SPEAKER_01 0:00

Had a wonderful experience with Steven Spielberg. And we were at Universal looking at the Back of the Future ride. He said to me, Doug, you know, I used to think you were completely out of your mind. And now that I look at this, I think you were right.

Kelly 0:26

Hello and welcome to the Lowdown on the Plus Up, a podcast where we look at everyone's favorite theme park attractions, lands, textures, and novelties. We talk in, over, about, and through our week's topic, and then, with literally no concern for practicality, safety, or economic viability, we come up with ways to make them better. My name is Kelly McCubbin, columnist for the theme park website Boardwalk Times, and with me as always is Peter Overstreet, University Professor of Animation and Film History in Northern California. Oh, Pete. Yeah.

Pete 1:01

What are we talking about today? Well, today we decided to take a break from the land of the mouse, and we said, you know what? This is not just a podcast about Disneyland or Disney World or Disney anything. It's all theme parks and all amusements. So we decided to actually take our first step away from the Mouse House. Yep. And just go up the freeway a little bit and go to their chief rival, Universal Studios Hollywood. And for me, I always say Universal Studios because that's how I grew up. Like there's only one theme park. Yeah. But we're going to talk about one particular ride that left its mark. Even to this day, there are people who are lamenting its loss.

Kelly 1:42

I would be one of them. I lament it quite a bit. And uh so I, you know, we're gonna go just up the road and maybe spend a little time in Florida, but not too much. But the important thing is we're gonna go back to the future. Back in time.

Pete 1:56

Yep, that's it. We're gonna do the back to the future ride. So uh yeah, this is I remember writing this multiple times and really loving it. Um to this day, a lot of people actually still consider it to be one of their best attractions that they've ever done. I'd love to start off by asking you a question. Oh god.

Kelly 2:18

No, I think you're gonna have uh opinions, and I and I suspect I'm always opinions, yeah. I'm gonna agree with them. Um what do you think of when let's talk about the domestic universal parks, the the Florida and California? Yeah. Uh what do you think of as the seminal attractions for Universal? I mean, you know, for Disney, there the it's it's pretty obvious. I mean, you got like Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, you know, maybe Peter Pan's Flight, stuff like Dumbo, uh stuff like that. It's pretty locked in. With Universal, what what are their primary attractions? What's their legacy attractions?

Pete 2:58

Well, um are we talking ones that still exist or defunct? Can we include that?

Kelly 3:02

Yeah, let's please include defunct. Okay. Because I actually my list includes mostly defunct.

Pete 3:08

Okay, yeah. Most of most of mine also include a lot of defunct ones. Um because I kind of grew up between Northern California and Southern California, and I wound up at Universal Studios a lot.

SPEAKER_07 3:19

Yeah.

Pete 3:20

Firstly, it was cheaper for my grandparents to take me to Universal Studios. And second of all, we didn't have to get a hotel. They lived in the valley, so for us, it was like a 45-minute drive on the 405 and jogged over to the Hollywood. I mean, that was yeah, yeah. I mean, and it was easy enough. Or we could just take surface roads and we were there. But my grandfather loved it because my grandfather was a big movie fan. And he's one of the people that really instilled in me that love for cinema and for movies, and also for cinematography, because my grandfather was a very avid filmmaker. Yeah. And I'm I'm saying that as if he's like a big Hollywood producer, but he wasn't. He was just a guy who liked cameras and he wasn't very good at it, but boy, did he film a lot.

SPEAKER_07 4:02

Yeah.

Pete 4:03

Um I think that's cool. It is, and one of the things, and the reason I'm mentioning that is one of the things he filmed was uh one of our first trips to Universal together. Oh wow, myself and my grandmother and my parents, and uh, and of course Grandpa Garnet, and taking us to Universal Studios, and it is kind of a greatest hits of what Universal was for a kid in the 80s. And for me, whenever I think of Universal Studios, and I am gonna be mixing uh more recent stuff along with this memory, right? But I always think Jaws, yes, the tram ride, obviously, because that's that's where it all goes. Uh Jurassic Park, the Jurassic Park Flume ride, I do think of that as as one of their seminal pieces. Yeah. I don't think it's one of their greatest, but it is one of their seminal pieces.

Kelly 4:54

Okay, yeah.

Pete 4:55

Um Backdraft. The Backdraft experience.

Kelly 4:59

Interesting. Yeah.

Pete 5:00

Uh Conan the Barbarian Sword and Sorcery Spectacular. Yeah. And Back to the Future.

Kelly 5:07

Yeah, I'm I'm I'm pretty close to that. I I tend to sort of tease Jurassic Park a little bit forward, and so I'm kind of like, maybe that's that's more modern, universal to me, but I get it. I get it. It's it right now you can't think of that park without Jurassic Park in it. You also can't think of it without Harry Potter in it, but that's so much newer that I wouldn't put it on the list. But I agree with you. I think uh Jaws, obviously in California being part of the tram ride, and in Florida being it's a whole other deal. Oh yeah. But that Kong or confrontation being huge, I mean that was a thing that that you really remembered. Oh yeah. And I think back to the future. And it's it's interesting because there's no singular Jaws ride left. No, he does Bruce still appears in the tram ride. Right. Uh, but that that really classic Florida attraction's gone. Yeah. Kong has been changed a lot. Oh, yeah. Um so much so that I think we could kind of argue that it's not the same attraction anymore.

Pete 6:16

I think we should actually in the future do an episode on this because I'm such a fan of that particular attraction for many reasons. Yeah.

Kelly 6:23

Did did did you see that great video of Bob Gurr with the uh Kong melting into his floor?

SPEAKER_05 6:29

Yes.

Kelly 6:32

Because Bob Gurr designed uh the original Kong for Universal. Yeah. Uh it's been since been replaced. Or was that one burned in a fire?

Pete 6:42

That's the one that actually burned in the fire, much to everybody's chagrin, myself included. It was actually very brokenhearted that day because nothing was cooler than riding through, yeah, watching New York get destroyed, seeing all the fire, the smoke, the helicopter shooting. You guys can all look it up on YouTube. It's a great experience. But by the time you got to Kong, you're on the suspension bridge and he's shaking it and it's moving the tram back and forth like a fishtail. So cool. And he's spewing out banana breath at you. It's so great. And so you walk out of it going, oh yeah, that does smell like banana. And I have a terrible sense of smell. Yeah. That's one of my worst senses. And I could totally just like, whoa, banana. I can't imagine what somebody like you know, my partner Tanya would be like because she has a very good sense of smell. She'd be like, oh God, banana. But unfortunately, he's gone. He was completely gutted by the fire.

Kelly 7:34

Yeah, and a big piece of him, I think, was it a hand? It was a hand was sent back to Bob Gurr and has been slowly melting into Gurr's floor. And he doesn't seem to be able to do anything about it. But it's really funny to see a video of him going, Yeah, here's Kong melting into my house. I'm gonna add one more attraction to that list, by the way. Um E.T. Okay. I think I think that is a pretty classic universal attraction. Yeah. Um on both coasts. Obviously, it's gone here, but it still exists in Florida. Is it in Japan as well? I think so. Uh-huh. And Japan also still has one of the um elaborate Jaws rides. Yeah. Like the one they did in Florida, which that is an entire other episode. I've actually read an entire book just about that attraction in Florida.

Pete 8:26

Oh man.

Kelly 8:27

And it's it's it's a fascinating story. Um and and you know, it's uh in in many ways, of all of these, I think Jaws is the most significant. I think Jaws is the the a after the tram ride itself, Jaws is the thing that that park was built on.

Pete 8:43

It well, yeah.

Kelly 8:44

Both of those parts.

Pete 8:45

And it does become kind of a cornerstone because I can only think of like one or two other things that Universal was doing in that era when it was put in. Yeah. Uh because let's go all the way back to Universal's founding by the Lemleys. Yeah. In which because it was the 20s and Universal, it was this giant family operation.

SPEAKER_07 9:07

Yeah.

Pete 9:08

If you were if you knew the Lemleys or you were related to Lemleys, you were probably living at Universal Studios. Carla Lemmley, yeah, she lived to be like 101 or something. Wow. She's the first person to ever speak a line in a horror movie uh in sound. She's the she's the young woman uh at the very beginning of Dracula who's reading a guidebook. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 9:28

You know, among the rugged passes of the Borgo Pass are found Cremlin Castles of a bygone age.

Pete 9:34

And that's it. You know, she's also ballerina and Phantom of the Opera. Cool. But uh she had she was the sweetest human being in the world.

SPEAKER_07 9:43

Yeah.

Pete 9:43

Uh got to meet her twice. She was so sweet. But she remembers w uh the days in which people would be put on buses that had the tops sawn off of them to make open-air buses. And this is during the silent era, so people could talk and gab all they wanted to, yeah, because it wouldn't affect production at all. Yeah. Um, and people would come and you were charged a quarter and you would get to see films being made. And that became uh one of the things that actually kept the studio alive for a while was this notion that you could be there. And there was also this mystique of if I'm here, maybe if I'm on this bus or if I take a break, yeah, I might be discovered and I can be the next movie star. Yeah. And there isn't, you know, there are probably some extras, and there are probably some stunt people and some stand-ins that had has have had this happen. Right. But as far as I can tell, uh I have yet to find any record of anybody saying, uh, there was this famous film star who got off a bus on a tour at Universal Studios and became a mega hit. You know, that that it was a nice fantasy. But that fantasy was something that Universal banked on heavily a long time.

Kelly 10:56

And they seemed very surprised in a way that that it paid off in the way that it did. And and they you know uh once it did start paying off, they really started trying to develop that tour more and more. Absolutely. Um and we see uh there's there's a great book. I think you have my copy of it right now. Yes, I like it. Which is No, no, no, you're welcome. Good. Uh the Universal versus Disney by Sam Genaway, and it's a terrific book. And what it does, he's written several books about Disney Parks already, so there wasn't really uh he doesn't go back through the background of that, but he does a really nice job of tracing the background of Universal Hollywood. And it's really interesting because Universal seems to be taken by surprise that people are this interested in taking this stupid tram like halfway through the lot and getting out and walking around looking at some costumes.

SPEAKER_07 11:49

Yeah.

Kelly 11:50

But then they start building it and building it, and it becomes a real success for them.

Pete 11:55

And they start building off on this notion of, okay, let's give people this fantasy. Everybody wants to be a star. Well, let's give them the opportunity to be a star without actually making them a star. Right. So they start having people be like, hey, you want to be in a movie, you know, and we'll show you what it's like. Yeah. And they would do these stunt shows and and be able to go on set every once in a while and actually do meet celebrities. Yeah. One of the more famous examples of that is the Munster's House. Right. You know, it'll pull up and oh my gosh, there's Fred Gwynn and there's Al Lewis and there's 1313 Mockingbird Lane. 1313 Mockingbird Lane. And um, my dad and mom uh went on a tour one time and they got to meet Grandpa Munster in full makeup, which is so cool. It's like, oh, and that's the one celebrity like uh out of all the the the kooky I have met John Aston. Yep. I uh was friends with um oh come on, uh Felix Silla, who played Cousin It in the original Adams Family TV show. Uh I I met Ted Cassidy through Felix. Nice. And uh I briefly encountered Fred Gwynn at a book signing, one of his children's books that he did.

SPEAKER_07 13:10

Yeah.

Pete 13:10

And I didn't even know it was him. Wow. Like had no clue. You know, it was like, oh, tall guy like me. That was it. And it was and later on, somebody goes, how's Fred Gwynn? I went, damn it. You know, no. But uh but yeah, I didn't get to meet him. But my parents said you would go into 1330 and they had a side area that they would take tourists through. They would be filming on the other side of these walls, and it was like this laboratory that you would go, and it was grandpa's lab, and they had a really bad wax model of uh Herman sitting on a slab, and you could get pictures, and um and then you'd leave and you'd just continue on your tram tour.

Kelly 13:47

I met Al Lewis briefly at his restaurant in New York. Uh me and some friends went into uh New York, I believe, to see the residents. And we got appropriate. Yeah, we got there a little early and we were just looking for a place to eat, and we walked right by grandpa's and you know, these three scruffy, hippie looking dudes from western Massachusetts walked in and he was there. He was he was How you doing? Welcome in here. Sit yourselves down, you know. He and he uh brought us in, he uh found a table, he came over and went bon appetite and walked away. Wow, and that was my entire encounter with Grandpa Munster.

Pete 14:33

Oh grandpa, one of my favorites.

Kelly 14:34

Yeah, one of my favorites. But let's get let's get back to uh Universal.

Pete 14:39

Okay, Jaws for just a second, because uh Jaws sets the standard, I think, for reason. It's because they specifically make an enhancement to the park to cash in on a movie tie-in. Yeah. Because this it's not a film set. Yeah. Even though it would later be used as Cabot Cove. Yeah. Uh, but you had the orca floating in the waters of the Jaws. I mean, Steven Spielberg loved to actually take breaks and sit on the orca and write until finally the park destroyed it behind his back. Yeah. But the mechanical jaws is not the mechanical jaws done by Bob Maddie. No. Thank God. Yeah. Uh you could for a time get a glimpse of glimpse of it at times on the backlog tour, what was left of the original Bruce. Right. But it was rusting and it was covered with oak leaves, and you're just like, ugh. Well, and the original Bruce didn't work very well to start with. Yeah, so it's like more power to you. Yeah. Um but the Jaws attraction, I think, is the first time where you really had an animatronic effect as an enhancement to the tram tour. Yeah. That is specifically as a theme park amusement movie to buy in. I had universal.

Kelly 15:55

Yeah, I think and I I I'm not sure when the uh Ten Commandments Parting of the Waters thing came in. You know, there was that that rotating cave that is still there doing something, uh, which for a while was like uh I think tied into like the Iger sanction or something, and then and then became the uh six million dollar man legend of Bigfoot Cave.

Pete 16:19

But that's how I started remembering that.

Kelly 16:22

But I think the Jaws thing was the first time that a contemporary film was included as as part of the tour, at least reasonably contemporary.

Pete 16:32

It's funny we're we're talking about Jaws because what's interesting about Jaws and the um all the different effects with like the collapsing bridge and the spinning tunnel, yeah, is it takes us to a location in the park where those were all at the bottom of a hill. The the back lot is actually at the bottom of the hill where the entrance to the theme park is at the top. Yes. And you'd have to work your way uphill to get back. So they would take like a main line straight down the hill, yeah, show you all the back lot movie sets. And I distinctly remember one year going, and they took us on the set of this one of the largest street setups that they'd had in a long time. And they were filming Streets of Fire.

Kelly 17:13

It's a rock and roll fantasy.

Pete 17:15

Oh my god. And I know I did not get to see Willem Dafoe running around, but it was or Rick Moranis, but it was still a great, it was still kind of cool going, I want to see this movie. It sounds amazing. I thought it was gonna be like a post-apocalyptic, you know, kind of escape from New York kind of thing. No, it's nothing like that.

Kelly 17:31

Yeah, no, it's it's not. You know what's weird about that? Um, they made a sequel not that many years ago.

Pete 17:39

Streets on Ice? I don't know what I don't even remember what it was called. But I was like, who was asking for that? That's so bizarre. That's so specific and bizarre. Yeah. So they would work your way through. Once you were done through the spinning tunnel, you would then be accosted by a Cylon centurion. Now this was until the 80s. This was not until the eighties, but I'm I'm mentioning this for a reason. And I'm not gonna do my Cylon impersonation because it sucks. Uh but you would be By your command. Yes, that's about as much as we get. Um but you know, humans, you would be, you know, escorted aboard to see the Imperious leader, you know, and the uh tram guide, you know, asks for candy. Uh little animal house humor there. Um gives them some sass, and then you're blasted by a CO2 cannon, and then you are driven into a giant Cylon ship. I did this, by the way. I loved it. Yeah. It was at the time Battlestar Galactica was so cool. Yeah. Um, so this was Battle for Galactica, is what it was originally called. And then you were held prisoner by all the Cylons, these animatronic Cylons and the Imperious Leader, and in comes Apollo or Starbuck, or somebody. Somebody comes in wearing a Galactica uniform and starts shooting real military grade lasers everywhere.

Kelly 19:00

Like, like there was actual danger. I wrote a thing about this recently. Yeah. There was actual danger. They had to be really careful that the human actor that came into the scene uh was in exactly the right place because he could be hurt. Yeah.

Pete 19:16

You know, because these laser, the lasers that they were using were not just light, like it was like light that could burn you. Yeah. So, because they would later use this in the Conan Sword and uh sorcery spectacular with the dragon that would ignite uh flash pots on the stage with his laser beam eyes for real. Like it wasn't perfectly timed. It just the pot sat there until the the dragon blew up the explosive. You were like, what? So, and then you know, Apollo saves the day, you drive off, and yeah, you have survived, you have, you know, you've survived the battle for galactica. Yeah, I almost said you have survived the realm of Tron. Yeah. But you the same type of voice, right? It's probably the same guy. Yeah, probably. But uh once you survived the battle for galactica, then you were pretty that was pretty much like the big finale. Yeah. Um in the 80s. That was like the big finale. The reason why I mentioned that is because that specific piece of real estate would be would be um changed dramatically in the late 80s. Okay. Because that's where Back to the Future was built.

Kelly 20:26

Interesting. So that So it it was it was where the Galactica warehouse building was.

Pete 20:30

Yes. So that that eventually all of that was torn down, and that's actually the lower that's the area where the Galactica was is merely the foundation. That's how big Back to the Future the ride actually is. It was the foundation where all the machines and the computers that ran that attraction resided, and then the giant OmniMax dome and the building to surround it and all the hydraulic, you know, eight-passenger DeLorean vehicles that were in the ride were housed, is above it.

Kelly 21:00

Now, have you heard, because you you brought up the foundation, have you heard the story about the foundation of the Back to the Future ride? The literal concrete foundation and the problem. No. Okay. Tell me. This is so good. Go. Um, and this ties into a couple of other legends about this attraction. But what happened was they were building them simultaneously in Florida and California. They intended for them to open at the same time. Okay. Uh Florida needed this attraction desperately because Universal had had a disastrous opening a couple of years before, and they weren't doing well. No. So they needed a big attraction. So they designed it. They hired up uh a special effects guy named Richard Edland, who is with ILM, um, Academy Award winner for you know a little. Films like Star Wars and dumb little things like that. Dark Crystal, you know, little things. Yeah. Just little things. He also, this is interesting. He did the original Star Trek series episode The Companion or the Metamorphosis. And he did the companion effect, which is like a shimmery light effect with Richard Edlund. That's wild. Anyway, he also did uh several episodes of Battlestar Galactica. Well the yes, he did. Um but they hired him in to start making the Back to the Future film while they were starting to build the structure. Someone in Hollywood was having trouble reading blueprints. Oh no. They poured the foundation in Hollywood the wrong size. So they start they get it all poured, and someone figures this out, and they realize we can't put this structure here.

unknown 23:01

Oh shh.

Kelly 23:02

So everything goes on hold.

Pete 23:05

Oh no.

Kelly 23:06

And this is partially the reason that uh that Floridas opens a couple of years early, is because they have to redo the foundation. And there is a story, and and this is questionable. Okay. There's there's two stories that lead to the same conclusion because Richard Edland does not do the film for Back to the Future. And the reasons given are this. Now he's Academy Award-winning filmmaker, Blake Special Effects guy. He's worked in this kind of he hasn't worked in theme park attractions, but very few people have at this point. Right. But one of the stories is that because of the foundation problem in Universal Studios Hollywood, everything gets put on hold and the the process sort of starts over. And they put it back out to bid. Now Edlund's been making the movie. He he hasn't actually shot anything yet, but he's been making demo reels, and they're going to this giant theater, like a domed theater in in Canada and projecting them. Wow. So there there is some footage. For some reason this is this is the story. For some reason the the uh whole thing gets put out to bid again. Edlund thinks he's got it. He and his company have it.

Pete 24:27

And now this is um what's that company's name? I have it right here. It is Boss Film Studio. That's right. Yeah.

Kelly 24:34

Okay, go ahead. And what happens is Douglas Trumbull of 2001 and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, his company sneaks in and underbids it. And so even though Edlund's been working on it and thought it was a done deal, suddenly they hand it over to Douglas Trumbull. Whoa. Now this is this is a crazy move. But as as you'll get from that Sam Getaway book, Universal was pretty crazy back then. Yeah. They they did some weird stuff, some some insane overspending. So it's not out of the realm of possibilities that this is true. The other story about why Richard Edlin doesn't end up making the Back to the Future film is that simply what he was doing didn't make any sense to the people that saw it. So so what they were seeing was that you know, people from Universal were going to this big domed theater in Canada where he's showing his test reels and they didn't like it.

SPEAKER_05 25:41

Yeah.

Kelly 25:42

And eventually they just dumped him in favor of Douglas Trumbull. I don't know which of these stories are true. Uh, it could be a combination of both. It could be that they used the Cement Foundation story to get rid of someone they weren't happy with. But ultimately, Academy Award winner Richard Edlund's company is kicked off the project. Oh man. And they end up with Douglas Trumbull, which is to my I I love ILM. I love what Richard Edlund's work, but Douglas Trumbull is much cooler.

Pete 26:18

Before we get into Douglas Trumbull, I want to, for those who have listened to the opening credits, Kelly always says that I'm a college professor, and one of the subjects that I teach is I teach uh animation and I also teach matte painting, which is uh akin to special effects. So with that class, I also teach the history of special effects. Yeah. So I'm gonna give the audience a moment to think about it. Don't Google this house. We will. I will come over there and smack you. No, I'm kidding. It'll be a m smack, not a smack. It'll yeah. Anyway. Um what is the first film to ever use computer generated imagery? The answer is not what you think it is. It's actually Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 film, Vertigo. Vertigo. Vertigo. Interesting. Vertigo uh was already kind of a troubled production. It was not easy. Um Hitchcock was having a lot of he wanted to really make an impact with an audience because it was one of his make it or break it kind of productions. So he hired designer, graphic designer Saul Bass to design the opening credit sequence. And Alfred wanted Bass to come up with a sequence that would pull people into the story and make them feel vertigo for real. And he said, we could spin the camera, we could do all these different things. And Saul is much more of a graphic designer, works a lot more in the realm of design and abstract. And he said, Well, what if we actually have like some sort of spiral? Yeah. Well, how do we get a perfect spiral set up? Because if I try to set up a camera that spirals, it's gonna get fouled up by all the cables. Yeah. Well, then he runs into he runs into these two brothers, John and James Whitney. Okay. And these two guys have been experimenting with different machines and motors. They're kind of, you know, they're just makers. They're they're they they've been working with a lot of army surplus materials. And they have found out that there's an analog computer system on World War II fighter planes. Okay. And specifically the planes that have belly guns or top guns. Okay. In which you need to be able to fire a machine gun in a 360-degree arc without any interruption. Because you can't just follow Oli 361 and then stop and turn all the way around because an enemy is not going to wait for you.

SPEAKER_07 28:50

Right.

Pete 28:51

So the army and their engineers had figured out a way to how to make an aluminum circle that works as a circuit and is thus able to complete the circuit so that way they could actually just rotate this mechanically. Uh-huh. So they can, you know, hit a controller and it will just keep going around in circles and circles and still have power to operate all of the targeting systems and everything attached to it.

Kelly 29:11

Okay.

Pete 29:12

And they take that and a few other bits and pieces. They take they buy one from a surplus yard. Yeah. Brand new. Army's like, we're not using it. The war's over.

SPEAKER_07 29:22

Yeah.

Pete 29:23

And so they bought it, got rid of the machine gun, sold it to some gun nut, and got rid of a few of the other things, but they kept the aluminum ring and the targeting systems. They attach an animation wheel to it and a pendulum. And thus, because of that, they're able to actually activate it and start generating a very specific style of spiral. And the spirals are called. I haven't written down here because I it's a French word.

SPEAKER_07 29:52

Yeah.

Pete 29:53

It's a Lisa Jou. Lisa Jou spiral. Which, if you think of a spiral, most people think of a circular spiral. Yeah. Lisa Ju is, and it's not a spirograph. Spirographs are circular.

SPEAKER_07 30:04

Yeah.

Pete 30:05

Lisa Jou are actually uh they're ovals. Okay. So that oblong shape. Right. And they were able to generate Lisa Jou uh spirals that were perfect. They would then take those spirals and then superimpose them on top of some actress's eye, who to this day we do not know who it is. It is not Kim Novak. Okay. Um and that became the projected spirals at the beginning of Vertigo. And those were all generated by an analog targeting computer. Interesting. Now they're not digital. Right. But it is the first computer, because they they just activated the targeting computer and say, go around in circles at this particular degree, at this particular angle, go.

SPEAKER_07 30:46

Yeah.

Pete 30:47

And the computer did the rest. Very simple mathematical computer computation, but there it is. And it's the first technically computer generated image. Huh. Interesting. Um The Whitneys would later go on to, you know, one of one of the brothers went off to do other engineering feats. Yeah. I think it was uh James, continued working and actually wound up meeting Douglas Trumbull. Okay. Okay. And Trumbull needed his assistance on figuring out how to do some of the optical effects for a new movie, little known movie that he was working on called 2001, a space odyssey, for the My God, it's full of stars sequence. Yeah. Where he's going through the Stargate. The Stargate, yeah. And uh that is when and now, even though most of that is, you know, pretty much analog and optical effects, yeah, some of the stuff that was used is still uh based a lot off the work of the Whitney brothers.

Kelly 31:46

That's so interesting. And before we move too much further in Douglas Trumbull's career, I want to take one step back because 2001 is really key. I mean, it's key for everything. Really, it's it's foundational. Um, but the reason that Douglas Trumbull is working on 2001 a space odyssey has to do with that singular event that we keep coming back to in this show over and over again, which is the not a world's fair from 1964 and 1965. And uh if of course, like so many things of modern Disneyland come out of this uh World's Fair, and uh many of which we've talked about in previous episodes. But also one of Douglas Trumbull's first jobs is working on a film that is for the sponsored by uh KLM Royal Dutch Airlines and presented in Cinerama 360 in a giant domed theater, a film called To the Moon and Beyond. Now, this is projected sort of sort of above your heads, and it is a kind of a history history of the universe sort of thing. And Trumbull's job was pretty much to draw like spirals, to draw like universal spirals that that would project well on this kind of screen. You know, Cinerama it that's a that's a catch-all phrase for a lot of different kinds of widescreen. So Cinerama 360 just meant real big and and curved over your head. Um this film, by the way, was narrated by one, Mr. Rod Serling. Oh, wow. Yeah. And so uh Kubrick went to that fair, saw that film, got in touch with the company that had made it to talk to them about some ideas that he had for his upcoming film, 2001, a space odyssey. Uh he several people from the company that made that film, including Trumbull, did some early designs for 2001. And then Kubrick being Kubrick, he just disappeared. Which he uh the Kubrick as a director is the master of ghosting people. Yes, he is. He you he you think he that you're his best friend until he's done with you and you never hear from him again. Uh this is what happened. But Douglas Trumbull was not to be dissuaded. Trumbull found his number. Oh. Called him up and asked him for a job, basically. Wow. And Kubrick said, yeah, come over to England. You're you're the FX guy on 2001 of Space Odyssey. Wow. And uh there's some there's a whole bunch of contention, and this is the you could go down a long rabbit hole with this, a whole bunch of contention about how much of the effects were Kubrick's innovation and how much were Trumbull's and a few other people in the team. But it's generally accepted that Trumbull was the key player here.

Pete 34:51

One of the things that made 2001's effect so effective was the format in which it was filmed. Yeah. Um, my father tells me the story of him seeing it for the first time. Yeah. Um, and he saw it at the theater, it was originally intended for right off the bat, which was the Cinerama Dome at 6360.

SPEAKER_07 35:10

Yeah.

Pete 35:11

And it's I have been to this theater. I've seen and I have seen a revival of 2001 there. It because of my dad, I said, You're never gonna guess what I'm watching.

SPEAKER_07 35:20

Yeah.

Kelly 35:21

And the I saw 2001 the first week, and I saw Lawrence of Arabia the second.net, you'll find some of the most well-considered and insightful writing about the Walt Disney Company, Disney history, and the universe of theme parks available anywhere. Come join us at BoardwalkTimes.net. Right, because it's in it's interesting because Trumbull is is absolutely an innovator. In a lot of ways, he's he's more an inventor than a filmmaker. You know, he he's playing with frame rates, he is doing all sorts of experimental like effects. One of the interesting things that I think def sort of delineates Trumbull from a lot of the peers of his time, and and I and I love these guys. I love Edlund. I love John Dixtra, who um was really foundational on uh things like Battlestar Galactica and and a whole bunch of other really cool films. Uh but one of the things that makes Trumbull so interesting is he is willing to push the limits of what the special effect consists of.

SPEAKER_05 36:46

Yeah.

Kelly 36:47

And you see this in the Stargate sequence in in 2001, like you you pointed out. You see this in Pete Pete's doing a fluttery thing that's hypnotizing me with his hands.

Pete 36:58

I'm simulating the Stargate with my hands. It's ridiculous.

Kelly 37:02

Um he he is the first one, and it starts with 2001, but really hits its stride in close encounters to uh start dealing with moving the camera in sync with the effect. That that kind of motion capture thing. Motion capture is not the word. Um motion control. Motion control, thank you. And and what's really interesting, so he he starts using that a little, he starts figuring it out in 2001. It really hits stride in close encounters. All of those uh the alien ships, particularly the big mother ship towards the end, really benefit from that technology. Interestingly enough, John Dixtra, not long after that, working on Star Wars on the first Star Wars film, uh, actually takes that technology a step further by finding a way to computer control it. But it starts with Trumbull, and like that's one of his major innovations. He starts innovating with wider screens, he starts innovating with uh deeper color bit depth, he starts innovating with way, way higher frame rates, which is how we end up with uh his sh show scan process later in his career. And um and and I actually I got to see one of the show scan films. This is so interesting. He invented this process. It ended up playing in maybe two specially fitted theaters in the country. Uh, and and he only made a couple of short films with them, uh, partially because the film he was going to use as a feature to show off the process uh ended up having problems. It was brainstorm with we'll talk about that. Yeah, we'll talk about that later. But anyway, um Trumbull was super interested in pushing the boundaries of this stuff. And if that meant taking something and making that that other FX makers would make fairly straightforward and literal, and making it really surreal and almost psychedelic. And uh, you know, the great example is uh Star Trek the Motion Picture, which was a Trumble film.

SPEAKER_07 39:08

Oh, yeah.

Kelly 39:09

And you know, Mr. Spock walking into the V'ger entity.

Pete 39:13

Yeah.

Kelly 39:14

That's such a great example of it's just pure Trumble. He's like, I don't care about what you want literally. I'm go I'm going to make something that sort of assaults you sensorily.

Pete 39:24

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I mean that's and that's also apparent in Brain uh Brainstorm.

Kelly 39:29

Yeah, brainstorm, absolutely. It's the only thing he directed. Yeah. Well, except for the short show skin film.

Pete 39:37

Right. It was his first major botion picture. And it's also kind of a groundbreaker, even though there had been uh a couple of you know TV movies that had mentioned virtual reality based very much off of uh sci-fi short stories like Ray Bradbury's The Velt, yes, uh stuff like that. This movie really dealt with the realities of what would it be like if you could actually plug into somebody else's sensory input. Yeah. And put it on magnetic tape.

SPEAKER_07 40:06

Yeah.

Pete 40:06

If you have not seen this film, you really should.

SPEAKER_07 40:09

Yeah.

Pete 40:10

Because it is broken. Uh-huh. And the reason why it's broken is because one of its stars, Natalie Wood, tragically passed away while they were filming it. Right. Uh, and it kind of led to Trumbull retiring from making films for a very long time. For a very long time, because it was very, very tragic. Uh, she by all accounts was just an amazing human being. Yeah. But if you watch that film, you can definitely see the beginnings of what is going to be his ethos for Back to the Future. Because this film is literally kind of an extension of this is Cinerama.

SPEAKER_07 40:47

Yeah.

Pete 40:47

Uh, it's the story of Christopher Walken uh creates a machine that you can plug into somebody else's sensory input. So you can hear, you can taste, you can feel. And then it starts asking question, well, okay, now we've gone past the the G Wiz factor, what does this really mean? Right. There's a character that dies and they record it. Uh there's a person who uh records a sexual experience and then just puts the orgasm on a loop over and over and over again, and it causes irreparable damage to his health. Like these are the sort of things that we're going to face with virtual reality. And Evelyn was very cutting edge when it came to this. Trumble. Trumble, sorry. Yeah. But because you have this first person aspect ratio of you are experiencing what somebody else is whether riding a horse or they're going down a water slide or uh they're going on a roller coaster or a race car.

SPEAKER_07 41:42

Yeah.

Pete 41:42

Uh I would actually make an argument that that was pretty much like I think he probably walked in with a videotape and said, Look, I'm the guy for you for back to the future, because I can make it look like this. Yeah. You know, here you go. Because this is what you need. You basically need to be sitting in a car that's moving while this is up on the screen. Yeah. I would make an argument that brainstorm would definitely be an introduction to that.

Kelly 42:04

I think so too. And so I I want to humor me a little bit. Please. I want to I want to put a pin in Trumbull and get back to him because I think we've given a pretty good background. So I want to get into his actual work on the ride, but I want to like duh let's do a little background about what's going on, why why this is an interesting franchise. What was so successful about it? I mean, first off, Robert Zemekas and Bob Gale. They're terrific films. Two Bobs. Yeah, and and they are so you know, coming up to that point, they had made a couple of films. They weren't hugely successful, but they'd made some terrific films. They also did an episode of Kolchak.

Pete 42:45

Really?

Kelly 42:46

Together. Yeah. Which one was that? Uh they did uh Chopper. Oh. Which is a great one. Actually, great episode. It's a Zemeckis Bob Gale episode. Um I'm telling you, there's a Bigfoot.

Pete 43:00

Get back, Lud of Universal Studios. Kolchak, get out of my office. Give me some evidence.

Kelly 43:08

Sorry. Oh, I love those. Love them so much. Um, so they you know, they did a couple of films like they did I Wanna Hold Your Hand, which is a great film, yeah. Didn't do very well. Um Used Cars, great film, didn't do very well. Then they kind of crack the code with a film called Romancing the Stone.

SPEAKER_05 43:26

Oh, yeah.

Kelly 43:26

Uh, and they start to get somewhere. And that's how they get the green light to make Back to the Future, which is some uh a pet project they've been working on for a long time. What I'm noticing about the films of Zemeckis and and Gale, or Zemeckis on his own when he's not working with Bob Gale, is they feel in a really good way, really American. Like they feel like I, you know, I'm looking at all of this other, all of this other stuff and and I love it. But I'm looking at stuh, you know, stuff like Return of the Jedi, which is kind of Britishy, Krull, which is kind of Britishy. Oh, it's so British looking. Yeah. Things like um uh Reapan and uh There's a huge amount of cynicism. A huge amount of cynicism. Yeah. And what I'm seeing is Zemeckis and Gail are like, that's not what we're doing. Yeah. We're doing brash, funny, uh reasonably positive, like feels like it comes from the US.

Pete 44:38

And also there's a level of wish fulfillment, too. That's right. Yeah you know, that that not a lot of these franchises offer. You are very definitely watching a film when you're watching Return of the Jedi. It's like, this isn't you. Yeah. This is about a guy named Skywalker.

Kelly 44:52

Yeah, this is a fantasy that's uh abstracted from you.

Pete 44:55

Whereas Back to the Future makes it so plausible. Yeah, you know kids like Marty McFly. You know people, at least one of us has had at one time or another some eccentric person in our background who's like Dr. Emmett Brown. Absolutely. We've all known a Biff Tannan at one point.

Kelly 45:16

And the movies and and the the especially the first one, uh, but also to an extent the other two, they're not precious about anything. No. Like they are willing to break rules left and right. I mean, Doc Brown keeps telling you not to change the past and then keeps sending you to do it.

Pete 45:34

Right? Yeah. It's like, what are you doing?

Kelly 45:36

I mean, these are these are not like Doctor Who rules.

Pete 45:39

Uh very loose. They're more like guidelines rules.

Kelly 45:45

And it must have felt like, I mean, it did for me. It must have felt like just a breath of fresh air.

Pete 45:50

Oh, it totally was.

Kelly 45:52

We're just not being that serious right now. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Pete 45:54

You also had the fabulous talents of Mr. Christopher Lloyd.

Kelly 45:59

Absolutely genius.

Pete 46:00

Who was mainly a character actor in films like uh One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and uh The Adventures of Buckaroo Bonsai.

Kelly 46:11

He was gonna be in Star Trek III. I know he was gonna be in Star Trek III as a Klingon the year before.

Pete 46:16

It's like here he is, along with John Larroquette of all things. Yeah. So you have Night Court and Taxi on the same starship. But uh anyhow, uh and then you also had a superstar already attached to this. It was it was like you were guaranteed the teenagers right away with Michael J. Fox. Michael J. Fox. Who um I don't remember if this was before or after uh the very pivotal episode of uh in which uh Alex P.

Kelly 46:45

Keaton in Family Ties. Yeah.

Pete 46:47

In Family Ties, uh a friend of his dies, and it's kind of like this death of a salesman-like performance that earned him an Emmy.

Kelly 46:54

Yeah. But I I don't know either.

Pete 46:55

It's pretty great. Yeah. Uh but you can definitely know at that point that I mean, because he was two fist in it. He was making family ties episodes and Back to the Future. Yeah. And thank and no offense to Eric Stoltz. Thank God it wasn't Eric Stoltz. Thank God it wasn't Eric Stoltz. And I it would have been a different film, I think.

Kelly 47:14

Yeah, and and you know, uh Eric Stoltz is great, but it was he was wrong for that film and they recognized it. Yeah. And um let's not forget about uh Tom Davis as uh as Biff. Tom Wilson. Tom Wilson, excuse me. Tom Wilson is.

Pete 47:32

Oh, he's a great, and he's also a fabulous painter. Oh, interesting. He paints retro toys. At least I I think he might be doing other stuff now, but uh I had a very close encounter with Thomas at a gallery in Los Angeles where I almost bought one of his paintings. I just happened to have a butt ton of money in my bank account. And he did a painting of Rock'em Sock'em robots, and I almost bought it from him, and I went, I better save my money.

SPEAKER_07 47:59

Yeah.

Pete 48:00

But it was and I didn't get to meet him. Yeah. You know, it was it, it was just like, and I didn't realize it was him until much later where I found out, oh, he was painting.

SPEAKER_07 48:07

Yeah.

Pete 48:08

And how I found out was um in Back to the Future 2, there was a dispute, and there are many different versions of the story out there on the internet. Oh, are we going to talk about Jeffrey Weisman? Yes. Mr. Jeffrey Weissman, ultimately what happened, and we don't have to go into the ins and the outs and all the arguments.

SPEAKER_07 48:26

Yeah.

Pete 48:27

But Crispin Glover, who originally played George McFly in the first film, was not invited back.

Kelly 48:34

You know, I read something about it uh actually the other day, and and um it's it sounds like it was simply a salary dispute. I think so. That everyone else was getting paid more than Crispin, he thought he was worth more. Um, and that he also had some other quibbles about it, but yeah, it just wasn't gonna work out.

Pete 48:51

So, for those who don't know, Jeffrey Weissman was made up to look like Crispin, to play George McFly. And that was the mistake they made. Yeah, that's that's not a Jeffrey thing, that's a Bob's thing. Yeah. So when you see George McFly as an old man hanging upside down, or you see him, you know, off in the distance, and it looks a little different. Yeah, he's acting a little odd. It's because it's Jeffrey portraying Crispin Glover, portraying George McFly. Yeah. He also works at the Dickens Christmas Fair. And that's where I met Jeffrey, and I had no idea that that was his credential. And then at one point he goes, Well, you know, when I was working on Back to the Future, and I went, What'd you do in that? He goes, You don't know. Said, no. He goes, I played George McFly. And I went, You were George, wasn't that Chris Montglover? He goes, No, no, that was he was in the first film. I was in the other two. I was Mark II. Oh, yeah, okay. I was the other Darren. Yeah, I know, right? He um I don't I don't think it did his career any favors, I'm afraid. Sadly, no. Uh and even Jeffrey, I'm sure, will actually say, yeah, probably not. So it was Jeffrey who actually gave me, it kind of got me started on a two-year journey that led to some amazing stuff. He introduced me to a couple of people who used to work at Industrial Light and Magic, Don and Anna Bees. They were working on an exhibit on the history of NASA called NASA Human Adventure. And they needed a designer to come up with some designs for two galleries for it, and the exhibit would be in Stockholm. So I said yes. I thought, well, I'm gonna be living in Stockholm for a month and a half. Let's do it. Went over there. Most of the models that were produced for that uh exhibit were huge, giant replicas of the Gemini, Saturn rockets, the works. But we also had real artifacts like we had the uh speedometer from the X-1 rocket that Chuck uh Jaeger actually broke the sound barrier with. Wow. I got to hold it in my hands. I'm like, this is cool. We had Al Bean spacesuit from one of the Apollo missions. I mean, it was great. And it was this big international thing, and they flew a bunch of us over there, and all those models were built by former ILM guys, most of whom worked on Star Wars and Onward. Uh, Nelson Hall, all these other guys. And one of them got shipped over with us on this flight, very tall, kind of shy, red-headed guy with a big beard. Yeah. And he sat next to me the whole flight, wouldn't talk to me. And I found out why, because he was very, very shy. Yeah. And eventually we had breakfast together, and Don says, Pete, you and Steve should get to know each other really well. And hi, I'm Steve Golly. Nice to meet you. I'm Peter Overstreet. And we started painting this full-size replica of the space shuttle, and we're stamping on all the uh heat tiles with uh ID markers, which was arduous because we had to get it 100% correct. Yeah. So we had to we made these special rubber stamps that could actually be turned around. We we invented this rubber stamp to stamp a space shuttle. But this guy, Steve, taught me how to do uh sewage leaks, how to do oil leaks, how to do rust, how to do uh re-entry burns. Yeah. And he showed me how to do it full scale. And so while we're painting re-entry burn marks on this full-scale replica of the space shuttle, I go, so what'd you do before all this, Steve? He goes, give me a break. I go, no, what did you do before all this? He goes, You don't know? I go, no. Well, I used to be a model maker, and uh I was working down in Southern California at a model shop, you know, selling Aurora model kits to people and was building stuff, and in comes a guy named uh Douglas Trumbull. Uh-huh. And he was working on a film called uh Silent Running. And I went, oh, so you made the the spaceships? Oh yeah, and I also worked on Huey Dewey and Louie and did all this kind of stuff. I said, Wow, okay. And he goes, and after that, I got a job at this uh company that had uh just moved to Marin called Industrialite Magic, and I worked on Star Wars. I went, oh, and uh and what else did you do? Well, I was actually the guy who built and operated the Flying DeLorean and Back to the Future. Wow. So there's pictures of him in the ILM book. If you look up Steve Golly and Back to the Future, you'll find pictures of him, a young Steve Golly wearing his undershirt working on because obviously it's the summer, but he's he built the Flying DeLorean sequence uh for Back to the Future, the original film.

Kelly 53:26

That's amazing. By the way, I think I said earlier that Brainstorm was the only film that Trumbull directed, but no, he also directed Silent Running. Yes, yeah.

Pete 53:34

And that's a great film. Another one that if you have not seen, it's very, very cool. Yeah. Um and still pertinent to this day. I actually think it it holds a lot of weight today.

Kelly 53:43

Oh, it does absolutely. And um it you know, it was hard to when we were at Disneyland, look at those uh three autonomous robots and not think of them as Huey Dewey and Louie.

Pete 53:53

You referred to them as Huey Dewey and Louie during our last episode. Did I? Yeah, you did. I can't I can't think of it in any other way. And they kind of walk the same. Um but yeah, so that's that's kind of our interesting thing. But that it's that special effects connection that brings us to this. Yeah. And it's that popularity of Star Wars that eventually leads to the creation of Star Tours at Disneyland. Right. And leads to kind of a rivalry.

Kelly 54:19

Yeah, so this becomes really interesting. Well, real you know, real quick, so we've we've got the the Back to the Future films. They're incredibly successful. They weren't expecting that kind of success. Uh, so they came back to Zemeckis and Gale, and uh and the films are produced by one Steven Spielberg, uh, who is also deeply involved in Universal Studios as they start to expand, both Hollywood and Florida. And uh you know, they come back to Zemeckis and Gale and say, we need sequels to these. And Zemeckis, however, is working on another very American film called Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Ah, yes. Um interestingly enough, like uh it it is uh you know it's all extraordinarily like foundational cinematic American characters, but um Richard Williams, who's in England, is doing the the effects work with it uh and wins a special Oscar for it. Yes, he does. But Zemeckas and Gail say we will do uh a second and third movie under two conditions. One, we get to film them both together, and two, as long as Robert Zemecas is alive, another one is never made. Huh. That stands to this day. Wow the reason that they because it's a franchise that people love.

SPEAKER_05 55:45

Oh yeah.

Kelly 55:45

Any other franchise with this much affection would have been rebooted by now.

SPEAKER_05 55:50

Oh yeah.

Kelly 55:50

But the reason that it has not been is because Zemeckis and Gail demanded that it not be. So they they made those two two films. Uh and in the meantime, as you point out, there is a little thing called Star Tours.

SPEAKER_05 56:08

Yep.

Kelly 56:08

And I actually made, I got interested. So actually, Star Tours comes out prior to Back to the Future 2 coming out, just by a little bit. Yep. Um Star Tours is uh a huge success for Disney. Um George Lucas is insanely proud of it. He he's he's pretty pretty cocky about it. Oh, yeah. Uh at some point he goes and calls his friend Steve Spielberg and says, Come over, I want to show you this thing. Now Spielberg's already starting to work with Universal a little bit. Um Spielberg comes and rides Star Tours uh pre-opening. He loves it. Uh Lucas can't stop bragging about it. And Lucas says something to the effect of you'll never be able to pull one of these off at Universal. Oh boy. Wrong thing to say to Mr. Steven Spielberg.

Pete 57:09

Spielberg, dare.

Kelly 57:11

Spielberg immediately goes back and says, We need to build something that's like Star Tours based on Back to the Future. Uh well uh and uh in early early versions of this ride, there we're talking about it being a roller coaster.

Pete 57:26

Oh yeah. I've seen the I've seen the 3D blueprints of that.

Kelly 57:29

Yeah, and and they just decided they couldn't create a narrative that way, so uh it turns into a sort of Star Tours-like ride. This month at Boardwalk Times, we're talking about Comic-Con. Comic-Con, Comic-Con, and cruise ships, and maybe a little bit of Doctor Who.

SPEAKER_01 57:57

Come check it all out at BoardwalkTimes.net, so we're talking about a motion simulator ride.

Pete 58:19

When we talk about, for those who've never seen it or ever read it, it's a motion simulator ride. And I want to do a real, as quick as I can, deep dive on the motion simulator ride phenomenon, if I can.

Kelly 58:31

Oh, yeah, absolutely. I actually I put together two, so I might interject a little while. Yeah, uh a list of interesting motion simulators. So we're gonna do ages.

Pete 58:41

A two for lowdown here. Okay. The very first that I could really find beyond just a simple swing, 1893 is when this is patented.

SPEAKER_07 58:52

Yeah.

Pete 58:52

Okay. Now, up to this point, you could get on a swing and have a whole bunch of people being swung back and forth on a swing. Right. But no one had ever experienced the joys of going completely 360 degrees upside down and around. Yeah. Until the invention of the haunted swing. Uh, it was invented by Amariah Lake of New Jersey in 1893. And what it was is you went to this building, it looked like a big barn or a big house, and you were escorted into this giant divan. Yeah. And there's about two or three rows, and so it sat about eight passengers, uh forerunner to our DeLoreans, and it would start, and you were in like a living room, and you would start to swing back and forth, and you would swing more and more until finally you were fully upside down. You did not have a lap bar, you did not have shoulder braces, you were upside down.

Kelly 59:56

Now, is this a variant of the Noah's Arc ride? Um where you're really not going upside down, the the building around you is turning. Yes.

Pete 1:00:06

And this and this is the this is the one that starts all that. Okay. So the Noah's Ark ride is is actually a later version. A later version of this. And the haunted swing, so basically you you're sitting in a giant barrel. Right. And the swing does have a little bit of motion at first. Right. But what really happens is as you're losing momentum, the building is gaining momentum. Yeah. And you are actually in this giant, almost imagine sitting suspended in the middle of your dryer. And the dryer drum is going around you, but all the furniture is tacked to the floor, and the chandeliers are hanging are welded so they are hanging from the ceiling. Right. And people would freak out. They really love this. And that's really the first simulation of motion.

Kelly 1:00:50

And it's so interesting because if you look at um something like Star Tours, uh, which is using a very similar effect, but the Star Tours motion simulator, which holds quite a few people at once, moves like crazy. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, they they literally, when they were testing out Star Tours, they uh at um some aeronautics facility, they actually had to have them take this the f safeties off so they could make it move more. Wow. That was when they were doing the trial. But uh for Back to the Future, where we are, and we'll get a little more in detail about what these vehicles are like, but you know, you're in these smaller, it's eight persons, right? Yeah. Yeah, eight-person DeLoreans.

Pete 1:01:35

Yep.

Kelly 1:01:35

Uh they it they don't move very much.

Pete 1:01:38

Which is really weird because it feels like they I remember distinctly thinking this is a lot more violent than Star Tours.

Kelly 1:01:45

Yeah, they move about two feet in in every direction. Wow. Yeah. And uh and but it's because of this exact effect that you're describing, where moving in a couple of feet with this giant filling your periphery uh Omnimax screen, uh uh uh accentuating the motion, you feel like it's crazy. Oh, yeah. It feels very intense, way more intense than Star Tours does.

Pete 1:02:11

And it's interesting, the that the degree of motion is a lot older than you might think.

SPEAKER_07 1:02:17

Yeah.

Pete 1:02:17

Of those types of simulators because it all started off as flight simulators.

SPEAKER_07 1:02:22

Yeah.

Pete 1:02:23

And one of the first platforms is called the Sanders Teacher. It was created in 1910. Wow. And it was a model aircraft connected to the ground by universal joint. So when wind was present, the pilot in training was able to use the aircraft's control surfaces to move the model in three dem uh in three rotational degrees of freedom: pitch, yeah, roll, and yaw. Wind powered. It was not electronic or hydraulic.

SPEAKER_07 1:02:47

Right.

Pete 1:02:48

But they were still because they were using the real controls of a plane, but the control was attached to universal joint so he they could practice on this. And so that's kind of cool. And the advances uh would then continue into 1929, and it was made with a patent by Edwin Link for what became known as the Link Trainer. And he used the pilot's control stick and rudder controls to control organ-type bellows under the simulator cockpit. So now we're talking about air pressure to move things. So it's basically these giant bellows underneath it. It sounds, it sounds so grampy from Betty Boop. Yes.

unknown 1:03:22

I have got it, Betty!

Pete 1:03:24

But the bellows could inflate or deflate, giving movement and pitch and you roll and yaw. Yeah. So and that continues to 1958, where they had a flight simulator for the Comet 4 aircraft, and it used three degrees of freedom hydraulic system. So that's when hydraulics are introduced. Yeah. And um then simulator motion platforms today actually use six jacks as opposed to the three. So they have hexapods, which gives all six degrees of freedom. Uh-huh. Up, down, left, right, yeah, you know, sliding side to side as well as the turning side to side, rolling, all of those. It wouldn't be until the military finally got commercial and military flight simulators in the 1960s and 70s. They actually used it in NASA too, for later uh training purposes. But flight instruction was really starting to be used in uh uh with this type of technology. But as with any great new technology, when the military takes over, they find ways to make it cheaper. And so by making it cheaper, it starts entering into the commercial realm.

Kelly 1:04:29

Right. Well, this so here's an interesting thing, and and uh I hadn't meant to bring this up, but it ties into this. You know, Walt Disney used to say that the technology that powered the enchanted tiki room was the same technology that they used to power Polaris submarines. He's stretching things a little there, but there is something related, which is they had simulators for those submarines, and they were being run off the technology that was later going to become audio animatronics. They were being run from audio signals off of a tape. And and what would happen is they they would um actually take submarines down and they could record like pitch and yaw and stuff, yeah. And then take it to a a model of a Polaris, put it in there and play it back and make that device move. So very similar technology, but in this case, what you're describing happened. They the Navy figured out better ways to do this. Wow. And so that particular technology, the uh the audio uh motion simulator technology, became public.

Pete 1:05:46

That's so cool.

Kelly 1:05:47

And so Disney was able to snatch it up for cheap because the Navy didn't need it anymore, and made the tiki room.

Pete 1:05:53

Wow. Isn't that weird? That's very, very cool. You know, and then uh you wind up with Star Tours. Yes. Which has a different feel than Back to the Future. Because Back to the Future is in order to plus up, uh Star Star Tours. Star Tours, you have a frontward, you know, front-facing view screen.

SPEAKER_07 1:06:14

Yeah.

Pete 1:06:14

And it's it's small, it's kind of clunky, but it works. Yes. But Back to the Future, you can look up, you can look around, and you feel like you are completely surrounded by this adventure. Yeah. Even though the stuff sometimes is a little too big.

SPEAKER_07 1:06:30

Yeah.

Pete 1:06:30

That is one of the disadvantages of it being on an Omnimax screen, which is a giant dome projector.

Kelly 1:06:36

Disney made sort of two in in rapid succession uh kind of simulator rides. And they they made star tours and they made a thing in Epcot called Body Wars. Um did you ever experience Body Wars? No, I've seen I've seen footage from it. I I did it. Oh dear. Um I it was it I was fine with it. It is intense. Yeah. It is basically you are being shrunk and injected into a body and and you you're going through the bloodstream. And it is it is far more intense than Star Tours, though it is basically the same technology. Uh it was notorious for people getting sick. Not as notorious as their later, like the early 2000s attraction, which was sort of similar, Mission Space. That's that one's crazy. Yeah. Um, and and that one has has so much more available motion. I mean, they they're really putting you in simulators that NASA astronauts would use. Sure. Uh but it it was the uh Body Wars was notorious for people coming out of it nauseous or and or having a uh protein accident. But I think the thing that makes Back to the Future different. I mean, there's a lot of things. Yeah. But the thing that makes Back to the Future different is it feels like such a more personalized experience. So you are and I mean we we can talk a little bit about the the cue here. You know, you it's the first time I can recall being in an attraction and having like being separated off with a small group of people and put in a small room to have your instructions given. So you remember you you like uh you you uh get put in like one of the offices in the institute. And it's like you and ten people. It's you and eight people because that's how many people are in the car. Right. And and it feels and you can touch stuff on the walls and you're alone in there. There's no there's no minder, there's no cast member doing anything with you. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Pete 1:08:47

Yeah, you have a big metal roll-up door on one side of the room and the exit door behind you, right? The rest is this Doc Brown Time Institute workshop.

Kelly 1:08:56

Yeah, and then you get let into the other room and you're in this small car with eight people, and that's it. And you yes, you can lean forward and see all the other cars if you really want to, but why would you do that to yourself? For the most part, the experience feels like you are in this really small group. It feels very individualized, and the screen is a hundred times bigger than what they were doing in Star Tours.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:24

Oh, yeah.

Kelly 1:09:25

So it is, even though there's a lot less motion, it feels a lot more intense.

Pete 1:09:31

Very much, very, very, very much. Um, I remember the first time I went, this was when not long after it had opened in Los Angeles. This is the Los Angeles version. And I remember that line just being murder, just you know, boiling in the Universal City sun. Yeah. And I'm getting a sunburn. I'm wearing my Marty McFly prism hat.

SPEAKER_07 1:09:57

Yeah.

Pete 1:09:58

You know, I've already bought all my Back to the Future junk. Yeah. I'm ready to go. I'm into this. Um, and you're watching all the video panels showing you behind the scenes stuff with the two bobs telling you, ah, yeah, this is how we made Marty McFly fly on the, you know, on his uh hoverboard. And um Back to the Future uses the state-of-the-art technology, you know, all of that kind of schmaltz. Yeah. And you have some guy wandering around dressed as Doc Brown in a bad wig, and it was great. Then you finally get inside, finally, after an hour and a half, and yeah, you're sucked into this world, yeah, and you suddenly realize wait a minute, Biff Tannen is part of the story. And you go, okay, that's kind of cool. Yeah. But it's subtle because at first he only appears in the backgrounds on like circ surveillance cameras. And you're like, what's is that what is that?

Kelly 1:10:48

I think they have Biff. Well, and and isn't this interesting? You know, we we uh you and I rode Rise of the Resistance uh about a month, what, three weeks back, four weeks back. Um and there's a long-term narrative there, yeah, right? It's several stages. Yeah. And one of the things that we noticed was that when the time gets off on that narrative, it gets very jerky. And you're and you kind of start losing your sense of of flow. But compare that to the narrative that's put together in the Back to the Future ride queue, which flows beautifully. It really does. I did it a number of times and it always worked. You got these monitors that were sort of giving you background stuff and also giving you plot points, but an an but you were kind of moving smoothly through them, and the and the narrative gets more and more concentrated the farther you get in the queue. Yep. Uh it never stops. Nope. And then you end up in that office and you get the real meat of it, and then you're immediately in the in the DeLorean. And I I just it's so elegant. You know, you've got all of your story points by the time you hit the car, and it never feels like you just got cut off for a while. Agreed. Yeah.

Pete 1:12:06

I mean, they even did stuff like they would have the security cameras all over the compound, yeah. Scanning left and right. Yeah. And they would show some of the hallways with the security guys like flashing their flashlights all over the place, and they will play a part later on. Yeah. You have the technicians, one of whom is Douglas Trumbull, working on the DeLorean. And then you would have Biff running around, and then it would cut to you in the hallway. So you're on the security footage with that. So it's immediately this nice little, oh, we're a part of this.

SPEAKER_07 1:12:33

Yeah.

Pete 1:12:33

It was so beautiful, like you said, it's so elegant. Yeah. And when they open up that door and the smoke and everything, the way you expect it, there's the DeLorean. You're like, I'm in. Let's do this.

Kelly 1:12:44

You were in that movie, and it is so good. And I and I think um maybe now's the time to actually talk about the main ride experience. Sure. Um, so one of the things that came up as Douglas Trumbull worked on this on the film for this ride is that he hated the Omnimax. He hated it. Uh, you know, Trumbull being who he is, he wanted more resolution, he wanted a higher frame rate, he wanted a uh uh he wanted a lot of things. Yeah. But he wasn't gonna get them because the building was was going. You know, they they'd already made their foundation mistake, they weren't gonna stop and back up. So he was stuck with it. So what he did was was really brilliant. Yeah. He said the the the narrative wasn't written before he started working on it. Like the the Richard Edlund version of this was very different. Uh it was it was people talk a lot about Edlund had a lot of blimps. And you were you were flying around through blimps and just sort of overlooking scenes from the movie. Okay. Um this may be part of the reason that Edlund didn't end up making the movie.

Pete 1:13:56

Yeah.

Kelly 1:13:57

What uh Trumbull did that was so brilliant was he said, I can see that the Omnimax has some problems. The main problems is that as you're moving, things on the periphery don't look that great. Right. They're blurry, you can't quite track them, there's no way to keep everything in focus. Right. So he rewrites, Trumbull himself rewrites the story to include this thing about bumping Biff.

Pete 1:14:26

Nice.

Kelly 1:14:28

And uh, if you haven't done the attraction, this is this is the gist. You're going to get in a flying DeLorean and you're going to chase Biff through time, accelerate to exactly 88 miles per hour. I don't know why, but 88 miles per hour.

Pete 1:14:42

Because when this baby it's 88 miles an hour, you're going to see some serious shit.

Kelly 1:14:50

And then you're going to bump Biff. So what that does is it forces the audience to focus on one central point in the screen where Trumbull knew it was going to look good. Nice. But Trumbull ran into another problem as he was working with this. You know, interestingly, we start his career uh in the 64 World's Fair, and he's working with designing things for Cinerama for big screens. So he's he's worked with large curved screens before. Yeah. So he's got kind of a handle on this. But one of the things he doesn't take into account, or what one of the things he's forced to take into account, is that this screen is so big and so curved. And you know, keep in mind, this is there's no computer graphics here. This is all stop motion animation.

Pete 1:15:38

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Motion control, yeah. Motion control, camera control, yeah, and stop motion. Which even for the dinosaur, people go like, wow, that's really great. I go, no, that's not CGI.

Kelly 1:15:48

It's not. Brilliant. You know, there's a couple of like kind of rudimentary like digital lines that are put across the screen in a few points, but but almost entirely, probably 90, 95% of it is is stop motion going over huge, huge models. But it is so wide, and the camera has to keep moving forward that it's really hard to light. Yeah. Because you're going to see any lights that are close enough to be effective. Yeah. So almost all of the model is lit internally. Wow. So it's the lights coming out of the buildings, the lights coming off of the vehicles, the all of the lights are coming off of the model itself.

unknown 1:16:30

Wow.

Pete 1:16:31

I mean, it's it's and the styrofoam cup.

Kelly 1:16:34

The styrofoam cup?

Pete 1:16:35

You know about the styrofoam cup?

Kelly 1:16:36

No, tell me.

Pete 1:16:37

Okay, in the 2015 section of the ride, yeah, among the buildings, somebody was drinking coffee. Yes, I did see this. It is somewhere on one of the buildings. So if you watch the footage, either on the Blu-ray or on YouTube, keep your eyes open for the styrofoam cup.

Kelly 1:16:56

Yes. I didn't now that you say it, I did see a picture of it. Someone pointed it out. Yeah.

Pete 1:17:02

Anyway, I'm sorry to erase.

Kelly 1:17:03

No, not at all. But so it it's a brilliant piece of work, and he's having to work with a lot of limitations, and he's making the limitations work for him. And you know, if you see like some of his uh some of his other work, if you look at things like Blade Runner, yeah, for example, you can really see how that kind of internal lighting stuff worked for him. Oh yeah.

Pete 1:17:29

Yeah, absolutely.

Kelly 1:17:30

And you know, and and it's just it it's remarkable. He's like and he does, he has to build uh a stop motion dinosaur that is actually big enough to swallow the camera. Oh, yeah. Because you were going to fly in its mouth.

Pete 1:17:45

And get bitten before you fall into the lava? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's the ice caves, the lava caves.

Kelly 1:17:52

Yeah, they they they lit from under the ice so they could get enough light in. They lit from under the lava so they could get enough light in the scene. Oh, okay. I mean, it's basically like science fiction Barry Linden here.

Pete 1:18:05

It totally is. And you have the distract you also have the added element of the environment that you were sitting in. Yes. Because you were watching the flux capacitor. Right. You're watching the odometer, you're keeping an eye on the speedometer, make sure, oh, you're up to 53, oh, you're down to the 40s. Every time it's sped up, it would go up and we're at 88. You know, when you're falling, you're actually you know get up to 88 to go through time before you hit the lava, yeah, stuff. And then you've got Biff taunting you as you go. So just you know, and that's also this great thing of drawing focus from the audience because you're watching Biff in the DeLorean. Right. And then you're like, okay, okay, now okay, I don't have to watch Biff anymore. I'm gonna, hey Doc, hello, hello, and he's on the screen right there. And you've got Doc, don't worry about it, Biff, we'll be able to get you out of the dinosaur's mouth. And finally you're able to zap him and boff him. But it's a great way to distract you as you're looking at the flux capacitor, the time circuits and everything going. It's marvelous narrative.

Kelly 1:19:02

Yeah, and if you if you see interviews with uh Trumbull later, he he will, because he's a bit of a Camargeon, he'll complain about like, you know, it's not brightly lit enough. Um the the the action doesn't seem uh in in-depth enough, the the visuals don't seem in depth enough.

Pete 1:19:18

Yeah, there are no day sequences.

Kelly 1:19:20

Right.

Pete 1:19:21

It's all at night. Yeah. Which kind of throws you off when you you know when you have been on this whole ride the entire time.

SPEAKER_07 1:19:28

Yeah.

Pete 1:19:29

And you probably have been standing in line in the noonday sun at Universal City, like, I did. I've been getting a massive sunburn on the back of my neck. It was worth it. But yeah, it kind of throws you off because like, why is this at nighttime?

Kelly 1:19:42

I yeah, exactly and and I think it's just so he can have his key lighting exactly where he wants it. Also, it's Douglas Trumbull. The did he ever make anything in daylight?

Pete 1:19:52

No. Yeah, it's like uh yeah, it's very, very apparent. What I love is also anytime you're going through space, you're basically in 2001 because he made the whole going through time sequence feel exactly like the Starfields. Yeah, like, oh, this is cool.

Kelly 1:20:07

It's so cool. And and you know, notoriously, I'll I'll cap off the story that we started earlier. Um, Spielberg decides to invite his friend George Lucas, who has bragged about his star tours and challenged Spielberg to come ride Back to the Future just before it opens. Lucas gets in, rides it. He is so livid, he can't speak. He walks off without saying a word to anybody. Whoa! Because uh the assumption is that he felt like he had gotten topped. And and you know, which whichever one you love, I don't know. You know, I I I grew up more with Star Wars than I did with Back to the Future. Sure. So I I I do have this real love for Star Tours. Yeah. But man, Back to the Future is a good ride.

Pete 1:21:05

They they are different beasts. Yeah. I mean, they they they really are. And and to say one is better than the other, it's kind of it doesn't do either of them justice, frankly, to compete them because they're kind of their own different things, even though they're a s like they're both motion simulators, but they are different beasts entirely.

Kelly 1:21:22

But there sure is an intimacy to Back to the Future that you don't get in uh you know, the only other simulator ride that I might suggest that really, really pulls that off. Actually, I'll name two, um, is the the Avatar Flight of Passage ride in Animal Kingdom in Florida, where you are literally on the back of a dragon. Like it it is it is built so that you can feel it breathing between your legs.

Pete 1:21:50

Oh, that's cool. Yeah, that's really cool.

Kelly 1:21:53

And it's very similar, similar in that you don't really I mean, you can see the people around you, but you don't really have time to. So it feels like you are on this dragon. It is also a massive high-def screen. Wow, it's very beautiful. Um, the other one that you kind of achieve this level of intimacy you and I did recently, which is Millennium Falcon Smuggler's Run.

Pete 1:22:15

Absolutely. Yeah, it it's it's brilliant how they carry it off because they make you feel like you are in one Millennium Falcon when you actually have multiple crews riding and they do it brilliantly. They expand upon the Back to the Future premise where you do not see the other passengers, but you have multiple cars with eight passengers each, all doing the ride simultaneously, and each one thinks that they're the most important one there. Absolutely. Which is so great.

Kelly 1:22:42

Remarkable.

Pete 1:22:43

Yeah. Except when you ride at the bottom left or the bottom right one. And all you have to do is just look up a little bit. Now you don't want to, yeah, because you're being shaken up so violently. Right. But you do actually spy them.

Kelly 1:22:56

Yes.

Pete 1:22:56

But uh it's pretty clever.

Kelly 1:22:58

Can I want to talk about one other guy that worked on this ride that we haven't mentioned yet? There's a guy named Peyton Reed. Now he wrote um all of the pre-show stuff.

Pete 1:23:10

Okay.

Kelly 1:23:11

He likely wrote some of the stuff during the show itself. He's this guy's an interesting character. He um r d directed and co-wrote the Back to the Future animated series. Huh. And interesting fact about the Back to the Future animated series, do you know whose Doc Brown is in it? No. Dan Castellanetta. And do you recall what replaced Back to the Future?

Pete 1:23:37

Oh, God help me, The Simpsons ride.

Kelly 1:23:39

That's right, featuring Dan Castellanetta as Homer. I actually I find it really interesting because I uh I understand that um that part of the reason that they probably wanted to retire the Back to the Future ride is that the uh intellectual property start was starting to feel stale. Sure. Also, you know, some of the visuals were being kind of uh l leapt over by other newer attractions. Of course. But it occurs to me that The Simpsons starts in like 1989. Yeah. So it's not that far off. It's about five years difference. It really doesn't make that much of a difference.

Pete 1:24:19

I'm glad it wasn't the Tracy Ullman ride. Yes. I'm just saying.

Kelly 1:24:22

That actually might have been kind of cool. It could have been. Go home. A couple of other things that Peyton Reed worked on, which I just found interesting.

SPEAKER_07 1:24:30

Yeah.

Kelly 1:24:30

Uh he did a 1995 TV movie version of the computer war tennis shoes.

Pete 1:24:38

What?

Kelly 1:24:39

He did a 1997 version of TV version of The Love Bug. He co-wrote and partially directed the uh The Weird Owl Show. Oh wow. Okay. Uh he did several episodes of Mr. Show. Oh, nice. Yeah. And he directed three movies that you may have heard of: Ant-Man, Ant Man and the Wasp, Ant Man and the Wasp, Quantum Mania. Wow. Peyton Reed.

Pete 1:25:08

Wow.

Kelly 1:25:09

Yeah.

Pete 1:25:09

Okay.

Kelly 1:25:10

And uh and I'm just gonna I'm gonna take a moment here and say, Quantum Mania is awesome, and I don't understand why people don't like this movie. It is so much fun, it is so goofy.

Pete 1:25:22

Drink the goo. Yeah. Um because it's got that same sense of humor. I kind of like that. Um yeah, so Back to the Future, sadly, like you said, you had mentioned, actually kind of suffered uh a fate that happens to a lot of universal rides because Universal is a lot quicker with the Executioner's accent Disney is. Yes. Uh, with a lot of their attractions. They will build something up and say, this isn't working, get rid of it.

SPEAKER_07 1:25:52

Yeah.

Pete 1:25:53

Even though it may be very beloved, like the mummy experience or you know, but and yet it amazes me what attractions still stick around, like Waterworld. A movie that, you know, I actually kind of liked it when it came. I did too. I actually kind of liked it. And I like that show a lot, too. Yeah, and the show is awesome. Yeah. But not a lot of people actually know that that's actually a movie. No, not anymore. They go, it's a movie based off of the stunt show, and you're like, no, no, no, no, it's not.

Kelly 1:26:22

They just they just opened an entire water world land in Japan.

Pete 1:26:28

Who knew? You know? Like so but Florida, you know, had you know, it what's great about the Back to Future ride, it saved Universal Florida.

Kelly 1:26:38

That's right, yeah. Absolutely. Turned their fortunes around 100%.

Pete 1:26:41

Totally. It it broke the uh attendance records. And it actually beat the attendance records of Disney's MGM studios the first year it was open.

Kelly 1:26:49

It did. One of the things I heard about that, though, is that that had to do with the fact that the first year of Universal, it was such a disaster that they were handing out free tickets like crazy. Oh wow. So uh there was some belief that by the time the Back to the Future ride hit in 1991, a lot of the attendance was people just redeeming those things.

Pete 1:27:16

Well, you know, again, there's such a rivalry between Universal and Disney. Yeah. That I don't think that they're gonna quibble about that. It's like we got him in, who cares? Oh, yeah, no, no, totally. So sadly, in Florida, they closed it down in 2006.

SPEAKER_07 1:27:29

Yeah.

Pete 1:27:29

And in 2007, the LA closed.

SPEAKER_07 1:27:32

Yeah.

Pete 1:27:33

And I can't remember if it was in Florida or in California, but one of them they actually had this great ceremony with Bob Zemeckis and Christmas.

SPEAKER_07 1:27:40

It was California, yeah.

Pete 1:27:41

Yeah, actually starting up the Hill Valley clock as a countdown for shutting down Back to the Future. Which is adorable and yet kind of sad in a way. Uh and then finally, um Japan, their version of Back to the Future, actually shut down in 2016.

Kelly 1:27:59

Yeah, last of the. For a long time. It really did. Yeah.

Pete 1:28:02

And um so that's kind of the the end of Back to the Future. And I would actually argue that in some ways, Back to the Future the Ride actually informed the Millennium Falcon experience. Oh yeah. And Rise of the Resistance in a lot of ways, most of which you have talked about putting people into a narrative, giving people a focal point, like, you know, look out, you must catch the train, you know, on the Millennium Falcon thing. And that's cool. But I would I would argue that we we also rode Star Tours the same day that we rode the Millennium Falcon experience. And I actually had more fun on the Millennium Falcon because of the fact it really felt like I was part of the narrative. More so than Star Tours is going to take you to the moons of Endo with the lovable Ewoks. Goochana, Koochana. Uh so we uh we uh we'll do a whole episode on Star Tours, folks. Don't worry. Oh, for sure. We will pay tribute to that because it we do actually love that ride.

SPEAKER_07 1:29:09

I love it.

Pete 1:29:10

But um but I would say that Back to the Future actually informed the thinking for those rides and uh laid the groundwork for stuff like the Escape from Gringotts vaults at uh Harry Potter. Absolutely. But I think uh we've reached a point now uh in the show that I think we should actually say what would a plus up be on a ride like Back to the Future? Yeah. Like where does this go? I mean, how do you I mean we've already kind of talked about what the plus ups have been, but what would be a good plus up for Back to the Future the ride?

Kelly 1:29:46

Boy, it's it's tough. So are we going to assume that we're plussing up a ride, we're just gonna ignore that it went away and that it's still there and running.

Pete 1:29:58

I I think for this particular plus up, I think let's make that the assumption. Yeah. Let's make that the assumption so that way it's not we're just gonna bring it back because again, we have to wait until Bob Zemeckis dies in order to revitalize the fame. No offense, Bob, or Bob. You know, I don't know.

Kelly 1:30:14

Did we call Bob up and see if we could just turn it into a Roger Rabbit ride?

Pete 1:30:18

They did that. Oh yeah. But uh or or a Kolchak ride. Everybody has to wear the little straw hat.

Kelly 1:30:29

So so here's what I I would say um is you know, like I said, I saw Douglas Trumbull's show skin, uh one one of his two showskin movies. Uh I saw the movie called New Magic featuring Christopher Lee. And um one of the gimmicks of that movie is that you're sort of you're you're watching another movie and it breaks down, and there's someone behind the screen. Oh and that person is some some sort of you you don't know. Anyway, there's a point where they come up to the screen, there's these lights back there, like someone's turned on the work lights, and they push on the screen, and it and the frame rate is so high, you see like three dimensions, even though you're not watching a 3D movie. Oh, that's cool. It's so incredible. Nice. And then, you know, Christopher Lee's an evil magician. So my plus up is bring Christopher Lee back and uh make him an evil magician.

unknown 1:31:28

No.

Pete 1:31:29

Doc Brown's rival.

Kelly 1:31:31

You know, that was actually one of the prospective narratives for um Richard Edlin's version of this was that Doc Brown would have an evil twin. That's right, it's John Big Booty.

SPEAKER_05 1:31:46

Big booty.

Kelly 1:31:48

Big booty! Yeah. But so I I I love that it stopped motion. So I'm I'm not going to say that that we should employ like newer CGI or computer animation, because I love that it stopped motion. But I would love to see it stop motion at a much, much higher frame rate. Um and and if we're going to use computers at all to enhance the lighting a little bit. And that and that's pretty much all my plus up to it because I think the ride is borderline perfect.

SPEAKER_05 1:32:25

Okay.

Kelly 1:32:26

So, yeah, much, much higher frame rate so that we actually get a sense of three dimensions without having to put on, you know, flight goggles or safety goggles or anything like that.

Pete 1:32:38

Okay. I like that. I like that.

Kelly 1:32:40

Mine is a lot more involved. Okay. That's good because I was struggling. I was like, I just like this kind of as it is. I would get on it right now.

Pete 1:32:49

And I would actually agree with you. It's a it's a beautiful, beautiful ride. Yeah. Here's my plus up.

Kelly 1:32:54

Okay.

Pete 1:32:54

When it was shut down, there was a cultural phenomenon that was starting to rise at this point and could have been used as a marketing potential, because Universal loves that kind of stuff. Yeah. And a great way to revitalize the ride without too much of a commitment to tearing something down and re- you know, they would reskin it. Yeah. Keep uh, you know, keep the intellectual property theming.

SPEAKER_07 1:33:20

Yeah.

Pete 1:33:21

But one of my favorite things about going to Universal Studios at this time is they had the time train out in front. And you could see, because that everybody loves the DeLorean. I love the time train. Yeah. You know, at the very end, when all of a sudden he shows up, I went, no way. And I actually, every time at the end of Back to the Future 3, you know, Doc, where are you going back to the past? He's nope, already been there. You know, and like all of a sudden the train starts to fly and it, you know, and it blows its whistle and comes right at the screen. I I actually get teary every time because it's like, I want to see what happens next. Like, are you kidding me? Totally. Doc and Clara and Jules and Verne, like, let's find out what happens with them. So my plus up would be the Time Institute has gone through a paradox. Yeah. And it has led to this steampunk reality of now. Yeah. And Doc is trying to use the time train now to fix things. So on the way in, everything is all steampunked out. Like the Time Institute is now looks like 19th century. So it's it you've gone back in time to where Doc is trying to fix a paradox that he caused. Actually, it's not him, it's that filthy little kid Jules, who, if you've ever watched Back to the Future 3, points at his wee wee. Yes. And it's because the little actor, actually, to be fair, had to go to the bathroom, was desperately trying to tell his mom, I gotta go to the bathroom. But unfortunately, it winds up in the take. Yeah. Right in the middle of Doc's inspirational, it means the future isn't written yet. So make it a good one. And he's like pointing at his junk, and you're like, oh. Poor kid. So it'd be great if Jules and Verne, like in the TV show, were the troublemakers. And so you could capitalize on the animated show. Yeah. Now you're on board an actual time train that breaks. So the cars would actually break apart. And it's still a motion simulator, but you're inside these train uh passenger train cars that are following the train that actually split apart, come together. And so it's a little bit like some of the trackless rye technology. Yeah. But you're telling a different story. And you could have mad dog Tannin. Yep. Or some other villain that you could pop in there.

SPEAKER_07 1:35:34

Yeah.

Pete 1:35:35

Or 2015 Biff from Hell Valley show up. Yeah. And you know, I'm I'm sure at this point, Thomas Willis is like, oh, no more back to the future police.

Kelly 1:35:46

Have you seen those great clips though of the song he wrote to answer all of his fans' questions?

Pete 1:35:52

Stop asking me the questions.

Kelly 1:35:54

Yeah. So good. I'd love it. Michael J. Fox. He's nice.

Pete 1:35:59

He's a nice guy. What's he like? He's an alien. Stop asking me the questions. I love it. But like something like that would be a great way to revitalize it and keep it alive for just a little bit longer. Cash in on the steampunk phenomenon of the mid-naughts. And uh again, give us something a little bit different, uh, and just to kind of goose it up. Yeah. And then you can tear it down. By now, it would be a steampunk, and I'm sure steampunks are gonna go like, how dare you! Yeah. But let's be honest, steampunk as far as a mass, it's it's become niche again as opposed to a mass appeal. Yes. You know, everybody has glued as many gears on them and called it a steampunk as they can. We've all spray painted a nerf, you know, renegade, you know, Nerf gun to look brass. But Pete, do you like this clock face that's on my forehead? Yeah, it's pretty great. Oh, thanks. Yeah, it's awesome. It goes great with your corset. Thank you. Uh and to be fair and to be nice, I I am kind of partially responsible in my own tiny little way for steampunk, because I did do a museum exhibit on it, so I am just as guilty as everybody else of all this. However, we do have to accept the fact, folks, that our steampunk world has kind of not gone bye-bye, but certainly gone to the sides again of being kind of niche.

Kelly 1:37:17

And my and my my band played at the steampunk festival uh a number of times.

Pete 1:37:23

Yes. So it has happened.

Kelly 1:37:25

So I got to hang out with Thomas Dolby.

Pete 1:37:27

Aw.

Kelly 1:37:28

Nice guy.

Pete 1:37:28

It's pretty awesome. Yeah. So so and and continue the narrative without continuing the narrative. Because what I love is a lot of people actually accept the ride as it was, as Back to the Future 4.

SPEAKER_07 1:37:43

Yeah.

Pete 1:37:43

Because that's about as much as you're gonna get from the two Bobs. Right. But they could have actually just said, hey, you know what? It's not actually the DeLorean, so it's the train. So we could kind of get away with stuff a little bit more. Yeah. They might have actually moved on, especially since when this would have gone in production, the Bobs were busy making the Polar Express. Right. So that could have been a way to kind of like smooth it over. Like, we could still do a train thing if you like trains. You know, we can take what you're doing with this motion capture technology and have you know Doc as a motion capture character.

SPEAKER_07 1:38:15

Oh, cool.

Pete 1:38:16

It would still be Uncanny Valley creepy the way that the Polar Express characters would be, but still, there you go.

Kelly 1:38:22

I gotta I gotta say, if there was a Polar Express attraction, I would get on it. That would totally be awesome. Yeah. I'd want it to be like three hours long and really slow and just kind of gentle.

Pete 1:38:37

Eddie Deason pops up. Hey.

Kelly 1:38:40

I got a Deason on by you here.

Pete 1:38:42

Yeah. Speaking of, I want to hold your hand. Yes, yes. And by the way, thank you, Eddie Deason, for cheering up my kid. Uh this is not an official plug, but thank you on Cameo. Uh you you made a little girl very, very happy. So if you ever are listening to this Eddie Deason, thank you. So just let I think we should end on Eddie Deeson. Absolutely.

Kelly 1:39:06

He is awesome.

Pete 1:39:07

He is indeed.

Kelly 1:39:08

Well, I'm Peter Overstreet. I'm Kelly McCubbin. And you've been listening to The Lowdown on the Plus Up. We hope you've enjoyed this episode of The Lowdown on the Plus Up. If you have, please tell your friends where you found us. And if you haven't, we can pretend this never happened and need not speak of it again. For a lot more thoughts on theme parks and related stuff, check out my writing for Boardwalk Times at boardwalktimes.net. Feel free to reach out to Pete and I on our Lowdown on the Plus Up Facebook group or send us a message directly at comments at lowdown-plus-up.com. We really want to hear about how you'd plus these attractions up and read some of your ideas on the show. Our theme music is Goblin Tinker Soldier Spy by Kevin McLeod at Incompitech.com. We'll have a new episode out real soon. Why? Because we like you.