Gen-Zing and Podcasting

Gen-Z is growing up, and we’re doing more than making tiktok dances. We’ve also jumped back in time to watch some old movies that we didn’t get to in our childhoods. As the leader of the 2020 Hindsight podcast, I have watched 12 movies so for over the past three months, I have jumped headfirst into the jewels of the 20th century as well as the horrible nightmare that was the Star Wars Holiday Special. 

Yes, I watched it and yes, I wanted to claw my eyes out.

I’ve seen so many differences between movies made now and movies made way before I was born. There are painfully obvious things like the CGI in Tron versus the CGI in Avengers; Endgame, the actors I see now like Michael Keaton as Batman versus his role as the Vulture in Spider-Man Homecoming, or the speed of storytelling in the 1978 Superman. 

As a Gen-Z and with the attention span the size of a pea some of the movies I’ve watched just seem…slow. All the credits at the beginning of movies are boring. There were four times I enjoyed watching the credits, solely because of the soundtrack; The Last Starfighter, Ghostbusters, Batman, and Superman. The soundtracks for those movies were absolutely FANTASTIC. I downloaded the soundtrack as soon as I got home. 

Courtesy of DC

It’s also been really fun seeing actors that I know in roles I definitely didn’t know them for, like Steve Martin in Little Shop of Horrors. 

Although I have loved the movies, laughed and cried (only a little bit) as well as begged for a movie to finish, podcasts are not as easy as I believed them to be. To be honest, I thought I would just walk on, commentate on a movie and leave, but that is not how podcasts work. News flash, we can’t repeat ourselves because if we do, we sound…well…unoriginal is the best word. The worst words could be immature, young, and even dumb. We do have to go through some training, teaching us how to speak up so the microphone can pick us up as well as come up with our own personalities, catch-phrases and ideas.

Going in and watching these classic nostalgic films can be a little nerve-wracking, simply because they are beloved films. I don’t want to be attacked if I hate the film, except if it’s the Star Wars Holiday Special. Everyone hates that movie. Even with that small worry, I love diving head first into the childhood my parents’ lived, with the crazy hair, puffy sleeves and eye shadow that spreads to the above girls’ eyebrows. 

Oh, and don’t get me started on wearing shorts over sweatpants. That was not a look. Shorts over leggings aren’t too hot either. I would never wear that outfit, but I also wouldn’t curl an afro on my head or wear eye shadow up to my forehead. Seriously, what happened to society when The Goonies was being made??

Courtesy of Warner Bros

There is always pressure, pressure from the audience, pressure when it comes to scheduling, pressure when it comes to finding hosts. With the COVID crazy, sitting down, turning my brain off for a minute is perfect. At least I’m not watching the movie through another zoom classroom. I love doing the podcast, learning life lessons, and jumping into the deep end of 80’s pop culture. I just won’t copy the craziness that was happening at the time.

No shorts over leggings, please. I’d honestly rather wear my pointe shoes to school than wear shorts over leggings.

So let me ask you this, “Have you ever danced with the Devil in the pale moonlight?” If you haven’t watch Mr. Mom’s—sorry—Vulture’s—sorry, Michael Keaton’s Batman, especially before the sparkly vampire steps into the bat-suit, or turn the earth backwards to 1978 to watch Superman, or join the league of Starfighters, before it becomes Wade Watts’s password in Ready Player One. 

Gen-Z may not know how to schedule our own doctor’s appointments, or be afraid of correcting an order mistake, but we love movies, really anything on the screens, even the ones made before we even existed. Listen to us on our trains of thought as we watch these classics films or a retelling of Peter Pan. 

Oh, and one more thing:

“No non-sunshine words!”

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