# Things in movies and TV that went over your head as a child **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 20, 2011, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606 "2011-05-20T18:32:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Pyper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pyper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pyper)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2011, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/1 "2011-05-20T18:32:59Z")
When my sister and I were kids, _Grease_ was her favorite movie. We must have watched it a hundred times. I didn’t realize until I was an adult how dirty that movie is! Sexual innuendo everywhere, a subplot about a broken condom leading to pregnancy- I never picked up on any of it. Also, I didn’t realize that the mice in _An American Tail_ were supposed to be Eastern European Jews, although my heritage is- you guessed it- Eastern European Jewish. What aspects of TV and movies went over your head as a child? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2011, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/2 "2011-05-20T19:49:46Z")
I missed that the Looney Tunes cartoons they were showing at the time were heavily (and very clumsily) censored to remove anything remotely “violent”. I did know that they were old, so when the Coyote ran to the edge of a cliff and the show abruptly switched to another scene, I thought that meant the film had broken at that spot and they’d taped it together. And of course pretty much all the celebrity references were over my head. ---
**Author:** ![Greg\_Charles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/839c29/32.png) [@Greg\_Charles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greg_Charles)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2011, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/3 "2011-05-20T21:03:49Z")
There was a sketch on the old “Carol Burnett Show”. Steve Lawrence plays a petty gangster and shows Carol (who has a secret crush on him) a diamond necklace he plans to give his girlfriend. “What would you do for a necklace like that?” he asks her, but just rhetorically. She answers, “Anything you want. And twice on Sundays!” At 11, I just thought that sounded funny. Many years later, I got the reference. ---
**Author:** ![garygnu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garygnu/32/2924_2.png) [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2011, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/4 "2011-05-20T22:38:07Z")
The plot of _Tron_. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2011, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/5 "2011-05-20T22:46:20Z")
**Back to the Future II** was one of my favourite movies as a kid. I never realized that Michael J. Fox played his own daughter. :smack: Not until I bought the DVDs a few years ago and listened to the commentary. I got they he played his older self, but completely missed that the daughter was him in drag. ---
**Author:** ![Small\_Hen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ad7895/32.png) [@Small\_Hen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Small_Hen)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/6 "2011-05-21T00:10:41Z")
A friend of mine told me that she watched Less Than Zero as a preteen and missed that Robert Downey Jr.'s character was a male prostitute. ---
**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:** [May 21, 2011, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/7 "2011-05-21T00:14:41Z")
The second time I watched _Ghostbusters_, I was amazed at just how sexual it was. All that business about the Gatekeeper and the Keymaster just completely whooshed me as a kid-- I was just in it for the special effects. As an aside, at the time, Sigourney Weaver was approximately as hot as the solar corona. ---
**Author:** ![Skara\_Brae](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f0a364/32.png) [@Skara\_Brae](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skara_Brae)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/8 "2011-05-21T00:17:07Z")
I always missed that characters were supposed to be drunk. (Probably because I didn’t know what \*drunk \*was). I always thought they were acting silly, but because they were upset or something. I think it was mostly on _Cheers_, but probably other shows too. Watching them later was always a revelation. _Ohhhh…_ ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/9 "2011-05-21T00:26:18Z")
The movie Deliverance. I never got why the redneck wanted Ned Beatty to scream like a pig. I get it now. But when I saw it, I believe it was on broadcast TV and probably censored quite a bit. It went completely over my head at the time. ---
**Author:** ![kushiel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bbce88/32.png) [@kushiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kushiel)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/10 "2011-05-21T00:35:41Z")
My brother and his girlfriend took me to see There’s Something About Mary when I was about 12. I got most of it, but the sperm gel totally went over my head. ---
**Author:** ![Ruffian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/71e660/32.png) [@Ruffian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruffian)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/11 "2011-05-21T02:25:05Z")
I saw _Empire Strikes Back_ dozens of times as a kid and preteen–but it wasn’t until just a few years ago when I was watching it on cable when this innuendo of this exchange sunk in for the first time: > [@](#): > > Leia: Captain, being held by you is not nearly enough to get me excited. > Han: Sorry, princess…we don’t have time for anything else. :eek: 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Hodge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Hodge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hodge)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/12 "2011-05-21T02:38:47Z")
> [@Pyper](#): > > When my sister and I were kids, _Grease_ was her favorite movie. We must have watched it a hundred times. I didn’t realize until I was an adult how dirty that movie is! Sexual innuendo everywhere, a subplot about a broken condom leading to pregnancy- I never picked up on any of it. Heh…I was about 11 or 12 when “Grease” was in the theatres and my mom took me to see it. I still remember a joke Rizzo told: “I feel like a broken typewriter. I skipped a period.” I turned to my mom and asked her what it meant. She shushed me, but I kept bugging her with “what does it meeeeannnn???” until she told me that she didn’t know so shut up and watch the damn movie. I dropped it but I knew something was fishy since she laughed and she wouldn’t have if she didn’t understand. It wasn’t until years later that I saw it on video and it finally clicked. Like **Der Trihs** , a lot of the old Looney Tunes cartoons jokes and celebrity references flew over my head but, sadly, my delicate sensibilities weren’t spared the graphic slapstick violence. I’m old enough that they hadn’t started sanitizing the TV broadcasts when I was young. However, a lot people forget that those cartoons were aimed at all ages so there were plenty of other gags that weren’t targeted at kids. That’s what kept them so fresh for me. As I grew older, I started getting more of the jokes. ---
**Author:** ![dada2fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ccd318/32.png) [@dada2fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dada2fish)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/13 "2011-05-21T03:00:32Z")
Why Paul Lynde, Charles Nelson Reilly and Dr. Bombay from Bewitched acted the way they did. The questions and answers on games shows such as Hollywood Squares and Match Game. Lots of sexual innuendo. The same with Laugh In and Love American Style. Those shows were risque at times and it all went over my head. I thought when they said “making whoopie” on The Newlywed game, they meant kissing. I thought kissing must be so much fun it makes you say, “Whoopie!” ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/14 "2011-05-21T03:27:27Z")
> [@Small\_Hen](#): > > A friend of mine told me that she watched Less Than Zero as a preteen and missed that Robert Downey Jr.'s character was a male prostitute. Unless, I missed it too, that was because he wasn’t. Julian was a prostitute (or gigilo, depending on your personal definitions) in the book, but I don’t recall it being clear he was one in the move. The movie shares almost nothing with the book other than the title and a few of the characters’ names. Clay, for example, was a drug user in the book (Rip was his dealer, not Julian’s), and not at all interested in stopping drugs himself, much less riding in like the white knight and stopping everyone else from doing drugs. In the movie, Clay is Nancy Reagan. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/15 "2011-05-21T03:41:01Z")
The theme to the TV show _Maverick_ says the gambler “lives off Jacks and Queens”. As a child, I wondered. “Who the hell is Jackson Queen?” Yes, I swore at an early age. ---
**Author:** ![Pyper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pyper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pyper)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/16 "2011-05-21T05:01:27Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > The second time I watched _Ghostbusters_, I was amazed at just how sexual it was. All that business about the Gatekeeper and the Keymaster just completely whooshed me as a kid-- I was just in it for the special effects. As an aside, at the time, Sigourney Weaver was approximately as hot as the solar corona. I completely missed the fact that _Ghostbusters_ was supposed to be a comedy. It terrified me so much that I thought it was meant to be a horror film. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/17 "2011-05-21T05:12:40Z")
> [@Ruffian](#): > > I saw _Empire Strikes Back_ dozens of times as a kid and preteen This makes me feel OLD. I was a married woman when ESB came out. A married woman with a CHILD. A lot of the references in the old cartoons went right over my head. I can remember that one cartoon cat said to another “Give me the bird, give me the bird” or something like that. And the other cartoon cat looked at the audience and said “I’d give him the bird all right, if only the Hays (code or committee) would let me”. ---
**Author:** ![SomeBodyUK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@SomeBodyUK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SomeBodyUK)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/18 "2011-05-21T05:30:47Z")
When I saw Dallas as kid, whenever they mentioned JR was sleeping with somebody I thought that they meant that they were lying in bed next to each other asleep, not having sexual relations. ---
**Author:** ![Dietrich\_K](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@Dietrich\_K](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dietrich_K)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/19 "2011-05-21T05:31:47Z")
When I was a kid, I thought this line from _Superman - The Movie_ was “You _will_ bow down before me, Jor-El. I swear it! No matter that it takes an eternity, you _will_ bow down before me! Both you, and then one day, your ass!” It wasn’t until years later that I figured out that it was actually, “You _will_ bow down before me, Jor-El. I swear it! No matter that it takes an eternity, you _will_ bow down before me! Both you, and then one day, your _heirs_!” ---
**Author:** ![Feyrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/fbc32d/32.png) [@Feyrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Feyrat)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606/20 "2011-05-21T05:38:18Z")
My parents VHS taped The Muppets when they first aired for me (I was a very small child - the 70s commercials they also taped are HYSTERICAL now) and when I went away to college, I packed those tapes and at some point during my sophomore year, I dug them out and me and all my friends who were around 20 sat around watching them. Hoooooly crap. We finally understood why our parents loved to watch The Muppets with us, unlike all the sugary pap that now passes for children’s entertainment. The Muppets were totally FILLED with adult jokes, some quite dirty, and we never suspected a thing! We watched those tapes largely with our jaws hanging open, laughing hysterically, and occasionally shrieking “They can’t DO THAT on a children’s puppet program!!” Oh yes they could… [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-in-movies-and-tv-that-went-over-your-head-as-a-child/582606.md?page=2)