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Comment by ryandrake | Hacker News Reader

It would be great if my kid was into the video games I was into as a kid, but I've kind of resigned myself to the fact that she's a different person, grew up in a different environment, has different expectations out of video games. You can't force someone to like something. Same with movies and music. I tried to get her into Harry Potter and Star Wars and the kid/teen movies I grew up with like The Goonies and Flight of the Navigator, but those movies just so old to this generation, and there's nothing in it for them to relate to.

It's like trying to get "11 year old me" into The Howdy Doody Show.

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This hasn’t been my experience. My kids have loved Star Wars, Harry Potter, Space Jam, Looney Toons, Muppets, Uncle Buck, Top Gun, Ghostbusters, My Neighbor Tuturo, all the classic Disney movies, Mary Poppins, Get Smart, and others I’m sure I’m missing. They even like some of the light westerns thier grandparents put on. It’s not everything, but it’s most of what I’ve tried.

They currently love playing classic arcade games on a cabinet I built.

It depends on the kid, but I don’t think it’s just a generational thing. The limits tend to be very old movies with sound issues, which was my limit as well.

My kid's into the old movies I show him but I only pick classics like Princess Bride and Neverending Story that are pretty much timeless, and also terrible B-movies where the oldness makes it even better.

Show them some Mystery Science Theater 3000!

And the thing is there is plenty of new content targeting that generation that is very good. There is a lot of changes in cultural values and norms that just aren’t captured by all our old 1980’s movies. For example views on gender, race and sexuality are wildly different than what we encountered as 80’s kids. Not to mention socioeconomic and geopolitical changes too.

That isn’t to say that 1980’s movies are garbage. Far from it. It’s just like the parent said… trying to get 12 year old me into old junk like pink panther or whatever cartoons were watched in the boomer era.

I mean hell, half the plot lines in older shows don’t work if everybody has a powerful internet connected computer in their pocket.

Oedipus Rex doesn't work if there are paternity tests but that doesn't mean it can't be appreciated.

I would say the topics mentioned were basically non-topics in movies of the past unless explicit like Mississippi Burning.

I think it is more like the Matrix. Super relevant with AI but traveling through phone lines and pay phones, what? It would have to seem so dated the way black and white movies have always just felt too distant for me.

> trying to get 12 year old me into old junk like pink panther or whatever cartoons were watched in the boomer era

I caught a few of them in reruns in the 80's, and for a long time, I assumed those were what the Pink Panther was.

It wasn't until college that I learned about the live-action Inspector Clouseau movies that the cartoons came from. They're amusing farces, and still hold up pretty well. (Though honestly, the Marx Brothers hold up better.)

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