Jesus might’ve taken a serious beating in the 2004 Mel Gibson epic The Passion of the Christ, but the actor who played him didn’t exactly get off scot-free himself. While filming the final shot in the movie back in 2003, Jim Caviezel, who starred as Jesus, was struck by lightning, along with production assistant Jan Michelini, who’d also been struck earlier in the shoot. Producer Steve McEveety described the second incident to Variety, saying, “I’m about a hundred feet away from them when I glance over and see smoke coming out of Caviezel’s ears.” 

Though it was reported at the time that neither Caviezel nor Michelini were badly hurt, that didn’t end up being true in Caviezel’s case. The effects of the lightning strike eventually led to two different heart surgeries for the actor, along with “lots of medication.” It wasn’t until the second procedure in 2014 that Caviezel says his problems were “finally corrected.” However, even that wasn’t without its hiccups.

Jim Caviezel Was Struck by Lightning While Playing Jesus, Leading to Years of Heart Problems

Despite crediting the 2014 surgery with saving his life, he explained to Shawn Ryan in 2023 that it, ironically enough, killed him as well—temporarily, that is. “I died on the operating table,” Caviezel revealed. “They brought me back. But I was supposed to be here,” he continued. “The reason why I brought that up is I felt incredible peace and love. That’s waiting for us.”

Caviezel went on to describe his brush with death as “amazing,” and compared the experience to cracking an egg. “And then it just came out, and I was dead, and I didn’t have to breathe anymore,” he recalled. Although Caviezel remembered the dying part being painless, he said that all changed when the doctors were finally able to revive him. You can listen to Caviezel recount the story for yourself in the video above.

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By the time Patrice O’Neal took the stage at Comedy Central’s 2011 roast of Charlie Sheen, he seemed genuinely bothered by some of the things his fellow roasters had to say about him. In response to William Shatner’s joke about Sheen waiting to get into the right projects like O’Neal’s family, O’Neal said, “You’re a f—king —hole, Captain Kirk!” He also took a moment to address all the references people made to his diabetes that night, including Amy Schumer’s line about the roast serving as a farewell party for O’Neal’s foot. “I’m dying of diabetes and you motherf—kers are like, ‘Oh, that evil fat f—k,’” O’Neal told the dais at one point.

Many made note of how well O’Neal did at Sheen’s roast, especially considering that he didn’t rely solely on prewritten material. “He had to go from his guts,” fellow comedian Robert Kelly recalled, pointing out that any other comic would’ve been finished if they’d gone the same route as O’Neal. For his part, O’Neal explained that he’d been practicing his entire life to be okay when facing the possibility of failure. Even all these years later, O’Neal’s set is singled out as the highlight of the show.

Patrice O’Neal Had a Tearful Conversation About Death With William Shatner Two Months Before He Died

But O’Neal’s interactions with Shatner weren’t all bad. According to Adrian Nicole LeBlanc, who spoke to Shatner after the broadcast, Shatner and his wife ran into O’Neal outside that evening, and their final encounter with him somehow managed to be both heartwarming and heartbreaking all at the same time. As the three waited for their cars together, they had a brief chat regarding O’Neal’s health. “It was a strange place to have a conversation about life and death,” Shatner remembered, “but it was presaged by his clarity at the roast.”

Shatner and his wife reminded O’Neal that diabetes wasn’t like cancer and that there were ways that he could reverse the effects of the disease. O’Neal was reportedly moved by this, and as the three parted ways, every single one of them was in tears. “He knew that he was dying, that he was a dying man, and in a way, he wanted to die,” Shatner said. “That’s what I saw. That’s why we cried.”

O’Neal died two months later from complications of a stroke, which was caused by type 2 diabetes. He was 41 years old. 

The post 15 Years Ago, William Shatner and Patrice O’Neal Cried Together After the Charlie Sheen Roast appeared first on VICE.

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By the mid-2000s, Seinfeld had been off the air for several years and Michael Richards wasn’t as in-demand as he was when the show was in full swing. Though Richards had started out doing stand-up comedy decades earlier, he was more focused on a career in Hollywood at that point. Interestingly enough, it was George Carlin who encouraged Richards to get back into stand-up when he was struggling to find work post-Seinfeld. As Richards explained to Rolling Stone in 2024, Carlin was curious to see if Richards could build an act after so many years away from the stage.

Nowadays, if Richards and stand-up are mentioned in the same sentence, chances are it’s in reference to the meltdown he had at the Laugh Factory in Los Angeles back in 2006. “Shut up! 50 years ago we’d have had you upside down with a f—king fork up your ass!” Richards screamed in a blurry cell phone video that was later obtained by TMZ.

Richards then repeatedly called the man the n-word, prompting him and many other attendees to walk out. If you haven’t seen it, you can take a look at the clip for yourself below—but be warned, it’s extremely NSFW.

George Carlin Encouraged Michael Richards to Do Stand-Up Before His Infamous Meltdown

Unfortunately for Richards, the outburst went viral, and, naturally, everyone had something to say about it, with the vast majority of people understandably condemning him as racist. But it was Carlin, who was partially responsible for Richards being on that stage in the first place, who might’ve had the most nuanced take of all.

While speaking with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette the following year, Carlin said that he understood what Richards was dealing with that night. “He was being ignored,” Carlin pointed out, adding, “That’s the worst thing that can happen to you in a club—not that they don’t laugh, not that they heckle you, but they don’t even listen, they talk among themselves.”

However, despite his acknowledgement of how frustrating the situation must’ve been for Richards, Carlin struggled to wrap his head around Richards immediately evoking the image of someone being lynched. “That had to come from a place in his mind where that already existed,” Carlin suggested.

“I don’t even have images like that. Even if I got mad at somebody, I couldn’t go to that,” he continued. “So you have to either have something in your head or not. You have to have a deeply held feeling about blacks or Jews or whatever it is, or you don’t.”

The post George Carlin Had a Brutal Take on Michael Richards’ Racist Stand-Up Meltdown appeared first on VICE.

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With all the other craziness going on in 1997’s Batman & Robin, it’s easy to overlook the fact that rapper Coolio had a cameo appearance in the movie. In case you missed it, that’s him playing the “banker” that Barbara (Alicia Silverstone) pays to participate in the motorcycle race.

Just after Robin (Chris O’Donnell) sneaks his way in from the shadows, Coolio can be seen firing the gun that signifies the beginning of the competition. Check out the scene for yourself below.

On the surface, it might seem like a random cameo from a rapper who was at the height of his success at the time. However, during a 2017 interview, Coolio revealed that there was a little bit more to the story.

According to him, the only reason he agreed to be in Batman & Robin was because he was promised the role of the Scarecrow in the next Batman movie. In the end, Coolio didn’t feel like he missed out since he apparently didn’t get along too well with director Joel Schumacher.

Coolio’s ‘Batman & Robin’ Cameo Was Apparently Meant to Lead Somewhere Much Stranger

For his part, Schumacher said that he went out of his way to try and get another actor to play the Scarecrow in the unproduced sequel. While speaking with The Hollywood Reporter in 2015, Schumacher explained that he’d actually gone to visit Nicolas Cage on the set of Face/Off to gauge his interest. But even though a script—entitled Batman Unchained—had been written by I Am Legend scribe Mark Protosevich, the poor reception of Batman & Robin ultimately led to the project’s cancellation. 

There were a few other interesting ideas proposed before the plug was officially pulled on Batman Unchained, though. For example, the possibility of Courtney Love playing Harley Quinn was floated at one point. The studio also wanted the film to feature cameos from all of the villains from the previous Batman movies.

To be clear, that would’ve included Jack Nicholson reprising his role as the Joker, along with Danny DeVito as the Penguin, Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman, Jim Carrey as the Riddler, and Tommy Lee Jones as Two-Face.

The post The Weird Reason Coolio Has a Random Cameo in ‘Batman & Robin’ appeared first on VICE.

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Three days after the 1977 animated movie The Rescuers was reissued on home video in 1999, the Walt Disney Company announced that they were recalling 3.4 million VHS and LaserDisc copies because they contained an “objectionable background image.” As it turns out, two frames of the film, which couldn’t be seen under ordinary viewing circumstances, featured a photo of a nude woman.

The hidden picture pops up roughly 38 minutes into the movie, when rodents Bernard and Bianca are riding around on the back of Orville the albatross. You can check out the footage in question below, and it should go without saying that it’s NSFW:

A Disney spokesperson said that the offending image was placed in the film more than 20 years earlier, but declined to reveal who was responsible. This marked the first time that a Disney release was recalled for such a reason. According to the company, they opted to take action in order to keep their promise to customers that the brand could be trusted to provide them with “the finest in family entertainment.” The Rescuers was later reissued with the nudity removed.

Over the years, many have understandably wondered about the person who decided to sneak a topless woman into a beloved children’s movie, and what their motivation was. In 2023, Eddie Bowley of the Eddache YouTube channel claimed that a background artist named Ann Guenther was the culprit. The source of this information, Bowley says, is animator Tom Sito, who worked on Disney classics like The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin. Sito knew Guenther personally and apparently heard it from her directly.

As for the why of it all, Bowley uncovered that Guenther was passed over for a promotion at Disney in favor of a man she’d trained for the position—this was reportedly because they didn’t want a woman to have the job. The Rescuers was the last movie Guenther worked on for the company prior to being let go, which would appear to suggest that she did it out of revenge. However, when Bowley ran the idea past Sito, he was informed that it was merely an in-joke on Guenther’s part.

Furthermore, Sito told Bowley, “Animators have been putting things like this in cartoons since the 1930s.”

The post There Was a Topless Woman Hiding in This Classic Disney Movie for Decades appeared first on VICE.

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Last week, Warner Bros. Discovery confirmed that Jim Carrey will be starring in a new live-action film adaptation of The Jetsons. Longtime fans of the original Hanna-Barbera cartoon will no doubt recall that this isn’t the first time Hollywood has attempted to bring the characters to the big screen.

Paramount tried to get something going as far back as 1985, but nothing ever came of it:

Made-for-TV movies like The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones followed in the late ‘80s, but the only theatrically released film the franchise has gotten to date was 1990’s Jetsons: The Movie. However, the long-awaited adaptation wasn’t well-received, and poor ticket sales prevented it from making a profit at the time. That’s in addition to the two dark clouds hanging over the film’s production. And just in case viewers hadn’t heard, the end credits made sure to hit them with this somber reminder that we lost the two lead voice actors before the movie was completed:

Before Jim Carrey’s ‘Jetsons’ Movie, the Franchise Had a Tragic Big-Screen Debut

For the uninitiated, we’re not talking about two nobodies who happened to land these parts. George O’Hanlon and Mel Blanc had been voicing George Jetson and his boss, Cosmo Spacely, respectively, since The Jetsons debuted in 1962. They also came back to reprise the roles for the 1985 revival series and the aforementioned TV films. Jetsons: The Movie would be the last project either of them worked on.

O’Hanlon suffered a stroke in the studio and passed away just after he finished recording his lines. He was 76 years old. Blanc was admitted to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center a few months later, where he died from heart disease and emphysema at the age of 81. Jeff Bergman, who eventually replaced Blanc as the voice of Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, was brought in to complete the dialogue for Blanc and O’Hanlon’s characters following their deaths.

The post The First ‘Jetsons’ Movie Has a Surprisingly Dark Production History appeared first on VICE.

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On March 27, 1985, comedian and future Law & Order: SVU star Richard Belzer welcomed Mr. T and Hulk Hogan—who were promoting WrestleMania I—onto his short-lived talk show Hot Properties. Belzer interviewed Mr. T first that night, and things turned combative pretty early on in their conversation. When Belzer asked if the violence on Mr. T’s popular action series The A-Team was antithetical to his image, Mr. T dismissed the question because of Belzer’s use of a big word. “I’m a street brother,” Mr. T started to say, before Belzer interjected, telling him, “I’m from the street, too. I learned that word myself, not in college.”

Hogan evidently wasn’t happy with the way Belzer was talking to Mr. T, and made his feelings clear by the time his segment came around. Throughout the course of Hogan’s interview, he referred to Belzer as “cocky,” a “little dude,” and a “coward.” Finally, Belzer asked the pair to demonstrate some wrestling moves for him, to which Mr. T replied, “We ain’t showing you nothin’!” Belzer then stood up and pointed to Hogan, saying, “I’m talking to him, man, OK?”

Richard Belzer Sued Hulk Hogan After a Wrestling Move Went Horribly Wrong

After consulting with Mr. T, Hogan decided to oblige Belzer, and the two walked over to the side of the stage. From there, Hogan explained that the floor was hard and he didn’t want Belzer to get hurt, so he was going to use a simple front chin lock on him. “You just tell me, brother, when you want him to quit squealing,” Hogan joked to Mr. T, who was sitting off-screen. Within seconds of Hogan applying the hold on Belzer, the comedian’s body went limp, and Hogan let go, causing Belzer to drop to the ground and hit his head.

The impact cut the back of Belzer’s head open, requiring him to get nine stitches. “[Hogan] came very close to killing me,” Belzer said years later. “I was told by a sports medicine expert that if I had fallen a few inches either way I could be crippled for life, I could have been dead.” Belzer sued Hogan, Mr. T, Vince McMahon, and the WWF over the incident and received $400,000 in a 1990 settlement. 

You can watch the entire 1985 episode of Hot Properties with Hogan and Mr. T below.

The post 41 Years Ago, Hulk Hogan Choked Richard Belzer Unconscious and Left Him Bleeding on Live TV appeared first on VICE.

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On December 5, 1992, Saturday Night Live opened up with a Wayne’s World sketch in which Wayne (Mike Myers) and Garth (Dana Carvey) count down the top ten things they love about Bill Clinton. Among the items on their list are universal healthcare, investment in infrastructure, and the president-elect’s huge head. But modern-day viewers will no doubt notice a glaring omission by the time Wayne and Garth get to the number one entry: number two was completely skipped over. All you can tell from the edited version on SNL’s official YouTube channel is that the item in question had something to do with Chelsea Clinton:

During the original broadcast, Wayne had the following to say about Chelsea, who was 12 years old at the time: “While it is true that adolescence thus far has been unkind, we think she’s a future fox.” Myers reflected on the deleted gag in 1999, saying that he’d had horrible acne as a kid and was sensitive to what Chelsea was going through.

“She had the adolescent face, the kind of please-don’t-look-at-me face, and that was my adolescence,” Myers explained. For that reason, he worried that the joke would be misinterpreted and asked to have it taken out.

The Wayne’s World Sketch That Made ‘SNL’ Issue a Rare Apology

However, the producers told Myers that if it got a laugh in the dress rehearsal, it would stay in, and that’s precisely what happened. Come Monday morning, the gag had predictably sparked outrage, which Myers said was mortifying because it wasn’t done with ill intent. As a result, Myers made the unusual decision to write Hillary Clinton a letter apologizing for the joke.

Though it was never officially acknowledged by the Clintons, word eventually got back to Myers that it was appreciated and understood.

SNL showrunner Lorne Michaels even issued a rare apology of his own in response to the backlash. “We felt, upon reflection, that if it was in any way hurtful, it wasn’t worth it,” Michaels said of the offending joke, which hasn’t been seen since it originally aired. “She’s a kid, a kid who didn’t choose to be in public life.”

Bill Clinton shared similar sentiments, telling People, “I think you gotta be pretty insensitive to make fun of an adolescent child. I think there is something pretty off-center with people who do that.”

The post 34 Years Ago, ‘SNL’ Apologized for This Wayne’s World Joke About Chelsea Clinton appeared first on VICE.

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To say that Jerry Seinfeld doesn’t like Bobcat Goldthwait would be a huge understatement. Goldthwait evidently first raised Seinfeld’s ire in April 1994, when he appeared on one of the final episodes of The Arsenio Hall Show. For whatever reason, Goldthwait decided to do some Seinfeld bashing during that interview, despite Hall attempting to deter him.

“He’s a spooky, weird Scientologist guy banging teenage girls,” Goldthwait told Hall.

For context, Seinfeld once studied Scientology and was allegedly dating a woman at the time who was 17 years old when he’d initially met her. Goldthwait assumed that Seinfeld had taken the jokes in stride because he was friendly with Seinfeld’s manager, but years later, Seinfeld made it clear on an episode of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee that he was no fan of Goldthwait’s.

While interviewing Bridget Everett in 2019, Goldthwait (whose name was censored) came up, and Seinfeld wasn’t shy about sharing his thoughts on his fellow comic. “I don’t like him at all. At all,” Seinfeld said bluntly.

Jerry Seinfeld Still Really Hates Bobcat Goldthwait

The mere mention of Goldthwait’s name got Seinfeld so riled up that he even started cursing, which is a rare occurrence for the usually clean-cut comedian. “He used to rail against comedians ‘cause they weren’t as wild and dangerous as he was. ‘Cause he sucked, OK? He wasn’t funny. And that’s why he didn’t get anywhere,” Seinfeld explained.

“‘Cause in comedy, nobody gives a f—k if you’re cool, if you’re lame. If you’re funny, you win,” he continued. “And he’s not funny. That’s why he had to do that stupid f—king voice. ‘Cause you have no f—king act.”

Goldthwait addressed Seinfeld’s comments while speaking with The Guardian in 2021, telling them, “He’s a sore winner. I felt like I was in a scene in a Western, where the gunslinger has put down his pistols, but then Seinfeld rolls into town, and he’s got to take his Colt 45 off the wall for one last showdown.” A couple years after that, Goldthwait jokingly offered Seinfeld an olive branch, saying that he was available for Bee Movie 2, but something tells us the pair won’t be patching things up any time soon.

The post The Bobcat Goldthwait Joke That (Allegedly) Made Jerry Seinfeld Hate Him Forever appeared first on VICE.

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When you think about who could’ve pulled off playing John McClane in 1988’s Die Hard other than Bruce Willis, what kind of names pop into your head? Action stars like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, Burt Reynolds, and Harrison Ford probably spring to mind, no? It should come as no surprise, then, that every single one of those actors was offered Willis’s role at some point. You know what is surprising, though? The first person the filmmakers reached out to about starring in the movie was Frank Sinatra.

Here’s how that ended up happening: Die Hard, as it turns out, is actually based on the 1979 Roderick Thorp novel Nothing Lasts Forever. The story revolves around retired NYPD detective Joseph Leland, who heads to Los Angeles to visit his estranged daughter, Stephanie Gennaro. Stephanie works inside a 40-story skyscraper, where her company is throwing its annual Christmas party.

While Leland waits for the party to end, a group of terrorists take the guests hostage, forcing Leland to spring into action.

‘Die Hard’ Had to Offer John McClane to Frank Sinatra First

But Nothing Lasts Forever wasn’t the first book to feature Leland. The ex-cop made his literary debut in Thorp’s 1966 novel The Detective. Two years later, The Detective was adapted into a film in which Leland was portrayed by none other than Frank Sinatra. Though the movie did well both critically and commercially, the idea of a sequel didn’t come about until after Thorp wrote Nothing Lasts Forever.

However, the folks at 20th Century Fox were evidently pleased enough with The Detective that they purchased the rights to a follow-up long before one had even been written. Because of that, the studio was contractually obligated to offer Sinatra the lead role in Die Hard. To clarify how ridiculous it would’ve been for Sinatra to entertain the possibility of taking the job, the singer was 77 years old by the time Die Hard was released. Sinatra wisely declined the proposal.

The post Before Bruce Willis, ‘Die Hard’ Was Offered to a Legendary Singer for a Weird Reason appeared first on VICE.

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The 2005 Rob Schneider comedy Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo could never accurately be referred to as a critically acclaimed movie. In a front-page article featured in the Los Angeles Times, film critic Patrick Goldstein chastised Hollywood studios for bankrolling sequels like European Gigolo and referred to Schneider as a “third-rate comic.” Schneider wasn’t happy about this, and took out full-page ads in Daily Variety and The Hollywood Reporter attacking Goldstein and questioning his credentials. In particular, Schneider pointed out that Goldstein had never won any awards for his journalism.

Schneider also suggested that Goldstein hadn’t won a Pulitzer Prize because “they haven’t invented a category for Best Third-Rate, Unfunny, Pompous Reporter.” “I can honestly say that if I sat with your colleagues at a luncheon, afterwards they’d say, ‘You know, that Rob Schneider is a pretty intelligent guy,’ whereas, if you sat with my colleagues, after lunch, you would just be beaten beyond recognition,” Schneider continued.

The Legendary Roger Ebert Review That Absolutely Torched Rob Schneider

Though he was a little late to the party, Pulitzer-winning critic Roger Ebert chimed in on the controversy in August of that year. “Schneider is correct, and Patrick Goldstein has not yet won a Pulitzer Prize. Therefore, Goldstein is not qualified to complain,” Ebert wrote. “As chance would have it, I have won the Pulitzer Prize, and so I am qualified. Speaking in my official capacity as a Pulitzer Prize winner, Mr. Schneider, your movie sucks.”

Two years later, Ebert would release a book called Your Movie Sucks, which compiled some of his most scathing film reviews—including his zero-star review of Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo. Despite that, Ebert and Schneider made amends following Ebert’s thyroid cancer surgery in 2012.

On his website, Ebert revealed that Schneider sent him a bouquet of flowers and wished him a speedy recovery, signing his note, “Your Least Favorite Movie Star, Rob Schneider.” Of the flowers, Ebert said, “They were a reminder, if I needed one, that although Rob Schneider might (in my opinion) have made a bad movie, he is not a bad man, and no doubt tried to make a wonderful movie, and hopes to again. I hope so, too.”

The post 21 Years Ago, Roger Ebert Hated This Rob Schneider Movie So Much He Gave It Zero Stars appeared first on VICE.

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In the Season 1 Game of Thrones episode “Fire and Blood,” King Joffrey Baratheon (Jack Gleeson) gruesomely forces Sansa Stark (Sophie Turner) to look at her dead father’s decapitated head, which he has propped up on a spike. Joffrey then points out the heads of her dad’s household staff, who’ve suffered the same fate. However, if you pay close attention to one of the spiked noggins in question, it bears a slight resemblance to a former U.S. president.

You can check out the shot for yourself right here:

In the DVD commentary for the episode, series creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss revealed that the head all the way on the left was modeled after George W. Bush. And before you jump to any conclusions, they were quick to point out that this wasn’t a political statement. On the contrary, they simply had to use whatever props they had lying around, and for whatever reason, Bush’s head was available to them. This would appear to be backed up by the fact that the head is facing away from the camera and has long hair, unlike Bush himself.

‘Game of Thrones’ Once Put George W. Bush’s Head on a Spike

But despite the reasonable explanation for the head’s inclusion, people were outraged once word of it hit the internet. This prompted an apology from HBO, in which they said that they were “deeply dismayed” by the situation and found it “unacceptable, disrespectful and in very bad taste.” The network also made their feelings clear to the show’s producers, who apologized for what they called a “careless mistake.”

Furthermore, it was announced that the footage would be removed from future home video releases.

Benioff and Weiss issued a statement of their own as well, clarifying that they’d used a lot of prosthetic body parts on Game of Thrones, but couldn’t afford to have them all made from scratch. For that reason, they had to resort to renting them in bulk. “In the DVD commentary, we mentioned this, though we should not have. We meant no disrespect to the former president and apologize if anything we said or did suggested otherwise,” they wrote in conclusion.

You can listen to George R.R. Martin recount the story to Stephen King in the video below.

The post 15 Years Ago, a ‘Game of Thrones’ Episode Featured the Decapitated Head of a Former U.S. President appeared first on VICE.

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One of the most persistent urban legends in Hollywood history revolves around a munchkin hanging himself during a scene from 1939’s The Wizard of Oz. As the story goes, the actor in question was driven to suicide by his unrequited love for a fellow little person. This was said to have been captured on film as Dorothy skips down the yellow brick road with the Scarecrow and the Tin Man, singing “We’re Off to See the Wizard.”

Take a look at the sequence below, and keep your eyes on the trees in the background.

Did you catch that movement in the center there? Well, as it turns out, that’s what people have been claiming is a dangling munchkin corpse for decades now. But what do the experts have to say on the matter, you ask? For starters, historian John Fricke, who wrote The Wizard of Oz: The Official 50th Anniversary Pictorial History, told People in 2024 that there’s no dead munchkin in the movie.

“This is the kind of stuff that gets perpetuated,” says Fricke. “We’re living at a time when anything is believable.”

The Truth Behind the Infamous ‘Wizard of Oz’ Hanging Munchkin Myth

However, Fricke is far from the only person to have dismissed the longstanding rumor. In fact, Snopes debunked this whole thing way back in 1997. According to them, what you see in that shot isn’t a person at all, but a bird (believed to be a crane) that was borrowed from the Los Angeles Zoo to give the indoor set more of an outdoors feel. What may have looked like a body swaying back and forth in the grainy days of VHS was, in fact, just a large bird flapping its wings.

Furthermore, the timeline of this alleged suicide doesn’t make sense at all. You see, the Munchkinland scenes in the film were actually shot after the forest scenes, meaning none of the munchkin actors would’ve been hanging around (one way or another) at that point. It also defies logic that not a single one of the many people involved with the movie would’ve caught this while it was happening. Oh, and as for the idea that the studio edited the “real” hanging out of later home video releases, that’s been discredited as well; case in point, this recording from a 1980 TV broadcast that predates the earliest VHS release:

The post Did One of the Munchkins Hang Himself on the Set of ‘The Wizard of Oz’? appeared first on VICE.

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In April 2006, South Park dedicated an hour’s worth of screen time to bashing Family Guy with their special two-part “Cartoon Wars” saga. The big reveal during the second episode was that Family Guy’s popular cutaway gags were constructed by manatees. As Cartman learns while visiting Fox Studios, the creatures come up with jokes for the show by selecting random “idea balls” that have different subjects written on them.

You can take a look at the scene in question right here:

Naturally, Family Guy fans were eagerly anticipating what series creator Seth MacFarlane would do in response. At the following year’s Comic-Con, MacFarlane was asked about South Park’s criticism, but didn’t react in the way many had been hoping he would. “We were actually overjoyed that they spent two half-hours of their airtime talking about us. I don’t have that kind of time,” MacFarlane explained.

“It really does come down to that,” he continued. “We would have to either do the greatest joke in the world that was really quick or do three episodes about South Park.”

‘Family Guy’ Cut Its Planned Response to ‘South Park’s Brutal Manatee Joke

MacFarlane went on to say that he didn’t know how to respond to the attacks and that it was probably best to leave it alone. He did reveal that there was one joke he considered doing to get even with South Park’s Trey Parker and Matt Stone, though. However, at the end of the day, the Family Guy staff decided that it would’ve been too much of a low blow. When the Comic-Con crowd booed MacFarlane for taking the high road, he pushed back by suggesting that he’d get the same reaction regardless of the choice he made.

Luckily, for those who are curious about the deleted gag MacFarlane was referring to, it did end up surfacing eventually. The joke was originally part of a scene from the 2008 episode “McStroke,” in which Stewie, disguised as an older boy, takes his date to a place called Anal Point, where people go to have sex.

As initially conceived, a guy in the car next to theirs can be heard yelling, “Ow, Trey!” to which another man replies, “C’mon, Matt, just relax and let it happen!” Check it out for yourself below.

The post WATCH: The ‘Family Guy’ Joke Seth MacFarlane Decided Was Too Much appeared first on VICE.

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