In a college town, students are known to experience life in various states of inebriation. Inspired by a series started at New York University’s blog NYULocal, we asked our staffers to write about their experiences drunk, high and sober. To protect their reputations, we kept their identities anonymous. This week — "Space Jam."
Drunk
Wow, this movie really does open with "I Believe I Can Fly." I opened with about two shots of Burnett's and kept going throughout the movie, which, for the record, is dope as hell.
Also baby Michael Jordan is so cute and he loves North Carolina! It's a first-class school! I love him!
There is a lot of flashing happening in this opening montage, and I respect it but I am confused (I also went into this on very little sleep). I like how over-edited it is, like a super-intense Instagram meme.
This montage is really fucking long. But MJ's press conference is super gorgeous in a cinematographic sense. I'm getting some "Chinatown" Polanski vibes here. Aaaaand now we're in space.
Danny DeVito truly is in this movie? What the fuck? He's being a real dick to the tiny aliens, too. Also, I'm so glad the Looney Tunes have global brand recognition because that is very important to me as a human.
Are the Barons a real team? Also, why is the catcher helping him? I don't understand baseball but that seems wrong. I'm 95 percent sure the Barons' publicist is in "Hitch," but I'm too lazy to look that up. Did you know this movie had baseball in it?
Also ALIENS. What are the mechanics of the worlds interacting here with the Looney Tunes portal? Is this some Yggdrasil shit where the worlds are all connected but not necessarily physically? (That is a reference to Norse mythology). Are they all in intersecting dimensions with freedom to hop between them? I'm really confused.
These tiny-ass aliens go hard as hell. I relate to the dumb blue one (he seems like a stoner, but that is not my brand today).
Back to MJ, who has a very nice dog! His family members in this movie are all cute and they seem very happy.
I know he's old now and he has a weird earring but shirtless MJ could get it. I'm glad the aliens didn't only draw from the Suns and Knicks because that would just be sad. One of them grew spines which sounds fake but OK. Bill Murray is here wearing a dorky ass hat, and good for him.
Lola Bunny is dumb thicc and I stand by that. I am still VERY confused about the relationship between the Looney Tunes’ reality and ours. Why are the aliens cartoons (other than financial reasons)? Why can Daffy and Bugs acknowledge that MJ lives in “3D World” and still inhabit that space? I am very confused, but there was space and jams, and UNC got mad shoutouts, so I’m giving this movie four out of five basketballs. Go Heels! Bill Murray — who the fuck do you think you are?
Sober
If you’re like me and had never seen it, to summarize: this motion picture-length advertisement for the NBA features Michael Jordan playing basketball with the Looney Tunes characters against some buff aliens who talk in surfer-dude accents (because it’s the ‘90s, so of course they do).
Their boss, the lovechild between Jabba the Hutt and Hades from Disney’s "Hercules," wants Michael Jordan as a “slave” for their theme park (their words, not mine), evoking imagery that’s quite risky for reasons I shouldn’t have to explain.
Also, Bill Murray is randomly in it, probably as an incentive to keep the adults in the seats with their kids, so they don’t make an anarchy of the theater. I hadn’t seen the film until hours ago, but even before then I noticed something.
"Space Jam" seems to have a uniquely polarizing quality wherein people who have seen it either saw it once when they were younger and didn’t give it its runtime’s worth of consideration, or will defend it to the death.
Or, you know, maybe not to the death. But they like it, which is radical enough.
If I had the pleasure to view this at a younger age, perhaps I would thank "Space Jam" for instilling in me the belief that I, too, can fly.
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Or, you know, my male peers can fly, since in the "Space Jam" alternate history, all women are stay-at-home mothers.
With the rare chance you do end up on the team with the rest of the boys, like the hilariously-failed attempt at feminism that is Lola Bunny, it’ll be made clear you’re there to serve as an elaborate masturbation device.
I mean, I wasn't expecting the pinnacle of female representation, but damn.
But I feel like critiquing "Space Jam" seriously would be like critiquing your toddler cousin's mac 'n cheese that they made in their Easy Bake oven and knowing it’s their parents, not you, who have to clean up the mess.
On the other hand, you also feel obligated to make sure your cousin didn’t, like, put a grasshopper in the cheese sauce, because while that’s intriguing and even hilarious to a toddler, you’ll just be left vomiting afterward.
High
I love a good mashup — Mac 'n Cheetos, Martha & Snoop and that wild Disney Channel episode "That's So Suite Life of Hannah Montana" where Hannah Montana and Raven went to stay at the Tipton with Zack and Cody.
But until recently, I had never experienced the greatest mashup of all: "Space Jam."
Yes, I am a ~'90s kid~ but apparently, the "Space Jam" hype flew right by me.
So, now at 20 years old, on the 20th anniversary of "Space Jam," I just watched the movie for the first time.
Now that I’ve seen it, I’m convinced that any grown person who has watched this movie during adulthood likes this movie ironically.
Kind of the same way we all love and miss Harambe and adore His Majesty Guy Fieri, because this movie was an absolute hot mess.
But it’s a mess in a lovable way.
Let me just rehash this plot, which was definitely conceived by someone on bath salts.
Don’t get me wrong, the writer didn’t use an apocalyptic amount that usually results in eating someone’s face, but they definitely consumed way more than they should have.
In this "Space Jam" universe, there exist several mini cartoon alien creatures that look like sentient Mike and Ikes.
They, for some reason, live in an amusement park in space called Moron Mountain — which, by the way, is where I am going to ski over winter break after I get my grades for the semester back.
These space aliens are controlled by their disgusting overlord boss, who looks like that green Mucinex creature from the commercials.
Typecast into voicing this character is none other than Danny DeVito.
This Mucinex overlord then decides that because his amusement park is failing, he must install a new attraction.
So, as anyone would do in that situation, he decides to send his alien minions to enslave the Looney Tunes, so they can entertain park guests.
A natural, simple solution to any failing business. I’ve seen it on “Shark Tank” a million times.
These aliens then come to Earth (where the Looney Tunes apparently live?) and capture the Looney Tunes.
Rather than peacefully protest for their rights, the Looney Tunes decide to win back their freedom by challenging the alien minions to a game of basketball, which is exactly how people have been protesting enslavement for centuries. Through games of basketball.
At this point, I’m convinced “Space Jam” is a creative way to teach the youth about African-American history since it literally depicts that the only way to earn back any freedom and gain respect from your oppressors is to be good at sports and entertainment.
Furthermore, I’m convinced this movie should be required viewing in every AAAD class.
Now of course, the alien minions don’t want to upset the Mucinex creature, so in order to rig this game in their favor, they suck the talent out of five pro-basketball players.
Because apparently this is something they are somehow capable of doing.
These basketball players then become completely devoid of skill and the aliens, harnessing the talent of the basketball players, turn into 15-foot-tall, jacked half-ton monster creatures, which leaves me with questions — if I lived in this universe and wanted to suck the talent out of Beyoncé, would I start to look like her too? Because yes please.
And oh, while all of this is going on, Michael Jordan is on Earth, failing in his baseball career, regretting he ever retired from basketball.
This element makes "Space Jam" a strange mashup of nonfiction, fiction and animation, but a wonderful underdog story for fans of both basketball and children’s cartoons.
The Looney Tunes then start to believe bringing Michael Jordan out of retirement into their cartoon basketball game is their only hope of winning against the now-jacked space aliens.
The Looneys then suck Jordan into their universe through a hole in a golf course, which, at this point, I’m just accepting because there’s no use fighting this movie anymore.
When Jordan gets sucked into this golf course, he's golfing with Bill Murray (who I am positive just stumbled on this set and improvised his whole performance) and Larry Bird, neither of whom are at all concerned by this.
This is only a little weird because I dunno, wouldn’t you like, call the cops or something if your friend got sucked into a golf course?
~SPOILER ALERT~
Ultimately, Michael Jordan helps the Looney Tunes win back their freedom once he, too, is threatened with enslavement (why is a children’s movie so obsessed with slavery?? file under: questions that need to be answered).
This, however, was not without the help of the Bill Murray, who, for some amazing reason, enters the court to coach the team.
In case you haven’t seen the movie, or just needed a reminder, this, by the way, was Michael Jordan’s iconic, tear-wrenching winning dunk.
Because why not?
Space Jam was probably the shit if you watched it as a kid — it featured aliens, the most recognizable basketball player of the time and some of the most popular cartoon characters ever to be imagined.
But if you watch it as an adult, it’s so bizarre and ridiculous that it somehow turned out to be absolutely inspirational in a meme kind of way. And I’d just like to say that now “Space Jam” is by far my favorite episode of “Black Mirror.”
I’d even go as far as to say that Michael Jordan’s role in “Space Jam” was one of the most powerful things a UNC alum has ever done.
