I guess I'm doing the ELA-type simulated version (simulated in my head):
The round of 32 has some doozies in it.
Atari Region
1/8 Ghostbusters: pure icon status easily gets past the niche hit Real Genius.
4/13 WarGames: chalk holds, but not without a fight from the emo Gen-X Heathers. The computer age and thermonuclear war trump a clever high school drama.
3/6: Beverly Hills Cop: strolls to victory over a dated, if funny underdog story. Yeah, the nerds will get their revenge and eliminate your blue collar jobs, but cocaine and flashy money are the boon and bane of 1980s society.
2/7: ET doesn't break a sweat over a slapstick comedy (Police Academy) that history largely forgets.
MTV Region: where the underdogs have come to play.
1/8: Top Gun: has to work to beat the movie that launched Tom Hanks (Big), but not that hard.
3/4: Predator: simply overpowers Purple Rain, which captured a specific pop moment in 1984, but not much else.
3/11: Lethal Weapon: could be a Cinderalla story, as racial tension, generational shift, rebelling against authority, the Vietnam hangover, and the drug trade are simply too much for a basic Cold War plot (Rocky IV). Don't sleep on this 11 seed.
10/15: Wall Street: greed is good in the go-go 1980s tops a forgettable collection of the Brat Pack.
DeLorean Region
1/8: Ferris Bueller's Day Off: Bill and Ted came to play, but ran out of gas, and chewing gum, trying to keep up with this 1980s Blue Blood.
4/5: The Terminator: Tom Cruise's if you had one night for a party just can't handle the apocalyptic fear of our computer overlords who will, indeed, be back...right around 2026 and the explosion of AI.
6/14: Die Hard: strolls to an easy win over a fun, underdog, sports movie in Major League.
2/10: Back to the Future: another cake walk as puffy jackets, skateboards, 50s nostalgia, nuclear power, and Middle Eastern terrorists easily top a solid 80s love story in Say Anything.
Big Hair Region
1/9: Fast Times at Ridgemont High: a blue blood destroys a mid-minor you forget about except for every 8 years when you see its name (Short Circuit) in the tourney (for one weekend).
4/12: Beetlejuice: in a back and forth battle, again decided at the buzzer, the Burton ensemble's critique of yuppies and government bureaucracy, topped off with a little glimpse of burgeoning emo culture survives a battle with the marketing of children's toys through horror movies (Gremlins), which feels like it only happened in the 1980s. A 12 seed moves on.
3/6: John Hughes: another buzzer beater. Vacation is a classic, and captures questionable American cars, the upper middle class in the city vs. people barely making it in rural America, and corporate greed, with a dose of Christy Brinkley to make everything just a little sweeter. But here in the Big Hair region, there is little more 80s pop culture than Molly Ringwold and the Brat Pack coming of age, with a little Long Duk Dong racism and parents completely ignoring their kids to add onto the 1980s veneer.
2/10: this is the matchup you all stayed up late for: the Breakfast Club vs. When Harry Met Sally. Fireworks. Don't you forget about me vs. can men be friends with women? This one goes to double overtime, but changing gender roles and yuppies in New York eek out the victory on a last second performance of a fake orgasm. I will have what she's having. When Harry Met Sally is set up for another run at John Hughes in the Sweet Sixteen.
