Oh what a Knight

'Tis Wednesday, my fellow humans. You are all humans, aren't you? Whew, that was close. I almost made an ass out of 'u' and 'mption.' In any case, I'm glad to have you here. I usually reserve Fridays for everything having to do with license plates that I spy, but one from last week made me think of something that I'd like to share with you.

The car's license plate said "LEN LEVY" on it. I caught a glimpse of the guy, and I'm pretty sure that's his name. He looked like a Len Levy. It immediately reminded me of an interaction from one of my favorite movies, "Real Genius." Chris and Mitch saw that their rival Kent had his name on his plate, and this dialogue followed:

Chris: Kent put his name on his license plate.
Mitch: My mother does that to my underwear.
Chris: Your mother puts license plates in your underwear? How do you sit?

For those of you not familiar with "Real Genius," it's one of the greatest 80s movies of all time. It's about a bunch of super intelligent teens that have to face the stresses of their school, social interactions, and the fact that they unknowingly built a military weapon that can vaporize a human target from space. Pretty standard stuff really. I don't remember the first time I saw the movie, but I remember watching it dozens of times, so it must have been in some basic cable channel's rotation. It's held up remarkably well too, and my lovely wife and I probably still watch it once every year or so.

The movie had a profound impact on me, which is something not usually associated with teen comedies from the 80s. Chris Knight, played by Val Kilmer, was someone I wanted to be. It was the first time I remember seeing a main character of something being both incredibly smart and with a lightning quick wit. I could watch "The Jerk" with Steve Martin daily, but I'll never want to grow up to be like Navin R. Johnson. With Chris Knight though, I wanted to model my sense of humor exactly after his. I know this is beginning to sound like a man-crush on a fictional character from 22 years ago, but hear me out. He was quite literally a genius (working with frickin' laser beams, nonetheless), was hysterically funny without resorting to slapstick, and he was super smooth with the ladies. In other words, of course I wanted to be him.

I apologize to all of you, because I'm not sure how entertaining the rest of this post is going to be. I'm going to list some of my favorite Chris Knight lines and conversations in an effort to illustrate my earlier point. Imagine 10-12 year old Peter watching this character on screen, and I think it will be clear (crystal clear, in fact) why I've idolized this guy for so long. It doesn't matter how many bad movies Val Kilmer may have made after this or what an asshole he may be in real life (as reported); he can't ruin this for me. If you haven't seen the movie, I'll be ruining a lot of good lines for you. If you have, please enjoy this recap. (Thanks to our friends at Wikiquote for making this incredibly easy on me.)

I'm going to start with a brief scene in which Chris is flirting with a young lady:

Chris Knight: No seriously, listen...if there's ever anything I can do for you, or more to the point, to you, you let me know, okay?
Susan Decker: Can you hammer a six inch spike through a board with your penis?
Chris Knight: Not right now.
Susan Decker: A girl's got to have her standards.

I'm about to break a major rule of comedy and attempt to explain why something is funny. Here's the thing about that interaction for me: on the surface and upon viewing it once or twice, Susan has the funny lines in it. To me though, the fact that Chris didn't say "No" but instead said "Not right now" is golden. Not fazed at all by her unexpected question, he managed to work another funny in there under the radar and I loved it. He has an amazing amount of witty retorts of that nature throughout the movie. Here are a few more:

Prof. Hathaway: (coming back from jogging) You still run?
Chris Knight: Only when chased.

(Sidenote: Dusty actually has a similar retort in his repertoire. If someone asks if he smokes, he says, "Only when I'm on fire." Usually that's met with confusion, but I happen to like it quite a bit.)

Professor Hathaway: You know, when I first brought you into this school I thought you'd become another Einstein. And you were well on your way. And then?
Chris Knight: I got a haircut.
Professor Hathaway: You're disappointing me, Chris.
Chris Knight: And you, me Jerry.

Dr. Dodd: Why is that toy on your head?
Chris Knight: Because if I wear it any place else, it chafes.

Mitch Taylor: Something strange happened to me this morning.
Chris Knight: Was it a dream where you see yourself standing in sort of sun-god robes on a pyramid with a thousand naked women screaming and throwing little pickles at you?
Mitch Taylor: No.
Chris Knight: Why am I the only person that has that dream?

So those are some scenes in which he uses his sense of humor in a more reactionary way, and that always-ready-with-humor quality was something I really craved. And believe me, I left quite a few more of them out in the interest of trying to keep your attention. Chris Knight didn't just react with wit though, he proactively brought it to scenes. Here are some of my favorite interactions and lines in that category:

Chris: Do you mind if I name my first child after you? "Dipshit Knight" has a nice ring to it.

Chris: (to a girl at a party) Don't eat that. Don't you know that eating that can give you very large breasts? Oh my God, I'm too late!

Chris: Moles and trolls, moles and trolls, work, work, work, work, work. We never see the light of day. We plan this thing for weeks and all they want to do is study... There was what, no one at the mutant hamster races and we had one entry into the Madame Curie look-alike contest and he was disqualified later. Why do I bother?

Chris Knight: Did you touch anything?
Mitch Taylor: Uh, no.
Chris Knight: Good. Because all of my filth is arranged in alphabetical order. This, for instance, is under 'H' for 'toy.'

Chris: (to a frustrated Mitch) Ok, calm down, let's just take a step back... No wait, take a step forward... Now take a step back... And a step forward.. And now we're Cha Cha-ing.

I realize that I should probably bestow all of this adoration on the writers of "Real Genius" instead of the fictional character, but I wasn't sitting there as a kid thinking, "Man, I wish I could write like that!" I wanted to be him, while some of my peers were probably feeling the same way about Maverick or Rambo. Chris Knight gave me hope that one day, no matter how smart I might become, I could still be funny and score with chicks.

I'm sure that says a lot about me, and that's mainly why I wanted to share this with you, gentle readers. Now I turn to you: what fictional characters did you idolize as a kid? Whether it's Hawkeye, Han Solo, Joanie, Papa Smurf, Wally Cleaver, or Gidget, I want to hear it. Comment away, my friends. As Chris Knight would say, it's a moral imperative.