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Part 3 - While recently playing 1985 Atari arcade game Paperboy I thought I spotted more than a few past / future references to movies associated with actor Tom Hanks.
- In 1987 Hanks & Dan Aykroyd formed a cop comedy duo in Dragnet.
- Aykroyd was later in 2015 sci-fi comedy Pixels about alien invaders who take on the form of video game characters. Paperboy has a cameo in this.
- A major Tom Hanks movie with possible reference to Paperboy: Joe Dante dark comedy The Burbs in '89.
- Actress Carrie Fisher appears in this, engaged to Dan Aykroyd in the early '80's.
- A sign similar to the Ghostbusters logo (encircled in red with a diagonal slash) featuring Namco's Pac-Man, also shown in Pixels, appears throughout the game.
- One of the larger inferences that one could draw from Paperboy may center on the movies of director Robert Zemeckis. Hanks had appeared in a few of these including Forrest Gump in '94.
- Back To The Future Part II in 1989:
- The arcade cabinet for Pac-Man ('80) can be seen in the Cafe 80's.
- Several of the houses in Paperboy have a dust mat in front of them that reads "BEAT IT!". The '82 Michael Jackson song by the same title can be heard as Marty goes into the Cafe 80's in BTTF2.
- The area around the Blast From The Past antique shop in the Hill Valley town square of 2015 may have some further clues to this theory:
- A Pac-Man lunch box can be seen in the window along with the VHS videotape box for Dragnet.
- Newspaper references around this area: The results of the chase involving Griff's gang are recorded nearby by a newspaper drone.
Doc Brown also shows Marty a future issue of USA Today that shows the outcome of the events they attempted to change.
- Several boxes for Nintendo video games are also seen in the shopfront window: R.C. Pro-AM ('88) may be hinted at in Paperboy via a character who sits on the front step of a home steering a radio control car on the sidewalk / street.
Transcript
00:00While recently playing 1985 Atari arcade video game Paperboy,
00:06I thought I spotted a couple references for movies starring actor Tom Hanks,
00:13both past and future.
00:14I looked into this, and I must say, pretty impressive connections between Hanks and the actual game.
00:21In 1987, Dan Aykroyd and Tom Hanks appeared in Buddy Cop, the slapstick comedy film Dragnet.
00:30Dan Aykroyd, known for Ghostbusters, was later in 2015 sci-fi comedy Pixels, directed by Chris Columbus.
00:41This cast featured Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Peter Dinklage, Sean Bean, and Max Frewer cameos as Max Hedrum.
00:50So the story of Pixels is like an alien invasion scenario.
00:56The aliens have modeled themselves own popular video game characters, stretching back to the 1980s.
01:03They're cameos by many popular game characters.
01:08Paperboy was among these.
01:10Namco's Pac-Man is featured heavily in Pixels.
01:14You can see this character shown in Paperboy.
01:17I think one of the first times this pops up is on the Middle Road difficulty level on Thursday.
01:26It's in front of House 204.
01:28There you'll see what looks like Pac-Man encircled in red with a diagonal slash.
01:35This leads into one of the larger collections of inferences that one could draw from what's shown in Paperboy.
01:44This relates to some of the hugely popular movies that Tom Hanks was in, directed by Robert Zemeckis.
01:52Time travel comedy Back to the Future Part II in 1989.
01:57This starred Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Leah Thompson, and Thomas F. Wilson.
02:03The Pac-Man arcade cabinet can also be seen here.
02:08It's in the Cafe 80s, near the opening.
02:11A few of the houses in the game have a dust mat that reads,
02:17Beat It!
02:18B-E-A-T-I-T.
02:20As Marty enters the Cafe 80s in Back to the Future 2,
02:25you will hear the song with the same title,
02:28performed by Michael Jackson,
02:31a huge arcade and video game fan that was on his Thriller album in 1982.
02:39The area around the Blast from the Past antique shop in the Hill Valley town square of 2015,
02:48there's a Pac-Man lunchbox here.
02:51The VHS videotape box for Dragnet can be seen in the shop front window.
02:58Newspaper references.
03:00A key scene takes place in the film around this area,
03:04in which the outcome of a chase by Griff's gang winds up being recorded by a newspaper drone.
03:13Doc Brown also shows Marty in addition of USA Today.
03:18As for other items in the antique store window,
03:23there's several boxes for Nintendo game cartridges.
03:28RC Pro-Am.
03:29This was developed by Rare for the NES, released in 88.
03:34And interestingly, in Paperboy,
03:36you can see a character sitting on the stoop in front of one of the houses
03:41with a radio control, a handheld device.
03:46The RC car you can usually find on the sidewalk or street or yard.
03:52There are a couple of small and hill-sized jumps constructed for the toy car.
03:58Here I show one such appearance in front of house number 113.
04:04Here I am.
04:04.

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