My Bloody Valentine (1981): The Slasher That Ruined Valentine’s Day

In this episode of SlashBack Cinema, we revisit My Bloody Valentine (1981)—the Canadian slasher that proved Valentine’s Day is a terrible time to throw a party. Set in the mining town of Valentine Bluffs, the film follows the bloody legend of Harry Warden, a pickaxe-wielding killer with a flair for the dramatic, heart-shaped candy boxes and extremely personal murder notes.

This one is Quentin Tarantino's favorite slasher, and we ask the real question: does My Bloody Valentine earn its cult status—or is it just coasting on vibes, gore, and too much Valentine's Day candy?

Plus, we throw it back with trivia from 1981 and give the film its official Stabby Score.

Transcript

Shanny Luft: 0:05

Hey, welcome back to slash back cinema, where two Gen X dads revisit the strange, scrappy and unforgettable horror from the 70s and 80s. I'm Shanny

Ryan Dreimiller: 0:13

and I'm Ryan. This week, we're talking about Valentine's Day, when our thoughts turn to love candy and drowning in a tub of hot dogs.

Shanny Luft: 0:21

That's right, Cupid is trading in his arrows for a pickaxe today, because we're talking about 1981 My Bloody Valentine.

Ryan Dreimiller: 0:29

And then we're throwing it back with a little bit of trivia from that year. How well do you remember 1981 all

Shanny Luft: 0:35

right, so Ryan, had you ever heard of this movie before?

Ryan Dreimiller: 0:38

I feel like I saw it on some lists, but no, I didn't know anything about this one. How about you?

Shanny Luft: 0:44

I feel like it definitely fits into something we've talked about a lot of times, which is there needs to be one slasher movie for every holiday. Because at this point, like the movie Halloween, which I think kicked this off, had come out in the late 70s. But even before that, Black Christmas had been out, and then Friday the 13th was the year before this movie. And so I feel like those three movies convinced movie producers that what audiences wanted was harm around American holidays. Yeah, I'd heard about this one, but I feel like this one doesn't have quite the same love that the other ones I mentioned have had.

Ryan Dreimiller: 1:21

Yeah, definitely more obscure. And I don't know you sent it over. And I was like, I don't know about another kind of, like, generic 80s slasher. You're like, oh, keep it. Give it a try, man. You try my leg it. I think you said this was a Quentin Tarantino's favorite slasher from from that eras.

Shanny Luft: 1:38

Yeah, that's what convinced me. When I read that. I thought, all right, well, at least we should give it a shot. And, yeah, I was surprised. So in your family, is Valentine's Day a holiday? Is there like an expectation that you're buying chocolate or candy for the kids? Is that like an important holiday for Ryan's family?

Ryan Dreimiller: 1:55

I feel like Jen gets into it from the make sure the kids are covered, perspective with with the candy. And when they were little, they would get some random stuff. I mean, it's not a big holiday, but you got to make sure you got the chocolates, maybe bottle of wine, some flowers, you know, Valentine's romance, yeah, yeah. How about over there?

Shanny Luft: 2:15

Do you remember an elementary school where you used to bring in cards for every kid in your class, right? Did you, did you do that? Yeah? We were like, Yeah, I feel

Ryan Dreimiller: 2:23

like you had to make the cards. And then it was like, there's like, candy hearts with little different sayings on them,

Shanny Luft: 2:29

those little chunky hearts, yeah, yeah. Or like, little lollipops,

Ryan Dreimiller: 2:32

yeah, the chalky hearts. Like, we're kind of gross, but I kind of liked them, like there was something about them, like, I feel like it was like training wheels for Tums or something.

Shanny Luft: 2:46

You know what? Tums should come with little sayings printed on each Tum. Yeah. How are they not doing that?

Ryan Dreimiller: 2:53

Well, so now they've moved to this is going to reveal my, my personal GI issues. But like now they've moved to these hard shell they're more like candy the chalk going to the chalky ones, which I still kind of like the chalky ones, yeah. But the new ones have the hard shell on them, more like M, M's, but,

Shanny Luft: 3:08

um, but they still make the chalky ones. And they do, they do. I think they should have little things printed on them, like, shouldn't have had that extra slice of pizza or, really, a third meatball.

Ryan Dreimiller: 3:20

Like, they all realize you're over 50.

Shanny Luft: 3:24

So let's get into this movie and talk about the plot a little bit.

Ryan Dreimiller: 3:30

So it's set in the small mining town of Valentine's bluff. Bluffs, excuse me, conveniently named. I think population of that town is like 3000 people. Which town I live in is 1500 people. So this is a bigger town than I live in. So live in. But I was like, wow, they get look at all these buildings they have. Anyway, you were jealous of this town. I know. I was like, Look at all this town infrastructure they've got here.

Shanny Luft: 3:51

So funny, because I read it as a rundown town, like it looked like it had, kind of had been beaten up by the 1970s

Ryan Dreimiller: 3:59

Yes, it's had a hard life, so Valentine's bluffs, they've seen some better days, but they've got this simple rule, and it's, don't celebrate Valentine's Day, and it's because decades ago, there was this mine explosion accident that killed all these mine workers, except for one guy, this guy, Harry Warden, he survived and well, he came Back to extract his revenge on those who had been negligent and caused the accident. And he killed all these people. They locked them up in a mental mental institution, and then they said they'll never celebrate Valentine's Day again. Well, fast forward 20 years the next generation. They've ignored this warning, and they throw a Valentine's Day party so they get the talent gets all into it, and all of a sudden, murder start to happen again. The townsfolk are getting whacked. Teenagers are dying left and right, and people begin to believe that Harry warden has come back for revenge. So that's that's our set dressing for this one.

Shanny Luft: 4:54

I was immediately charmed by the fact that the town is called Valentine's we've talked about this. Before that, if you're going to construct your entire movie around a holiday, you need to lean into everything about that holiday. So the random fact that the town is called Valentine's bluff, I'm like, and then people in the movie are, like, kind of obsessed with Valentine's Day. One guy says, if there's one thing I love more than Christmas candy, it's Valentine's candy. I was like, Really, Valentine's candy. That's your favorite,

Ryan Dreimiller: 5:23

opening up like that. That box, heart box. Those chocolates are like the worst. It was like eating wax. But he was very excited about it, except until he opened it up and saw a heart inside the box.

Shanny Luft: 5:35

Yeah, yeah. First of all, the people in this town are giving it pretty substantial size boxes of chocolate you only ever see in movies or, you know, that's what you give to, like a new girlfriend, but I don't know, I never like those, because it's always like a Russian roulette of chocolate. You don't know what you're gonna get

Ryan Dreimiller: 5:51

in there. Well, half the time it's like the weird creams or fillings that, like you put it in your mouth, like, Oh, God. We thought we were fancy when we were handed this out in high school. But, yeah, gross.

Shanny Luft: 6:02

You know what? The fancy boxes are, the ones that came with a little map. Tell you what's in each one. I'm like, Just tell me which one has caramel. Point me to that one, and you can keep your strawberry cream. Yep, those were the good ones.

Ryan Dreimiller: 6:15

Yeah. What? Yeah. They really leaned into the Valentine's Day thematics, the streamers, the hearts everywhere. And some fantastic taglines for this movie too. We had Harry's out to steal your heart, cross your heart and hope to die.

Unknown: 6:30

Yeah, heart burn Sarah, beat My Bloody Valentine. The list keeps going. In this town on Valentine's Day, everybody loses their heart.

Shanny Luft: 6:40

Actually thought the characters were kind of interesting. I was surprised how much time was spent on fleshing out the characters. And there's a lot of them. There's so many people to keep track of. I was instantly lost with Wait, which one is this guy and who's this guy, and how did these all relate to each other? And I didn't realize the kill count in this movie is so high that they're introducing you to 25 people. So because they're going to be knocking off like 23 of them, like, yeah, there's really a lot of people to keep track of

Ryan Dreimiller: 7:09

in this film, yeah, when they got to, like, the peak party that they've they've just had to towns canceled the party because everybody's getting killed. And then the kids are like, Well, damn it, we're gonna have a party over at the mine in the I guess their break room or whatever.

Audio Clip: 7:24

Well, if we aren't Valentine's dance, what are we going to do? Why don't we have a Valentine party?

Ryan Dreimiller: 7:32

They start introducing people that I've never seen in this movie. I'm like, Who's this guy? I'm like, Oh, he's

Shanny Luft: 7:39

dead the movie. In the opening credits of the movie, a person dies. This movie does not it just got going. It's the opening credits, two people in mining outfits. So when we say miner over and over again, we're talking about people that work in coal mines. So these two people in like, fully decked out in minor outfits are walking down

Ryan Dreimiller: 8:01

describe what they're wearing, because, like, people might just think they're wearing dirt, dirty overalls

Shanny Luft: 8:06

right now. They're, they look like outfits you would wear to go to the moon. They were. They had, like, these onesie jumpsuits plus a full mask with giant eyes plus a mouth, yeah, the respirator, yeah. And so you can't even and they're wearing gloves. You can't see a person. They just look and clearly that is setting up, because that's what the killer is going to look like. So these two people go down to the mine, and then you find out that one of them is a woman. She wants to start making out. It's I felt bad for this actress who has to act sultry, taking off this mining costume, and then also act sexy around this guy's he doesn't want to take off his respirator, so she's like sexy respirator, and then he kills her. And meanwhile, they're running the opening credits, starring, also directed by

Ryan Dreimiller: 8:58

I was thinking, Boy, apparently Tiktok was inspired by this movie. They were like, hook 'em in two seconds. Like, we barely started the film, and somebody gets whacked. They're right out of the gate. I am surprised, honestly, that, like, this was sort of one and done. Like, I think people the was it paramount that did this one, but they had expectations that this was going to be the next Friday, the 13th, or whatever. And it did make money, like, I think they doubled whatever, they covered the costs, and then made a few million. But this one got thrown into the bin of slasher movies to be forgotten, although it did have a remake in what 2009 right? Apparently, they decided it needed to be in 3d I'm not sure why I had I know one of the things that you'll call out as we watch some of these is people not having any sense of what it actually takes to tell a story in terms of how you film something. I thought this was well shot like it was, like framed up, well, interesting cinematography. Fee this, the fact that they put it in a real environment, I thought, added a lot of character to this film, versus some of these set ones, like house we watched last week, you could tell that was on a set, and it like, creates a different, very different feeling than like these guys were in a freaking mind that I was like, I would not want to be down there. And I think they were shooting, like, sometimes, like, 900 feet down, had to, like, take precautions with the types of lighting that they were using to not actually set off a methane explosions, right?

Shanny Luft: 10:30

Yeah, the movie really filmed in an actual abandoned mine, and you can tell it's like, it doesn't look like a set at all. It doesn't look plastic. I was looking for interviews with the cast, and I couldn't find much, but damn, it must have been, hell. It must have been free. Have been freezing to film down there.

Ryan Dreimiller: 10:44

Well, should we talk about some favorite scenes as I was watching this? There's definitely some that stood out to me. And I think that the one question that rose to top of mind for me as I watched this, I was like, I need to talk to Shanny about who does the laundry in his house. How are your dryer skills? Yes.

Shanny Luft: 11:05

So one of the early people that's killed in this town is a woman who runs a laundromat, and then the police open up a dryer, and then her body falls out, and the movie goes out of the way to have the dryer spinning so that her body is spinning around. And, yeah, I wrote in my notes, how the hell is a human being supposed to fit inside of a dryer? Like they're not six feet deep? Oh, my god, yeah.

Ryan Dreimiller: 11:30

Well, one of those big industrial dryers, but still, like, that didn't crack me up, because the cop, he rolls in and he's like, he's like, something feels off, and he goes in there and he, like, starts assessing the the whole laundromat. He's looking for this woman, Mabel. Maybe they had a thing going on, who knows. But anyway, he he notices on the wall that the hearts are not facing the right the right way up. They've been turned around upside down. He pulls one off, and he's looking at he starts looking around. It's sort of like, you know, the cross being hung upside down in this town, apparently, or something. And then he walks over to the one laundry machine, opens it up and starts sniffing the laundry like I was like, Is this something that people do? But meanwhile, he doesn't notice that in the next dryer, there's a body had been clunking around. It's Mabel. She's been set on the too high of a heat setting,

Shanny Luft: 12:23

yeah, Detective, if you put a pair of tennis shoes in a dryer, it sounds like a thunderstorm in your house. How are you not noticing a adult human body spinning? Yeah? So that's kind of surprising. And see, this is another example of what I got a kick out of in this movie. The killer turns the hearts upside down like his his attention to detail. Very theatrical. Yeah, you know what it reminded me of? I think my favorite moment in the first Friday the 13th movie is when there's two people and they go into one of the cabins and they think they see someone in bed, and so they pull the blanket back, and it's just an ax sitting with the with the head of the AX on the pillow, I think. And I remember saying to you, this means Jason to go into that room, lay an ax on the bed, pull the blanket off like the attention to detail that Jason was putting into this actually, it wasn't Jason. You'll have to listen to the episode to find out who it was, but this killer who we're gonna just keep calling Harry until the end. He is just constantly coming up with like, like clever or wacky little things to do, like turning all the hearts upside down, or sticking human hearts inside heart chocolate boxes and writing poetry. Roses are

Audio Clip: 13:34

red, violets are blue. One is dead and so are you.

Shanny Luft: 13:41

I was trying to figure out which one of the people in this movie, which character, was a theater major, because I was positive that has to be the one who's the killer, because he's got such a way with his his murders. Everyone there, every single one. So there's a lot of murders to talk about, because this has, I think, the highest kill count of any movie we've talked about, yeah,

Ryan Dreimiller: 14:05

he's really going for it, like we've talked about in prior episodes, a certain ratio and formula around X number of minutes to how many teenagers need to die. Like, yeah, Harry was just letting loose, like it was high Carnage and a variety of ways. I mean, he's pretty consistent with his weapon. I mean, there's some like, variety in terms of, like, how it all came together, but nice little details, like you're saying, like, boiled human hearts and the hot dogs hot water. Like, he really got a lot of use of that hot water, boiling the hot dogs in that one scene.

Shanny Luft: 14:37

And then did you notice they don't realize the guy has been drowned in the hot dog water, and so they're just eating the hot dogs later on in the movie, not knowing they're murder dogs.

Ryan Dreimiller: 14:47

Murder dogs, well, until they notice this heart float up and they're like, what's this gross? And it's like, right?

Shanny Luft: 14:55

Yeah, the movie also raises questions about what the hell is in a hot dog, because the heart that they pull out. Coat of the hot dog water is exactly the same color as the hot dog. It looks just like a hot dog, slightly malformed, and so, because they don't see a body, they're like, Oh, that's weird. That's the

Ryan Dreimiller: 15:12

ketchup. Yeah.

Shanny Luft: 15:16

About the one hour mark, I started to I was getting a little bored, because I'm like, I mean, we've met way too many people for me to keep track of. And I also was starting to wonder, what exactly is the plot of this movie, like, who's the main character and what is the main character trying to do? But then right as I was starting to wonder that, I felt like the best part of the movie is really the last 30 minutes, because that's when the kids the police have canceled the Valentine's dance because Harry has written so many poems and delivered so many chocolate heart boxes with human hearts that the police are like, you know, we really need to listen to this guy and cancel this dance. But the kids are upset, and so they go down to a mine. Why don't they just go to one of their houses. Why is going down into the mine the next logical place to go so dark

Unknown: 16:06

down there? On second thought, I think I'm gonna stay right up here. Oh no, you don't if I'm going down there, baby, you're going with me.

Ryan Dreimiller: 16:14

And then I did have the note that this may have been the most Let's split up sequences in any horror movie that I've ever seen. Like it was, like, any opportunity that they were together, like one of them would go off in another direction and, well, guess what? That person got killed, and then they were like, down to the last three and then the guy's like, Oh, I'm just gonna go this way. And you're like, what?

Audio Clip: 16:37

They kept splitting up. It was like, left and right.

Shanny Luft: 16:40

But every time I thought he's probably the killer, that guy then died in the next scene and towards in the last 10 minutes, I'm like, they killed every person I thought was going to be the killer. We're really running out of casting.

Ryan Dreimiller: 16:51

Spoiler alert here, yeah, and they did throw you off the trail there towards the end where you're like, Oh, wow. Okay, that's interesting. But also, I will say, at no point watching this did I ever think it was Harry like this is 20 years later. This dude worked in the mine his entire life. There's no way he's coming back and taking people out like he's, at this point he can barely get out of a chair.

Shanny Luft: 17:15

That's some hard work, right? Yeah, we're in our 50s, and we didn't live a life of miners. Right? And already we can barely get off the couch. Yes, I have gotten lightheaded standing up. Have you had this happen to you yet? You know

Ryan Dreimiller: 17:31

you might want to check in with your doctor, but yes, it does, I will say so. Talking about this is like the final scene that was like my other scene to that I had highlighted as one of the favorites. The way it ends, like, I will say, this is a flashback done, right? Shanny, yeah, compared to Silent Night, deadly night, where we spent free 40 minutes in that movie flashing back, Dad has fallen out of the car. Mom has been killed. Dad's fallen like, I was like, Oh my God, this movie, it happened so fast. I was like, what just happened? Yes, like, they basically, they're like, why Axel? And then in a less than 22nd clip, they basically put his whole childhood on screen that explains why he's he's doing what he's doing. And you watch it, and you're like, Well, okay, right? I guess I get it.

Shanny Luft: 18:22

You're absolutely right in 15-20 seconds, they're like Axel, 20 years ago, was a little kid under the bed who watched his dad get killed by Harry because his dad his because axel's Dad was one of the town leaders who was responsible for this mine Cai in and so Axel grew up because he saw his father die. It's very close to Silent Night, deadly night, where, yeah, kid sees a parent die on a holiday, and now that kid is obsessed with that holiday

Ryan Dreimiller: 18:49

we talked about a little bit before, just in terms of, like, the setting being an actual talent. I think this was in Nova Scotia, Scotia. So it took me a beat to realize. I'm like, Oh, they sound weird. I must not be in America, but the true reveal was when I kept seeing all the moose head beer. It is in every scene. It seemed like it was the official beer of this movie, Shanny and perhaps this podcast.

Shanny Luft: 19:18

Are they a sponsor for this episode?

Ryan Dreimiller: 19:20

Oh, they certainly could be moose head beer. Who does the moose head beer?

Audio Clip: 19:26

Moose head beer brewed in Canada, possibly brewed with Canadians, made from ice, cold water, barley, hops, and legally, we're told to say no actual moose heads were used. But we're not ruling anything out. It's crisp, it's clean. It pairs perfectly with Valentine's Day parties. Moose head beer, when your slasher movie has more moose head than survivors, you're doing something right. Drink responsibly.

Shanny Luft: 19:52

Yeah, we want a moose head beer, not a sponsor flashback cinema, but a real company.

Ryan Dreimiller: 19:58

Yeah, don't. Don't sue us. It's just a joke. We love you.

Shanny Luft: 20:01

I'm sure, I'm sure they're a delicious brand, and we only have the highest respect for your corporate identity

Ryan Dreimiller: 20:09

and friends. We love Canada, and we're intellectual property. I think it's time for stabby scores.

Shanny Luft: 20:14

What do you I think we should do? How many beating hearts would you give this movie? So out of out of four beating hearts. How many beating hearts would you give My Bloody Valentine?

Ryan Dreimiller: 20:26

Well, we talked about slashers. Are not our favorites, but I would say this is a pretty damn solid, solid slasher, like is well done, well shot. I'm gonna land this one at a solid three hearts, beating hearts.

Shanny Luft: 20:37

Yes, absolutely. I'm 100% with you. Talk about that nice, yeah.

Ryan Dreimiller: 20:44

I mean, it's got a great setting. The cast is solid. I think it's well written. It's got a good backdrop and story. The kills are are pretty mean and kind of creative, and they really did lean in. We both appreciate a film when it really it embraces the holiday that it's anchoring too fully, between the written notes, the poetry, yeah, the cut out hearts in a box. You know, there's some real Luft put into this film. So it's a fun one. Where are you at with this?

Shanny Luft: 21:12

100% agree, yeah, three stabbies. Wow. Yeah, that hasn't happened, I think, in the last couple but it was better than I expected it to be. Actually, thought this movie, it doesn't have the kind of love now that Halloween or Friday the 13th or nightmare Elm Street has, even though a lot of people get killed, the deaths are just so wild and weird. So So yeah, three, three, beating hearts for me as well. All right. Well, I'm glad we got a little time here, because Ryan, I have a question for you.

Ryan Dreimiller: 21:41

Shanny, what's up?

Shanny Luft: 21:43

My question is, shall we play a game?

Ryan Dreimiller: 21:46

We shall. Yes.

Shanny Luft: 21:47

Yes, excellent. So My Bloody Valentine came out in 1981 So Ryan, today I have four trivia questions for you all about things that happened in 1981

Ryan Dreimiller: 21:58

okay, I was nine years old. I yeah, I may or may not remember some of these items, but Lay it on me. What do you got?

Shanny Luft: 22:05

Yeah, I'm gonna list four metal bands, three of them formed in 1981 so my question is, out of the four, which of these heavy metal bands did not form in 1981 Okay, here are your four choices. Anthrax, Slayer, Metallica and Def Leppard. Only one of those bands did not form in 1981 big year for heavy metals.

Ryan Dreimiller: 22:32

Okay. All right, hit me again.

Shanny Luft: 22:34

All right, you got anthrax, you got Slayer, you got Metallica, and then you've got Def Leppard

Ryan Dreimiller: 22:41

gonna go anthrax.

Shanny Luft: 22:44

Anthrax actually formed in 1981 and so did Slayer, and so did Metallica. Def, leaf leopard is the only one of the four that did not form in 1981 later. They were later, yeah. I think there were eight or three, yeah. So, um, I was really surprised, like 1981 is a big year for for metal bands forming Shanny.

Ryan Dreimiller: 23:07

I got a question for you, yeah, and what year was anthrax, the the ancient disease identified,

Shanny Luft: 23:19

I'm gonna say the 60s. Let's say 1965

Ryan Dreimiller: 23:24

who knows? I think it was 1876 Yeah, maybe 700 I don't know. I'm just

Shanny Luft: 23:33

all right. What do we got to Yeah? What popular cartoon premiered in 1981 only one of these three cartoons premiered in 81 was it the Smurfs? Was it Thundercats? Or was it he man? Which popular cartoon between Smurfs, Thunder Cats and he man premiered in 1981 only

Ryan Dreimiller: 23:56

one of them. Okay, I'm gonna go Smurfs. Was the Smurf.

Shanny Luft: 24:02

Well done, sir. Yes, I can't. I'm not. I can't. I'm struggling to picture you as a fan of the cartoon The Smurfs.

Ryan Dreimiller: 24:10

I joined me some Smurfs. Yeah, Smurf head and Papa Smurf.

Shanny Luft: 24:14

I feel like Smurfs was one of those first things that that my family, like, collected, like, like, you could buy every single Smurf, little plastic Smurfs. They were, like, in Hallmark stores. And so, yeah, we had quite a few of them. I feel like it's such a brilliant idea, because, because each Smurf has its own identity, you could find, like, what? Like, there's a jokey Smurf and and, of course, Smurfette. And so you could like, and there's, like, a sports playing Smurf, so everyone can have a Smurf that they associate with. There's brainy. I remember brainy. Oh, Brainy Smurf, yeah, all right, so you're one and one question number three, in 1981 it was the first year that a video game told a story in the cut scenes. So I'm gonna give you three options. My question is, which of these video games was the first video game ever to tell a story in the cut scenes? Was it Pac Man? Was it Donkey Kong, or was it Galaga?

Ryan Dreimiller: 25:14

Yeah, because it became a thing, and I know Miss Pac Man had a cut scene. I don't know about Pac Man. I'm Gore Donkey Kong.

Shanny Luft: 25:21

It was Donkey Kong, yeah, yes, the first video game that has story

Ryan Dreimiller: 25:25

the name, if you think about it, so Donkey Kong, like, seems like something was lost in translation, maybe. Yeah. Well, we were down in Philly over the holiday, and we went to those, one of those retro arcades, and, yeah, played me some Cubert and some Dong Kong. And, yeah, it was fun.

Shanny Luft: 25:51

Were your kids there? Were they impressed with what you? Could do to show off?

Ryan Dreimiller: 25:56

We, so, oddly enough, the game that really captured my 10 year old nephew's attention was Robotron. If you remember that game, he was really into Robotron.

Shanny Luft: 26:06

Remind me which one Robotron was.

Ryan Dreimiller: 26:08

So that's the one. You had the two joysticks, and you were like, you could one made you move, the other made you shoot. And each level like all you'd have to kill all the things on the screen. And okay, I what I realized is, it's like, the audio still holds up in those games. It was so, like, loud, you're blowing everything up. Like, he was like, yeah, and he could play side by side. So it was kind of fun.

Shanny Luft: 26:30

I think the reason I have such fondness for like, the 80s video games is it's a time period, especially in early 80s, where you didn't have a lot of graphic fidelity, no. And so to come up with and design a video game, they really had to focus on, like, creative concepts. Remember, Dig Dug. Your job is to it's a perfect game for this movie, because you dug down into these mines, yeah, and then you had, like, an air pump that you would use to pop the bad guys. Do you think that I'm overly romanticizing those that time, or, I

Ryan Dreimiller: 27:05

mean, I feel like what worked was they had a lot of limitations, like you're saying, in terms of, like the graphics and what could actually be done, and they made up. They made them really engaging. I mean, it's the soundtracks, I think, and the auditorium components of those games, I think, and then also the graphics on the branding that they brought to it, and then the whole experience, you had to go somewhere else, like so there. It's very immersive and sensory, engaging. Yeah, thing that happened with those games, it was a shared experience too, which, you know, I mean, you get that now because you're playing online, but it's different because you're not together physically.

Shanny Luft: 27:43

Yeah, going into an arcade was also amazing, like the cacophony the music of all the games at the same time. It was just a great feeling to go into the casino training wheels. I love it. If people, I don't know if this little sidebar is going to make it into our podcast, but I'd love to hear listeners what their favorite video games were from that time. And what you went to in the arcade, my my go to immediately was that Star Wars game where you flew an X Wing fighter into the Death Star. It was, it was kind of like the first game I ever saw that was kind of 3d and the idea of being an X Wing fighter, man, I just, I pumped so many quarters into that game. And so that actually relates to my final question. Lay it on me. I'm ready for it. So you got the first one wrong, but then you you killed it with the Smurfs and Donkey Kong. So you're two for three right now. Last question. So the movie Empire Strikes Back, came out in 1980 and this is when they were really rolling with Star Wars toys. I felt like, like, when the first Star Wars movies came out, they were kind of like caught unawares, that kids were going to obsess over these toys, like heroin addicts. But by Empire Strikes Back, they were, they were ready. They're printing money, yeah. And so one of my, my most prized toys that that I was obsessed with as a kid was an ad at Walker.

Ryan Dreimiller: 29:01

That was a big, big spendy item there.

Shanny Luft: 29:03

That's exactly where I'm going. So Ryan, I looked up how much an ad at Walker cost in 1981 and so my question, I'm going to give you three prices, and this is 19 $81 you tell me how much you think an ad at Walker was. And so people

Ryan Dreimiller: 29:19

that don't remember the ad at it was quite large, like, it was not a small toy that was, like, it was probably, like, almost two feet tall, maybe not quite that tall. And you could put a lot of figurines in there. This was a, this is a top tier item here.

Shanny Luft: 29:32

All right, how much was it at AT walker in 1981 yeah, this is the thing that walked in the snow. So was it$3999? Was it $4999? or was it $5999?

Ryan Dreimiller: 29:46

in my head, before you started talking about it, I was like, it's, it's 40 bucks, but like, a lot of cash in 81 like, I feel like we had one, and I can't believe if I. Had one and it was $49 there's no way my parents bought it for me, like it definitely my grandparents bought it for me. All right.

Shanny Luft: 30:07

My mind is blown right now because I wanted to follow up with I didn't even think I knew anybody that had this toy. You and I were not friends like in 1981 but I was obsessed with this thing. It was just from TV commercials, but it was the coolest toy I could imagine. Yeah. And so that's why, that's what got me thinking about it. But you want to say, was it 3999 4999 or 5999 and I want to remind you before you say your answer, yeah, almost every time we've played this game, when you go with your gut, that is correct,

Ryan Dreimiller: 30:40

I'm going 49 I'm going 49 because I was gonna go back to 39 I'm like, that's wrong. 4949 99 is correct. Damn. 50 bucks. What's that in today's currency?

Shanny Luft: 30:53

I looked it up, yes. If so, if you, if you were to buy one today, the amount that you would be paying. Now, I don't mean like as a collector's item, because they're way more than this, but in today's dollars, 4999 would be $179 which I actually thought was less than I expected it to be. But can you imagine buying your kid $179 toy? I mean, I don't know. Maybe because everything's out of control, because kids have $500 phones in their pockets that it doesn't even seem like that much, but the idea of a $50 Star Wars toy, it was way out of my price range. Yeah, that's wild. As I was writing these questions, the thing that I was reflecting on was, do you call it an AT-AT walker, or do you call it an "A" "T" "A" T".

Ryan Dreimiller: 31:39

I always call it an AT-AT, I don't know actual,

Shanny Luft: 31:41

yes, you call it that because that is correct. Because, okay, let me tell you the story. This is one of my proudest parenting experiences. Oh, okay. Oh, no. What do you got when Simon was in elementary school? This is my son. He referred to it in school as an ad at Walker. And another kid in class said, No, it's an 8080, and Simon said, No, you don't say the letters. You say you read it. You call it an ad at and then he and the kids started arguing, and Simon's response was, yeah, you don't call it a twin ion engine. You call it a tie fighter. Like, oh, Simon, I am so proud of you. The fact that he could pull that out and point out that everyone calls them TIE Fighters, even if you don't know what T ie stands for, but Simon knew what it stood for and had that argument in his pocket. Oh man, I was so proud. I thought that is, yeah, that is extremely persuasive argument. Those are ad at walkers that wraps up another trip down memory lane. Hopefully you enjoyed revisiting My Bloody Valentine as much as we did.

Ryan Dreimiller: 32:41

If you're enjoying slash back cinema, subscribe to the show and rate and review us on Apple or Spotify. Please do leave a comment. It really does help new listeners find us, and we appreciate it. If you'd like to support us directly, you can donate at the link below in the show notes, and a huge thank you to all our current sponsors,

Shanny Luft: 32:57

plus, we want to hear from you. If you've got a favorite memory from the 70s or 80s, or a classic horror movie you'd like us to dissect. Drop us a line at slash back cinema.com, because your suggestions keep the conversation alive.

Ryan Dreimiller: 33:14

You keep wanting me to eat this microphone, and then you get mad when I'm blowing it out! so well I can't make you happy, or my wife! What's going on?