Sunday, October 17, 2010

CHUCKING AROUND

Digging through the pile of stories written for "Inner Toob" (but yet to be posted), I found one about the season premiere of 'Chuck' from last month.

So, let's finally get around to it.....

'Chuck' provided a couple of examples of Toobworld goodness in its first episode back this Fall TV season. Here's what they offered up:

1) HARRY DEAN STANTON AS THE "REPO MAN"Twenty-six years ago, Harry Dean Stanton starred in a cult classic, "Repo Man" with Emilio Estevez. And here he was again as that character, working the same job - repossessing cars. And this time it was Chuck and Morgan's $900.00 lemon. The name of the character wasn't stated within the episode and Toobworld Central doesn't acknowledge what happens in a show's credits. Therefore, why can't we assume that the actor was playing Bud, the same character as in the movie?

It's not like 'Chuck' has never crossed over with a movie before. It turns out that Big Mike, the former manager of the Buy More store, has Sgt. Al Powell as a first cousin. Sgt. Powell was the LAPD cop who helped John McClane take down the terrorists who "hijacked" the Nakatomi Plaza building in "Die Hard". That can mean one of two splainins - either "Die Hard" has a counterpart in the TV Universe, or the movie has been totally absorbed out of the movie universe and into Toobworld, as has happened before with "Maverick", the 1966 "Batman", and the "Star Trek" franchise.

And 'Chuck' isn't the only TV show that has incorporated something from "Die Hard" into Toobworld. 'Middleman' was at the Nakatomi Plaza building, crawling through the duct works during a case.

2) VANDALAY INDUSTRIES
Chuck applied for a job at Vandalay Industries which fans of 'Seinfeld' know was the fictional corporation that George Costanza claimed as a job reference. But what if it wasn't fictional? Maybe George saw the name somewhere and pulled it out of the deep recesses of his memory.

I don't know if we actually saw the name "Vandalay Industries" actually spelled out within those 'Seinfeld' episodes where it was featured (beginning with "The Stake Out"). But it's usually spelled as "Vandelay", whereas 'Chuck' identified it as "Vandalay" in an onscreen credit. But since those are invisible to all but the tele-cognizant, we can dismiss it if necessary.

Therefore, both references were for the same place.

BCnU!

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