And of course they spoofed it in a Simpsons episode, when Bart went to work as Krusty’s assistant.
“It’s Betty! Betty…Simington!”
Well, you’d better get used to the on-screen ads, folks. I remember a news story a month or so ago about how ad revenues are gonna drop BIG TIME in the next few years due to DVRs like Tivo and the ones that cable companies are offering. And I can see their point - now that I have the Time Warner DVR, I rarely - if ever - watch a show “live” anymore and bitch when I do because you can’t fast-forward through the commercials. Even for our “can’t miss” shows like 24, my missus and I will wait until 15 minutes into the show to start watching, so we can skip all the commercials. Of course, you read and hear things all the time that will never happen - remember “microwave clothes dryers” anyone? - so the article could be full of it. But I can’t see where they’re wrong either.
Don’t get me wrong - I hate it too! Especially when the “bug” or “promo” covers up the name of someone they’re interviewing! But alas - what 'cha gonna do?
And in another where the family is watching a Noah’s Ark movie (starring Troy McClure). God is about to give Noah a final message when Kent Brockman inturupts. Then the credits are smashed to the very left and scrolling at a fast speed.
“Meet a real life Noah. Instead of saving two of every animal, he kills two of every animal!”
Hate, hate, HATE that. I’m watching a Buffy rerun or something, and then suddenly: gunshots! What? Who’s getting shot? Is it season six already? No, it’s a promo for “The Shield”. Grr…
I love it when the feature ends on Turner Classic Movies, and instead of showing you the credits they cut to Robert Osborne, the personification of Smarmy Twit, revealing fascinating factoids that you don’t want to know.
For that matter, does anyone really need “hosts” who appear at station breaks to share their recipes, gossip and opinions about the movie? Is this a secret plot to drive up video rentals?
Just tried Googling to answer your question about the Doctor, Master Wang-Ka , but the website apparently operates on the principle that “only pretty people count”. :rolleyes:
That is, the big names only were listed.
Are you sure about that? In the old days ('60s) credits were short enough to show at the start of the movie only.
When did credits become 5 minute affairs?
26 responses and no one thought to look it up for the great Master?!
Dr. James Cody was played by Robert Mammone.
I think we can safely blame George Lucas for this.
Credits appear at the end of lots of old movies.
I don’t care too much about who the wardrobe assistant was, but it would be nice to know the names of some of the supporting actors.
People F-FWD through commercials on VCRs too, so this isn’t new. I don’t get the logic of these stations. “Boss, people are watching movies on DVDs because they don’t like commercials.” “Hm, that’s not good! People don’t like commercials, so they don’t watch our station. We’d better make up the shortfall by selling more commercial time!” “Brilliant!”
I was positive an old friend of mine appeared in a SciFi Channel show about UFOs in Kecksberg, but I haven’t talked to him in a couple of years and wanted to be sure. “Squish!” went the credits! I taped the show when it was on, and tried to read the credits on replay. No joy. I e-mailed SciFi Channel to ask them who played the reporter. I got a form-mail mail that said, in effect, “Thank you for writing SciFi Channel. We get a lot of mail, so we don’t read any of it.” :rolleyes:
Only five minutes? IIRC Pirates of the Caribbean, for example, had 20 minutes of credits.
I think the extra-long credits come from unions. Unions require more people on the crew, and they expect their members to be recognised for their work. More people + recognition = longer credits.
So once again, unions are mucking up things for the rest of us.
Why else, would we be seeing the name of the guy who puts the donuts out in the morning and the third assistant standby costume mender?
But seriously, can someone compile a list of names, phone numbers and addresses of people we can harrangue about the credit-crunching and those noisy, animated, screen-filling bugs and promos?
That was exactly what I was thinking.
I guess I just take IMDB for granted. It rarely occurs to me that other people don’t know about it, or how useful it is. As indicated by TJDude’s cite, IMDB is *the * place to go for any credit you could possibly want. It’s settled more than a few arguments for me, and alleviated the nagging “What else has that guy been in?” questions, along with all kinds of interesting facts, trivia, movie goofs, etc. TV shows, video games, foreign films… It’s got everything.
So, Johnny L.A. if you go to IMDB and type your friend’s name in, it would tell you whether he was in that episode you saw. And it would tell **Master Wang-Ka ** if he went to high school with anyone. Although, if it was a Stephen King made-for-TV movie, I’m not sure you’d want to admit that. 
Only if his friend is Jonathan Emrys (aka Jonathan Hufnagel-Giba).
TCM does not cut off credits. Robert Osborne, certified Fountain of Knowledge, appears before the movies start and reappears only after the final credits have rolled.
I don’t watch movies that have been edited for television (with the exception of MST3K) but if someone wants to watch hosts jabber at each other it doesn’t bother me.
Hmmm… He says his friend played a reporter, and a quick googling says that a reporter named John Murphy (who was played by Jonathan Emrys) took pictures of the Kecksburg incident so… We just may have a hit. If, of course, his friend is indeed Jonathan Emrys.
Thanks, TJ. He looked familiar as all hell, but durned if I’ve ever heard the name.
Powers Boothe and I nearly went to college together, and among my professors was one of the chaps from TV’s Hogan’s Heroes, so, yeah, I compulsively read credits…
Well, we’re not quite there yet. PotC has about 10 minutes of credits. Well, at least the DVD version does, anyway.
Don’t worry, they’ll soon be longer even if they have to put in people who had absolutely nothing to do with the movie. “Director’s father’s brother’s nephew’s cousin’s former roommate (which makes them absolutely nothing) - Turd Ferguson”
I did that after seeing the show. IMDB did not have that on the credits at the time. I did go back several weeks later and it had been updated. But it was no help the day after the show.
It is, indeed! 
Hey, I just noticed that Pirates of the Caribbean and Passion of the Christ are both abbreviated “Potsie”.