Barb Wire

hell? The Pamela Anderson movie.

Barb Wire?

No, the showgirl.

The one she was nominated for.

And I remember this.

I was Barb Wire Pamela with Ari Aguirre as my Tommy Lee.

At this time, I had like no man that was willing to claim me enough to be my Tommy Lee.

So Ari was kind enough to be my Tommy Lee in all of my photos back when we were going strong.

That

she produced and in it as part of, you know, talking about her life and talked about how excited she was about barbed wire.

Because she was a big international star at that point with Baywatch and barbed wire was going to make her a movie star.

But barbed wire is horrible.

It's so bad.

And so you see her and Tommy Lee like walking out of the barbed wire premiere with just their heads hanging because it's so bad.

Herb Wire.

I don't think.

What? Bride Wars, Going the Distance, and Bachelorette.

Uncle Xander Berkeley, repeat offender from Barb Wire.

Mm-hmm.

Horatio Sanz from Boat Trip.

How about that?

Congratulations.

Marshall Manesh, repeat offender from Barb Wire.

I wish I knew how to quit you.

No

Uh, Pamela Anderson's film Barb Wire in 1996

Oh, Barb Wire

Yeah.

Uh, number five

Yeah.

Barb Wire.

Barb Wire.

Yes.

Barb Wire.

Was ahead of its time.

Ahead of its time.

By the way, fun fact, Steve, you'll love this.

Jack Noseworthy, the movie he did right before this was Barb Wire.

I

did see that.

[rock music] Welcome action fans, and thanks for joining me for another edition of All 90s Action All the Time.

I'm your host, Scott Murphy, and on today's show we are looking at the infamous Pam Anderson vehicle and stealth Casablanca remake, Barb Wire.

As always, I'm not tackling this one on my own.

No, alongside me to delve into this one I have encyclopedic movie buff and one-time host of the gone-too-soon Dracula Sucks podcast, Pearce Duncan.

Um, so yeah, uh, just a funny thing.

Uh, uh, just a random thing I looked at today, I was looking at my statistics today and I was like, "Ah, interesting how, how, uh, anybody discovered me." Um, but we're not here to talk about that.

We're here to talk about Barb Wire, and I'm gonna give you some stats on Barb Wire before we get into talking about the film.

So Barb Wire was released on May 3rd, 1996.

No, not at all.

Look at Barb Wire in 1996.

The core concept of a cynical mercenary operating a nightclub in a war-torn near future city, that is entirely present in the Dark Horse comic, which was called Steel Harbor.

But the movie, starring Pamela Anderson, fundamentally shifts the tone to capitalize on the aesthetics of its lead actress rather than honoring the gritty, complex world building of the source material.

It alters character arcs, shifts chronologies, and changes entire plot lines.

Wait, wait.

Hasn't our entire discussion up to this point been about how changing the source material is a recipe for disaster? Why does altering The Umbrella Academy work when altering Barb Wire or the Sin City sequels failed so miserably?

It comes down to intention and medium specificity.