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MacGyver Film In the Works?
An anonymous reader writes "Looks like everyone's favorite Swiss Army knife-wielding action hero may be making an appearance on the big screen. The original series creator has announced plans are in the works for a MacGyver film. Serious questions abound: Will Richard Dean Anderson reprise the role? Will filming and editing somehow be done only using a paperclip, duct-tape, and TV remote?" And who, if not Anderson, would you want to play MacGyver?
And who, if not Anderson, would you want to play MacGyver?
Me!
(You insensitive clod.)
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Rename the movie to MacGyver Brothers, and performed by Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage. Would love to see the extra-dvd content where they show how and where the movie they just acted was wrong.
I hope they don't try to update the MacGuyver idea for the 21st century.
Keep that 80's feel, with the big hair and aviator glasses.
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I've had the chance to watch a couple of MacGyver episodes recently and they feel dated.
At the same time, the Bourne series comes to my mind as a modern version of MacGyver.
So... Matt Damon as MacGyver?
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Indeed, he's not even 60 yet. His shelf life for this role is a little longer than some other traditional action heroes because it depends on him looking smart, rather than looking tough. If they're gonna do this within the next 3-5 years, get Anderson.
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Matt Damon did excellent work in the espionage/underhanded sort of films like the Bourne Trilogy and the Oceans Trilogy. He also can pull off a good sense of humor as evidenced in the Ocean films and his cameo in Eurotrip (his rendition of the band's vocalist is STILL some of the funniest shit I've ever seen). He would make an excellent MacGyver.
The real question here is can he pull off a mullet?
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If you stapled it on, I'm pretty sure that he wouldn't be able to pull off the mullet.
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They need to keep it 80's because MacGyver with 21st century tech wouldn't work anyway. I think the 80's was probably about the only decade when a concept like MacGyver would work, for the following reasons:
Things just aren't simple enough or accessible enough anymore. Think about the 80's... things were starting to get really high tech, PCs had just been invented, etc, but all that was still in the early stages. It was easy for Mac to hotwire or jury-rig a car, mess with a computer, oscilloscope or some other high tech piece of equipment, tie the wires of a car phone into a car security system, etc.
On a modern show, what is Mac going to do? Almost everything is an integrated circuit these days. Intel cpus are made with 45 nm process. You can't just go in and mess with the wiring on something like that, or even repair it when it breaks. In fact, almost none of our technology can be repaired anymore. Most of it has to be scrapped, and a new factory chip put in, because no one can physically deal with the level of miniaturization we have now using just their hands. And going back to the car example, most modern cars have computers built into everything, including the tires. There's a lot less jury rigging that can go on with those. And the security systems, with chips inside keys, etc, etc, makes it a lot harder to just go hotwire one.
The other issue MacGyver of the 21st century would have to deal with is the level of specialization required to do most anything. You can't just jump into a device and start messing with it, because as was stated above, most things are computerized integrated circuits. There are a lot more black boxes and many more types of engineers involved in almost any project, so knowledge of basic principles and a strong grasp of chemistry doesn't carry you nearly as far.
That said, I think if they are going to have a 21st century MacGyver, they need to rewrite his back story a bit. I think in the show he had a physics (and maybe chemistry?) degree, but for this decade they'd better give him a compsci/computer engineering degree instead (perhaps still combined with his physics or chem degree). And they almost have to make him more hacker-ish. In the 21st century, 90% of what he does would touch computers, so if they make him a reverse engineering expert specializing in software (which is the easiest thing to circumvent/mess with/jury rig), he might be believable again. I've seen clips on youtube of people hacking those electronic signs over freeways and putting in their own personal messages, and there's really no end to what software you can hack at this point. So if they took that route, he'd be believable again.
Lastly, though, I think they need to have RDA in the role, and I think it's good that he's probably in his 50s. Mac was always a lifelong learner, so you could convincingly say he went back to school in the interim and picked up the comp sci degree. Also, I don't think I would find a movie or show like MacGyver very convincing in this day and age unless the star was probably 45. There's just too much to know for some 28 year old to take the part and seem convincing, no matter how much of a buff action star he may be. So if RDA can work out and get into shape again (he didn't look the greatest in that superbowl mastercard commercial), I think he's absolutely the one who should be cast for this.
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Richard Dean Anderson already has prior commitments not doing stargate, he won't have enough time to not do MacGyver as well.
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You know you are reading Slashdot when somebody says Matt "Daemon" and nobody seems to have a problem with that.