Stupid Guest Tricks

susislicker wrote:You know I did not really think about that title...But you're right and it is aptly titled! This is Twilight Zone scary! Loony Tom!!!!!

It may not have been intentional, but the title is a direct quote -- inflection and all -- from the opening scene involving two ambulance attendants (and repeated with one of them in the final scene).

Anyone remember who played the attendants, and what happened in that opening scene? (Sorry for the OT, but I love the way this movie opens and closes!)

[spoiler]Albert Brooks (later the voice of Marlin) and Dan Akroyd!

They are killing time on an (apparently cross-country) ambulance run at night by humming TV theme songs for the other to guess. Eventually they do the Twilight Zone theme and begin reminiscing about favorite episodes. Finally, Dan Akroyd says, "Hey, do you wanna see something REALLY scary?" Albert Brooks does, but Dan assures him it's really scary and makes him pull to the side of the road. Once safely on the shoulder, Dan hides his face, only to reappear as a hideous monster who attacks and kills Brooks' character! (Dee dee dee dee, dee dee dee dee.) <shudder>

In the humorous (and creepy) ending, John Lithgow has a frightening experience on an airliner and is hauled off the plane in a straight jacket. As he's driven away, the ambulance driver chats him up about the experience, and then leans around to look at Lithgow -- letting us see that Dan Akroyd is driving the ambulance! He asks, "Do you want to see something REALLY scary?" and smiles. (Dee dee dee dee, dee dee dee dee. End of movie.) Love it![/spoiler]

Okay, with this out of the way, did anyone ever watch 3rd Rock from the Sun with John Lithgow and catch the HUGE inside-joke reference to the Twilight Zone movie -- one of my favorite moments in sitcom history???

Oh, I remember that episode with the ambulance drivers. That WAS scary - completely unexpected!

BRWombat wrote:It may not have been intentional, but the title is a direct quote -- inflection and all -- from the opening scene involving two ambulance attendants (and repeated with one of them in the final scene).

Anyone remember who played the attendants, and what happened in that opening scene? (Sorry for the OT, but I love the way this movie opens and closes!)

[spoiler]Albert Brooks (later the voice of Marlin) and Dan Akroyd!

They are killing time on an (apparently cross-country) ambulance run at night by humming TV theme songs for the other to guess. Eventually they do the Twilight Zone theme and begin reminiscing about favorite episodes. Finally, Dan Akroyd says, "Hey, do you wanna see something REALLY scary?" Albert Brooks does, but Dan assures him it's really scary and makes him pull to the side of the road. Once safely on the shoulder, Dan hides his face, only to reappear as a hideous monster who attacks and kills Brooks' character! (Dee dee dee dee, dee dee dee dee.) <shudder>

In the humorous (and creepy) ending, John Lithgow has a frightening experience on an airliner and is hauled off the plane in a straight jacket. As he's driven away, the ambulance driver chats him up about the experience, and then leans around to look at Lithgow -- letting us see that Dan Akroyd is driving the ambulance! He asks, "Do you want to see something REALLY scary?" and smiles. (Dee dee dee dee, dee dee dee dee. End of movie.) Love it![/spoiler]

Okay, with this out of the way, did anyone ever watch 3rd Rock from the Sun with John Lithgow and catch the HUGE inside-joke reference to the Twilight Zone movie -- one of my favorite moments in sitcom history???

I remember that quote and the scene. I LOVED that Twilight Zone movie! My favorite segment was the John Lithgow one. You are right, the quote is the same and the inflection as well. It must have been subconcious... :twisted:

Does anyone remember the series Amazing Stories? It was one of the coolest shows on. I remember one segment in particular. It was a bout a WWII bomber that needed to land and its wheels were gone. The guy in the glass bubble gunner compartment was not gonna make it cause of where it was located. He was a cartoonist and drew cartoon wheels on the plane and it landed on the cartoon wheels. Does anyone remember that show? It was so cool. It was produced by Spielberg. I have the whole first season on DVD. I have been watching for more, but never see them listed at Amazon.

I did not see every show of Third Rock. I loved that show, it was very funny. But I missed the reference you speak of. :(
sues

susislicker wrote: Does anyone remember the series Amazing Stories? It was one of the coolest shows on. I remember one segment in particular. It was a bout a WWII bomber that needed to land and its wheels were gone. The guy in the glass bubble gunner compartment was not gonna make it cause of where it was located. He was a cartoonist and drew cartoon wheels on the plane and it landed on the cartoon wheels. Does anyone remember that show? It was so cool. It was produced by Spielberg. I have the whole first season on DVD. I have been watching for more, but never see them listed at Amazon.

OOOO OOOO OOOO...***horshack imitation. I remember that show that one in particular. Awesome series. SIGH...now I have to go look up some more on it. Darn you .....lol And here I was going to go do dishes. All your fault I have to eat on dirty plates....lol

The 3rd Rock moment I spoke of was hilarious, but it requires some setup. (To me, that's what made it so masterful -- it was a reference only a very few people in the audience would get, but they still stuck it in.)

Apart from the opening and closing scenes I mentioned above, Twilight Zone: The Movie is a compilation of four short stories, each filmed by a different director. Some of the segments are better than others. The first, involving Vic Morrow as a racist blowhard who suddenly finds himself with the tables turned, is okay, but was overshadowed by the death of Morrow and two child actors during the filming. The second segment, directed by Steven Spielberg, was my favorite. It had Scatman Crothers as a man who brings a little youth to elderly residents of a nursing home. Sweet story. The third tale was downright creepy, about a boy who could change his environment at will, and holds several adults hostage as his "family" in a cartoon nightmare.

The fourth story has John Lithgow as a nervous flyer on a jet, whose nerves are getting the better of him. He's already near panic just from a strong fear of flying, when... he sees something on the wing -- some sort of creature tearing the engine apart, trying to make the jet crash! Trouble is, he's been such a handful already that no one believes him, and he goes berserk. True, creepy, old-fashioned Twilight Zone at its best.

The first three stories were created for the movie. Only the last, with Lithgow, was a remake of an original Twilight Zone episode. In the original, it was a young William Shatner who portrayed the panicky flyer.

Which leads to 3rd Rock from the Sun, a goofy and often clever comedy about an alien family sent to observe human ways. Lithgow plays their commander, in disguise as the dad of the family, Dick Solomon.

Throughout the first several seasons they make mention of keeping in touch with the supreme commander on their home planet, the Big Giant Head. (Stay with me here.) During one of the later shows, the Big Giant Head decides to take on human form and visit Earth. And who better to play a character named the Big Giant Head than William Shatner?

The Big Giant Head accidentally lands in the wrong city and has to take a jet, so the Solomons are picking him up at the airport.

All that is the setup for a couple of lines of throwaway dialogue that not 1 in a 100 people would get, but I nearly fell out of my chair:

Shatner's getting off the plane, and Sally asks, "How was your flight?"

[INDENT]Shatner: "It was horrible! There was this... thing, out on the wing of the plane!"

Lithgow, in frightened recognition: "The same thing happened to ME!!!!"[/INDENT]

A great moment.

Sorry for the lengthy post. I'm home sick with strep and need something to pass the time -- when I feel like being upright, that is.

eww.. strep sucks. To make you feel better and for Susi too, here is the link for the episode list of Amazing Stories. I will have to keep an eye out if they are going to play on Sci-Fi or something. I remember a bunch of those episodes.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088478/episodes

vixen101485 wrote:OOOO OOOO OOOO...***horshack imitation. I remember that show that one in particular. Awesome series. SIGH...now I have to go look up some more on it. Darn you .....lol And here I was going to go do dishes. All your fault I have to eat on dirty plates....lol

You can get the first season on DVD at Amazon or on eBay. Now I have to go rev up my DVD player to watch it today. :D:

BRWombat wrote:The 3rd Rock moment I spoke of was hilarious, but it requires some setup. (To me, that's what made it so masterful -- it was a reference only a very few people in the audience would get, but they still stuck it in.)

Apart from the opening and closing scenes I mentioned above, Twilight Zone: The Movie is a compilation of four short stories, each filmed by a different director. Some of the segments are better than others. The first, involving Vic Morrow as a racist blowhard who suddenly finds himself with the tables turned, is okay, but was overshadowed by the death of Morrow and two child actors during the filming. The second segment, directed by Steven Spielberg, was my favorite. It had Scatman Crothers as a man who brings a little youth to elderly residents of a nursing home. Sweet story. The third tale was downright creepy, about a boy who could change his environment at will, and holds several adults hostage as his "family" in a cartoon nightmare.

The fourth story has John Lithgow as a nervous flyer on a jet, whose nerves are getting the better of him. He's already near panic just from a strong fear of flying, when... he sees something on the wing -- some sort of creature tearing the engine apart, trying to make the jet crash! Trouble is, he's been such a handful already that no one believes him, and he goes berserk. True, creepy, old-fashioned Twilight Zone at its best.

The first three stories were created for the movie. Only the last, with Lithgow, was a remake of an original Twilight Zone episode. In the original, it was a young William Shatner who portrayed the panicky flyer.

Which leads to 3rd Rock from the Sun, a goofy and often clever comedy about an alien family sent to observe human ways. Lithgow plays their commander, in disguise as the dad of the family, Dick Solomon.

Throughout the first several seasons they make mention of keeping in touch with the supreme commander on their home planet, the Big Giant Head. (Stay with me here.) During one of the later shows, the Big Giant Head decides to take on human form and visit Earth. And who better to play a character named the Big Giant Head than William Shatner?

The Big Giant Head accidentally lands in the wrong city and has to take a jet, so the Solomons are picking him up at the airport.

All that is the setup for a couple of lines of throwaway dialogue that not 1 in a 100 people would get, but I nearly fell out of my chair:

Shatner's getting off the plane, and Sally asks, "How was your flight?"

[INDENT]Shatner: "It was horrible! There was this... thing, out on the wing of the plane!"

Lithgow, in frightened recognition: "The same thing happened to ME!!!!"[/INDENT]

A great moment.

Sorry for the lengthy post. I'm home sick with strep and need something to pass the time -- when I feel like being upright, that is.

Now that is clever! I would have caught it had I seen that episode! Like I said, the Lithgow segment was my favorite of the 4 in the movie. I remember when that accident happened with Vic Morrow. I was in news broadcasting at the time and it was one of our lead stories when it happened. Brutal. A lot of folks thought the set of that movie segment was jinxed or cursed at the time, I remember!

Oh my gosh! Strep is nasty. You will need antibiotics to get rid of that! I used to get strep throat regularly, twice a year when I was in my teens and twenties. Man, it hurts to swallow. It hurts to breathe. I have not had strep in years, knock wood. I do NOT want it again! I think I have a little teeny cold brewing right now. I am just a bit congested and my throat feels yucky. Not a sore throat, but like there is a virus or bug that is making it not healthy. You know that very first beginning stage of a cold. I BETTER not get one. We are flying out to DL a week from Wednesday and I am NOT going to be sick this trip. I refuse! I want a trip to enjoy this time, since he last one was a mess of flu and pain!

GET BETTER Wombat! Chicken soup and a good Disney film and alot of water! Fluids are good!!!!!!!
sues

The first three stories were created for the movie. Only the last, with Lithgow, was a remake of an original Twilight Zone episode. In the original, it was a young William Shatner who portrayed the panicky flyer.

Being old enough to remember the original twilight zone, I remember that all episodes except the first were remakes. Billy Mumy played Anthony in the original episode in the sixties, the kid who controlled everything.

BRWombat wrote:The fourth story has John Lithgow as a nervous flyer on a jet, whose nerves are getting the better of him. He's already near panic just from a strong fear of flying, when... he sees something on the wing -- some sort of creature tearing the engine apart, trying to make the jet crash! Trouble is, he's been such a handful already that no one believes him, and he goes berserk. True, creepy, old-fashioned Twilight Zone at its best.

The first three stories were created for the movie. Only the last, with Lithgow, was a remake of an original Twilight Zone episode. In the original, it was a young William Shatner who portrayed the panicky flyer.

The cloud crawlers! That was a cloud crawler on the wing!! Remember a long time ago when we were discussing airplanes and I mentioned something about cloud crawlers that live in the clouds and sometimes they get on a plane's wings and that's what causes it to crash? Well, that Twilight Zone episode is where the cloud crawlers are from.
At least that's what my ex use to tell my son when he was little. No wonder the kid had a fear of flying for awhile. But I still think of that whenever I fly through clouds. I have to look out the window and make sure there are no cloud crawlers trying to bring the plane down.

One of my favorite stories, and I don't remember if it was Twilight Zone or Amazing Stories, was the lady who bought a little hunter doll that came to life and tried to attack her. It chased her all over her house and every time she thought she'd killed it, the thing came back to life. I think she ended up throwing it in the oven and burning it, but when she opened the oven door all this smoke rolled out and the next thing you know, the lady (was it Karen Black?) is crouching in the corner holding a spear and she has turned into the hunter doll. Creepy! Makes you want to check under the bed before you go to sleep.
The other good story was the one about the human cookbook. Eek!

"to Serve Man"!