Buckaroo Banzai: The VHS TV Edition

This one definitely falls squarely under the title Fan Mix. It's not trying to fix anything, it's just a what if exploration. BionicBob has set up an entire imaginary TV series and fandom as background for this project which just adds to the fun. This was masterfully executed.

The technical aspects were spot on. Just enough degradation to imply an old VHS recording without going overboard. The ad break bumpers felt just right for an '80's TV show. The commercials were well selected for the time (dating myself, I remember several of them).

Now I'm looking forward to him "dredging up the next found VHS recording" for the next episode.

BionicBob does what he does best in this edit by mixing his love of great (even if sometimes lesser appreciated) gems and re-imagining it through his encyclopedic knowledge and love of numerous genres; in this case, the greatest decade of them all, the 1980s (You can disagree with that statement, but you'd be wrong!)

I love the concept of this project on multiple levels, from the re-worked mythos of BB as an ongoing T.V. show to it's bitter ratings drop to comic-con cult-trading classic. Many of us remember the days before the interwebs where bootlegs were not just a magical holy grail, but getting them was often a mythic (and sometimes expensive) journey, and Bob blends all of that nostalgia wonderfully in this lost video tape concept.

Now, to the actual product and ratings.

Technical (A/V quality, Visual Editing and Audio Editing): 10 across the board.
It's a little cheat I suppose because the goal here is to degrade the quality, but to do it convincingly is actually a bit of an art, and he pulls off the balance just right here making it feel authentic. The edits are seamless, and the audio work is great, particularly with the intros and outros to the commercial breaks. It takes some work to get the right 'natural' feel and everything about this feels authentic for the era it replicates, including the fantastic work on making it a 4:3 frame. Great work!

Narative: 10
Being a 1 hour episode (minus credits and tv breaks) Bob does a great job of creating a compelling chapter within the broader story, with an appropriate "previously" section so that as a viewer we have everything we need to dive in. I would say the only thing missing for me would be a "Next week" teaser at the end that sometimes ran with such projects.

Enjoyment: 10
The most subjective category, I have to give a 10. This was FUN. Having grown up in the 70s and 80s, this edit speaks directly to that innocent version of me who adored all the lunatic television and films in a world where cable was an extreme luxury and the closest thing to the internet was a BBC you'd access with your phone modem. My brother in law was wandering in and out of the kitchen as i watched this and he in particularly loved the commercial breaks and NBC spots.

If you didn't grow up in or live through the 1980s, this is absolutely an authentic treatment of what TV was like.

I'm square in the middle of the target audience for this, and it delivers. Great job Bob!

Today, for sixty minutes, I was 8 years old again. Memories of being glued to the TV screen watching shows such as "Knight Rider" or "The A-Team" or "Street Hawk" or 80s airings of "Buck Rogers" and the sixties "Batman", right before going outside to play with friends and pretend to be the characters from the shows, warmly flooded back. This edit is exactly the kind of stuff I would have loved back then and never ever miss the week's (or day's) episode. So much fun, and so close to the real thing! The recreation was spot-on. It does help, of course, to have been raised on this style of TV (I wonder what younger people would make of it), and/or being fond of the Buckaroo Banzai movie (and how can you not be? It's a complete mess, for sure, but the kind of mess that is so out there that it jumps right at you, covers you in puppy kisses, and dares you not to love it. Just like a lot of 80s TV!) Beyond the visual treatment, we're also presented with a few easter eggs from other shows and movies, and vintage ads that are both fun and, for those like me who hadn't seen most of them due to not being from the US, quite surprising (Stanley Tucci, of all people, in hunk mode?) Even some small audio imperfections don't detract at all, due to the "found footage" angle of this. And special mention must go to the watermelon vanity plate! That made me chuckle.

Gosh, I miss the 80s. And being young. At least this edit provided me with a reasonable facsimile of both for an hour. Now, someone please unearth more episodes from this lost show! I've heard that the "World Crime League" arc was a real highlight...

First I will say I am a bit biased as I have enjoyed many of Bobs edits (Six Million Dollar Man fan here). Be that as it may as I have written before I am not a techie about the editing this or that stuff. I look at these edits as a pure fan looking for enjoyment nothing more or less. So when I blew off the dust from my VHS copy of this and put it in my machine that needs to have the heads cleaned oh so badly. Turned on my 13 inch Zenith color Tv. Popped my Jiffy Pop and sat in my lazy boy recliner. I hit the play button and all I have to really say about this edit is Brilliant. Thanks so much for the work effort and share. This actually had me looking for other episodes. I was thinking did I miss something? Now I am gonna cruise around LA to look for filming locations to see how much has changed since 1984. Looking forward to your next project

Audio/Video Quality: The audio and video were intentionally degraded for the immersion, but not to the point of things being hard to make out, just enough to convey the style. The audio and video quality is perfect for what it is trying to achieve without going too far.

Visual Editing: Nothing felt out of place, no weird cuts, the cropping looked nice, everything was well done. The look of the movie was consistent with that of the commercials, and the whole presentation was nicely immersive.

Audio Editing: Everything was again nicely edited together, I'm especially fond of the inclusion of a brief line of dialogue from a deleted scene. The commercials were noticeably louder than the rest of the feature, which was intentional as part of the immersion. I wasn't quite fond of this, but there's no sense in taking points away for it, especially now that Bob is talking about releasing a version without this.

Narrative: For the majority of this edit, it just follows the movie without any real big changes to the narrative. The beginning "Last time..." part was very well done and did a great job at conveying everything that occurred before our story picks up. The cliffhanger ending was also handled well. I didn't realize that it was going to end where it did, though I made the mistake of checking how much time was left so I knew there would be some sort of cliffhanger.

Enjoyment: The presentation of it all was fantastic and really enjoyable, some of the commercials were very amusing. Beneath the presentation, as mentioned before there aren't really any big changes to the narrative, so I was a tad bored at parts because I happened to watch the movie again not long before this. It's not the edit's fault, it's not trying to be different in that department, it's just trying to present the film in a new context, and the presentation itself was fantastic, so no reason to take points off.

This edit was really interesting, though I don't necessarily think I'd watch it again anytime soon unless I were to make my own vintage TV edit of something and wanted a refresher on how to do it right. I seriously appreciate all of the effort put into this edit by Bionic Bob.
I wouldn't recommend this to anyone who doesn't already like the film, it's not a fanfix obviously, but fellow fans of this film will surely love this interdimensional experiment.