The Hoard Potato: Memetic Backfire

[athelind]

Okay, paka was wrong: posting my own version of the Better Than It Sounds Meme only made me feel stupider, when I realized how vague and general some of my descriptions were.

#8 is the worst. The problem, obviously, is that the description I gave could describe dozens of other movies; I think I described a full-on trope rather than a single movie.

I'll go ahead and post the rest of the answers tomorrow night, but for now, let's see if some hints will help:

1. Comic book. Adapted for TV and the big screen, but the adaptations don't match this description. (sternbunny already got this one, w/o hints.)
   
2. Movie. This description spoils the last ten to fifteen minutes. The police officer has drug issues.
   
3. Movie. The man with the medical condition is played by Samuel L. Jackson. (hitchkitty and iridium_wolf got this within ten minutes of each other.)
   
4. Short Story. A classic of Golden Age SF. Adapted for both radio and TV. I use "Hilarity" in a very morbid sense. (mocha_mephooki just got this one. I am, for the record, Headed South For The Winter.)
   
5. Multi-Generational Novel Series. I know pyat and doc_mystery have read these, and yes, that information is a hint in itself. Another hint: Years later, it (ahem) inspired the Silver Age reboot of a comic book superhero. (iridium_wolf got this one!)
   
6. Movie. Based on a long-running property, with a cast drawn from the TV series. (sternbunny got this one, too, and it was the first one down!)
   
7. Book, with a movie adaptation. The title is not the name of a famous composer. (dewhitton and doc_mystery got this one, almost simultaneously.)
   
8. Movie. The first of a five-film series, though they had to ignore the ending of this one to make any of the rest. It took a star of popular Westerns and put him in a modern-day setting, and spawned a whole subgenre of imitators. (In)Famous for the protagonist's terse speech to the antagonist at the climax. (toob finally got this one!)
   

Have fun, and please don't shoot me when the answers come out!

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"Please don't shoot me" could work as a hint for at least two of the really tough ones, come to think of it.

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Comments

[perlandria.livejournal.com]

We all had multiple guesses that would also fit. It is the nature of stories and art in general to do that. It is a feature. Please be kinder to yourself.

[toob.livejournal.com]

8's gotta be Dirty harry.

[iridium-wolf.livejournal.com]

#3 is now probably Unbreakable.

[athelind.livejournal.com]

DING DING DING DING DING!!

... that wasn't too MANY hints, was it?

[athelind.livejournal.com]

DING DING DING DING!

[iridium-wolf.livejournal.com]

Flash of bizarre iinspiration for #4.... Buck Rodgers?

(And not Flash Gordon, he got a movie...)

[ladyringo.livejournal.com]

4. War of the Worlds?

[cpxbrex.livejournal.com]

It's the nature of riddles. I mostly don't pay too much attention to riddles because almost none of them have one correct answer.

[pyat.livejournal.com]

Is 5 the Foundation Trilogy...?

Tom Swift, maybe? :D I am very fuzzy today.

[sternbunny.livejournal.com]

For some reason, I want to say #5 is Belgariad, talking about Polgara and her husband.

And for #4, I feel like I know this one, about a man and a hitchhiker and time looping around. But I'm probably wrong.

[paka.livejournal.com]

Naw, I've been really liking the vagaries of this stuff. I mean... it's really made me feel much happier that everyone's selection is incredibly hard to guess, and that everyone gets some of these guesses wrong. So the way I look at it, I can't figure these out, but when you finally reveal what they are, it'll be great to see this familiar stuff described from a completely new, yet obvious, perspective.

[athelind.livejournal.com]

Oh, MAN, you are SO CLOSE with that first guess.

HINT: Years later, it (ahem) inspired the Silver Age reboot of a comic book superhero.

[athelind.livejournal.com]

Never read the Belgariad, but I know the movie you're talking about, with the hitchhiker and the time loop. Damn, I can't remember the title; it was great!

I saw it twice. Appropriately enough, I was halfway through it the second time before I realized that I'd seen it before.

[iridium-wolf.livejournal.com]

Lensman

DING DING DING DING

[athelind.livejournal.com]

You got it!

[kinkyturtle.livejournal.com]

Heh, I've been reading other people's takes on this meme, and half the time I keep thinking "Is that one Star Wars? It could be Star Wars..."