Space Jam 23 years later

With Space Jam 2 coming out next year, I figured this would be a great time to revisit one of my all-time favourites from my childhood, the original Space Jam. This is an incredibly important movie for me, as it is actually what got me into basketball at a very young age. Before I watched it, I didn't know anything about basketball, or the Looney Tunes for that matter. All I knew was that there was a dude in this movie whose last name was MY first name. That was enough to get little narcissistic me to pop it into the old VCR.

It is a miracle that the tape in this thing isn't completely worn out.

The first time I watched Space Jam, it was magical. The flashy animation, the silly humour which 3-year-old me ate up, and most importantly, the energy. This movie has so much kinetic energy, it's so fast-paced and exciting, and a lot of that is driven by its killer soundtrack. One does not simply talk about Space Jam without mentioning the soundtrack. This was an era where the crappiest movies had the absolute BEST soundtracks. Batman Forever, The Bodyguard, and Godzilla all came out around this era and all of them had amazing soundtracks, even though the movies themselves weren't all that good.

The big single from this soundtrack was I Believe I Can Fly by an artist who we don't talk about anymore. The song, however, is still a classic and one of the all-time great 90's earworms. But the best track has to be the title track, Welcome to the Space Jam by Quad City DJs. Quite possibly the most hype song in the history of ever.

It scares me that there might be people who read this who have no idea what this is...

The soundtrack definitely boosts this movie, and the album holds up. In need of a little boost of nostalgia, I decided to look back at the movie and see if it holds up too. So I brushed off the old VCR, which probably hasn't been used since 2002, popped in the tape, and prepared myself to relive a hugely important part of my childhood. I got cozy on the couch, and watched one of my favourite movies of all time. I've seen it probably over 100 times in my life, but this was the first time I watched it as an adult. So I actually realized something that I never had before....

....

It's really bad.

Now, don't get me wrong, I was LOVING it for like, the first 10 minutes. The opening scene is actually quite touching. A young Michael Jordan talks with his dad in the middle of the night while shooting some hoops. The actor who played his dad probably gives the best performance in the movie, and he's only in this one scene. This emotional scene is enhanced with the inclusion of I Believe I Can Fly in the background, but then dramatically changes gears and goes into the title sequence, which, if you've never seen it, is basically the hypest opening of any movie ever.

Unfortunately from there, it's all downhill. I don't consider myself an elitist or anything, but the movie is, like, pretty bad. I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that so much of it is hinged on Michael Jordan's ability to act. Let's just say there's a good reason he went into basketball and not theatre. Beyond his performance, the jokes are VERY corny and dated, the celebrity and basketball player cameos are very random and kind of pointless, and it's overall just not a very well fleshed-out story.

So you probably think I hated watching it this time. Well, you'd be dead-wrong. The movie still filled me with joy and I was never bored while watching it. My critical mind is a bit sharper now than it was when I was like 6, but that doesn't stop me from being able to shut off my brain and enjoy a dumb gimmicky movie from my childhood. Without this movie, there likely would not be a Sporty Jordy, and because of that, it'll always hold a very special place in my heart.

My first basketball. My dad got it for me because I loved this movie so much.

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