5 Baffling Times Movies And TV Predicted Real Life

5 Happy Gilmore Mirrors A Gator Golf Dilemma

In The Movie:

When many people think of golf, they think of Happy Gilmore, which follows Adam Sandler's ex-hockey player character as he becomes a winning underdog among the stuffy country club elite. Sandman gets into some standard shenanigans out on the links, but you don't get nominated for a Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Blimp Award without taking a little risk.

During a high-stakes tournament in the movie, Happy lands his ball right into a gator's mouth. Because he's an Adam Sandler character in the '90s, his first instinct is to run up to Captain Hook's nightmare, get right in its face, and demand the ball back. Once he realizes it's the same gator that chomped off his mentor Chub's hand, it's on like Donkey Kong. Happy and the gator get into some MMA-style fighting in a pond, and he emerges as the victor, ball in hand.

In Real Life:

Alligators in the South have been known to pay a visit to your local course, even without a membership. ("The nerve! The gaul!! The gumption!!!") But when a hefty gator tried to sabotage pro golfer Brian Gay's shot during a PGA Tour event in 2012, it wasn't the pro who stepped up -- it was his brave caddie (and owner of the most golf sounding name imaginable), Kip Henley.

Instead of throwing down Fight Club-style, Kip grabs a sand trap brush and gently pushes the alligator's snout away from Brian's ball. After some coaxing, the massive creature slinks back into the water, and Kip walks away a hero. But this wouldn't be the last time Kip Henley saved the day; he went on to shoo away another gator at the same tournament five years later in 2017. Even Sandler didn't try that sequel, and he made two Grown Ups.

We couldn't help but wonder: has a gator ever disfigured one of Kip's father figures, like Happy's gator did Chubs?! Hard to say, but we can safely assume most large reptiles hold some resentment against humans for evolving into intelligent beings while they didn't. You can see it in their eyes when you eat pizza and churros at the zoo while they get stuck with cold raw chicken. It's no wonder they are shady with our balls whenever they get the chance. 

And just in case you feel like you could take on a literal living dinosaur-like Kip can: Do Not Attempt This, You Are Not A Bad-Ass Caddie, Sorry We Had To Break It To You, Please Stay Safe.

4 A Cartoon Creep Filmmaker Turns Out To Also Be A Creep

In The Movie/Cartoon:

For those who didn't grow up watching Merry Melodies, Pepe Le Pew is a skunk whose entire personality is "horny AF." Cartoons weren't bogged down with PC culture back then ("then" being immediately after World War II ended), so violent murders, racist imagery, and overt sexual innuendo were simply the norm. 

A typical Pepe episode went like this: Pepe spots a cat that looks like a skunk; he thinks, "Oh, a female? Minding her own business? I MUST HAVE HER," and then went about chasing her around until he got tired of it or she managed to elude him. This might explain why your Boomer uncle, who loved Pepe in the '50s, now has a couple of restraining orders against him.

In Real Life:

Cut to 2016 at Comic-Con, when Max Landis, son of National Lampoon director John Landis, announced that he was developing on a Pepe Le Pew flick for Warner Bros. Up until this, Max was known for his Dirk Gently series, writing Chronicle, and being an asshole on Twitter. But it wasn't long before people started smelling something off with this guy, and it wasn't the skunk he hitched his wagon to.  

A couple years before this announcement, Max Landis got dragged for making misogynistic comments about prior relationships, even about giving a girl an eating disorder. He also dug a ditch for himself when he called Rey from Star Wars a "Mary Sue"-type character. However, the hammer really dropped on him when, in 2017, a whole bunch of allegations came out claiming he is a serial abuser and sexual assaulter -- some even said his reputation was "an open secret" in Hollywood.

Since the accusations dropped, there have been no further updates on the film, but considering that Warner Bros. yanked the skunkual assaulter from Space Jam 2 and future projects (and even more Landis allegations dropped in 2019), we guessing that's all folks.

3 A Real Dude Named Walter White Cooks Meth

In The TV Show:

The United Nations declared 2008 to be "The Year of the Potato," and it kinda makes sense when you think about it. Obama became Commander-in-Chief, Lehman Brothers went bankrupt, and Breaking Bad premiered to rave reviews and birthed an obsessive fan base -- like the potato, it was both a comforting and unhealthy time. 

The story of Walter White, a down-on-his-luck anti-hero who turns to making meth and becomes a drug kingpin, was one that America had never seen, let alone celebrated thanks to award-winning writing and acting. Except, America had seen this story play out because, by 2008, people were tweaking left and right in much of the country. The meth train had just left the station, and, like the Cranston character, some folks saw an opportunity to become flush crank conductors.

In Real Life:

While Breaking Bad was exploding into the public consciousness, a Tuscaloosa man with the government name of Walter White was getting arrested for producing and trafficking methamphetamine. This guy could've picked any drug to peddle, but he chose to commit to The Jenny Crank Diet. You might think, "Oh, he probably did it cause of the show," but the show had only just begun.

But, by the time season 5 was in full swing, the IRL Walter White was in a bit of a pickle. He had been out on parole in 2012, but when the cops caught wind that he was back to his ice-making ways, they added him to their Most Wanted list. While the fictional W.W. managed to never get caught by 5-0, the similarity between these two male figures is undeniable. The main difference is that Brian Cranston would probably never encourage you to actually do meth, and we commend him for that. 

2 Milo Yiannopoulos Is Basically Elliot from Search Party

In The TV Show:

The show Search Party is about a group of friends who get entangled in mystery and murder and follows how their lives are altered by it. One of those friends is Elliott, a pretentious Brooklynite who is prone to catty comments, social climbing, and semi-delusional humble-brags. While being gay is one element of his persona, achieving stardom definitely holds more importance in his life. So, when confronted with the opportunity to be a national television personality in exchange for abandoning his progressive viewpoints and overt gayness, it took him all of five minutes to think it over and agree to it.

In Real Life:

It is mystifying how someone in 2021 could seriously relinquish their sexuality, especially since it's definitely not a choice. This is why, when Elliott does it, it's funny. But, when right-wing hellion Milo Yiannopoulos announced he was "ex-gay" and in favor of conversion therapy, it left everybody scratching their head. Sure, it's hard to believe anything coming from the guy who claimed that grown men having sex with 13-year-olds was "life-affirming." However, it is undeniable how Elliott's story arc mirrors Milo's. Season 4 of Search Party, which sees this persona twist with Elliott, came out in January 2021, only a mere three months before Milo made this back-assward announcement:

1 Dazed and Confused Jokingly Predicts CTE Crisis

In The Movie:

Even though the film came out in 1993, the story takes place in 1976 -- bell bottoms are chic, 8-track tapes were all the rage, and President Gerald Ford was the butt of every political joke. Before the midwestern Republican was sworn in after Nixon resigned in disgrace in '74, lil' Gerry Ford was the star player on University of Michigan's football team. He even led the Wolverines to back-to-back national championships in 1932 and '33, back when football helmets were made of "hard leather," which, while terrible, was a notable upgrade from "your hair and pomade."

The fact that football players' skulls were being "protected" by the same material used in car seats might've given credence to the stereotype of the dumb jock. Knowing that Ford was getting smacked around a lot on the gridiron while his teenage brain was still developing, it was easy to blame his ass-backward presidential policies on his beat-up noggin. That's exactly why Cynthia, the intellectual redhead in Dazed and Confused, ponders, "Which one of you had the theory about how president Ford's old football head injuries are affecting the economy?"

In Real Life:

Richard Linklater, the wunderkind filmmaker who directed the movie and wrote that very line, probably always thought that was just a throwaway joke about Ford boneheaded. But, he couldn't have foreseen just how seriously football injuries could impact players later in life. In 2017, CTE, the degenerative brain disease found in athletes with a history of repetitive brain trauma, became a lightning rod in the sports world when a scientific study found that 110 of 111 subjects who were football players had CTE. We don't have the medical degrees to get too into the medical weeds but know that it basically had the entire football-loving world SHOOKETH. 

Whether you were befriended or bullied by jocks in your life, it's hard to see anyone suffer from a disease like CTE. And even though it's in poor taste to joke about it these days, Gerald Ford was still a pasty old fart who pardoned a scumbag like Nixon, so there are still plenty of other things to shit on him about.

Top image: Warner Bros.