Plenty of movies are celebrating their 30th anniversary this year.Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,Ghostbusters IIand Tim Burton’sBatmanwere some of the biggest releases in summer 1989. But one movie would change comedy forever. Okay, it wouldn’t really. But at the time, Weird Al Yankovic fans were extremely excited to see the King of Parody make his first foray into feature films withUHF. Though a major bomb for Orion Pictures at the time, the comedy has gone onto to reach cult status.
Making a long-lasting career out of spoofing the biggest song hits of the day, Weird Al Yankovic decided to turn his attention to 80s movies, giving us a hybrid parody movie in the style ofAirplaneandNaked Gunthat was contained within its own unique and original story. After losing yet another job, George, played by’Weird Al' Yankovichimself in his first and only leading role in a feature film, wonders if there is any career that can handle his outrageous personality. When George’s uncle (Stanley Brock) hands him the deed to a local TV station, George creates a series of television shows based on social satire and hyperactive humor, with the help of his best friend, Bob (David Bowe). However, a rival station’s bitter CEO (Kevin McCarthy) tries to destroy George’s wacky programming, forcing him to fight back.
UHFwas testing through the roof in special advanced screenings leading up to the movie’s release in July of 1989. But when it opened, it hit theaters with a loud, thunderous thud. And some have blamed the movie for Orion’s disintegration in the 80s. The studio recently came back, giving us theChild’s Playremake earlier this summer, and they are currently in production onBill & Ted Face the Musicafter having also releasedBill & Ted’s Excellent Adventurein 1989. While there has often been talk of aUHF 2, it’s unlikely that Orion will tempt fate twice now that they are back on their feet and producing semi-successful movies yet again.
Fright-Rags is celebrating the 30th Anniversary ofUHFwith a retro throwback collection of T-shirts any Weird Al fan will want to score. They say this about their T-shirts.
The first shirt in the collection features the classicUHFlogo that appeared on the movie posters. The second spoofs MTV with the slogan, ‘I Want My UHF". The third shirt celebrates channel 62 with an old school advert promoting Bowling for Burgers, Town Talk with George, and some of the other fine programming available at the station. The fourth shirt is a Spatual City T, and finally Stanely Spadowski’s Clubhouse gets its own T-shirt.
Fright-Rags also has some other cool new merch. Though it is also the 30th anniversary ofGhostbusters II, they are instead celebrating the 35th anniversary of the original 1984Ghostbusters. They also have some new T-shirts celebrating Rob Zombie’sThe Devil’s Rejectsas the world prepares for the release of its sequel3 From Hellthis September. Fright-Rags offers this about their other two lines coming soon.
“Who ya gonna call for the bestGhostbustersdesigns? Fright-Rags has four exclusive shirts, a pair of socks, and blind box enamel pins. Catch Slimer, Zuul, Stay Puft, and more with randomly inserted pins in ghost trap packaging. While fans await the release of Rob Zombie’s3 from Hell, Fright-Rags is here to do the Devil’s work with apparel from its predecessor.The Devil’s Rejectsline includes four new tees and a set of three enamel pins featuring a bloodied Otis, Baby, and Captain Spaulding.”
Ghostbusters,The Devil’s Rejects, and UHF collections are on sale now atFright-Rags.com. As of this writing, The Spatula City shirt is already all sold out, but it was a highly requested item. Perhaps they will get more in? You can take a look at all the cool new shirts here.
