With his recent Super Bowl victory Matthew has broken back into the public consciousness. Or at least mine which is just as good. He inspired flashbacks to his glory years before the incident and the sellout. The incident has left a sour taste in my mouth for the last 15 years. It was just such an unthinkable act. Something so tragic that it was nearly impossible to maintain respect for him.
I speak of course of his marriage to the creature Sarah Jessica Parker. This was quickly followed up by the inspector Gadget sellout debacle. I have had my back turned to him ever since. However Honda reached out and made me look back and remember the man he was, not the man he became. And for that I have to thank them.
His early years were beyond impressive. We are talking off the charts life changing events. For a young white kid growing up in the suburbs Broderick’s work here inspired a lifetime cynicism, sarcasm, games, fantasy, and slacker excellence. War Games and Ferris may not have directly inspired me to want to head into Computer Science but they did do several things for sure:
- Make me want start a Global Thermonuclear War and eat at Burger King.
- Assume no one in charge has any idea what they are really doing.
- Use my talents for mischief and otherwise slacker behavior knowing it could all be fixed in the end. I mean, look at me now!
- You can always win Tic Tac Toe. You just have to keep trying.
Besides the above two megahits Broderick also brought us Ladyhawke during this period. It was of course a dangerous fantasy movie that for some reason was always on HBO or Cinemax and therefore I watched it all the time as well. This plus LOTR and RPGs helped hinder my development for years. Thank God for football and sports. Many others were laid low by these traps but this was all part of the Broderick charm.
Broderick also produced the best Civil War movie ever – Glory. Name one better. Gettysburg? Ha. Keep trying. You have to have characters and character growth to tell a real story. Name one in Gettysburg. That Glory was not even nominated for Best Picture is still a travesty to this day. My Left Foot? Come on Son!
The Lion King is still the best Disney movie. Not Aladdin or Ferngully or Avatar or any of their other hippie crap. This movie is the only saving grace for that institution. It was an amazing tale and Broderick did an excellent job of voice acting even though his career was on a downward spiral at this point.
After that Broderick’s career is a series of landmines except for the excellent Election with America’s blonde sweetheart Reese Witherspoon.
Will one commercial make up for over a decade of failure and mediocrity? No. It cannot. What it can do is form a bridge over the failure back to the past so we can remember him in better times before the incident, before the ineptitude. When he was a shining beacon of the power of the 80’s and their glory. When America was great and the future was so bright we had to wear shades.
Thank you Matthew for all the memories and terrible life choices you inspired in me.