# Movies/TV Shows/etc moments that seem really dated now... **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 13, 2002, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226 "2002-09-13T04:39:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Alfishius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e56c9b/32.png) [@Alfishius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alfishius)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2018, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/161 "2018-05-02T22:32:21Z")
> [@Torgo](#): > > Early episodes of recent hit shows; first season episodes of **“Friends”, “Seinfeld”** and others showcasing early 90s hairstyles and clothes (a little too close to the 80s for my tastes). The 80s were fucking awesome. I wish all the girls fashions of the 80s would come back. The hair, the clothes, the makeup…nothing hotter than an 80s chick and if you don’t think so, you’re a dope. ---
**Author:** ![HowSoonIsThen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@HowSoonIsThen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HowSoonIsThen)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2018, 8:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/162 "2018-05-03T08:04:35Z")
The 90s gave us both a Senfeld episode and a Simpsons episode where the characters get an illegal cable hook up. Its quite interesting just how worried and guilty the characters feel about stealing tv. I mean, watching tv without paying for it? The nerve! I’m sure glad that never took off… ---
**Author:** ![Alfishius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e56c9b/32.png) [@Alfishius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alfishius)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/163 "2018-06-22T10:22:43Z")
The 80s were such an awesome time, the 90s just cant compare. Every decade since then has sucked hard. As I get older and older I keep waiting for an awesome decade like the 80s to come along. Maybe it will before I run out of decades I’m alive for, but I’m starting to doubt it. Oh well, only 2 more years before the next decade starts. Maybe…! ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/164 "2018-06-22T13:33:22Z")
This thread reminded me of an episode of Dragnet (“The Kidnapping”, Season 1, Episode 3) where a cosmetics entrepreneur named Adele Vincent had been kidnapped. A woman who worked for Vincent had come to the police to report the crime. In setting up the rescue operation, Friday and Gannon were getting descriptions of Miss Vincent and the man who’d kidnapped her. I (correctly) remembered the woman describing Miss Vincent as “lovely, …” I had thought this was a sign of the sexism of the times. But when I went back to view the episode, I learned that the woman also included in her detailed description of the kidnapper’s looks and clothing that he was “not bad looking”. Maybe it’s not just sexism that people’s hotness was included in their descriptions. Maybe it was also a reflection of the fact that TV in that era was a mostly white world? And that with a more uniform standard of beauty in place, it made practical sense for police to note how attractive someone was in describing them? Either way, it seems very dated. ---
**Author:** ![Alfishius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e56c9b/32.png) [@Alfishius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alfishius)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2018, 10:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/165 "2018-08-24T10:20:25Z")
> [@Alphagene](#): > > You got a lot of Moxie to be jumping on this guy like he’s a Trampoline. Did someone put Vaseline in your Cornflakes or Heroin in your Granola? Heroin isn’t a brand name…(neither is granola). ---
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Tan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/charlie_tan/32/12582_2.png) [@Charlie\_Tan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Tan)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2018, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/166 "2018-08-24T13:50:25Z")
> [@Alfishius](#): > > Heroin isn’t a brand name…(neither is granola). [It was](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayer#Heroin) > [@](#): > > Heroin (diacetylmorphine), now illegal as an addictive drug, was trademarked and marketed by Bayer as a cough suppressant and non-addictive substitute for morphine from 1898 to 1910.[19] Bayer scientists were not the first to make heroin, but their scientists discovered ways to make it, and Bayer led commercialization of heroin.[20] Heroin was a Bayer trademark until after World War I.[21] ---
**Author:** ![Alfishius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e56c9b/32.png) [@Alfishius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alfishius)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2018, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/167 "2018-09-26T23:28:16Z")
Well fuck me sideways! ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2018, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/168 "2018-09-27T13:58:43Z")
We are currently watching an episode a night of _Mad About You_. The one last night was based on Jaimie and Paul using some non-refundable tickets Paul’s father bought. So they had to pretend to be Burt and Sylvania 😉 Buchman. The starting point was at the airport. The airport. They were using someone else’s tickets to get on a plane. How does that work? Doesn’t the TSA check these things? Really takes you out of the show for a bit. Also, the resort they went to had no phones or TV. But I bet they had WiFi or no one would go there. ---
**Author:** ![Alfishius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e56c9b/32.png) [@Alfishius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alfishius)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/169 "2019-01-13T12:02:21Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > We are currently watching an episode a night of _Mad About You_. The one last night was based on Jaimie and Paul using some non-refundable tickets Paul’s father bought. So they had to pretend to be Burt and Sylvania 😉 Buchman. The starting point was at the airport. > > The airport. They were using someone else’s tickets to get on a plane. How does that work? Doesn’t the TSA check these things? > > Really takes you out of the show for a bit. > > Also, the resort they went to had no phones or TV. But I bet they had WiFi or no one would go there. People watch _Mad About You_? By choice?? ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/170 "2019-01-13T15:55:39Z")
I envision a world a hundred years from now, civilization has collapsed–the sporadic survivors are mostly Thunderdoming each other, but a few wisps of the old Web remain, almost entirely forgotten. Then, one day, Alfishius makes his next reply to this thread (probably a “lol”.) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/171 "2019-01-13T17:57:34Z")
**Alfishius** , do you ever make any post without waiting at least three weeks, first? ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2019, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/172 "2019-01-13T19:01:41Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > … > > In 2011, audiences will rent old DVDs > … Even this thread is dated! ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/173 "2019-01-14T00:38:58Z")
> [@Don\_Draper](#): > > My Dad was a doctor and a fairly senior staff member (basically someone like Dr. Westphall or Dr. Auschlander from “Elsewhere”) and even during the original run of the series, he would be gnashing his teeth, grimacing, and sometimes even groaning and guffawing out loud at the mispronounced medical jargon, the ridiculous “life or death” drama over what were routine medical procedures, and just what he viewed as the contrived and inept portrayal of what actual hospitals are like. I think it was the first episode of _St Elsewhere_ where in the first five minutes someone was performing CPR incorrectly. Wife was medical and was incensed they would show it because viewers might try it and people would die. Medical dramas were off the menu until _House_. > [@terentii](#): > > Not surprising. I’ve worked with abacuses too (until recently, they were ubiquitous in Russia), and I know they’re really fast! > > I don’t think that was quite what Chin’s line was intended to convey, though. 😉 I thought Chin meant, “I’ll show you my fucking abacus, Roundeyes.” ---
**Author:** ![Ashtura](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ashtura/32/2963_2.png) [@Ashtura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ashtura)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/174 "2019-01-14T16:43:54Z")
Honestly, I think anything that wouldn’t appear “dated” if you were doing it as a modern period piece shouldn’t count. Not having cell phones is not “dated”, it would an anachronism. ---
**Author:** ![BwanaBob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bwanabob/32/2985_2.png) [@BwanaBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BwanaBob)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/175 "2019-01-14T17:05:13Z")
I hope to god this whole thread is one big whoosh. Seriously, all those movies set in the Roman empire are stupid. Why use those chariots when they could use a hemi-engined SUV? Get places much faster. And those dumb doctors in the 1880’s, sitting around watching people die of tuberculosis. Give the poor schmucks some antibiotics already… It seems like nearly everyone in this thread can’t bear to watch anything set in the past because duh we have better technology and different social views. ---
**Author:** ![caligulathegod](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/caligulathegod/32/9685_2.png) [@caligulathegod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/caligulathegod)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/176 "2019-01-14T20:54:55Z")
I think you’ve missed the point. It’s just a look at films and TV shows that were ostensibly modern when they were made but now are amusingly relics of their time. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2019, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/177 "2019-01-14T21:20:51Z")
I’ve posted this one elsewhere, but why not: the “let’s all learn how to use a fax machine” scene in **Die Hard 2**. Pretty silly by today’s standards. Plus, a fax machine isn’t the greatest way to send an image of a fingerprint, and a 1990s fax machine would probably just turn it into a smudge. If you have a really clear print, it’ll work, but it’ll have scan lines; even an amateur can spot a faxed print. ---
**Author:** ![Alfishius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e56c9b/32.png) [@Alfishius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alfishius)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/178 "2019-02-15T11:33:51Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > **Alfishius** , do you ever make any post without waiting at least three weeks, first? I don’t think so… ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/179 "2019-02-15T13:19:03Z")
> [@akrako1](#): > > Almost any early CGI, especially on TV. Babylon 5 is a great example. Wonderful stories, but oh-so-terrible graphics by today’s standards. While watching, you feel like you’re playing a late 90’s video game. Yeah, I doubt there’s any financial incentive to re-CGI it. The CGI at the beginning and end of “Labyrinth” likewise looks terrible (not to mention Bowie’s tights). Funnily enough, B5 deliberately put a dated reference into the show. The bar had a prominent “ZIMA” sign, which IIRC JMS stuck in as a joke, knowing full well that Zima was in no way going to be the drink of the future. > [@Alfishius](#): > > The 80s were fucking awesome. I wish all the girls fashions of the 80s would come back. The hair, the clothes, the makeup…nothing hotter than an 80s chick and if you don’t think so, you’re a dope. I remember the 80’s, and if you think shoulder pads and puffball skirts are “hot”, well…it’s debatable which one of us is a “dope”. > [@Alfishius](#): > > I don’t think so… ISWYDT. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226/180 "2019-02-15T14:07:45Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > I’d like to see all my favorite Harry Hausen films with the animation upgraded with blur motion. Harryhausen was well aware of the “strobing” effect his animation had, and thought it was an acceptable part of the experience. I wouldn’t like to see it blurred out, either. For what it’s worth, people have been blurring away the animation strobing well before there was “full” CGI. In the 1920s animator Ladisls Starevich moved his model during film exposure. Animator Jim Danforth used a movement mechanism to move wings and such on his animation models so that they would photograph as a blur\*. In the 1980s Phil Tippett at Industrial Light and Magic came up with his own version – “Go Motion” – that was used in several films, like _Dragonslayer_. Since the early 1990s it’s been easier to simply use CGI to cause blurring. \*The Wikipedia article on Go-Motion claims that Danforth used a petroleum-jelly method to create the blur, but contemporary sources said that he actually moved the winds during exposure. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-tv-shows-etc-moments-that-seem-really-dated-now/128226.md?page=10)