The Next Reel Film Podcast

“What good is a sword against sorcery?”
From Barbarian to Family-Friendly Fantasy
After the success of Conan the Barbarian in 1982, producer Dino De Laurentiis wanted to create a more family-friendly sequel. He recruited director Richard Fleischer and turned to comic book writers Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway to craft a PG-rated story. With a screenplay by Stanley Mann, Universal Pictures aimed to broaden the franchise's appeal while maintaining its sword-and-sorcery roots. Join us—Pete Wright and Andy Nelson—as we continue the Conan series with a conversation about Fleischer’s 1984 film Conan the Destroyer.
Destroying Expectations with Comic Book Flair
The shift from the gritty, violent tone of the first film to a more lighthearted adventure creates interesting discussion points. While the comic book influence brings fresh energy to the franchise, the movie struggles to balance serious fantasy elements with comedic moments. The addition of characters like Tracey Walter's Malak as comic relief and Wilt Chamberlain's Bombaata as a double-crossing warrior presents both opportunities and challenges for the narrative.
A Journey Through Cast and Creative Choices
The film showcases notable performances and creative decisions that deserve attention:
  • Grace Jones delivers an intense, committed performance as Zula
  • André the Giant appears uncredited as the Dagoth monster
  • Basil Poledouris returns with another masterful musical score
  • The mirror room sequence features impressive practical effects despite questionable creature design
  • Sarah Douglas brings regal menace to Queen Taramis
  • Olivia d'Abo debuts as Princess Jehnna in an underwritten role
The Legend Continues
While Conan the Destroyer may not reach the dramatic heights of its predecessor, it represents an interesting experiment in broadening the appeal of the franchise. The lighter tone and increased emphasis on humor might disappoint hardcore fans, but the film maintains enough sword-and-sorcery spectacle to remain entertaining. We have a great time talking about it, so check it out then tune in. The Next Reel — when the movie ends, our conversation begins!
Film Sundries

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Creators and Guests

Host
Andy Nelson
With over 25 years of experience in film, television, and commercial production, Andy has cultivated an enduring passion for storytelling in all its forms. His enthusiasm for the craft began in his youth when he and his friends started making their own movies in grade school. After studying film at the University of Colorado Boulder, Andy wrote, directed, and produced several short films while also producing indie features like Netherbeast Incorporated and Ambush at Dark Canyon. Andy has been on the production team for award-winning documentaries such as The Imposter and The Joe Show, as well as TV shows like Investigation Discovery’s Deadly Dentists and Nat Geo’s Inside the Hunt for the Boston Bombers. Over a decade ago, he started podcasting with Pete and immediately embraced the medium. Now, as a partner at TruStory FM, Andy looks forward to more storytelling through their wide variety of shows. Throughout his career, Andy has passed on his knowledge by teaching young minds the crafts of screenwriting, producing, editing, and podcasting. Outside of work, Andy is a family man who enjoys a good martini, a cold beer, a nice cup o’ joe. And always, of course, a great movie.
Host
Pete Wright
#Movies, #ADHD, & #Podcasting • Co-founder @trustory.fm🎥 The Next Reel Family of #Film Podcasts @thenextreel.com🎙️ Taking Control: The ADHD Podcast @takecontroladhd.com📖 Co-author of Unapologetically ADHD • https://unapologeticallyadhdbook.com

What is The Next Reel Film Podcast?

A show about movies and how they connect.
We love movies. We’ve been talking about them, one movie a week, since 2011. It’s a lot of movies, that’s true, but we’re passionate about origins and performance, directors and actors, themes and genres, and so much more. So join the community, and let’s hear about your favorite movies, too.
When the movie ends, our conversation begins.

Pete Wright:

I'm Pete Wright.

Andy Nelson:

And I'm Andy Nelson.

Pete Wright:

Welcome to the next reel. When the movie ends

Andy Nelson:

Our conversation begins.

Pete Wright:

Conan the destroyer is over. I go where I feel myself led.

Trailer:

In an age when only the strongest survive and only the ruthless triumph, Only one name became a legend. Coman, the destroyer. In his first adventure, he fought alone. It is written that a woman child must make a perilous journey. I want you to take her on that journey.

Trailer:

Now she joins a wizard. What am I going to do? Have watch. A warrior. There are six of them against him.

Trailer:

One, two, three. A renegade. Think you're right. And a princess. Together, they are sent by a treacherous queen across the lands of hostile kingdoms to solve the mystery of an ancient race and seek the power of a phantom city.

Trailer:

You're afraid of magic.

Trailer:

And when it comes from evil

Trailer:

This will. Come many will. The horn of Dagoth, destroyer of worlds. The god will live again. Enough talk.

Trailer:

If they cannot seize the horn in time, the world will be plunged into eternal darkness. Grace Jones, Wilt Chamberlain, Marco, Sarah Douglas, and Arnold Schwarzenegger as Conan the destroyer. The all new adventures of the most powerful legend of them all.

Pete Wright:

Alright, Andy. I know you're just watching this for a young Olivia Dabo.

Andy Nelson:

What's funny is I could not like, I heard the name and I was like, oh, I think I know who that is. Started the movie. I'm like, oh, that is definitely not who I thought it was. I I it took me a while to figure it out, but I had Natasha Kinsky pictured in my head the whole time.

Pete Wright:

Oh, that's different.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. It's very different. And then I started this, I'm like, Olivia Diabo, or is it Dabo or Diabo?

Pete Wright:

I think it's Dabo.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. I was like, I have no idea who she is. And then I looked, I'm like, oh, the Wonder Years? Uh-huh. I was like, okay.

Andy Nelson:

So clearly, watched A lot. I watched a lot of her Yeah. When I was when I was young. But this is on my list. I picked this.

Andy Nelson:

I wanted to come back. We we talked about Conan the Barbarian back in our Oliver Stone in the eighties series. Having never seen this film before complete, I had seen a few little scenes here and there. I added this to the list. I thought it would be fun to kind of have a Conan series, and so I wanted to discuss this.

Andy Nelson:

So I didn't grow up with this film. Like, I just I had no sense of Olivia Diablo or Dabo growing up, and I'm trying to look like now early on, what would I have seen of her growing pains? She was in two episodes of growing pains. She was in one episode of Simon and Simon. Like none of the films that she was in, I had ever seen.

Andy Nelson:

Star Trek the Next Generation, one episode. And then it's The Wonder Years. So really, my introduction to her was largely TV. And and then it was just like bit parts and things like Wayne's World two. And so I missed a lot of her growing up.

Andy Nelson:

But I'm I don't know. Was she was she a a poster girl for you when you were growing up?

Pete Wright:

Poster girls were like Lamborghinis, man. My posters were cars. I was that guy. You know, I did know her from, obviously, the the Wonder Years is how I I knew her for sure. I recognized her in all of the movies that I then saw her and because I just knew her face very well.

Pete Wright:

So this was it was a fun treat to come back and and see her that she was actually in this movie. I I did not have that connection. I didn't remember that. I thought she was I yeah. I mean, I I guess, yes, I was a fan.

Pete Wright:

I didn't have a poster. I never went to a con

Andy Nelson:

Okay. Okay.

Pete Wright:

Just to see her.

Andy Nelson:

Well, and she's a part

Pete Wright:

of this film. She is a part of it.

Andy Nelson:

But it's it's it's definitely a Conan film, and it definitely feels different from the first film. So I mean, I mean, where do you wanna start? Did you grow up with this film? Is this a film you saw when you were young? Like, do you have an attachment to it?

Pete Wright:

No. No. And and I think if we do a bit of a recap, I didn't have an attachment to Conan the Barbarian either, and I didn't care for it that much. It just was not that was not my hero movie of the era. I saw it late.

Pete Wright:

I saw it because my dad loved it. And so because I didn't have an attachment to it, I felt like I I was just looking through it the whole time. And this movie, I I you know, trying to level up what this move movie was to Conan the Barbarian by making it trying to make it have broader age appeal and being a PG movie and having more jokes. There are moments in this film that I that I like. Overall, I think it lands poorly to even my already kind of sublimated view of Conan the Barbarian and almost lampoons the the character that I thought I knew.

Pete Wright:

At its peak, the wrestling match between the gorilla head guy with no actual mouth and Conan in the diamond room, I think it's I was laughing out loud that I was laughing out loud. Like, why was that supposed to be funny? It was funny. I found it funny. Did you find it?

Pete Wright:

Am I supposed to find it funny? I thought I was supposed to find it threatening.

Andy Nelson:

Threatening is a an interesting word to try to to use in the in this context because Yeah. The foundation of this story is so much more of a comic book nature than the first film, which felt I you know, I've never read any of the Conan works by Robert E. Howard. Like, I've never read any of the the Conan stories that he wrote. I may have glanced through some of the Conan the Barbarian comics when Marvel started putting those out.

Andy Nelson:

Like, Conan was never my thing. But it definitely felt like when you compare the two movies side by side, it definitely feels like the John Milius Oliver Stone version of Conan wanted to be a little darker, a little more violent, a little, more gritty, which I'm assuming lends more to the Robert E. Howard stories. Whereas this version, I mean, this version started with, you know, a story by Roy Thomas and Jerry Conway, who were huge parts of the Conan the Barbarian comic. And so this one feels very much more comic booky.

Andy Nelson:

It feels that in the relationships, in the humor, in the, just kind of the way the story unfolds. Like, I I appreciate that they were trying to go for more of a PG rating, but it definitely felt like in those instances where you're talking about, it's hard to say I was meant to feel like an actual threat from that fight because it just felt kind of like a comic book fight.

Pete Wright:

Yes. That that, I think, is exactly the point. And so I ask you, how do you conceive of these movies as a set? Like, they it's it's like high jump, low ceiling. Like, they don't make sense together to me.

Andy Nelson:

I don't think that's a problem. I mean, it's not so different. It's like I mean, my my my thinking when I saw this was very much going to, like, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and we talked about this way back early in the our very first series we did on this podcast in 02/2011. Raiders of the Lost Ark is one thing. The other three now four Indiana Jones films feel like another thing.

Andy Nelson:

If anything, the most recent film, not directed by Spielberg, actually feels the most Raiders of the Lost Ark of all of them. It's actually one that feels a little more serious in tone, a little less goofy, whereas Temple of Doom Goofy. Last Crusade, Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, all feel like they have this level of goofiness. Even if Temple of Doom does go much much darker, it also is so much goofier. But they're all still feel like Indiana Jones films.

Andy Nelson:

And so I don't have an issue looking at them as a whole. It's it's just like different stories following the character and sometimes they might be goofier, sometimes they might not. I didn't really have any issues with Conan the Destroyer because of that specific issue. Would I have liked it to hew a little closer to where Milius and Stone kind of took that first film? Sure.

Andy Nelson:

But I think it was fine the way that the way that this one felt.

Pete Wright:

That is a fair parallel, the the Indiana Jones parallel. That's I I totally get it. I I think I'm I it's easy to be more critical because I didn't feel in terribly engaged to the to the film. It felt like I if I had been seen it when I was 14, I probably would have loved it. I would have I think I really would have loved it.

Pete Wright:

So it it's fair to say that this is this is not a movie for me in spite of sort of itself and its goofiness. Things I love about it, like, I I love watching Arnold Schwarzenegger just move around. Like, he's such a specimen, and this movie and Conan before it were such celebrations of physicality and not like there's very little of the magical mayhem. Like, we get some of the wizard, you know, opening and closing doors. Like, that's a that's a big one.

Pete Wright:

There's giant mouth door. And I think that set was the set that they used to build the Conan adventure at Universal Studios when I was a kid. Like, that was one of the theatrical presentations you could go see after you went on the ride, the Jaws boat ride, and that there was a Battlestar Galactica thing where everyone was shooting at you, and then you could end up going to the Conan save the princess event. And I think it was them with the mouth that opened up. That suddenly was very familiar to me.

Pete Wright:

And so I like, I I enjoy that stuff. I enjoy this just sort of the universe, the the parade of of physicality, and it feels like, you know, a heavy metal album cover, in a in a really satisfying way to me. So I yeah. Like, I get it. I get the look of it.

Pete Wright:

I did think that the addition of the comic, the jibes, the jester character was rough. This this just felt this just felt like a level up of the of the shenaniganry in a way that didn't that didn't feel earned from the first movie.

Andy Nelson:

I mean, there are some definite elements there that I can agree with. And, you know, I will say it's fair that I when when we talked about Conan the Barbarian back in that previous series, it wasn't a film that I grew up with either. And when I watched it, I was also, alright. It's alright. It's nothing great.

Andy Nelson:

I rewatched it to prepare for this, and I had so much fun with it. Like, I just loved it. It was a great film. It was great eighties fantasy. I'm still never I've never really been a big fan of kind of that Boris Vallejo style of, like, next to naked.

Andy Nelson:

I mean, I don't have problems with people being next to naked, but the idea of warriors next to naked going into battle, like, it's just never really made sense.

Pete Wright:

Seems so silly.

Andy Nelson:

It's like, why you're you're like half you're gonna get hurt. Like, it just seems so dumb. But it it works for the look. So anyway, I had so much more fun with Conan the Barbarian when I revisited it. And so it's entirely possible.

Andy Nelson:

I just walked into Conan Conan the destroyer with that in my head. And so I was just looking for more of a fun time, and I had a really fun time with it. Like you though, I have always struggled with these films that feel like, well, let's throw in a goofy sidekick because that'll that'll help for the kids. That'll give the kids someone to really latch on to and enjoy. And we definitely get that here.

Andy Nelson:

It wasn't so much the case in Conan the Barbarian, and so as we had, you know, Tracy Walter as Conan's thief buddy, I was just like, here it is. Like, my brain immediately went to when when we had Rob Schneider pop up as judge Dread's sidekick character in Stallone's judge Dread. That was like

Pete Wright:

Oh my god. Not what

Andy Nelson:

I was expecting in that particular film. And that's kind of where Tracy Walter was for me as Malak as this kind of goofy character that just didn't really need to be there. Like, I really preferred the the people that he was working with in Conan the Barbarian that were also thieves, but you could take them seriously. Tracy Walter, I mean, I had a he first of all, as an actor, he's somebody that I generally don't think of in this sort of film. Like, he doesn't strike me as somebody who's gonna be in a a sword and sorcerer type of movie nor in an action film.

Andy Nelson:

Right? And I think that, like, all of those elements, when I walked into that with Tracy Walter, like, feel like he's the sort of person who is a, you know, hillbilly in the South sort of actor. Right? And so seeing him here, I'm just like, Tracy Walter as Conan's sidekick. Okay.

Andy Nelson:

So, yeah. Right out of the gate, I struggled with that.

Pete Wright:

He's he's such a funny actor. Right? Because as much as I totally understand what you're talking about, I look at his his credits and, you know, he was in Silence of the Lambs. He was Bob the Goon in Batman. He was in

Andy Nelson:

Oh, yes.

Pete Wright:

Star Trek. A bunch of Star Trek. He was in Designing Women, one episode. The guy he was an elf, an episode. Like, the guy has been like, he's such a face at this point.

Pete Wright:

I don't know how to really wrap my head around what he wouldn't be in anymore. So the the fact that he's he's not that that the the character doesn't really hit home for me is less about, I think, Tracy Walters surprise than the fact that they decided to put a character like Malik in here as the goofy sidekick in the first place. And this gets to one of the reviews that I stumbled on as I was kind of prepping for this movie was a guy that that has the background in the Conan universe Coniverse and was very frustrated by the title destroyer. I was frustrated by the title destroyer because I'm not sure Conan actually destroyed anything. The the castle at the end, the ice castle, maybe you could make the case that he was a part of that because he broke all the mirrors and they were structurally integral to the structure.

Pete Wright:

I don't know.

Andy Nelson:

Fault. Yeah.

Pete Wright:

That that would be a stretch. But he didn't really he wasn't really a destroyer like I wanted him to be. And here is the what this particular reviewer had to say. As a side note, I found the adjective destroyer in the title quite misleading and unfortunate. For those of us that read the Conan novels, we see Conan driven by his own motivations and fighting his battles only if he had to and not for the sake of destroying.

Pete Wright:

The film distributors could have picked something else to promote the movie. Well, it kinda gets to what we see all the time in adaptations where, you know, the act of adapting the character for film takes away some of the the heart and soul of what the fans knew the character as in the first place. I've complained about the same thing regarding the Joker. I've complained I mean, we've we've all complained about this in some some way or another. And I feel like I don't have the benefit of that background.

Pete Wright:

So to me, it just looks goofy. But it sounds like there's some reason that this character is doesn't play in this movie the way it does in the first.

Andy Nelson:

I mean, it's funny. I had not hadn't really thought about the title, and I guess it's only because it seemed like they were trying to do a thing where the films would all be Conan the blank, Conan the this, Conan the that. Because they had subsequently talked about doing another film eventually to the point where, I mean, and we'll talk about this later, but they're looking at Conan the king as a potential return to the franchise. And so that's interesting. And and I was just glancing through the titles of the stories of, Howard's actual Conan stories, and they're just literal things like the frost giant's daughter, the god in the bull, the hall of the dead, the hand of Nergal, the hour of the dragon.

Andy Nelson:

And it does make me wonder if there would have been more success for the film had they done Conan colon the horn of Argoth as as like the actual title. Or if that would have pushed audiences away because it was a bunch of weird fantasy looking words, or would that have drawn them in? I don't know. But Dino De Laurentiis, as we just had a whole series talking about De Laurentiis, here we are back talking about him. He seems the sort of producer who looks at what is gonna be the best thing for the movie to actually make money.

Andy Nelson:

And if it means not giving it a goofy title, but just doing something like Conan the destroyer, then that's what he's gonna do, you know, whether it's helpful or not.

Pete Wright:

Yeah. I'm not maybe it was helpful. We'll see. We'll see when we get to the numbers, but, it it it's confusing. I guess I wanted him to destroy more stuff.

Pete Wright:

He destroys Bombata. He does. Can we talk about Bombata? Bombata. Sure.

Andy Nelson:

We're gonna jump into that. Yes. Let's talk about good old Wilt Chamberlain.

Pete Wright:

What do you know of Wilt Chamberlain?

Andy Nelson:

Wilt Chamberlain, here he is working to protect the virginity.

Pete Wright:

You can't even do it.

Andy Nelson:

Protecting the virginity of our, heroine here of of Olivia Diablo's princess, Jenna. That is funny.

Pete Wright:

Wilt Chamberlain, protecting virginity since 1984.

Andy Nelson:

By destroying it. What did you what

Pete Wright:

did you think of of old Wilt? What do you know of Wilt Chamberlain?

Andy Nelson:

Other than he's incredibly tall. I mean, he's seven foot one. He is, the sort of height where, you know, they're having conversations with stunt the stunt coordinator saying, just be aware, one of the people in this stunt is seven feet tall. So be prepared for that. Like, it's it's you have to take that into account when you're sorting, like, what kind of horse is he gonna be riding?

Andy Nelson:

What is he gonna be wearing? Like, there's a lot of work that goes into that. Will Chamberlain, I mean, we're joking a little bit about his history of his sexual exploits, which is quite a story. But, you know, I I know that this was the one movie that he ever did, and it was the only movie he ever did because he thought he was interested in movies and then starred in this one and realized how boring it was. He hated that he was sitting around all the time.

Andy Nelson:

He would go up to the director and say, look, can't you just, like, make all of my scenes, like, just bunch them all together so I can just get this over with? And they're like, there's a lot of other pieces that we're coordinating, not just your role, but all these other roles, all the sets, locations. And so he really had a hard time with the idea of making a movie and kind of realized I mean, he had fun. He did a good job. I mean, I I thought he was fine as this, this soldier protecting this, princess, But it's it's just funny that he hit this point where he's just like, no.

Andy Nelson:

I'm not gonna go through that again.

Pete Wright:

I like this line in his bio. Wilt didn't come from a race of giants, as many thought. Hope his parents were no bigger than five nine.

Andy Nelson:

That is a weird, weird line. Yeah. Many people thought.

Pete Wright:

I wonder you know, I I don't know. Ken Severson is credited with that bio, and I wonder I wonder what Ken's connection is to Wilt Chamberlain. Arguably, as this bio says, one of the greatest basketball players ever.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. I mean, that's that's that's what he does, not not acting. But he again, he was fine.

Pete Wright:

Yeah. Big Dipper, one nickname. Wilt the Stilt. Oh. Yep.

Pete Wright:

Alright. Andy, we both need an Andy the a Pete the nickname. We're gonna have to workshop that. I thought he was, I thought he was fine. I think the challenge of having a basketball professional basketball player who is exceptional at the game of basketball, doing a thing that isn't basketball is that it makes you, I think, a little bit more critical of how this person it's is is this one of the early nepo babies?

Pete Wright:

Right? Like, a career nepo baby. Like, the reason he's cast in this is because he's one seven foot one, and two, because he's super famous. And, like, if you aren't drawn to see this movie by Arnold, then maybe you'll be drawn to see this movie because you're a fan of Wilt Chamberlain. And I think that's strategic casting, stunt casting.

Pete Wright:

And I did not find his range terribly compelling. Right? The the whole idea behind the character of Bombata is that he is he's he's charged with protecting the virginity of this girl and getting her to do the the diamond thing. And in as such, he's kind of a double agent. He's on the team.

Pete Wright:

They don't get along very well, Conan and Bombata, but he's on the team. He's on team rescue the princess, and then he turns. And I never really tracked his motivation from scene to scene. Like, I know that's what that's what he was doing because other characters told me that's what he was doing. He was not able to convince me of that on his own.

Pete Wright:

And he wasn't very scary.

Andy Nelson:

No. And it's it's it is I mean, great points. Because, mean, the queen does tell him, get use Conan to get this horn and and so that we can wake this, dag off Right. And then kill him. Like, we don't want him around for whatever reason.

Andy Nelson:

It it doesn't make sense other than she just doesn't wanna fulfill her promise. But there's really, like, there's no reason at all why they need to kill Conan. Like, I couldn't figure out, like, why does that even matter other than the queen just doesn't want she's gonna, you know, commit to doing something that she just can't do for Conan, which is bring Valeria back, which was, who he was in love with from the first film. And I really enjoyed that relationship. So I could buy Conan seeing that her promise was something that was, you know, being blinded enough that she could actually bring Valyria back from the dead.

Andy Nelson:

Sure. Okay.

Pete Wright:

Yes. But I agree

Trailer:

with that.

Andy Nelson:

But again, it's like, why does the queen have to use this as a as a way to kind of get Conan out of the way? That really didn't make any sense to me. And then to your point, and this is a problem with, I suppose, the script as it was put together, but also Wilt Chamberlain playing Bombata is it's like, yeah, you're you're having a hard time understanding his his logic and reasoning as far as like when he is going after Conan to actually kill him. Like the first time he he comes after Conan, he and he, you know, the princess is like, why did why what are you doing? Why are you doing this?

Andy Nelson:

And and his response was like, oh, I thought you were gonna hurt the princess. And that was kind of it and everyone's okay with it. And you're like, really? It's like, okay. I had a hard time with that.

Andy Nelson:

And then later, it's like he causes this rock slide, which doesn't kill them. It just kind of keeps them stuck in this tunnel long enough so that they can get out. So he doesn't actually ever really follow through. So to your point, he's not much of a threat. Like, he's just somebody who's here who's there for plot.

Andy Nelson:

He does what the plot and the as the script dictates that he's that he does, but he isn't much of a threat, and he's just doing the things that he's being told to do. And this is

Pete Wright:

a challenge with a lot of action movie villains. Right? That they only exist to be bounced off of by our other principal characters. And that's very much what what Chamberlain's role is here, and he just happens to be tall enough to pull it off. So, I mean, it's it's fine.

Pete Wright:

It's just empty calories.

Andy Nelson:

Well, and it does make me wonder, like, if they had cast somebody else, like, you know, looking at the people that James Earl Jones had as his, kind of assistance. Like, one of them was Thorgrim, Sven Oly Thorson, who is, you know, Arnold Schwarzenegger's bodybuilding stunt buddy. He also ended up in this, but as he had to be masked because obviously, we had seen him get killed in the first one, he couldn't come back. But, like, that was this person that I felt more he carried more weight in Conan the Barbarian. Like, he's a more interesting character.

Andy Nelson:

There's more threat from him as a villain. Like, it just worked. And that is definitely something with Bombata that we're just not getting much of. And it's really only when they actually have their final fight in the palace at the end of the film where he actually seems a little bit of a threat, and it just seems because of his height, like, when he's able to grab Conan and just, like, start, like, biting his ear off. Like, there were moments that made him see

Pete Wright:

What is with a bite?

Andy Nelson:

I don't know. It was a strange moment, but hey, it incapacitated Conan briefly. Alright. But still, it's just one of those one of those things. Yeah.

Pete Wright:

Yeah. I it incapacitated Conan. He bit it's here. Jesus. There is absolutely that part.

Pete Wright:

Now I I think Wilt Chamberlain, he's fine. Bombata's fine. We move on from Wilt Chamberlain. We gotta turn our attention to our main wizardly antagonist because that allows us to talk about the fight in the chamber and the gorilla mask, which is really all I wanna talk about. So if there's anything you wanna talk about before then, let's do it.

Pete Wright:

Let's have an airing of grievances.

Andy Nelson:

Well, you were talking about the gorilla mask. Which which one are you talking about? Because there are two creatures that that Conan fights that I mean, neither of them are exactly gorilla masks. But

Pete Wright:

What is the what would you call them if they're not? They're gorilla adjacent monsters.

Andy Nelson:

I don't I nothing seems gorilla ish. It's a strange thing. Like, they're they're I mean, I don't know. Dagoth, at the end, is a god who is I don't know what he is, but he's a That's not

Pete Wright:

a gorilla.

Andy Nelson:

He's a single horned creature that is this, I don't know, webbed feet and hands. I don't know what Daegoth is, but he's like some sort of mutated, like, sea creature is basically what it looks like. He doesn't look anything like his god statue suggesting he was going to like

Pete Wright:

at all.

Pete Wright:

God statue was handsome. I mean, that was a good looking god. Like, people are seeing that. They're like, let's put the horn in because we need to get a piece of this god. And then the god turns into horrible thing.

Pete Wright:

Do you think if they had successfully sacrificed the princess when they were supposed to sacrifice the princess, that Dagoth would not have turned into the slimy mud monster?

Andy Nelson:

That's a great question. Would he actually have just then gone back to hunky god look?

Trailer:

Oh. Right.

Pete Wright:

Yeah. Get a piece of that. Let me just tell you, in terms of effects in this movie, when Conan jumps on the back of Dagoth and starts ripping the horn off, that's one of the greatest, most disgusting effects ever because it's like, you all the sinew and the, like, fibrous stuff that's pulling out is so gross. It had it it turned my stomach. Yeah.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. That was great. Okay. So there's that creature, but I think what you're talking about is is what the wizard in the ice palace becomes. That's Pat

Pete Wright:

Roach Wizard's avatar.

Andy Nelson:

Who's who's most famous for me as the the Nazi mechanic in Raiders of the Lost Ark, who is the one who fights with Indiana in front of the plane as the plane's spinning around and then ends up getting his face sliced off by the propellers. That's Pat Roach, and he plays this this wizard here, Thoth Amon, who is the one who's keeping this, the jewel that is the key to get the horn. Blah blah blah. It's it's all like a fantasy, the rigmarole that they need to go through in order to get all the puzzle pieces. Anyway, he does go through this process of and he's, you know, got this ice palace, this mirror room.

Andy Nelson:

I really liked the sequence when Conan gets trapped in this mirror room, and this red cloaked figure appears in all of the mirrors around it, steps out, and you've got a room full of these red cloaked figures who then walk around and almost like the the figures collect each other until it's just one figure. I thought that was actually a really interesting setup. I enjoyed what they were doing with that. And then he takes his cloak off and he looks like one of the stupidest things ever, and you're saying it's gorilla creature. Okay.

Andy Nelson:

Sure. Maybe a shaved gorilla is what it ends up looking like. It's it's really dumb. The costume that he's in is really just terribly done. Like for a decently budgeted film, I was surprised that something looked so stupid.

Andy Nelson:

Anyway, yes, he's the one who now has to fight Conan, and that's that's the sequence. It I like the way that Conan has figures out how to actually destroy him, which is actually by breaking the mirrors. Like, that all played really well for me. It's just the creature itself is terrible.

Pete Wright:

It's bad news, man. It was bad news. It was the like, a $2 mask from party city or something. How the spirit Halloween. Bad news.

Pete Wright:

There was no mouth. I mean, there was no mouth on the mouth. It was just a painted tongue, and they did way too many close ups. Were they proud of it? Like, give us some more obscured shots.

Pete Wright:

Don't just keep what are you doing with the I mean, come on, Jack Cardiff, man, phoning it in, filming this fight. It looked so bad. And the fact that it was, like, I know. I if I were a fan, the fact that that, you know, Pat Roach is as a a wrestler with on with Arnold Schwarzenegger is must have been incredible. Like, I can imagine if I had been a wrestling fan, seeing these guys do wrestling stuff might might have been really amazing as a kid.

Pete Wright:

But, god, it's dumb right now. It's so dumb. I don't know how else to like, I don't have any real critical thoughts other than it was shot stupidly. It was leaned way too hard into the the mask on too many medium shots and close ups, and as if they were proud of it. The head felt like it was actually falling off at some points, and Arnold it gave Arnold too many times where they he did they do that move where he puts Arnold over his upside down on his back and starts spinning him around, and you get to see Arnold do his it's actually the total recall scream that where he's in his eyes.

Pete Wright:

Like, in total recall, it's right before his eyes come out of their sockets, but that's that's what I got. That's how he's spinning

Andy Nelson:

him by his feet. Yeah. He grabs him by his feet and is spinning

Pete Wright:

him around the room to throw him. Yeah. God. Andy, so dumb.

Andy Nelson:

No. I don't like the creature. I don't mind the fight. I don't I don't mind the fight. It's okay.

Andy Nelson:

I don't mind how it's shot. It's it's a mirrored room, and that is a more difficult thing to shoot in the mid eighties. They don't have the ability to paint out camera like they do today, and the fantastic work that can be done to just make cameras completely nonexistent when you actually see camera in shot in the way that they film projects today. Back then, you had to, like, rework all the mirrors in the room, reposition the camera, the gear, the the crew, everybody involved, and make sure that they never moved in a way where they would end up being seen in a mirror. So it is more complicated at the time.

Andy Nelson:

I give them that. I give them the benefit of knowing that they had to deal with those complexities when they were filming this. So I don't fault Jack Cardiff, and maybe it's because so much of the rest of the film, I think looks really fantastic. I like the comic book look that they do, the all the filters and everything that they're playing with. But, yeah, it's just hard when the creature looks just so cheaply put together.

Andy Nelson:

I was kind of surprised. This is the one area of the film as a kid that I remember watching. And I think even then, I just always felt like it just it never looked that good. It's just a shoddy bit of costume work. And it's a shame because I think when it starts, you've got Thoth Eamon appearing as like, I don't know, a hallucinatory smoke pterodactyl when he goes and actually steals Olivia Diablo.

Andy Nelson:

Like, I thought that was actually kind of cool. Like, he appears as this smoke creature and and takes her away. That was neat. Then to become this thing, it just was a real disappointment and and also surprisingly fast. I was clocking it and I looked at this and I'm like, holy cow.

Andy Nelson:

They've already got this diamond and they've killed the wizard and destroyed his palace all within like the first half hour of the movie. Like this, as a obviously not the big bad, but he's he's a sublevel boss that has to be destroyed before they can kind of continue on. He was he did end up being a little a bit of a letdown.

Pete Wright:

Well, they had to give it get us to, you know, the mud evolution of Dagoth. Right? I mean, that's the they had to get us all the way back there. And I I wanna say, I to to your point about Jack Cardiff, as much as I level blame at Jack Cardiff for for the way the fight itself was shot, the rest of the movie actually looks really good. Right?

Pete Wright:

Like, I love the the way he shoots landscapes and their travel across barren wasteland, and I just think he makes the he makes dirt look good. I I thought it it holds up. So, you know, I'll do credit where credit is absolutely due.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Haven't really talked about, the rest of the cast, Olivia Dabo, as our princess here. A little bit rough, but and it's it's interesting.

Andy Nelson:

I I again, I can't speak much to Olivia Dabo as an actress because I, I've seen her in things, but I she's not somebody I can picture much in her actual performances. I'm really just kind of taking it this for what she gives here, and it's like, I I think one of my problems I mean, I did have fun with this film, but it definitely feels very comic book y throughout, which is I mean, we'll talk about the writers and kind of the how this got put together. It is just so much more comic booky than the first film. To the point where these characters, like their interactions, their dialogue, the way that they they make decisions, it all feels so just written just to get the plot moving. And that, I think, is the thing that makes Princess Jenna the strangest of the characters, like and and the hardest one to really connect with because it's like, okay, she's supposedly falling in love with Conan throughout the film.

Andy Nelson:

And I'm just like, other than the fact that they write dialogue about her doing so, I never actually see it happening in the film. And she just is like a little bossy princess who's who's pushing Conan to do these things because she's the leader of the group and stuff. And it's just like, it just it all feels so written. I I struggled with the way that she was written as a character. And I I don't blame it on Olivia, but I just I feel the script for her was just not giving doing her any favors at all.

Pete Wright:

I think you're you are relitigating our exact same complaints with Wilt Chamberlain's character. Right? Like, that Sure. Yeah. I I I feel like that's a consistent thread, because I totally agree with you.

Pete Wright:

At no point do I ever feel like she's given an opportunity to demonstrate, to show us her relationship with Conan. She's and yet, then we have the the sequence where she asks Grace Jones, how do you get a man?

Pete Wright:

You grab him. You take him.

Pete Wright:

Right? Which, you know, we'll need to to dig into Grace Jones briefly. But I I think that's a funny moment that is supposed to illustrate their growing connection. She's trying to research and figure out how to get a man because she's naive, and yet as a as a performance, I don't think she's given an opportunity to actually show us how she feels, but only is it relegated to comedy.

Andy Nelson:

I I think that's it. And, mean, that's really the problem with so many of the characters that we we talked about, Tracy Walter too. It's like they're here to give us the these comedy beats and just the story points that our writers have kind of crafted as part of this story. But I don't know. I also feel like there is an element of the way that people saw fantasy stories as needing to be crafted in the eighties, where I think they saw it.

Andy Nelson:

Because, I mean, you can even see this in maybe not so much, but you can see it for sure still in Ridley Scott's legend. Like, there are still elements, like the all of his little dwarf characters and everything. Like, they're so goofy. Like, they felt like you have to build a high level of goofiness into fantasy for audiences to to buy into the stories. And I just don't feel like after Conan the Barbarian, like, I feel like they had a hard time remembering that fantasy could be taken seriously until, like, Peter Jackson gave us the Lord of the Rings films.

Andy Nelson:

And I think that was a real struggle. And and and I mean, because you definitely see it with all of the characters here. I mean, I I think that the queen maybe isn't one who's relegated to as much goofiness, but still she is relegated to just moving the plot along and putting all these pieces in place to just make all

Pete Wright:

of this stuff stuff happen. Absolutely. Absolutely right. The other thing that strikes me is that this movie and and I don't you just watched Conan. How many at its peak The barbarian.

Pete Wright:

Conan.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah.

Pete Wright:

Right. The barbarian. Yeah. O'Brien. At its peak, how many people were traveling with Conan the barbarian?

Andy Nelson:

I believe it was four. It was, Conan and Valeria and Mako, who I don't believe had a name in the first film. I think he was just the wizard of the rocks or something like that. Well, this is I'm looking now. What was his character's name?

Andy Nelson:

Wizard of the Mounds was what Mako's wizard character's name. And then there was Subotai, was the fourth one who was traveling. So I think at the peak, those four are traveling together. I mean, I there is a point where, well, I I don't know if it really counts, but they do rescue the king's another princess from Fulsa Doom and are bringing her back to her father. So technically five, I guess.

Pete Wright:

It's interesting because in my memory of the barbarian was that the building of the party was much more natural. Like, I don't it didn't feel forced in in as much of a way as it does here. Right? Here, it feels like, oh, people like parties. We're talking about D and D a lot.

Pete Wright:

Like, that's kinda big right now. Like, this we need to build a party, and everybody has to have their own goofy personality, and they all get to talk all the time. My memory I don't have as strong a memory of that in Conan the Barbarian. This feels so so forced in that same regard.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. I I didn't feel that. Like, I I thought it was just building of a team anything. Like, I mean, sure, Conan the Barbarian, there does feel like there's this natural, bond of the three thieves, Conan, Sabotai, and Val Valeria, when they kind of create their core team and then they bring on the wizard and eventually the princess. Like, that one felt really natural.

Andy Nelson:

But this one, I I guess I didn't have any issue with the fact that it's also a team. You know, Conan and and Malak, who are the initial pair, hired by essentially hired by the queen to go help, the princess because she's the one who the only person who can perform this mission. So the princess and then her guardian, Bambata, have to come along. He needs his wizard and now, like I his wizard has a name, Akiro. So he goes and gets his wizard because he knows he's gonna be fighting fighting magic.

Andy Nelson:

And then they end up bringing Zula along. I didn't have an issue with the team building, like, throughout this. I actually liked it. And maybe it's because Conan seems to work best when there is a group of people that he's working with, you know? And so Yes.

Andy Nelson:

It gives us it gives us a sense of of different varieties of personalities for Conan to bounce off of.

Pete Wright:

Well, and it yeah. It balances out the sort of assumptive case of Conan as kind of the lone warrior. Right? Like, the lone slave turned warrior. Right?

Pete Wright:

And and Really? Yeah. Right. And I I think that works. I just feel like this was they were working to build a team in a a weird way, like, just a sort of a comedic way.

Pete Wright:

Like, everybody joins a team on a joke, and and, that just felt forced to me.

Andy Nelson:

I don't understand that. Like, I I I don't the like, nothing seems like it's a joke really in this. Like, what where are you saying it's built on a joke?

Pete Wright:

The script?

Andy Nelson:

But, I mean, the princess in Bombata, like, that just seems like a mission. Like, doesn't like, nothing about that seems like it's a problem.

Pete Wright:

No. That's not a problem. I think I and I don't have the script in front of me, Andy. I I I'm not gonna be able to litigate this specifically. I just remember feeling like everyone joins the team for a reason that felt like there's a hole in the team and you have to fill it.

Pete Wright:

And in Conan the Barbarian, it felt much more natural. Like, there everybody had a purpose. Malik was already on the team, but he was a jokester from the beginning. The I I will say there's something about Malek that I do like, which is Malek also killed people. Right?

Pete Wright:

Malek was of of purpose. He when they were in a fight, he wasn't useless. He had his little daggers, and he jumped on bigger guys, and he stabbed them a bunch of times in the neck. And I thought that was actually great because often, the comic foil is totally useless in a fight and absolutely reliant on the big the big guy. And they did not do that in this one.

Pete Wright:

So I thought that that part was great. But it starts out with that kind of light banter that I didn't find to my taste. Like, again, I said, this is not my movie. This is not a movie for me, and that's okay. Yeah.

Andy Nelson:

I just I don't have a problem with the team building in this. Like, everybody ended up being a part of the team. They felt like they were there for a particular reason. If anyone mostly just seems kind of, like, added to the team arbitrarily, it's Zula, Grace Jones' character because because simply because they rescue her and she needs a place to go. She just wants to join Conan because she knows knows of him.

Andy Nelson:

He's now saved her and she wants to fight with him. But again, even there, I didn't really have much of a problem with the way that that was constructed. I you know, it sure, it all feels scripted, but I for me, it was no more scripted than how the team was brought together in the first film.

Pete Wright:

Okay. Fair. Yeah. Do you apparently, Grace Jones was problematic to the crew making this movie because she took the part so seriously, and that is about the most Grace Jones thing I can imagine hearing today.

Andy Nelson:

I love that about her. I mean, I feel bad for the stunt people she was working against, but, yeah, the stunt, stunt coordinator of the film said she could not figure out, like, pulling her punches. Like, she just felt like she had to actually punch when she was doing it. And she broke the nose of, like, she's got her her pole fighting is really what she's doing and she smacks a guy in the face in the scene where she's, first where we first meet her and, like, took the guy's nose out. And I know.

Andy Nelson:

Good. But she's tough. She's fun. She's a she's a great addition to this. I I've always have enjoyed seeing Grace Jones in, I mean, the few films I've seen her in, and I think I'm only counting two, this and, View to a Kill.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah.

Pete Wright:

Yeah. She's I I like watching Grace Jones on film because she is so so severe. Like, talk about someone who understood the assignment. I I think she was great. And I would I would watch her in other Conan movies.

Pete Wright:

I think she actually pairs very well with Arnold Schwarzenegger in this era. So, yeah, that that part was solid.

Andy Nelson:

I said too, she's been in a lot of films, from '73 in Gordon's War all the way up through 2016 in Gotterdammerung, so where she played death and the devil. All sorts of movies. The two that we're talking about are, you know, the two like '84, '80 '5, but then she was in Vamp, Straight to Hell, Siesta Boomerang, Freddie as f r o seven, Cyber Bandits. She's been in a lot of things, so so very busy.

Pete Wright:

She yeah. I mean, you mentioned those two. I feel like I've seen her in more stuff. I just don't, I just don't remember. Like, I have seen Vamp, and I'm sure there are others.

Pete Wright:

How would I mean, I don't think I would have such a strong memory of Grace Jones if I hadn't seen other stuff.

Andy Nelson:

Well, but but she's a presence. Like, that's the thing with Grace Jones. Every time I see her, I just feel like she is such a great presence on screen. And, I mean, you know, she's she doesn't need to be acting. She is still, singing and very very busy at the age of 76.

Andy Nelson:

So she's kudos to her for keeping so busy all the time.

Pete Wright:

For sure.

Andy Nelson:

For sure. We didn't mention that it was a fun little surprise, but Andre the Giant was actually the Daegoth monster, uncredited in this. But, yeah, Andre Roussimov, in fact, was the man inside the mask. Did you read that?

Pete Wright:

I did. Mud monster himself. That was great. I I did not notice the body movement of, that that is familiar to me as Andre the Giant. He really buried himself in the part, you might say.

Andy Nelson:

Yes. Yes. You just might. I wanna talk a little bit we we talked a little bit about kind of the the creation of this. I just I I we've kind of already done it, but I just wanna mention, you know, the the script.

Andy Nelson:

The reason I think this feels so comic booky. I mean, Dino De Laurentiis, after Conan the Barbarian, he wanted to make another Conan film, but really wanted to kind of tone it down and make it something that could actually pass as PG. The it's this came out at a very interesting time. This this movie was released 06/29/1984. The PG 13 rating went into effect 07/01/1984.

Andy Nelson:

So this just missed it, being able to be p g 13 by two days, which I think is really interesting. But so they were trying to do something that could still get a PG rating, and so they really toned it down the violence. And, you know, he talks to, Richard Fleischer, filmmaker who he had worked with a number of times. Fleischer was like, yeah, that sounds great. Let's do it.

Andy Nelson:

Let's let's make something that's a little more toned down. And so they went to the two men who were really kind of big parts of the Conan the Barbarian comics, Roy Thomas and, Jerry Conway. So these two, they had put this story together. Now, I say these names as people who are, important in Conan the Barbarian, but when you say Roy Thomas, let me just read this list to you, Pete. Among the comic characters he co created are Vision, Doc Sampson, Carol Danvers, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, Ultron, Yellowjacket, Defenders, Man Thing, Red Sonia, Morbius, Ghost Rider, Squadron Supreme, Invaders, Black Knight, Nighthawk, Havoc, Banshee, Sunfire, Thundra, Arkon, Killraven, Wendel Von, Red Wolf, Red Guardian, Daemon Hellstrom, Valkyrie.

Andy Nelson:

So he is a big name in comics. He actually is the one who was Stan Lee's successor as editor in chief at Marvel and is the one who introduced Conan the Barbarian into Marvel Comics in 1970. Jerry Conway worked with him quite a bit on all of that. And also, I mean, I could go through his whole list of things too. Another name in comic lore that is just very very big.

Andy Nelson:

My point is really just the fact that these two men knew Conan largely as the comic book figure that they very much had kind of developed and crafted based on Howard's character. And so I think it makes sense that, okay. Yeah. You can see that this is the direction they were gonna go with the story. They wanted it to feel more comic booky and everything.

Andy Nelson:

Stanley Mann ended up taking their story and being the person who wrote the script. It's interesting because he didn't have much of a comic book background, but was very much just a a screenwriter. He had just done Firestarter. Before this, he had done things like Damien Omen two, and Meteor. And so it was kind of like, I don't know, he strikes me as somebody who may be more of a, just kind of a a hired hand screenwriter to kind of develop the story.

Andy Nelson:

But I think that he made changes to the story that neither Thomas nor Conway were very happy with. But, you know, De Laurentiis was happy with it. Fleischer was happy with it, and this is the film we got.

Pete Wright:

It's it's interesting. Think Roy Thomas also created Luke Cage, and I find the Luke Cage Netflix story interesting. The character is an interesting parallel to Conan. Right? This this character who is impossibly strong, and yet still, it's a story that tracks his weaknesses, in the spirit of building a team and solving a problem.

Pete Wright:

Like, this is a an age a story that's ages old. And it feels like Roy has some is exercising some demons through these characters in a really satisfying way. I actually I think I on it hindsight, I prefer the Luke Cage character, tone, sentimentality, and I I feel like it's a matured Conan. Isn't that a funny parallel that Roy Thomas was involved in in both of these? I thought that was cool.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. Very interesting. Very interesting. Well, I mean, it's a fun movie. I I definitely have fun with it.

Andy Nelson:

Do I like it as much as Conan the Barbarian? Definitely not. But I didn't hate it. A lot of people seem to really, like, look at this as, like, you know, just garbage. And again, going back to Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones, that's how a lot of people feel about Temple of Doom.

Andy Nelson:

You know, I don't know. I I find them both to be fun films. Yes. It's a tonal shift. I don't like this one nearly as much, but I still enjoyed it.

Andy Nelson:

I enjoyed it, you know, as kind of an eighties fantasy film. I think they were it was fine.

Pete Wright:

And I also thought it was fine, but I would have rather watched Crawl.

Andy Nelson:

Yes. Another another interesting bit of eighties fantasy that would be fun to discuss for sure.

Pete Wright:

Eighties were big for this kind of fantasy. Right? Like, there's a series in here. There is. Season perhaps?

Pete Wright:

We're building our season.

Andy Nelson:

Alright. Well, we will be right back, but first, our credits.

Pete Wright:

The next reel is a production of True Story FM, engineering by Andy Nelson, music by Roy Spielger and Blackbaud, Moovika, Ian Post, Oriole Novella, and Eli Catlin. Andy usually finds all the stats for the awards and numbers at d-numbers.com, box office mojo Com, I m d b Com, and Wikipedia.org. Find the show at truestory.fm. If your podcast app allows ratings and reviews, please consider doing that for our show.

Andy Nelson:

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Andy Nelson:

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Andy Nelson:

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Andy Nelson:

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Andy Nelson:

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Andy Nelson:

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Pete Wright:

Sequels and remakes, Andy. Are we still are they still they're still making Conan movies in some way, shape, or form. I think there's one coming out. Right?

Andy Nelson:

It's been in discussion, but who knows if it'll ever happen. Yeah. I mean, there was a comic book adaptation of this film in Marvel super special number 35, which came out December. Interestingly, Roy Thomas and Jerry Conway, who we're just talking about, they were dissatisfied with Stanley Mann's script and the finished film. They actually took that story and made a graphic novel called Conan the Barbarian at the Horn of Azoth, which was published in 1990.

Andy Nelson:

They did have to change a lot of the names, but, they actually got their version of the story out there. So if you're interested in checking it out, you can still find copies of that. It's a little more on the rare side these days, but you can find copies of it on eBay. Robert Jordan wrote a novelization of this and that now the sequel. There was a third film in this trilogy planned for 1987.

Andy Nelson:

It was gonna be called Conan the Conqueror, going to your point about these names. Guy Hamilton or John Guierman would have been directing this. Schwarzenegger, however, was committed to film Predator the same year, and his contract with De Laurentiis had actually run out because he did read Sonya immediately after this one, and along with Raw Deal, and he didn't want to get back in and negotiate a new contract. So the movie fell into development hell, and that script ended up becoming Cole the Conqueror. Do you remember that one in 1997 with In name only.

Andy Nelson:

I don't remember it. It's, with Kevin Sorbo, I believe, is the one

Pete Wright:

who The Beastmaster himself?

Andy Nelson:

He ends up playing Cole in that particular film. And so, it's an adaptation of the Conan novel, The Hour of the Dragon. I remember it coming out. I never saw it. But apparently, if you are curious to see where Conan the Conqueror would have gone, you can watch Cole the Conqueror to understand that one.

Andy Nelson:

Now, as far as perhaps a new one, I mean, did have the Conan the Barbarian reboot, I guess, with Jason Momoa in 2011, which was not really very good. And then Schwarzenegger announced in 2012 that he was going to return to a film called Conan or The Legend of Conan, which would have actually skipped you know, they love doing this now. It would be a direct sequel to the original Conan the Barbarian. Skipping Conan the destroyer, kick skipping Jason Momoa's film, it would have just been a direct sequel to the original. Never got off the ground even though Schwarzenegger was excited about it, and then it finally got dropped.

Andy Nelson:

Then as of 2019, Schwarzenegger said it is still in active development, and that's when we got the word that it was now gonna be Conan the king. Again, still never saw anything, from that. So who knows if they'll ever if it'll ever come to pass. I think it would be interesting to see at this age, Schwarzenegger taking on that role again.

Pete Wright:

I think so too. I I would absolutely be down for that movie. Yeah. I think an older Conan, especially seeing you know, I'm I'm a fan of of some of what Schwarzenegger's been doing. I like Maggie a lot.

Pete Wright:

Like, his post governor acting gigs have been interesting. I would love to see him get back into an action thing.

Andy Nelson:

He's almost 80 years old, though.

Pete Wright:

I know.

Trailer:

I know.

Pete Wright:

I mean, say I say I'd like him to get back into an action thing. Like, I haven't seen, again, any of the expendables. So I know he's still doing action stuff. But that's a really good point. And yet, like, look at the guy.

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. But but you also have to look at what he's done in the recent Terminator films, and I feel like that they're he I mean, he might be just at a point where they're needing to bring in stunt people more often to actually handle the the real work, you know, or or

Pete Wright:

I should bring in Kevin Sorbo. That would be funny as his stunt person.

Andy Nelson:

There you go. Oh my god.

Pete Wright:

Protect the face. Protect the face. Okay. How did you at award season? Is this a long and distinguished list?

Andy Nelson:

It wasn't wasn't very popular in the award circles. It did have one win with three other nominations. At the Saturn Awards, Grace Jones was nominated for best supporting actress, but lost to Polly Holiday in Gremlins. At the Razzies, Olivia Dabo was nominated for worst supporting actress, but lost to Lynn Holly Johnson in Where the Boys Are. She also was nominated for worst new star, and she won tying with Bo Derek in Below.

Pete Wright:

Oh, no.

Andy Nelson:

I know. I know. Last but not least, at, at the twenty twelve International Film Music Critics Awards, it was nominated for best archival rerecording of an existing score, but lost to the battle of Noretva slash the naked and the dead. So and we didn't even talk about the fact that of the returning elements of the film, Basil Polodorus is back doing the score, and it's just it's just fantastic. I love his music for this franchise.

Pete Wright:

Which do you like better?

Andy Nelson:

They use elements like the themes across both, and so it's I I don't know. Hard to

Pete Wright:

tell them apart. Yeah. Yeah. Alright. Well, how to do at the box office?

Pete Wright:

Conan, big draw, eighties, high fantasy. It's gotta it's gotta made some bucks.

Andy Nelson:

Well, for Fleischer's turn at the Conan films, he had a budget of 18,000,000 or 54,900,000.0 in today's dollars. The movie opened 06/29/1984, as I said earlier, opposite Cannonball Run two and Bachelor Party, landing in fourth place because none of the new films could bump Ghostbusters or Gremlins out of the top two spots. The movie went on to earn 31,000,000 or 94,700,000.0 in today's dollars. That lands the film with an adjusted profit per finished minute of $386,000. A profit, but perhaps not enough to warrant continuing the franchise as it was quite a drop from the profits of the previous film.

Pete Wright:

Wow. Yeah. But at least it's an abfum.

Andy Nelson:

Hey. At at least it made money back, I guess. Yeah.

Pete Wright:

Alright. Well, I you know, this conversation has been good for me, Andy. I I came in probably a bit too bearish on this movie. Again, it's not for me, and yet there is a lot to have fun with. I'll just forget about the gorilla man mask with no mouth fight.

Pete Wright:

Like, that was a a real low point, and everything else

Andy Nelson:

It is. Yeah.

Pete Wright:

It's a fun romp. I think I and and given how I felt about the first movie okay. Yeah. It's it's fine. It's fine.

Andy Nelson:

It might be worth rewatching the first movie for you as well. Like, it really changed for me, and I had I had a great time with it. It feels different from this one, but I just I had a lot of fun with that first one. This film, I again, I didn't like it as much as the first one, but I did have fun with that. I enjoyed it.

Andy Nelson:

It's it was an easy watch. I mean, that's the thing with these sorts of movies. It was just very easy to just kind of sit back, relax, and enjoy. I would watch it again. I'd probably still enjoy the first one more, but, you know, it's it's a fun enough sort of film.

Pete Wright:

Okay. Well, we're gonna further litigate that in a minute when we get to, you know, our ratings and reviews.

Andy Nelson:

Yes. Yes. But first, we'll be right back for those ratings. Let's, tune in for the trailer for next week's movie, returning to our movies in the remake series. It's Rowdy Harrigan's nineteen eighty nine film Roadhouse.

Trailer:

Can I buy you guys a drink? Guess not. Patrick Swayze is Dumb. I thought you'd be bigger. Opinions vary.

Trailer:

When he's around, anything can happen. How does a guy like you end up a bouncer? Just lucky, I guess. And usually does. If somebody gets in your face, I want you to be

Trailer:

nice. Don't. Don't be rude.

Trailer:

Ask him to walk, but be nice. Help this gentleman to the door. Until it's time to not be nice. So says the philosopher. He may be hard to handle.

Trailer:

I keep talking, you're gonna go off thinking I'm a nice guy. I know you're not a nice guy. But he's easy to like. What's the matter, Dalton? Don't you like wind?

Trailer:

The worst I ever had was wonderful. He's not what you'd expect. I thought you'd be bigger. But there's one thing you can count on. He's the best friend, a good time ever had.

Trailer:

Aren't you guys tired? I'll go get all asleep I need when I'm dead.

Trailer:

This

Trailer:

is my time. I'm not afraid of him. I guess you'd be having that fire sale now. Alright? You got your hands full, kid.

Trailer:

I just think I'm looking at a dead man. Patrick Swayze. With that line of work, I thought you'd be bigger. Gee, I've never heard that before. Roadhouse.

Pete Wright:

In an age of chaos, when heroes were forged in the fires of forgotten realms, one force rose above the rest. 'Twas not a sword. 'Twas not a spell. It was the next real family of film podcasts membership. Join us, brave traveler, on a journey beyond the veil of ordinary podcasting into a world where bonus episodes echo like wardrobes across the plains, where early access arrives swifter than a thief in the night, where in episode bonus content content reveals truths darker than any wizard's spell.

Pete Wright:

You shall wield your own personal podcast feed, a totem of power known only to the chosen few. You will hear ad free episodes unsullied by merchants or mid episode proclamations. Gather round the sacred flame of live recording sessions where the hosts conjure insights in real time and enter the enchanted stronghold of our Discord where members dwell in exclusive fellowship. All this for those bold enough to support the podcast they love, to lift their voices, to join their ranks, to become a member. So heed the call, ride forth to truestory.fm/join.

Pete Wright:

And remember, in a world of destroyers, you can become a creator.

Pete Wright:

Letterbox, Andrew. Letterbox, this is where we assign our stars and our hearts and see where we rank this movie. Letterbox.com/the next reel. That's where you can find our page headquarters page HQ page. Yeah.

Pete Wright:

That's what it's called. What are you gonna do? What are you gonna do? What'd you do? You came back to Conan on revisit and rated that what?

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. I think I had started at three stars with that one, and then I ended up after I revisited four and a half. Like, I freaking loved It was so much fun. I think I must have been on cold medicine or something when I watched it the first time. It was just like it was a great film.

Andy Nelson:

And so this film, you know, I I have fun with this one. It's an easy watch. I think that it's fair. I do have problems with it. But it's three stars in a heart.

Andy Nelson:

I think that's a fair spot for this one to sit for me.

Pete Wright:

Well, I'm in trouble because I rated the first Conan. I've not rewatched it. And I rated the first Conan two stars. No heart. Yeah.

Pete Wright:

Is that?

Andy Nelson:

Yeah. That's why you need to rewatch it.

Pete Wright:

I know. After this conversation, it makes me think I need to to rewatch it because there's something wrong with me. And I'll own that. That's fine. I get it.

Pete Wright:

Because I wanted to my initial thought for this movie is I don't know that I'm gonna watch it again. It it was fun and frivolous, and I don't I've had enough. I would give it three stars. Probably no heart, Kind of feels right down the middle. But now, I've just rated this movie higher than Conan the Barbarian, which feels like a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions.

Andy Nelson:

It does. It definitely does. I you started this little thing that we had, like, where we get to assign each other movies that you have to watch this next week. I'm gonna tell you, you need to watch Conan the Barbarian this week. Yeah.

Andy Nelson:

Sorry. You're gonna have to revisit that one.

Trailer:

You got it.

Pete Wright:

Yeah. I'll do it.

Andy Nelson:

Good. Alright. Well, that will average out to three stars in a heart over on our Letterboxd account, which you can find at the next reel. You can find me there at soda creek film. You can find Pete there at pete wright.

Andy Nelson:

So what did you think about Conan the destroyer? We would love to hear your thoughts. Hop into the ShowTalk channel over in our Discord community where we will be talking about the movie this week.

Pete Wright:

When the movie ends.

Andy Nelson:

Our conversation begins.

Pete Wright:

Letterbox giveth, Andrew.

Andy Nelson:

How does Letterboxd always doeth?

Pete Wright:

Okay. What what are you gonna do?

Andy Nelson:

I'm going with the two and a half star by Ahab, who had this to say. There are two really great things about this movie. One is that it is called the destroyer, which I just think is funny because of our whole conversation about that. The other is that Conan punches a horse in the face and has a three stooges moment with a camel in the same sequence. I like to call it the Conan takes no s from animals sequence.

Andy Nelson:

Apart from those two diamonds in the rough, I mostly just regretted not watching Barbarian again.

Pete Wright:

Okay. We didn't say anything about Arnold Schwarzenegger punches animals, and we absolutely should have because that's still here.

Andy Nelson:

Such a strange such and it's it's like the same camel from the first film and he's apologizing to it. What a what a weird moment. Yeah.

Pete Wright:

So weird. Alright. I have this from Comrade Yui. Conan the barbarian. Crom, I have never prayed to

Pete Wright:

you before. I have no tongue for it. No one, not even you will remember if we were good men or bad. Why we fought or why we died. All that matters is that today two stood against many.

Pete Wright:

That's what's important. Valor pleases you, Crom. So grant me one request. Grant me revenge. And if you do not listen, then

Pete Wright:

to hell with you, Conan the destroyer.

Pete Wright:

Roll two d 10 plus five for your greatswords melee damage.

Pete Wright:

Love a good D and D joke. Thanks, Letterboxd.