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I have to wonder how many got the joke?

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Many of my favorite jokes in TV and movies are the ones aimed at a very small segment of the audience or maybe not at the audience at all and meant just for the writers. (It's a big part of why Rocky and Bullwinkle is still funny decades later.)

First, a confession. Remember a while back when somebody asked about guilty pleasures? Well, one that I have to sheepishly admit to is that my wife and I are addicted to those silly Hallmark movies. Yeah, they're corny. Yeah, there's dozens of them but there are only four plots. Yeah, they're littered with repeating tropes and populated by the same actors shuffled like a deck of cards. But they're fun.

Maybe half the fun is seeing what differences the writers manage to create while telling the same story for the fiftieth time.

Caught one the other night that had all the usual elements. "The girl" leads an unfulfilling life in the big city wondering if she'll ever find true love. She travels to a small, rural town where life is slower paced, everybody knows everybody and everybody's friendly and cheerful. In this idyllic setting she meets "the guy" and they fall in love.

In the second to last scene she sees something that makes her think "the guy" was just playing her and didn't really have feeling for her. She runs off in tears. When he finds out she ran away he chases after her. But he's too late. He gets to the quaint little small town train station just in time to see the train she's on roll out toward the big city.

And the name of the village on the sign on this quaint small town train station: WILLOUGHBY
 

AngliaGT

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Wasn't there a funeral home with that name?
 
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back of the hearse.

willoughby-doors.jpg
 
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train station sign as seen in T-zone

12.png


latest


I would think that the train station and the whole town in T-zone were sets on the MGM back lot.



This is the old Santa Susana Railroad Depot, about 40 miles north of Los Angeles. Hollywood often uses the surrounding area for filming rural backgrounds. The Hallmark movie's producers just covered the sign with one that read "WILLOUGHBY."

the-santa-susana-train.jpg


Considering Hallmark's primary demographic, I'm betting the writers did it for fun and didn't expect many in the audience to get it.
 

AngliaGT

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Doug, when the hearse takes away the body, we see the name of the funeral home is "Willoughby and Son".


Actually I remember that,but was trying to see if anyone caught the reference.

"Walking Distance" was another episode of the "Twilight Zone".
 

NutmegCT

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Like Tom, I recognized it immediately from TZ.

Let's see ... I can remember most of the Twilight Zone and Outer Limits episodes from 50 years ago,
but can't remember what I had for ... for ... whatever that meal was after I got up this morning.

Episode 1.jpg
 

waltesefalcon

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That's great, I love catching allusions like that when watching something completely unrelated.
 
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.... I recognized it immediately from TZ.
I knew you guys would get it.

I wonder how many people watching the movie on Hallmark Channel got it. Is there really much of a crossover between fans of feel-good romance and classic sci-fi?

Although some of their plots do employ T-Zone'y premises like time travel, supernatural beings (angels) and seeing into the future.



....
but can't remember what I had for ... for ... whatever that meal was after I got up this morning.

View attachment 57261

Don't worry, you'll have time enough at last to figure it out. ;)


.... we'll still have our LBCs!...
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3149.2.jpg



"Walking Distance".
I have to confess that I couldn't connect the title with the story at first and had to look it up. Yeah, great episode. The name just didn't stick with me like Kick the Can.
 

glemon

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That scene with the Sprite is great, the car geek in me is wanting to get a better look at those hubcaps. I think MGs had a fancier hubcap at one time, but don't know if the early box Sprites did. Not that the parts wouldn't be interchangeable.

Back before we had streaming everything one of the cable channels would run Twilight Zone non stop around new year's, always enjoyed that.
 

waltesefalcon

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"I have to confess that I couldn't connect the title with the story at first and had to look it up."

I don't know the titles to most episodes myself and just say something with "the Shatner and Gremlin episode."
 
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They showed that Hallmark movie again the other day. I was tuning in to watch the next movie so I only caught the last few seconds. Darn, missed the Willoughby train station scene.

But the next movie had its own inside reference. It was in a sort of serious scene and I just busted out laughing, causing my wife to give me one of those "what's wrong with him now?" looks. (She doen't have a long history of Sci-Fi geekdom.)

In this other movie, "the girl" lives with her father, who is disabled, spends most of his day in his recliner hooked up to an oxygen tank and is played by the always excellent Dean Stockwell (a.k.a. Admiral Al Calivicci).

In an early scene she comes home and asks how his day went. He complains about his smart phone, holding the device in his right hand and slapping it with his left.
 
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