the uh shark from jaws was the hanging uh the dead shark from jaws hanging upside down which is not but at least you knew he died the jaws died in the movie and you go oh yeah sure that's what happened to jaws after the movie you walk over to this and you're like when did he open a chicken restaurant independent but elsewhere at city walk you have uh have Bubba Gump's.

Right, which, again, makes sense when you're talking about the movies. This one, I'm saying, like, Doc doesn't go, I'm opening up a chicken restaurant. I see. It's in the movie. That's what I'm trying to say, yes. Nothing canonically makes sense. Right.

He doesn't have, like, he loves chicken or something. There's not a scene where he's like, we've got to make a stop. And then they go to, like, KFC or something. I think I's not a scene where he's like, we got to make a stop. And then they go to like KFC or something. I think I can justify this. I believe that at some point with all these inventions, he probably would have gotten around to or maybe someone did it for him, filing at leasts or whatever and invested it in a business because, you know, the restaurant business, while margins are small, people do like fried chicken. Keep going. You're 10% of the way through this explanation, I think. He always had a passion for the restaurant.

I mean, he just wanted to see what it was like. He had conquered so many inventions, but he had never opened a small business restaurant. Well, that concise explanation would have really helped me when I was in line to buy some fried chicken at his restaurant. I think we're in a timeline where he, as we've established, we think that maybe Doc steals inventions from other people. Yeah, he's a bad man. I think he went back and stole the Colonel's recipe. Yes, that's great. I think we're in a time when Doc Brown has replaced the Colonel in terms of pop culture.

Because they're similar. Shock of white hair. They dress all in white. That's true. So, yeah, there is no Colonel. When you're inside Universal Studios, there's no Colonel. Right. Doc Brown has replaced him and erased him from history.

Wow. I'm going to go one step further. Okay, go ahead. In our new movie with Doc Brown's evil brother. Yeah, yeah. Doc Brown's protege played by Don McGlover. Yep. Doc Brown, when he retires, is finally devoting his time to his passion project, Doc Brown's

fried chicken, which is next to the establishment. So that makes sense. So your pitch for the movie is that he's done with time travel and he's just all about chicken now. Well, I think that's when Pastor Gray comes back, is at the retirement ceremony or party for Doc Brown, Pastor Gray blows up the chicken restaurant and that's his big entrance. That's his big Thanos-like entrance. Well, they blows up the chicken restaurant and that's his big entrance.

That's his big Thanos-like entrance. Well, they blew up the chicken van in Hilldale last night. But he would have had to do it with an old-fashioned bomb. No electronics involved in that bomb. No, we're talking a big, circular black sphere

with a long fuse coming out of it. If this is in the same universal world as Snidely Whiplash, perhaps you could have borrowed it from Snidely Whiplash. Sure, yeah. Or maybe one of the dastardly villains from A Million Ways to Die in the West. I'll be honest, this is sounding less fun to me now by the end. The movie?

Yeah, yeah. All these properties interacting with a DeLorean at the center. It's a Ready Player One. We're together pitching Ready Player One 2. Okay, fine. Here, let me throw some in so I like it again. The Lockhards, the comic strip, Love Is,

and then Andy Cap is also involved. Oh, great. Oh, finally. So as long as those characters are all in, I'm back. Well, all of them together could fit into an eight-person DeLorean. That's true, yeah. So that's how you get them all. You collect them through whatever time and places

they're all in. I feel like we may have missed massive swaths of what the actual ride is. Yeah, I think we talked about the ride a lot less than everything else. Yeah, uh i don't know if you're listening to this you probably you know if you want to just watch the ride you could do that but if you want to hear a lot of tangents uh mixed with dry facts that's what you come to

podcast the ride for and i think we delivered oh yeah for sure so that being said well do we do do we review this as a uh is it a is it a keep it as is, burn it to the ground for insurance money, even though it is gone? If it were still there, is there anything that we would want to change or improve? Yeah, we can do that. I'm going to go first. If it were 2018 and this ride was open right now, what would I want to do to it? Would it be keep it perfectly as is? Would I want to plus it up what would I want to do to it? Would it be keep it perfectly as is? Would I want to plus it up or would I want to demolish it?

I'm going to say demolish it. I'm going to say knock it down. Here's why. Because the ride is a classic. It's great. I love it. But I think it's too outdated, and I think then the ride system sort of holds it back

because if they were going to truly plus it up to the point of making it a new Back to the Future they'd have to make a big CGI Back to the Future video that's because they're not going to do it the old way they're not going to make practical model stuff so it's so much

a pain in the ass there's no way they would do it even in my Blue Sky I won't even consider it in a blue sky fantasy sorry don't tremble it would be yeah it would be cgi and that would be a lot less fun and sort of not in the spirit of the original movies i feel so i just i think this is the first time i've ever said this about any ride i think demolish it again if have to do something, and then build a totally new Back to the Future ride. And also, if you look on message boards, I don't think that's out of the question. I think that's possible still, especially when we're talking about maybe a third park in Universal in Florida.

This is something that's still obviously culturally very relevant, and there's somebody put some sort of i don't know if this was just sort of fan art but somebody put some some idea for a back to the future coaster a newer one and they're like a delorean sort of car and then you know you load into it and two and there would be show scenes so like i feel like i feel like demolish the thing and then build a new back to the future ride using technology using Harry Potter level technology top of the line boy that would be show scenes going back to the going to the future because because to actually go to that fake future and I mean I guess you could maybe push it to like 2030 or something so it's not such a weird thing that we're going three

years in the past going backwards yes uh that wouldn't really make sense but yeah yeah retcon it so it's like a 30 year everything's 30 years difference i tell you what one of my thoughts is if uh i want to see some of those characters that i love so much yes that like in the way that you in the simpsons ride you're like narrowly avoiding some of your favorite simpsons characters so i want to to see Fujitsu-san, Marley's mean boss in the future. I want to see Marlene McFly on a shopping excursion. Goldie Wilson. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

What's Mayor... And his son who does hover conversions. He's around. And most of all, I want to see Needles. We all want to see Needles. When you said I want to see characters, Needles is the first name that popped into my head. Flea's character who convinces Marty to do some confusing deal via fax in the future. This bizarre, God, why is that scene so stuck in my head?

It's so strange. You don't really know what he's talking about. The Jits will never find out. What? What is the plan? You also don't find out what Marty's talking about the jits will never find out what what is the plan you also don't find out what marty jr's plan is with griff he's pulling some scheme and they never tell you what that is yeah drug deal right what why are the mcflies getting into such nefarious shit right they're like yeah it seems like they're all like shitty they all get shitty

later but like to be able to go into a dark ride into that living room. And watch the little flies have dinner. Oh my, if it looked like that last scene in Carousel of Progress. Oh, it's a lot like that. Yeah. Bizarro future. Bizarro future. Gramps is around.

You almost knock over George McFly in his upside down back correcting machine. I mean, that's what else do you want? So, Scott, you're saying plus it up, demolish it and then build something new, too. I suppose I would say that. And I and I but I have I have one other pitch for this, for what I what I want to see happen in a new iteration of the ride. You know, so just to tie it all up, you up, in the end, you bump Biff. You take him back to the present day. And what happens there?

He's sort of taken away by some suited guards at the Institute of Future Technology. I don't think he's thoroughly punished enough for his deeds, his evil deeds through time. And what's more, I don't think we're punishing the right Biff.

Because yeah, he's just going on a joyride or whatever. But he's some punk kid, you know, just crashing into stuff. You know, I think you want to bring justice to the ultimate, most villainous Biff, which is the Biff who is in control of the alternate 1985 future. The Biff who's the mayor, the Biff who's taken over the town with horrible casinos, who's all powerful and does all this awful stuff. So I say in the end, we go deep into that alternate future and we track down that Biff, the bloated Biff with the shitty out of date hair. He looks awful. He's a horrible despotic leader. And maybe we find out a little bit more about him, like, you know, he that he rose to power, you know, by on this wave of angry populism in Hill Valley. He started accusing Mayor Goldie Wilson of not being born in America. You know, you find out that his one of his gang

members, like the Billy Zane guy, was meeting with the Russian government. And that's how he was elected mayor. And he didn't even want to be mayor. He just wanted, like, a contract to build a Biff Tannen's Pleasure Palace in Moscow. You know, just kind of flesh out Biff being in charge and what that means. He wants to kick Syrians out of Hill Valley, even though it was the Libyans who were up to the plutonium hijinks. So I want to find that Biff. Maybe find him when he's, like, I don't know, give or take 71 years old, something like that i want to find that biff maybe find him when he's like i don't know give or take 71 years old something like that let's find that biff let's pin him up against the wall of his own casino and let's just ram that delorean into him over and over again let him drop to the ground run over his head a couple of times this biff i just i don't know something about that 71 year

old horrible biff who rules over this terrible future where everyone's angry at each other. I want to see that biff come to justice. I think this is a good idea. Obviously, it's very unbelievable, but that's what's fun about fantasy. But I like the idea that it's a nice, fun family adventure. And then the last part of it is just the grossest, most gruesome thing, full of you murdering a man. Yeah, just squishing his bloated man. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just squishing his bloated head. Again, it's fantasy.

No one would want to see that happen. It's really, it's blue sky here. Yeah, it's blue sky. You never want to see that happen to anyone in our real world. Now, if a character, like you were describing, existed, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. We would all pay top dollar to see it. Imagine if a guy who looked like

Biff Tannen, if you had to watch his shitty bloated face on TV every day and listen to every blather out of his mouth. I don't know. I want to crush that skull and throw the remains into the Mr. Fusion and ride off into the sunset. I think that's great, too. So it's a little grim, but that's my idea of where to take the new back to the future of the ride.

Unfortunately, our real world is much more bleak, and most evil goes unpunished. On that note, I would say my big thing is, you know, I said her at the top. I think this ride is one of the ones I would call a classic. So were it still around, I'm going to go the the middle route of just keep it as is but if if again it was still around i say fresh coat of paint on everything yeah they should have brightened that that screen brighten the projectors years ago probably replace the projectors replace the screen and and just like uh gussy it up in the same way that Disney kind of gussied up some of the, some of the fantasy land rides,

uh, for the recent, uh, what was it? 60th anniversary. Uh, uh, just,

just made, made everything look a little more pretty. Cause I, I think this, uh, yeah, I think there's still a huge fandom for this attraction as we've seen, as we've talked about ourselves and yeah.

Yeah. And there's also not that much back to the future stuff, like we said. So it was always nice. You know, I ride was still open when I worked there, when I was a tour guide at universal and here in the, here in that score and here in the sweet swell of Huey Lewis news,

it was right outside of our break room. So I'd sit out on the patio. If a tour went well, then I'd get to come back, chill out, have some baked lays, and listen to a Huey Lewis loop over and over again. Some positive feelings. Did you eat at Doc Brown's? Did you get an employee discount at Doc Brown's?

Yeah, I would specifically make the Doc Brown's a trip. Not free or anything. Yeah, but I'd take the time. What was your order at Doc Browns a trip. Not free or anything. Yeah, but I'd take the time. What was your order at Doc Browns? I think we're just talking basic leg and thigh. I think I preferred the dark and real good fries. It kind of got shittier as it went on, a little more sodium heavy.

You could tell they were letting that recipe lapse. But as they do with rides, things deteriorate. But you know what? That's what I... We'll have to go check out Cletus and see how he's doing. How he's doing under new ownership.

Well, you guys, we've really done it today. We've gone the distance again. We thought we were going to try to keep it short. We didn't. say, We thought we were going to try to keep it, we were trying to keep it short. We didn't. No. We went very long.

But this is Back to the Future and it deserves it, so. Yeah. You know, split it. We didn't want to, well, we had the choice really of splitting it in two as the filmmakers did

in making parts two and three and we chose to make it one mega episode. Yeah. But i don't know but we'll revisit it in editing and split it yeah um but scott you were about to say they've survived podcast the ride that's correct yeah but you know what i think you covered it all right yeah i'll still take the fun hey in this case you truly survived Podcast the Ride. You survived an epic adventure through time. I feel like I expended 21 kilowatts of energy. Sticking the landing on the way out.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We always, yeah, we never, we don't sputter to a stop. We hit the landing hard. We need to bump this landing. Let's bump it. You survived Podcast the Ride. Please follow us on Twitter and on Instagram and anything else that you guys would want any listeners to do.

And email us at podcasttheride at gmail.com and review on iTunes. Tell five friends. Yeah, tell friends. Turn this into a pyramid scheme of some kind. There's this show where it's these three guys and they talk for two hours and 45 minutes. And some of that content is about the rides

that the episode is named after. Do you know what an Omnitheater is? Do you like listening to three men who at best could be described as late bloomers talk for a while? Then you will enjoy this show. Thank you for listening. Yeah, hey, and the future is what you make of it.