00:00Without a codename, what good is a hitman? As one might expect, James Bond is 007,
00:06the gray man's court gentry is Sierra 6. Even Maxwell Smart from Get Smart goes by Agent 86
00:12when he's on the clock. Fincher's new assassin thriller The Killer tells the story of a
00:17professional assassin who has more than a few pseudonyms, and they all have a common origin.
00:22The Killer, played by Michael Fassbender, is a fan of old-time television,
00:27he has a collection of aliases that are all taken from classic sitcoms.
00:32There are indications that he may have been raised on television, according to The Killer
00:36screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker, who previously worked with Fincher on their breakout film Say
00:427N. It may have been more of a parent to him than any other parent could have been.
00:47The running gag originates from an earlier collaboration between Fincher and Walker.
00:52As Walker tells Tootum, he was polishing Fight Club at the time.
00:57I was working with Fincher and we realized that Edward Norton's character had to have
01:01little name badges on him, or sign up sheets for his support groups he would attend.
01:06Fincher was like, if we want to use names from Planet of the Apes,
01:10then let's just use Dr. Zaius or Cornelius, etc, etc.
01:15Fincher continued.
01:17With Walker working on The Killer, he decided to sneak casual sitcom name drops into scenes where
01:22the main character introduces himself, as a subtle easter egg for viewers who are particularly well
01:28versed in sitcoms. As a result of Fincher's influence, he persuaded him to go even further
01:34with the idea. I started with characters that are much more obscure now than they were when I started,
01:39such as Mr. Mooney, a foil to Lucille Ball on her 60s vehicle The Lucy Show, Walker explains.
01:47Fincher's genius lies in the fact that he was like, okay, here's your kind of silly little hidden joke,
01:53like a character in a movie. It would be great if we could bring it forward.
01:57The production under Fincher's watchful eye made sure to make sure that every single alias was
02:02brought to the forefront. When he was shooting a lot of the car interiors and doing a few tiny
02:08reshoots and inserts, Walker says of Fincher, he made sure to show every single name first and last,
02:14including plane tickets, driver's licenses, etc. Below you will find all of these names,
02:20along with a handy guide to the sitcoms from which they stem, as well as a handy list of their
02:25origins.
02:28Y'all already know what to do, subscribe.
02:32The Killer's Massachusetts Driver's License, listed as Sam Malone. Sam Malone. The production under
02:39Fincher's watchful eye made sure to make sure that every single alias was brought to the forefront.
02:44A computer screen bearing another killer alias. Robert Hartley. At another point in the story,
02:50the killer disguises himself as Robert Hartley, the alter ego of Bob Newhart on the popular 70s sitcom
02:57The Bob Newhart Show in order to conceal his identity.
03:00Lou Grant. As one of the killer's many credit cards reads, a tribute to the gruff news editor of
03:07The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Lou Grant, appears on one of the killer's cards. It was Ed Astner who
03:13originated the character, and he continued to play him in a dramatic spinoff series also titled Lou
03:18Grant. The beloved actor won Emmys for both. The killer produces a credit card reading,
03:24Lou Grant. Archibald Bunker. Archie Bunker, also known as Archie Bunker, the cantankerous
03:31protagonist of All in the Family and Archie Bunker's Place, was portrayed by Carol O'Connor
03:36in both of the shows. As far as we know, there is no evidence that the character's name originally
03:42bore an umlaut, but perhaps the killer knows something we don't. There is a plane ticket that
03:47bears the name Archibald Bunker on it from Miami to Santo Domingo.
03:52Felix Unger. The character Felix Unger, sometimes referred to as Unger, first appeared in Neil
03:58Simon's much-loved play The Odd Couple, and later in various film and television adaptations of the
04:04play. It is Felix, played by Jack Lemmon, Tony Randall, Ron Glass, and Thomas Lennon over the
04:10years, who was the neat freak in the classic sitcoms, well, odd couple dynamic, who was terrorized by a
04:17slobby roommate. Crush that bell please and don't forget so you don't miss my videos.
04:23There are some people who might not be aware of The Odd Couple as much as they should be,
04:27Walker says. The time has come for you to study up. A Paris boarding pass and credit card belonging to
04:34Felix Unger. Oscar Madison. There is no discrimination when it comes to the killer. He borrows the names of
04:41Felix Unger as well as his aforementioned slobby roommate, Oscar Madison, played onscreen by
04:46Walter Matthau, Jack Klugman, Desmond Wilson, and Matthew Perry respectively. Although it is polite of
04:53him to do that, if we are being honest, the fastidious killer is a lot more similar to an Oscar
04:59than he is
04:59to a Felix. A Bancredito credit card owned by an Oscar Madison. Howard Cunningham. The father of
05:06Happy Days protagonist Richie Cunningham, Ron Howard, is one of only two characters to be a part of all
05:13255 episodes of the show, having been portrayed by Tom Bosley in the series and Harold Gould in the
05:19pilot. Another actor, Henry Winkler's scene stealing Fonzie, might leave too much of an impression on the
05:26viewer for the killer to use it to his advantage. Another boarding pass, this time for Howard Cunningham.
05:32The character of Reuben Kincaid on The Partridge Family is probably one of the more obscure
05:37characters, according to Walker. As played by Dave Madden, Kincaid played the manager of Shirley
05:43Partridge's, Shirley Jones, titular singing family, The Partridge's. A Hertz rental agreement signed by
05:50Reuben Kincaid. As George Jefferson, Sherman Hemsley first appeared alongside his fellow killer alias
05:56Archie Bunker in a 1973 episode of All in the Family before he moved on to play the lead
06:02in the spinoff The Jeffersons, which ran for 11 seasons in total. This is a character who has a
06:08special place in Walker's heart, as he is one of his greatest loves. In his opinion, the best thing
06:14that could happen out of this is that there will be a lot of people flocking to find out who
06:18some of
06:18these people were, he says. George Jefferson, you've got to be kidding me, aren't you? There is no doubt that
06:26he is one of my favorite characters ever created. As silly as that may sound, if this movie is kind
06:32of a window into that world, as silly as that may sound, then that makes me very happy. A wire
06:38transfer
06:39authorization signed by George Jefferson. Thank you very much for watching.
