Mike Judge on the Legacy of Idiocracy

I watched Idiocracy this morning Oh boy Dude it fucking holds up It holds up Oh my god it's funny I've never saw the whole thing before It was one of those movies that I just For whatever reason I just never saw the whole thing Well it kind of Yeah it didn't have much of a release so It didn't? No they It was um I mean to be fair like it was a weird movie It was hard to market It's a funny fucking movie man Oh thanks It's funny I mean I watched it in the gym While I was working out I was cracking up Oh nice to hear It was really good It was like surprisingly funny There was some great stuff about it When When it shows the very smart couple That's holding off and having children And the dumb people keep fucking Yeah that was uh I feel like I really made the whole movie Just to make that sequence That was one of those rare times Patrick and Darlene the two actors That was the only time I think this has ever happened I think they were auditioning them in pairs And they auditioned and I kind of looked at like Two or three more people and then said Let's just cast them It's perfect That guy was so good Patrick Fisher yeah It was such a good movie man It's just like Thanks It's so interesting like looking at the world in 2022 It's like the only thing you missed was social media Yeah I mean I keep thinking about all the stuff I missed I Yeah I feel that movie was I feel like it was cursed to begin with Um everything that went wrong went wrong Everything that could go wrong went wrong like And it was So many things like we shot it here in Austin It's supposed to take place in a drought And it was like the rainiest summer We had to keep killing grass Which feels really awful to do Oh god How do you do that? Oh yeah you put like a giant piece of like Tarp cardboard over it for like two nights or something Ahh But then sometimes they have to put gasoline on it or something It just feels horrible to kill grass Um yeah I don't know and then I feel like the curse of the movie Kind of just spread out into the world or something But uh I was just thinking about this cause I can't I have a hard time watching it cause it just brings back so many stressful memories But um Cause it was difficult to make? Yeah just we were you know Barely had an impossible schedule and And then in post You know they They just cut We had a bad test screening and they just cut the effects budget down and But I mean you know they did Pay for the movie to get made so I appreciate it But um Yeah I was just thinking that so there was the wardrobe Uh Woman whatever I don't know what do you Costume designer is the official title She you know she had a limited budget also And for the shoes so this was we shot in 2004 She goes she tells me okay there was a start up And it was Crocs but they weren't out in the world yet But it was a small company and she goes look at these These are these horrible plastic shoes And we could really save a lot of money And then I said well what if But what if by the time the movie comes out What if everyone's What if these become popular and people are wearing them She said oh these are never going to become popular No one would ever wear these things they're horrible And then yeah there you go And then but then it took two years for the movie to come out But then people were like oh that's pretty funny that you put everyone in Crocs They did kind of become popular right? Yeah and then they're not around much anymore But they were really popular They're really popular right now They came back They came back in the last like two years all of a sudden What do you mean who's wearing them? Post Malone had a deal with them I think Justin Bieber did too People were putting like pins on them and stuff They're very popular right now Pins? Yeah like little like pins yeah Oh like shirt pins? Yeah yeah yeah I should stop talking shoes I know people wear them A lot of guys wear them like in camps You bring them to camp like they're camp shoes They wear Crocs around camp because they're light You know if you're wearing like hiking boots all day And then you're camping you wear Crocs at night And you're hanging around a campfire Oh so this is a new thing I've only seen it popping up recently I'd heard they were they were in bankruptcy like five years ago or something Maybe I heard wrong Wow maybe they were Maybe somebody came in with funding Yeah I mean yeah And took a distressed property I don't get it I was always confused like there's so many options for shoes Why would you ever buy those? There's all kinds of slippers you could have Yeah there's no need for those I don't get them for camping though Like can't you get like ticks all over here No I think the idea is Are they putting socks on? Like hunters wear them So like when you're in the woods and you're hiking You're wearing these like very kind of rigid hiking boots And then when you're just around the campfire Oh okay They wear these little Crocs Okay Because they weigh nothing you know Oh okay yeah they are light And they provide you with protection from sticks and shit Okay And then wear them like you know over socks I see So they're horrific looking They don't look good What is this? That's why I wanted them in the movie What the fuck is this for? These are $600 Crocs These are fashion Crocs Cut the fucking shit I thought they were fake they are not fake Those are real? These are real $600 Crocs with some kind of a heel What does the bottom of that heel look like? Is it a peg? Like a peg like a nail It's like a nail is going through That is so strange You know what I don't get? The strap The prediction correct What's the story with the strap at the top of the foot? Oh that's like sport mode We need to really keep them on Do they all have straps? Just like the one thing about us This is important You need to run and you gotta You need to do some action You ain't doing shit those things You gotta pull the lock it in Put it on your heel So it doesn't fall off Kinda sprintin Wait $600? Is that how much? Yeah they're real $600 That's how dumb people are Put that in your new movie Yeah I know I wish I could remake that What'd you do different? Well like you said I probably would have had more staring at phones and stuff Nobody saw that coming though Yeah Well there's also Why? Because you filmed it It was released in what? 2005? 2006 Filmed it in 2004 yeah So if you think about like phones Back then it was all flip phones Yeah they were starting to come out with a Nokia But yeah the iPhone I don't think was there That was 7 Yeah it was about to come out Yeah and even then Everybody thought that was kind of like a novelty Nobody ever thought it would be like Almost a requirement for life Yeah and also I wrote it in I started writing it in 2001 And then That's writer Eitan Cohen I wrote a draft with him I wrote an outline So that was like 2002 I think or 2003 that we wrote it So it was like Pretty far away from all this stuff happening That's the only thing you missed though I mean that even like a Dumbing down of people you nailed Yeah I was sort of I was thinking of it like So I had I had the idea in the 90s But I remember When In 2001 In the summer It was with Well it was It was the year 2001 I had seen the movie 2001 again And thought wouldn't that be Wouldn't that have been funny If that movie instead of everything being pristine Advanced civilization It was like Giant Walmarts And the Jerry Springer show And like what if What if that movie made in the 70s Was actually That accurate And I just kind of thought of a Graph of like everything from Whenever that movie was made like 71 To the year that it was 2001 If you just kept that progression going And just like more crass foul language In the mainstream more like Just everybody getting dumber and dumber And just advertising everywhere I don't know it was just It was sort of a I also wrote it I owed Fox a screenplay And I pitched two or three different things And they said oh that's the commercial one That's one you should make and I didn't think they would make it It was fun to write Why didn't you think they would make it? Just seemed too weird I'm not sure But you know they saw it You know anything in the future sounds fun And like a big broad comedy But yeah then they It just it was more fun to write than it was to make I mean nothing against anybody involved It was just like a very difficult schedule A lot of stuff went wrong Had 65 speaking parts in it Which you don't even When you're writing Oh and then there's this And it's like oh yeah You have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people And then you have to cast every one of those people