Episode 251: Passing Fads of the 2000s, Terminator 2, Origins of CGI, Huey Lewis & the News(7-8-2026)

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Passing fads from the 2000s. Terminator 2, 35 years later. The origins of computer-generated imagery (CGI).

Episode 251 brings the cool breeze of GenX nostalgia to the hot July weather.

It all begins with a staple of today's entertainment. Computer-Generated Imagery, or CGI, is commonplace in the 2020s. So much so that it can be taken for granted. It had to begin somewhere, and we're going to look back at the origins of CGI, which go back further than you might realize.

Hasta la vista, baby! 35 years ago this week one of the greatest sci-fi films, and one of the greatest sequels ever, was released. Terminator 2: Judgment Day broke the mould of what a science-fiction film could do. Great characters, incredible effects, tremendous acting, and more. We will do a deep dive into this iconic 90s film.

The Top 5 heads way back to the bygone days of the early 21st century. We are going to look, laugh, and shake our heads at some of the passing fads of the 2000s. Were you guilty of partaking in any of them?

We have a brand new This Week In History and Time Capsule, of course, looking at the life and career of 80s rock legend Huey Lewis.

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Helpful Links from this Episode

• Buy My New Book, In Their Footsteps!
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Listen to Episode 250 here

Transcript

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0:02

Hello world, and welcome to the In My Footsteps podcast.

I am Christopher Setterlund, coming to you from the vacation destination known as Cape Cod, MA.

And this is episode 251.

Man, it's a hot 1, like 7 inches from the midday sun, as Rob Thomas would say.

0:25

I'm here to help you try to stay cool with a new batch of Gen.

X nostalgia.

We're going to kick it off with a look back at the origins of CGI in general and some of the early uses of it in movies.

We're going to go way back in the day, 35 years to the release of Terminator 2, Judgement Day, one of the best movies I've ever seen in theaters.

0:50

There's going to be a brand new top five going back to the bygone era of the 2000s to look at some of the passing fads from that decade.

And there's going to be a brand new this week in history and time capsule looking back at the life and career of Huey Lewis as we celebrate his 76th birthday.

1:09

All of that is coming up right now on episode 251 of the In My Footsteps podcast.

It is a race against time for me this week.

Like I said in the intro, it is a hot one.

One of the hottest days of the year probably is happening on the day I'm recording this podcast.

1:29

I record on Fridays to launch the podcast on Wednesdays.

Those of you living in the East, you know the Friday was the hottest day of the year so far.

We're in one of the worst heat waves of the last 15 years.

And what I mean by a race against time is I have my AC unit in the window to my right.

1:50

But if I have that thing going during the time that I record the podcast, it's just an incessant humming that is super annoying to hear and even more annoying to edit out.

So I've got the AC off.

We are headed for a high in the upper 90s today.

2:07

I'm going to try to get through this podcast quickly with as few mistakes as possible.

I hope wherever you are, you are staying cool.

I hope you had a safe 4th of July weekend.

Thank you all for tuning in.

Thank you to everyone who tuned in last week to mix tape #4 weird New England laws.

2:27

This week I'm back with all new content to hopefully accompany you to the beach or having you sit in front of an AC unit freezing cold or 1000°.

I can't start off the podcast without thanking my Patreon subscribers.

2:43

Big shout outs to Laurie, Mary Lou, Ashley, Kevin, Leo, Marguerite, Neglectoid, crystal, Matt, doctor, shrimp, Porto, Chico.

Thank you all for being my biggest supporters, my biggest backers.

2:59

You too can get a shout out on the podcast by becoming a Patreon member.

I have multiple tiers, 3 dollars, $5 a month to support me and my content.

I'm doing more this month in July to try to figure out things that I can do for content to get more members, more subscribers.

3:19

I also have an ever growing free tier over there on Patreon so you can go and become a member and it doesn't cost you anything.

You get access to bonus podcasts, you get early access to the hidden track podcasts, you get the remastered without a map, live streams, early access to YouTube videos, special bonus podcasts like the 1996 changed everything series.

3:44

The second one is going up sometime this month.

As many starving artists would say, it cost nothing to look.

The link to Patreon is in the podcast notes, so go and check it out.

Also, you'll notice at the top of the podcast notes the link to the GoFundMe for my feature film debut The Cabin, which I am producing.

4:06

If you can, go and donate to it before the middle of August.

If you're hearing this after, then you know don't go.

It'll be shut down.

But go and donate if you can.

Share if you can't.

This is the biggest project of my professional life.

There will be more time for housekeeping at the end of the podcast.

4:23

I am tracking the temperature in my room with no AC going.

So let's dive into the podcast like I was diving into a pool filled with ice.

Let's look at the origins of CGI and some of the earliest examples of it in movies.

4:40

Coming up right now to kick off episode 251 of the In My Footsteps podcast.

CGI computer generated imagery has been a part of the entertainment industry for well over 30 years, at least in good ways.

4:58

It is seen by a lot of people as one of the most important technological revolutions in the history of entertainment.

Especially when done right.

CGI makes almost anything possible in terms of storytelling, visual effects in movies, television.

5:16

In the beginning it was just abstract mathematical experiments that were conducted by scientists and engineers, and this eventually transformed movies, TV, video games, advertising, architecture, medicine, nearly every form of modern visual communication.

5:34

On the other hand though, those of us that are old enough to remember movies without CGI, sometimes if it's done poorly it can take you out of it.

Practical effects, stop motion effects, just overall creative visual effects seem to be things of the past mostly, and when they're brought back into films they seem revolutionary again.

5:56

Today CGI is so common that most audiences don't even notice it.

There are entire digital worlds, realistic creatures, actors being de aged and photo realistic environments are now just routine.

Before computers entered filmmaking, visual effects were created using practical methods.

6:18

Things like miniatures, matte paintings, stop motion animation, optical compositing, puppetry, hand drawn animation, stop motion effects.

I always think of when it comes to older creature feature films, the original King Kong or some of the B movies in the 1950s.

6:39

For as detailed as CGI can be, I think stop motion animation is even more impressive, where every single movement of a creature has to be done by hand.

Classic films like King Kong, the original, and 2001 A Space Odyssey relied on groundbreaking practical effects that push the limits of pre digital filmmaking.

7:01

These were effective, but they were also really labor intensive, limited by physics and camera technology.

It led to scientists and engineers beginning to wonder whether computers could someday create images entirely from mathematics.

Incredibly, the roots of CGI stretch all the way back to the 1950s, when researchers first used computers to generate simple images.

7:26

Early computers were massive machines.

I mean, look at your phone that you have and realize that it probably has 200 times the power of the computers that were around 60 years ago that were probably the same size as the room you're sitting in.

7:43

One of the earliest pioneers of CGI was Ben Liposki, who created abstract electronic images called ossilions using analog computers in 1952.

Another major breakthrough came from Ivan Sutherland, who is often called the father of computer graphics.

8:03

In 1963, Sutherland developed Sketchpad at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT.

Sketchpad allowed users to interact with graphics differently on a screen using a light pen.

This was revolutionary because it introduced concepts still fundamental today, like graphical user interfaces, object manipulation, digital drawing, and interactive graphics.

8:29

Much of the early CGI research was funded by military and aerospace organizations.

The Cold War era saw governments investing heavily in computing technology for flight simulation, radar visualization, satellite imaging.

8:46

Organizations like NASA, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, they all helped accelerate graphics computing research.

By the mid 1960s, artists and programmers began experimenting with digital animation.

One of the earliest important films was Hummingbird in 1967, created by Charles Surry.

9:06

He combined artistic techniques with computer algorithms, proving computers could create expressive visual art rather than merely technical diagrams in an answer to a trivia question.

The first CGI used in film was in 1973, a film called Westworld, directed by Michael Crichton.

9:29

It should come as no surprise that the person who created the Jurassic Park series of novels and then that led to the films was the one that first experimented with CGI in movies.

Westworld featured a robot gunslinger played by Yul Brenner.

9:46

The film used computerized pixelated imagery to represent the robot's point of view.

Those of you younger, if you see it, it'll be very primitive to you, just like people looking back at Atari video games that were the best thing ever when I was a kid.

10:01

But even though it was primitive by today's standards, it was groundbreaking as being one of the first uses of digital image processing in cinema.

It introduced audiences to a distinctly computer generated visual aesthetic and obviously demonstrated that computers could become part of the cinematic storytelling.

10:21

The sequel to Westworld called Futureworld, which came out in 1976, made history again by featuring the 1st 3D CGI human face and hand in a feature film.

These sequences were created by researchers at the University of Utah, one of the most important institutions in CGI history.

10:43

This program became legendary because many future CGI pioneers studied at the University of Utah, including Ed Catmull, John Warnock, and Jim Blinn.

The Utah Teapot, which is a simple 3D model created in 1975, became one of the most famous symbols in computer graphics history because it was widely used to test rendering systems.

11:08

If you type in Utah Teapot, you'll see it's very simple.

It is a teapot in 3D graphics.

It's nothing special, but considering it was 50 years ago, it definitely changed the world of graphics.

In the later 1970s, Star Wars came around, and even though the original Star Wars relied mostly on practical effects, it helped advance digital filmmaking indirectly.

11:33

George Lucas founded Industrial Light and Magic, which became one of the most influential effects studios in history.

It pushed forward motion control, photography, digital compositing, computer assisted editing, and early CGI research.

11:50

And if you didn't think that George Lucas was looking forward to CGI, just look at the remastered Star Wars trilogy, the original that came out in the late 90s.

You either loved it because it gave a fuller vision of what George Lucas's Star Wars universe was meant to be, or you hated it because it ruined things from your childhood.

12:11

Me, I liked it.

The big revolution in CGI came in 1982 with the release of Tron.

Produced by Walt Disney Pictures, Tron combined live action with extensive computer generated environments.

12:27

This is 44 years ago.

The visual stunned audiences.

Glowing digital landscapes, Wireframe vehicles, Computer rendered animation, virtual worlds.

The funny thing is, the film was disqualified from Academy Award consideration for visual effects because some people believe computers were cheating.

12:49

The original Tron was a modest hit at the box office, making $50 million on a budget of 17,000,000, and is 60% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.

So even though it was revolutionary, it didn't immediately change the world in terms of CGI.

13:06

That would come a few years later with the rise of Pixar.

This was because of Inside Lucasfilm, the company's computer division, led by Ed Catmull and Alvi Ray Smith, developed advanced rendering technology.

A young animator named John Lasseter joined the team and helped to demonstrate that CGI could emotionally connect with audiences.

13:29

In 1986, Steve Jobs purchased the division, which became Pixar.

I'm pretty sure that most of you have heard of Pixar, especially since Toy Story 5 just came out last month.

Besides Pixar, the 1980s saw a lot of breakthroughs in CGI, including The Last Starfighter, which came out in 1984.

13:50

It was one of the first films to use extensive CGI for spacecraft battle sequences instead of physical miniatures.

Digital models were used for many scenes.

This was important because it demonstrated that CGI could replace practical models, but more importantly it reduced certain production limitations.

14:11

You know, you might not have the budget of millions of dollars to blow up a city block for real, but you could create a fake 1 using CGI and have it blow up and if you get it wrong you just tweet the program to make it look right.

Young Sherlock Holmes in 1985 featured the first fully computer generated photo realistic character in a movie, a stained glass knight.

14:36

One of the first examples of CGI that I remember is the movie The Abyss from 1989.

This was directed by James Cameron and featured a water like alien creature created with CGI.

This sequence was revolutionary because the CGI interacted realistically with the actors.

14:56

Surfaces reflected light naturally.

The digital object moved organically.

As CGI evolved, you got into more all time classic movies with uses of CGI.

Terminator 2, which we're going to talk about later, Jurassic Park, the Toy Story franchise.

15:15

By the late 90s and early 2000s, CGI was mainstream.

Titanic, The Matrix.

The Star Wars prequel trilogy, The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

You started to get motion capture, digital crowds, realistic physics simulations.

15:33

To start to sum this up, CGI changed media forever because #1 filmmaking became limitless.

I just mentioned my example of blowing up city blocks.

But directors could now create with CGI impossible worlds, massive battles, alien planets.

15:52

Modern franchises like Avatar, Avengers, End Game and Frozen would be completely impossible without CGICGI also led to the decline of practical effects because as it became cheaper and more powerful, many studios reduce their reliance on the miniatures and stop motion and animatronics.

16:13

CGI transformed television.

It evolved video games dramatically.

Interestingly though, beyond entertainment, CGI also transformed architecture, medical imaging, scientific visualization, engineering, virtual reality.

16:31

At some point in the future on the podcast, I will go in the other direction and look at some of the worst examples of CGI, just because I have to do that.

Obviously we're looking back, though.

Over 50 years since CGI was first used in film.

What began as crude wireframes and mathematical experiments evolved into one of the most powerful artistic tools ever created.

16:56

It revolutionized movies, reshaped television, and transformed gaming, but more importantly, it expanded the limits of imagination itself.

It's almost like anything you can think of you can make.

Due to CGI.

The Pioneers of computer graphics weren't merely inventing special effects, they were creating an entirely new visual language for modern civilization.

17:25

This week in history we are going back 76 years to July 5th, 1950 and the birth of 80s music icon Huey Lewis.

This was 1 I had to do.

Few artists are as closely associated with the sound of 80s American pop rock as Huey Lewis and for me as a child of the 80s growing up having his sports album and him being the soundtrack to Back to the Future, there was no way I was going to pass up on looking at the life and legacy of Huey Lewis.

18:01

Huey Lewis was born Hugh Craig in New York City.

Although he was born in New York, he grew up primarily in Marin County, north of San Francisco in California.

He was an exceptionally bright student who reportedly scored a perfect 800 on the math portion of the SAT.

18:19

He also excelled in athletics and became an all state baseball player during high school.

His family environment exposed him to creativity and counterculture influences, with his mother later becoming involved with beat poet Lou Welch.

18:38

Huey Lewis also became familiar with the music scene surrounding the Grateful Dead growing up in that area.

After graduating from the prestigious Lawrenceville School in 1967, Huey Lewis enrolled at Cornell University to study engineering, but by 1969, he had left college to pursue a career as a musician.

18:59

Before he became famous, Huey Lewis hitchhiked across America and eventually made his way to Europe.

During these travels, he learned to play the harmonica.

While waiting for rides, he spent time playing music on the streets in Spain and elsewhere.

19:16

Years later, Lewis often described these adventures as some of the most important experiences of his life.

In the early 70s, Lewis joined a band called Clover in the Bay Area.

At the time, he was performing under the nickname Huey Harp.

19:31

Because of his harmonica skills, members of this band Clover contributed to early recordings by Elvis Costello.

When Clover dissolved in the late 1970s, Lewis returned to California and began assembling the musicians who would become Huey Lewis and the News.

19:50

This new group initially performed under the name Huey Lewis and the American Express, but there were legal concerns from the credit card company, so the band adopted the simpler name of Huey Lewis and the News.

The band included talented musicians like Johnny Cala, Bill Gibson, Sean Harper, Mario Cipollina and Chris Hayes.

20:12

Their sound combined rock, soul, Blues and some new wave influences.

Their second album, Picture This in 1982 was what broke them through a little bit on MTV with songs Working For a Living and Do You Believe In Love.

20:30

Everything changed, though, when they released the album Sports.

This is My introduction to Huey Lewis.

It included the hit songs Heart and Soul, I Want a New Drug, The Heart of Rock'n'roll, and If This Is It, These songs were all over MTV, all over the radio.

20:47

Eventually, sports would go on to sell more than 10 million copies, with the appeal of the band crossing demographic lines.

Because they combined catchy pop hooks with traditional rock'n'roll sensibilities, they seem to be normal in an age where there were a lot of unique, I'll say, acts.

21:06

In 1980's Pop, Huey Lewis looked like a guy that you would just see at the store or a coffee shop.

Maybe that's why he played a teacher, at least for a few moments in the original Back to the Future 'cause he just looked like he could be one.

Sports may have made Huey Lewis in the news mainstream stars, but it was Back to the Future and the music that they recorded for it that forever linked them to the highest of highs in mainstream 1980s culture.

21:37

The Power of Love and Back in Time are two of the most well known songs from the 80s.

The Power of Love earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song.

And for those of you that don't know Back to the Future, Huey Lewis is in it.

When Marty Mcfly's band are trying out for the talent show and the teacher that tells him they're just too darn loud, that was Huey Lewis.

22:02

Their follow up album 4 had hit songs like Stuck With You, Hip, To Be Square, and Doing It All for My Baby.

Despite selling 10s of millions of albums and being recognized worldwide, friends and colleagues have often described Huey Lewis as unusually grounded for a major rock star.

22:21

Sadly, in the 20 tens, Huey Lewis developed many Airs disease, which is a condition that affects the inner ear and can cause Vertigo, tinnitus, dizziness, and hearing loss.

In 2018, he had to retire from touring and performing because of this hearing loss.

22:38

Despite the hearing loss, Huey Lewis and the News released their final album, Weather, in 2020.

Huey Lewis occupies a unique place in American Music history, with his music remaining a staple of classic rock and oldies radio, while the power of love continues to be inseparable from Back to the Future.

22:59

More than 4 decades after his breakthrough, Huey Lewis remains one of the defining voices in American pop rock.

And we go back 76 years ago this week in history, and we wish Huey Lewis a happy birthday.

We're going to go back in time to another time capsule.

23:21

Boy, that really fits.

Here we are going back 42 years to July 10th, 1984.

I chose this because Huey Lewis and the new song If This Is It, was released, it would go on to become the band's fifth top ten hit.

23:38

But what was going on elsewhere in the world of pop culture back then?

Let's find out.

The number one song was When Doves Cry by Prince.

This was off of the all time classic album Purple Rain.

It was Prince's first number one hit, staying there for five weeks.

23:59

Fun fact, because I don't know when I'll get to share this again on the podcast, the year 1984 is known for having the fewest number of #1 albums with only five albums going to #1.

Those were Thriller by Michael Jackson, the Footloose movie, soundtrack Sports by Huey Lewis and the News, Born in the USA by Bruce Springsteen and Purple Rain by Prince the murderer's row of excellent albums.

24:29

There's a trivia question you can use at work.

The number one movie was Ghostbusters and you could get into the theater with a ticket costing $3.36.

Another all time classic starring legends like Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Sigourney Weaver, Rick Moranis, but a group of guys that fight ghosts in New York City.

24:57

The movie is 95% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.

In 1984, it made $370 million at the box office.

That is equal to just under $1.2 billion when adjusted for inflation.

So yeah, this movie was a big deal.

25:14

Endlessly quotable in the Ghostbusters theme, ironically is connected to Huey Lewis because Lewis claimed that portions of Ray Parker Junior's Ghostbusters theme resembled the melody and structure of I Want a New Drug.

I can always do a segment on the podcast about that later.

25:34

The number one TV show was Simon and Simon.

No, this is not the fictional show about Paul Simon and Simon from the Chipmunks teaming up.

I wish it was now.

It was a drama series about brothers Rick and AJ Simon running a private detective agency in San Diego.

25:54

It was on for eight seasons and 156 episodes between 1981 and 1988.

And if you were around back then, July 10th, 1984, maybe you were coming down from the highs of the 4th of July celebration.

26:11

You're a little short on cash, but you need to go buy some stuff at the store.

Well, you're in luck.

There are two catches, though.

First, you have to live near a Venture department store, which was kind of a discount retail chain, kind of like Bradley's.

26:27

And the other catch is you have to be over 62 and have the Venture Senior Citizens Savings card.

You could save 10% at the store.

You could save on such things as great fitting clothes.

This is how they describe it in the ad.

26:44

Powders, lotions, notions.

I guess they were trying to be cute and rhyme.

Yarns, draperies, but no tobacco.

So don't go in there trying to buy a carton of cigarettes with your ID, Dang it.

But best of all is they have a sale on exercise needs.

27:01

It says to strengthen your thighs.

That is in their ad.

So if you're 62, go to venture and strengthen your thighs.

But that's going to wrap up another time capsule that's going to wrap up this week.

In history we go from the mid 1980s to the bygone era of the beginning of the 21st century.

27:23

So let's look at some passing fads from the 2000s and all bask in the embarrassment that we did some of these or own some of these.

You know, in my mind, the 1980s are still 30 years ago.

27:42

The 90s are still 20 years ago.

Unfortunately, as I get closer to 50, I find myself being shocked at how long ago certain things were.

I figured, why should I be the only one to feel old?

Let's all of us go together and be sad about the passing of time.

28:00

This week's top five we're going to look at the passing fads of the 2000s, which just so you have it hammered home in your head.

The year 2000 was 26 years ago now.

I could sit here and cry as AARP gets closer to my doorstep, or we can laugh at some of these passing fads that I'm sure a lot of you listening to had or did.

28:24

As with most of these top fives, they're in no particular order.

I've got some honorable mentions to get the ball rolling.

I will tell you the hardest part about this list, besides coming to grips with the fact that it was so long ago now, was narrowing down my choices, mostly because it's feels like it was yesterday.

28:44

So a lot of these things, I'm like, wait, these are passing fads?

I thought they were still around, and some of them are kind of.

But enough about that.

Let's get in the therapy circle and hold hands and we'll get through this together.

Honorable mentions for passing fads of the 2000s include the PT Cruiser automobile.

29:05

This was made by Chrysler from 2001 to 2010.

It looked very much like what cars looked like in the 40s and 50s.

Apologies to my aunt and cousin who both owned PT Cruisers.

Another honorable mention is FarmVille.

29:24

This is on the honorable mentions because it came out in 2009, so right at the end of the 2000's.

The obsessive game where you would plant crops and that was it.

Many of my Facebook memories from 2009, 2010 are me sharing FarmVille updates.

29:44

Like, man, I really had a lot of important stuff to say.

Oh, look at my new beats that I planted.

Yay.

Another honorable mention is twerking.

If you don't know what that is, this this stupid dance where you kind of squat and just shake your ass up and down like it's not really a dance.

30:04

It's also on the honorable mentions because it's still around today.

You see a lot of stupid social media videos with people just doing that.

Like it's really impressive.

I say that, and I come from the generation where we had the cabbage Patch, where you basically mimic stirring sauce in a big pot and that's a dance.

30:24

Or the running man or the Electric Slide or whatever.

MC hammers wiggly feet to the side with his parachute pants.

Is that Chinese typewriter?

Whatever name.

But yes, twerking is still the dumbest of all of those.

Another honorable mention is blinged out everything that was with the rise of cell phones.

30:46

Putting things on your phones, fake rhinestones or different colors or stickers, trying to make your 30 cent flip phone look like it was something right off of the Hills or Jersey Shore or whatever show was quote UN quote cool at the time.

31:04

And the final honorable mention is buying custom ringtones.

I think this might still be a thing, but back in the 2000s when you would pay extra money to have a clip of a song, sometimes poorly done to be your ringtone, I guess they were status symbols.

31:24

Instead of having some random computer generated sound as your ringtone, you had a few seconds of a real song.

Me, because I'm old, I'd rather have the old Rotary telephone ringing that sound, which ironically annoyed me as a kid.

31:40

But those are the honorable mentions.

Did you do any of these?

Own any of these?

Did you play FarmVille while twerking in the back seat of your PT Cruiser?

But the embarrassment really continues now as we get into the actual top five S the passing fads of the 2000s.

32:00

We're going to start with #1 frosted hair tips.

No, this is not some knock off brand cereal.

This was thanks to every boy band that came out around that time.

It was putting a lighter color or a different color just at the end of your hair.

32:19

Mostly guys.

Typically their hair would be spiked up and you'd have darker hair and then blonde Little tips.

You look like matchsticks on fire.

I colored my hair many times when I was in college, some worse than others, but it was always my whole head.

32:38

It wasn't just the ends of my hair.

I think it was mostly because I figured it would be too much of a pain to keep it up.

But then again, there was one time that I colored my hair red and I think I left it in just long enough to walk outside and realize it was crap.

32:55

And I think I went in and shaved my head #2 is fidget spinners.

This is a toy that was like 3 sided, these three lobes with a center and you would spin it around because that's what it was.

33:11

It was like to give kids with extra energy things to do with their hands.

I guess what's interesting is it was a fad in the 2000s that a lot of people just used in the 20 tens.

It became more useful for kids with autism or ADHD.

33:29

So I'm not looking at fidget toys today.

I'm looking at the fidget spinner in particularly from the 2000s.

I always saw them in the 2000s as being almost like the successor to hacky sacks, where a lot of people had them, but very few knew like what to do with them.

33:48

So you just had it.

The irony now is that at my mother's house, she has several fidget toys, which I think she got originally for my youngest niece, Sylvie.

Every time I go over, I end up playing with them to the point that she's gotten new fidget toys and I go over and I end up playing with them.

34:07

I do think I have a touch of adult ADD, but that's fine.

It makes more sense with some of my manic moments on this podcast, like right now.

Anyway #3 is LIVESTRONG bracelets.

Do you remember when Lance Armstrong was a respected and inspirational athlete and you had the yellow rubber bands that you would put around your wrist to support cancer awareness and survivor programs?

34:37

Yes, it was a different time.

I had a LIVESTRONG bracelet because I thought it was great that Lance Armstrong was so inspirational.

Little did we know that he was super doped up.

These silicone bracelets first came out in 2004 and since their launch have sold more than 100 million units.

34:58

So a bunch of them have sold, but how many of you still have yours?

How many went right in the trash when he came out and said yes, I've done PEDs?

It's sad because the program itself is great for cancer and survivor programs, but being associated with a liar and a cheat, you know, even though he did survive cancer, it still kind of ruined it.

35:21

What it also did was it inspired, like everybody to create their own silicone bracelets for their causes.

Most of them were good, like real nonprofits.

If you want to relive those bygone days of the 2000s, livestrong.com is still around.

35:39

I'm sure it's a great program.

And now it's no longer associated with Lance Armstrong the Cheety Mccheater pants.

So if you go buy one, I won't make fun #4 is the Motorola Razor flip phone.

Yes, I had two different ones of these styling and profiling with a flip phone in the mid 2000s.

36:03

I will admit these looked great.

They were like half inch 3/4 of an inch thick.

This was back in the day when you still when you were texting, you had to press each number a few times to get a different letter.

How many of you used to text and drive back then?

36:18

Now, I didn't do it a lot, but did you get good at knowing?

OK, I've got to press #2A couple times #5 three times to get words out.

These phones were first introduced in 2004.

I think I got mine in 2005.

This was the Razr RAZR V3.

36:39

I'm guessing this was probably the most popular cell phone of the time.

I was a sucker for that phone.

I liked it.

I kept it long after I got rid of the phone plan for it, and I ended up with my iPhones.

So I got my last Razor probably in 2008.

36:58

In 2020, I still had it and I gave it to my little niece Sylvie, who was probably a year and a half at the time, so she'd have her own cell phone.

It was like, here have my trash.

Last but not least #5 on the list of passing fads of the 2000s is Myspace, the OG giant of social media.

37:22

Where is Tom today?

This was very addictive.

You would go on there.

You had your own profile picture.

You could have music that started up when you had your profile opened up.

You had your top 8 friends.

At its peak in April 2008, there were 115,000,000 monthly users of Myspace and there were more than 300 million total profiles.

37:51

From 2005 to 2009, Myspace was the unquestioned #1 social media platform before being overtaken by Facebook.

The ultimate irony is that Myspace basically killed themselves.

They were purchased by News Corp in 2005, and it wasn't immediate that the site was going downhill, but you could start to tell, and Facebook passed it, that its peak in the late 2000s, Myspace was valued at $12 billion.

38:22

And don't worry, I'm going to be doing a much longer full form segment about Myspace coming up in the future on the podcast.

But there you go, top five passing fads of the 2000s.

How many of those were you participating in?

38:39

I was huge on Myspace.

I had the razor flip phone, I had Livestrong bracelets, I played FarmVille.

I did not twerk unless I was drunk falling down the stairs and it just happened to look like it.

But now we go from passing fads of the 2000s to Arnold Schwarzenegger and his biggest movie, Terminator 2.

39:00

So let's go look back at it 35 years ago.

Some movies just are ahead of their time.

Some of them you realize long after that they were.

39:16

Others, as you're watching it, you realize you're watching something special.

That's the way I felt when I was in the movie theater at age 13 watching Terminator 2, Judgment Day.

For me at that age and still at this age, it is a perfect movie for what I like.

39:35

Directed by James Cameron, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Edward Furlong, Robert Patrick, the film is widely regarded as one of the greatest sequels ever made.

And we're going back 35 years ago this week to look at the creation, the release, and the impact of T2.

39:56

The fact that Terminator 2 is seen as one of the greatest sequels ever is made even more impressive by the fact that it followed the original Terminator from 1984.

That movie told the story of young Sarah Connor, who was targeted by a killer Cyborg from the future.

40:14

It was a big hit, making $78 million at the box office on a budget of 6,000,000, and is 90% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.

James Cameron wanted a sequel almost immediately, but there were rights issues that delayed development for years.

40:32

During those years, CGI advanced significantly, especially after Cameron's work on The Abyss.

It was that liquid water pseudopod effect that I was talking about earlier in the podcast that influenced the T1000 character that was played by Robert Patrick.

40:51

That is the liquid metal Terminator.

The story in Terminator 2 is set roughly 10 years after the end of the original film.

Sarah Connor has become a hardened warrior.

She's preparing for the coming war against the AI known as Skynet.

41:08

Her son, John Connor is destined to become the future leader of humanity's resistance.

Then two Terminators arrive from the future, the reprogrammed T800 played by Schwarzenegger, who was sent to protect John, and then the more advanced T1000, the liquid metal one played by Robert Patrick, sent to kill him.

41:30

The fact that Arnold's T800 was the hero and not the villain was one of the film's greatest twists.

It would have been easy to just have Arnold as the Terminator again, trying to kill Sarah Connor and John Connor, but it was this twist of making him into this beloved good guy that made for a lot of the most classic scenes.

41:53

The film itself was easy to market, having Arnold Schwarzenegger as the lead.

He'd already been in the original Terminator, Conan the Barbarian, Predator, Total Recall.

He had all of the famous lines in the movie.

42:09

Hasta La Vista baby, or I need your Clothes, Your Boots and Your Motorcycle or the all time classic.

I'll Be back.

Sorry my Schwarzenegger is not as good as everyone else's.

It's good enough.

That was kind of spur of the moment.

42:26

I'll sprinkle in my Arnold impression.

It's too late to edit it out.

Probably the most impressive transformation between films besides Arnold becoming the good guy was Linda Hamilton.

Her character Sarah Connor in the first film was just a waitress in T2.

42:44

She's battle hardened.

She's a survivalist.

I just remember seeing her muscles and be like, wait a minute, she's pretty hardcore.

Edward Furlong made his acting debut as John Connor.

Rebellious, street smart.

It's pretty cool riding his motorcycle or moped with Guns and Roses.

43:04

You Could Be Mine, playing Robert Patrick as the T1000 delivered one of the greatest villain performances in sci-fi history.

He was calm, but he was relentless.

He had that uncanny physicality, with Patrick training extensively to move with machine like precision.

43:24

Like the scenes where he's fast enough running after cars that he could dive and turn his hands into spikes and hook onto the trunk and crawl his way in.

At the time of its release, Terminator 2 was among the most expensive movies ever produced.

43:42

In 1991, the budget was upwards of $100 million.

That would put its budget around $246 million when adjusted for inflation to 2026.

You could see why, at the time, many industry observers doubted that the film could recover its cost.

44:02

Oh, but they were wrong.

Terminator Two would go on to make $520 million at the box office.

That's equal to $1.28 billion when adjusted for inflation.

The visual effects in Terminator 2 changed filmmaking forever, mostly with the T1000.

44:23

There had been computer generated characters in films in the preceding 10 years, but no major film had relied so heavily on ACGI driven character.

Industrial Light and Magic, led by visual effects pioneer Dennis Murin, developed groundbreaking technology to create the liquid metal Terminator.

44:44

You had a character that could melt into liquid metal, flow through barriers, morph into other people and instantly repair damage.

There are so many cool scenes with that effect.

The scene where the T1000 is the floor and then the guy walks on it and it the floor morphs into the same guy and then he just shoots him with a spike through his face or he gets shot with the shotgun and it's just slowly melts away and he becomes normal again.

45:17

I love the scene in the helicopter where the T1000 breaks through the window and just kind of melts into it and while he is still liquid metal he looks at the other guy in there just says get out.

The guy jumps out like 100 feet above the ground.

These effects from 35 years ago still hold up despite the T1000 being the big example of CGIA.

45:41

Common misconception is that T2 relied mostly on CGI, but in reality the movie used a carefully balanced mixture of practical and digital effects.

In fact, a lot of the T1000's damage effects were achieved using prosthetics, animatronics, dummy bodies.

46:01

A lot of film makers consider T2 the gold standard for combining both practical and digital effects.

It's funny, I've gotten this far into this segment and I didn't even mention like, oh, be careful of spoilers because I'm so excited to talk about this movie that I've just been spoiling everything because I was going to go into some of the best action scenes from the movie.

46:24

And I'm like, oh, I probably should tell people watch out for spoilers, but it's way too late for that.

Anyway, more spoilers.

There is the awesome Los Angeles River Chase.

That's the motorcycle versus truck with Schwarzenegger and Edward Furlong on the motorcycle and the T1000 in the semi truck driving after them.

46:45

You had the Assault on the Cyberdyne Systems.

That's the one with Joe Morton, who plays Miles Dyson from Skynet, and he goes to shut down everything 'cause Arnold reveals his arm, the exoskeleton, but he gets shot up and he's holding the bomb, and he tells the military that comes in.

47:06

I don't know how much longer I can hold this.

And of course, there's the whole finale in the steel mill where the T1000 eventually goes into the liquid metal and it's just becoming all of the different people that it had imitated.

And of course, it ends, sadly, with Schwarzenegger with the T800 realizing he has to also get into the liquid metal because he's got the chip in his brain that they could grab and create a new Terminator.

47:35

Even at age 13.

When this movie came out, I realized that Terminator 2 was something special because for all of the oh that's cool effects and explosions and stuff, it had a really engaging story.

There were the themes of fate versus free will, with the central message that the future is not predetermined.

47:55

Sarah Connor, Doctor Emmett Brown, they have the same messages.

There is no fate but what we make for ourselves.

This was the philosophical core of the franchise.

There was a theme of humanity versus machines, with the T800 gradually learning human behavior, developing a relationship with John Connor.

48:16

And the big thing was the nuclear annihilation theme, with the nightmare vision of Judgement Day reflecting the Cold War fears that were still going on in 1991.

I mean, the worst of it was over, but it was also, it had been a part of society in this country for the previous 35 years.

48:35

Even when I was in school in the 1980's, the Cold War was front and center.

Upon its release on the 4th of July weekend in 1991, Terminator 2 grossed just over $52,000,000.

And for a little bit of fun, if you were curious what the other movies in the top five were, the week that Terminator 2 came out number two was the re release of 101 dalmatians #3 was the debut of Boyz N the Hood.

49:04

Number 4 was Point Break and #5 was Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves.

Terminator 2 won four Academy Awards, best visual effects, best sound, best sound effects editing, and best makeup.

49:22

This achievement helped to legitimize visual effects heavy films as serious artistic accomplishments.

It is hard to overstate the influence of Terminator 2 as it helped to popularize CGI driven characters, massive summer blockbusters, the modern action hero which ironically 2 years later in 1993 Arnold Schwarzenegger starred in last action Hero which was not good.

49:51

It also helped to popularize the strong female action protagonist and sophisticated visual effects storytelling.

It definitely influenced later films like Jurassic Park, The Matrix, and Avatar.

It would be 12 years until they had a sequel, Terminator 3 Rise of the Machines.

50:11

This was still a big hit making over $430 million but on a budget of almost 190 million.

I just remember the end of Terminator 3 being disappointed that the end of the world still happens.

I was like, wait and T2 you said the future isn't predetermined and it's like, wait, it happened exactly as you said it would.

50:33

Then again, by that time I was 26 and way more cynical than I was when I was in my early teens. 35 years this week in history, Terminator 2 came out, and today it still remains one of the rare films that succeeds simultaneously as a science fiction classic, groundbreaking technical achievement, a thrilling action film, a sequel that surpasses its predecessor, and an emotional character drama.

51:03

It's easily in my top five favorite films that I've ever seen in the theater.

One of my favorite movies ever.

One of the highlights of my summer going into eighth grade.

And obviously that's where my Arnold impression came from going into school in 8th grade, talking to all my friends.

51:21

Did you see Terminator 2?

Did you like it with Schwarzenegger?

Do you think he was good?

I just wanted to make people laugh.

Yay, wholesome ending to this segment.

So yeah, we're celebrating 35 years since the release of Terminator 2.

51:37

I highly recommend, if you haven't seen it, to watch it in about 10 minutes when I'm done talking on this podcast.

And if you have already seen it, go watch it again.

It definitely stands the test of time.

But until next week, that's going to wrap up episode 251 of the In My Footsteps podcast, the Hotter Than Hell Outside edition of the show.

52:00

I've made it through the whole podcast.

No AC going Now.

Granted, I'm recording this in the morning pretty early, but even now as I'm finishing the podcast, the real feel outside is 102.

But he made it the point on social media today to share an unreleased video I took during the frozen Cape Cod weeks back in February.

52:25

I have literally been holding on to that video for five months almost now just so I could release it on one of the hottest days of the year.

To ask people the question, would you rather have it be upper 90s and humid or in the teens with everything frozen over and covered in snow?

52:43

Yes, there's no in between.

I'm sure next week will be cooler when I do episode 252 of the podcast.

We're going to look back at the classic Live Aid Concert Festival, one of the defining musical moments of the 1980s.

53:02

We're going to celebrate an anniversary near and dear to my heart. 60 years of Doritos.

Sometimes I feel like I've eaten 60 years worth of them.

Fun story about Doritos.

I have been diagnosed with migraine headaches since I was two years old.

53:19

My mother told me that the doctor realized that MSG high quantities of it would trigger headaches.

Doritos have those, and because I love them so much, my mother was like, well, we'll just have to deal with it.

So yes, I love Doritos so much that I would give myself headaches just to have them.

53:39

We're also going to be looking at the top five rebranded sports franchises, teams that were well known somewhere else and got moved but had to also change their names.

For example, the Montreal Expos becoming the Washington Nationals, things like that.

53:57

So that's coming up next week on episode 252.

But also this weekend from when this podcast goes live, there's going to be a new hidden track podcast going up, the bite sized podcast where I do deep dives into something I spoke about previously on the show.

54:13

Give it a little more love.

So yes, this is the week you get 2 podcasts in the same week.

If you are grateful for all this content that I slave in the heat for for you, it's like I work in the kitchen again.

You can support me by becoming a member on Patreon.

54:29

I've got several different tiers.

You can also buy me a coffee.

Those are non recurring so if you wanted to just do a one time donation, please check out the link for the GoFundMe for my feature film The Cabin that I'm still raising funds for, probably for another 5 weeks.

54:47

The end of August is when I'll be going on the road to be there to film it.

Who knows what happens after that?

Well, editing.

But then who knows what happens after that.

As far as like next year when it gets released.

I will tell you when it comes to this fundraiser and the donations, I have come to see who my real ride or die people are.

55:10

The ones that gave their hard earned money to help me pursue this dream.

The ones that have taken time out of their day, some of them several times to share and promote my fundraiser.

For the most part I see everyone that shares it so I know the ones that have actually put in the time to support me and it really is overwhelming.

55:33

I'm so grateful to the family and friends and some strangers that have put themselves out there to support me and my work.

Happy birthday this week to Janelle, the wife of my long long time friend John.

55:50

I have known him for over 30 years and I can say honestly that he is very, very lucky to have found someone like Janelle.

So very happy birthday.

I hope you're staying cooler out in Southern California than we are in Cape Cod, which as of me recording this, is hotter currently than Las Vegas.

56:11

But hey, it's all good.

I'm starting the countdown to fall.

Sorry, not sorry.

Summer is my third favorite season out of four.

I will try not to be too overbearing about it, especially as days in the 90s get more and more frequent in July and August.

56:28

So please stay cool wherever you are.

Sit by the pool, sit in the shade with one of those handheld fans you just wave in your face.

Do the old ice bucket challenge again but just laying in a lawn chair or turn on the AC, put on some big over-ear headphones and listen to my sultry tones doing the Arnold Schwarzenegger impression.

56:52

I'll keep pumping out the content everywhere.

Videos, blogs, podcasts, tons of social media posts.

And until next time, remember in this life, don't walk in anyone else's footsteps, create your own path and enjoy every moment you can on this journey we call life because you never know what tomorrow brings.

57:15

Thank you all again for tuning in.

This has been the In My Footsteps podcast.

I am Christopher Setterlund, you already knew that.

I'll talk to you all again soon.