Iron Eagle Quadrilogy Review Minisode (with Johnny Potoky & James Bruno)

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[00:00:32] The news for them now, Lewis Gossett Jr., Jason Gibrick, Iron Eagle, rated PG-13. Starts Friday at a theater near you. Alrighty, alrighty, so we were long overdue to talk about the Iron Eagle films, that's right. Now, you've heard a gazillion podcasts talk about these. You're gonna hear inserts from earlier chats as well as on-release chats.

[00:01:01] Me talking with fellow colleagues Johnny Potoky and James Bruno on the Iron Eagle films. James is a huge fan because, you know, this was the role that defined Lewis Gossett Jr. for him. Rest in peace. Still miss you every day, buddy. And Potoky loves making fun of all kinds of cheesy B-movies as well as finding the ones that are actually good despite being critically derided. And I'm in the middle. I was like, yeah, I wanted to check out every one of these.

[00:01:29] I saw the third one first because it was by James Bond director John Glenn. Had some reasonable action. Basically, they were, if you didn't see Top Gun, you saw this knockoff, which also was for the Rambo crowd. You know, just all the jingoism, you know, of the 80s. So part one, it's interesting. It feels almost like a cartoon show, but it's live action.

[00:01:55] You got a guy way too young to be, you know, in the Navy as a pilot going around. They have access to basically everything. It just makes you wonder, you know, was there a script or did they improvise at all? Could they had at least been like G.I. Joe or even Amanda? We're just like, okay, here's our or maybe the 18 just make this be a fictional base. So we didn't have to follow any real life thing. But unfortunately, you know, it is one of those.

[00:02:25] The story never made a lick of sense. They never had much realism. And I can generally forgive something as long as it exists in some kind of world and sets up rules. And unfortunately, you weren't ever going to get anything in this because the stories were schlocky. And everyone pretty much only saw it because they wanted to see some aerial action and explosions. So yeah, movie one really rough sit. David Suchett was an over the top villain.

[00:02:52] Yeah, Perot himself, not as well used as he was in other blockbusters like Executive Decision. Tim Tomlerson was also in there. And then you had Iron Eagle 2 and same kind of lazy rehash, except even more teenage and young boys way too young to join the Navy or any war setting charges. And you're like, what is it they actually do? Sometimes they fly. Sometimes they don't fly much at all. And they're just getting the machine gun fights.

[00:03:19] And again, it's surprising to me that these weren't produced by just Canadian cheapies by Sydney J. Fury, but no Canon Films connection whatsoever. But yeah, so movie free is owned by Warner Brothers and comes out and gets a surprisingly decent reviews by Siskel and Ebert. That was the first one I saw. And I think that one worked because it was just gorillas and commandos. So in movie two, though, going backtracking to that, that's where the main lead died.

[00:03:48] Jason Jedrick is a reasonable actor. I've seen you've seen him in other stuff like, you know, Bosch and backdraft and what have you. And then they came back with movie four and we're like, let's undo that. He didn't actually, he never actually died. It doesn't make sense, even though we saw him blow up, but then let's have a different actor play him who's not that great. And let's make it be even more cheap and forgettable and filmed on a private base by a Canadian crew.

[00:04:15] And so, yeah, it's, I wish they had just done Iron Eagle, just the third one, but you can still watch it. It is objectively a fun, you know, commando cartel takedown movie with actual flying around. But yeah, movie one is kind of a so bad. It's good movie. Movie two was pretty lame. And then, yeah, movie four fucking sucked. So enjoy the rest of this. And it is just so funny how Lewis Gossett Jr.

[00:04:44] This is after his award win for, you know, an officer of a gentleman and he's still in military mode, but he carries these movies. But you're just like, where did the plot go? So, yeah, don't watch these at all unless you're a bad movie completist. That is all I'm going to leave it at. And thank you for listening. Next, reloaded. Re-edited.

[00:05:11] Sometimes we get so deep into conversation that we have separate segments worthy of their own place in the sun. Here is a reshuffled mini episode. If you walked up to me and said, here's two DVD box sets of movies, which would you rather have? And one was Karate Kid and the other was Iron Eagle. I would take the Iron Eagle movies.

[00:05:41] Yeah, I don't even think Iron Eagle is good, but it's very entertaining. It's entertaining. It's pop-corn. In that top gun rip off Rambo kind of way. Yeah, because somehow a kid's dad gets killed flying a plane and somehow they let the kid go after the guys. Yeah, it's a mystery science theater Elvira type movie where you want to see only in the 80s could you make, you know, and here's the thing. But you know what, I will say the 80s had a lot of movies where they tried to empower the teenager. Like look at the last Starfighter. Last Starfighter. That's Tron in space. Yeah.

[00:06:11] But here's the other thing too. Cool movie. Just like you brought up Invasion USA in another chat and everything. Many people also got to look at it on this side. Many movies could work if you just rewrote it. A little bit. Yeah. Like Iron Eagle would work totally if it was a season of G.I. Joe, you just would be it would be a different format. So you'd be able to suspend belief.

[00:06:34] You know, it's the same deal with like when you see some other kind of movie or show and you're just like, yeah, that would have been better as like a Criminal Minds episode or maybe that could have been it. Or short form or TV series would be better than a movie. Bingo. Yeah.

[00:06:49] This pretentious Christopher Nolan movie, which has a cool like two thirds and then it has like a annoying plot twist might have been better as a Twilight Zone season as opposed to, you know, a two hour mind fuck that didn't hold up on repeat meetings. You know, I don't. Right. And the other thing, too, though, I do like how you bring up a lot of these movies. And this is why we do this food for thought. There's plenty of movies you don't have to necessarily love, but you should just see once just to see. Oh, agreed.

[00:07:19] Production design and concept. There's plenty of movies. They don't work at all, but you like the idea. So yeah, popcorn. Yeah, and it's B movies in general. There's a lot of B movies will take the chance on plots that might not sell because but because it's unique mainstream theater always has to follow certain. Formulas that make money, you know, a list stuff. And it's I understand that, you know, get me wrong. But, you know, another thing I what I do like is you have a generation of people watching movies from the 80s and 90s.

[00:07:48] And while yes, some of them had toxic masculinity and all that in it, I'm not going to deny that it was a product of the times. A lot of them like the Chuck Norris movies and stuff. You're talking about a time period when we still are going and we still had the Cold War going on to see what I mean. I was I remember I remember when I was when I was like a first grader. We had we still had drills in my school about like if there's a nuclear like if they attack. Yeah, it was only like for a year or two and then they stopped doing a bunker.

[00:08:15] Yeah, just yeah, doomsday scenario stuff before because we they they wholeheartedly still wholeheartedly thought the Soviet Union and America was going to go to nuclear war years before. So I realized the CIA is technically it was instigator, you know, and Soviet Union and that's that's a tricky one is CIA generally in most cases. But when it's the Soviet Union, I just mean the guy running.

[00:08:36] I was gonna say look at the guy that's running it now, you know, and he's from that decade, you know, but you know terrorists had only started hijacking planes in the late 70s. Yeah, you know, you had like you had like DB Cooper, but you didn't have organized terrorist groups that were like, hey, you're assholes because you did this and you have a different religion. So we don't like you. We're gonna connect this plane and we're gonna kill everybody on it because in the name of God, which is not correct. I'm ready for tonight.

[00:09:07] Because I was thinking of some of the movies that Lou Gossett Jr. Because basically, you know, again, just everything, you know, Iron Eagle, Officer and a Gentleman, Roots, Stargate S-D1 and just powerhouse powerhouse. And whenever I see him in a newer movie, like he was on the recent Watchmen show, and he's just one of those, he could have been, you know, dynamite, gotten all these bigger opportunities.

[00:09:34] But I mean, he's never really felt phoned in for me, you know, he did some cool movies for Showtime. There's this crime thriller called Zoom In where he's trying to help his, a black community kind of figure out what gangbangers going around doing scentless murders. Yeah. He's in the original Raisin in the Sun. Oh yeah, when he tells that speech. Oh God. Totally. That speech is just amazing, you know.

[00:10:03] And that's him holding his, that's him holding his own against Poitier. Yeah, but to go against Poitier, I mean, that's not an easy. That's like, that's like, that's like, you know, being, you know, that's like being a guy going against, that's like, that's like Jerry Quarry going against Muhammad Ali, you know? A thousand percent. You know, when it comes to accuracy. Cause you know, you don't expect it from him, you know? Totally.

[00:10:28] That scene where he tells that, when he tells that speech and it's like, you're like, whoa, head turns. Like, who is this young guy going toe to toe with Sidney Poitier? You know? And not just anyone can try it and do it. No. He knocks it out of the park in that one. And there was a movie he did later called The Landlord, which was how, which was kind of like Hal Ashby's first movie. Yes.

[00:10:57] And Hal Ashby, you know how Hal Ashby was with the way he directed, you get all these offbeat scripts and stuff like that. He plays a Black Panther member with an identity crisis or something like that. And it's like, it's just a, it's just a tasteless. It's like, it's not taste. I don't want to say tasteless. It was kind of that, like that off, like that dark humor. Like that, like Harold and Maude. Hal Ashby did Harold and Maude. So it's kind of like the precursor to Harold and Maude. Right.

[00:11:27] That's the way I'm looking at it, you know? And yeah, I, I have seen that one. And that was interesting in that it was just very experimental. Bo Bridges is in it. Yeah. He's, his guest spots include multiple guest spots on the Mod Squad. Petra Solly, Good Times. And everyone else has definitely seen him.

[00:11:52] And, you know, episodes of Madam Secretary, The Dead Zone. And he's done also just so many just great miniseries and TV movies. And when, even when he's in a B thriller, like the Punisher with Dolph Lundgren or the principal, it's just like, which I love. Oh, those are that, that movie. I love the principal. Oh yeah. So much. That's a great movie to watch. And he's done some dramas and cop movies too. Like, yeah.

[00:12:22] I'm sure you might have seen this obscure HBO TV movie back in the day called The Guardian. Where he plays this guy who has to help out. Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. And just such a creepy home invasion movie. Yeah. Martin Sheehan, do you remember him? Verbally like raped. Yeah. He has to stop him from getting killed. Do you remember the show he did with Jonathan Silverman called The Inspectors? Yes. Where they played postal inspectors. So underrated.

[00:12:51] And there's like, if I remember correctly, there was a, like they had to fight a mail bomber or something like that. I forgot what the plot was, but I watched it. I really got into it and I really hoped that it had been a series, you know. I was just glad that it was funny. But he was in a TV show that I remember called The Powers of Matthew Starr. Oh yes. We talked about that. I'm sorry. Yeah. And, uh, yeah, Matthew Starr.

[00:13:17] I mean, it was interesting how it was kind of a greatest American hero kind of cash in. It was like one of his first times. Yeah. And he just won the Oscar for, yeah, he's just won the Oscar for, uh, Officer Gentlemen, like a year, year and a half before that. Right? So we're just like, wait, what's it? He's in it? Wait. He, he was in a movie.

[00:13:48] He, he's always, he's always been like that one constant in a movie that I, you know, like if you watch, if it has Lewis Gossett Jr. in it, like, like enemy mind. Totally. Which is one of the most underrated science fiction movies of all time. Absolutely. Because. Where he goes from, you know, where the, him and Dennis Quaid go from enemies to, you know, he becomes, you know, Dennis Quaid has to take care of him because he's pregnant. And.

[00:14:18] And such a tough role to do, you know, when. Yeah. I got to respect him even more because this was in a period where even though we like to think we got progressive throughout the nineties yet. And the eighties, you know, it's so hard to play, you know, a creature and makeup. And like you say, yeah, just an unusual sci-fi spectrum. He reproduces, you know, asexually. It's like, yeah. And. He's a pregnant man alien. And.

[00:14:45] It was in a time when people would frown on whatever kind of makeup roles he would do, or you'd be typecast and so cool how he had enough star power. He could do basically whatever he wanted. And you forget it's him. Yeah. Yeah. You can tell. I forget after a while. I was like, yeah, that is freaking. I was Lewis Gossett Jr. You know, even he has his limits on what he wants. Yeah.

[00:15:11] I'm sure he had a decent enough agent or is like, okay, so your hot shit for a minute. Yeah. I, he's pretty much in the roster of actors, kind of like Marlee Matlin and all these other people is like one time Oscar winner, you know, and now just kind of doing TV the rest of your life because it's like. Yeah, every we've done it. We've had to be a military guy and all a bunch of other dumb blockbusters, but now let's let's get you back to some considerate stuff based on plays or.

[00:15:40] Well, I mean, I loved him. It was an iron eagle. Yeah, he owned it. Owned it. The thing I couldn't. The thing I can stand was they brought Jason, which will call it back. Oh, yeah. And third. Wait, he died in the second one. What's he doing in the third one? I thought it was the fourth one, but I could be wrong. Yeah. We find out Doug didn't die. You know, it's like, wait, wait, what?

[00:16:08] The third one was wild because basically now Gossett is carrying the movie. Now he's got a whole new group of recruits to go from fun movies. If you can get past the jingoistic, you know, you can get past the crap that you that you were, you know, that that's being thrown at you, you know, I have a Reagan crowd. Oh, well, let's see. Iron Eagle is eighty five, eighty six. Something.

[00:16:36] Yeah, because Queen comes out with one vision in that movie. And then they have Iron Eagle two and eighty eight. Right. Hmm. Iron Eagle three is aces. Yep. Ninety two. And they change. I think that that's where it changed hands. Like those were like in the Sony movies. And that was a new line cinema one. Yeah. But John Glenn directed. I didn't know that. Yeah. And it was supposed to. And the originals were done by Sidney J. Fury. Yeah.

[00:17:06] And. Well, what's weird is this one is like it played in theaters briefly, and I constantly saw it advertised on many home video trailers like it just kind of it did better there. And I even recall some people gave it kind of the highest reviews out of it. It's just most critics were kind of already done with it because they just couldn't not look at it as a Top Gun Rambo knockoff. No, but I thought it was a really fun movie to watch.

[00:17:32] But what gets me is like they do like it's like an alternate the fourth one. Yeah. Just like he never died. And you're like, what? No. Yeah. And they strain it. So as a missile lock shooting down, Doug ejects safely. Okay. So so what we find out is that he's not dead in the fourth one. And I'm kind of like, well, why the hell is he not dead? You know? Yeah.

[00:18:01] And when you basically lie to your audience and just say, yeah, guess what you thought wrong, despite what you saw. It's it's just not good screenwriting no matter the genre. Yeah. And yeah, he looks confused just as much in that one as he doesn't just free where he's I mean, just free. You know what he's going for, but he's not sure if it's making any difference, you know, with what is on screen. But yeah, with that one, he's like, hey, time to hang it up. I don't have to do anything except just look intense.

[00:18:32] The thing that cracks you up Iron Eagle three is that Sonny Chiva is in that movie too. Sonny Chiva. Yeah. All people. Sonny Chiva, man. I can't say anything bad about him. He was a great, great actor. Mm hmm. Street fighter son of, you know, street fighter son of sister of street fighter, you know, so. Totally. But yeah, that's what that's what happened. You know, I was like, look at it.

[00:19:02] I was like, but yeah, it was Iron Eagle was kind of like, you know, the, the, the, the, the, it wasn't Rambo. Like you said, it wasn't Rambo. It wasn't, uh, you know. That's just it. When you have elements of other movies that are coming out, people just want to just pretty much destroy your movie. Yeah. Yeah. But the great thing about this, it was fighter pilots and nobody, you know, it wasn't Top gun. Top gun to me was just, you know, you know, Tom Cruise smiling.

[00:19:31] A bisexual romance. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, with, with Kelly McGillis and his, you know, you know, the, the whole, the whole, the whole, the whole theory that, you know, uh, was it Quentin Tarantino said is the, it's the ultimate gay movie. Mm hmm. You know? So, uh, what happens is that like you watch Iron Eagle, we're like, okay, it's a kid. His dad gets captured in the middle East by some like, you know, banana Republic dictator. Yeah.

[00:20:00] Him and his father, him and his father's buddy. And Perrette of all people is playing the bad guy. Yeah. Yeah. And you're like, you're like Perot. Wait, wait, the guy who played, the guy who played Quirquille Perot is playing the movie is in the movie. Yeah. Oh God. This guy, he looks like he could be anything, but he is not Middle Eastern. Yeah. He could. He looks like, he looks like he could be from, no, no, no, no. Tim Thomerson, Jack Death himself from transfers is also in there. Also Robbie wrist is in that.

[00:20:31] Oh, Robbie wrist. And, um, I keep thinking Lamar from Revenge of the Nerds is in that Michael B Scott. I mean, might as well. Might as well put him in, you know, but the funny thing is like, you know, I love the part where he's flying the plane and he puts the plane on the back of the pickup truck. You know, it's like, you know, it's just, oh, come on, man. You know?

[00:20:58] But, um, yeah, you know, he's had a great career, Lewis Gossett Jr. You know, it's nothing to sneeze at. You know, he's won an Oscar. Compared to most. He won an Emmy. You know, he won an Emmy. Even when he does some of these faith movies, it's hardly anything where you're just like, Oh boy. You know, it's just. Yeah. Like I'm here and there and then would follow it up with a pretty compelling mystery or an award winning drama. And it's like, yeah, that's, that's fine.

[00:21:24] It's okay to be the Emmy guy in addition to the war guy. So he's just one of the many character actors who basically embraced any format before it became cool to be a movie star. Who's now doing TV, you know? Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's the good thing. You know, he, he, he's gone from the big screen to the small screen to the big screen, to the small screen. He can, he, he dips his, he dips his, he has both toes in the water, so to speak. Yes.

[00:21:55] You know, if Robert Forster can do it, do an exploitation movies and then award winning, you know, TV shows and you know, everything is possible. And I'm just glad that he's one of the many. Yeah. We'll return after these messages. All right, folks, how back here we got a 90 minute weekly shack stop. It's growing all over the world.

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