I watched the first four episodes of the second season on Xfinity On Demand. I had a disc that I was recording some other series on which only had one show on it. I hate wasting that blank space so I often will fill it up with something I might want to refer back to but not be too serious about. It's filler, nothing more. I don't even know if the show would come out on dvd. Who would buy it. Not me. You can watch them on Amazon for $1.99 an episode but that's crazy talk. I didn't see any dvd. Joe Maddelana has a movie collectible business and auction house. He buys and sells props and costumes from film and tv. That shit can go for astounding prices.
The first show had some guys wanting to sell off their movie costume and prop collection. They had been collecting for 15 years and it was time for them to move on. They had Superman and Jor-el's costumes from the Christopher Reeves Superman movie. Joe puts up a pair of Ruby Slippers from The Wizard Of Oz but no one wants them in the auction. The buyer won't take less than $2,000,000 so they hit the phones and Joe finds a guy to take them for that. Sean Astin brings his Rudy helmet over and Joe restores it and mounts it on a stand. Someone did anyway. They never show the process at all.
In the second episode they auction off the camera that George Lucas used to film the first Star Wars movie. It sold for $525,000. The same guy who had the camera also had the green dress that Marilyn Monroe wore in Bus Stop. It sold for over $200,000. Some poor guy with a large medical bill sold off his collection of John Chambers makeup kits and makeups. Chambers did the makeup for the Planet Of The Apes and Outer Limits and plenty of other movies and tv shows. The surprising item was the makeup kit that Chambers made for the CIA. It sold for $95,000. That guy was out his collectibles but he paid his bill and had plenty left over. Some guy sells his Laura Croft stunt pistols at auction so he can buy some Xena collectibles.
In episode three Joe buys the 1977 Camero that appeared in Transformers as Bumblebee. It cost him around $25,000 and he sold it for $40,000 a short time later. Joe doesn't seem to have any collections of his own. At least it isn't something that he mentions. It can go either way with dealers. Some guy brings in the on set rehearsal Yoda puppet and that went for $22,500. He had lots of proof that it was the real thing. His mom worked on Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. They try to get the guy who owns the houses that were used in the Hunger Games to put them up for auction. The guy goes for the plan. Some guy brings a Hellraiser puzzle box but they find it to be a replica and not worth what the guy paid for it. You got to do your homework when dealing with collectibles. That's the lesson I learned from the Lovejoy books. There's a lot of cheats out there who will exploit your lack of knowledge.
The fourth episode a music producer with the costumes from The Sound of Music wants to get rid of his sub model from Hunt For Red October. He has the Red October and it's 22 feet long. It sold for $95,000. That guy also had the bench from Forrest Gump but he didn't sell it. He did sell the Bubba Gump hat that Tom Hanks wore in the movie. That was about $10,000. One of Joe's staff had an extra part in Lost and he sees his costume from the show for sale. He sells his prop knife from the series to pay for the costume. I never watched Lost. He actually doesn't get a credit for that part on the IMDb but he does have some credits for other things I haven't seen. One of the staff buys some Wonder Woman braclets without first authenticating them. Lucky for her they could pin them to the show. They had the son of the prop man from Wonder Woman come by and he told them where to look for them on screen. A lady brings in a mask used in 300and that fetches $4000. Some lady brings in a lock of Marilyn Monroe's hair. Joe isn't interested in it unless it has a DNA test to go along with it. We don't see the lady come back with the DNA test and there is a clip of her saying that she should have gotten the hair checked before she bought it. Life is just a big bowl of caveat emptor, baby! Someone used to say that, I wonder who?
Mostly I like seeing the props and what they sell for. The show is way too packed with time stretchers and repetitive stuff. It's better to record them and fast forward through all the dull stuff. If I replay the show at 1.5 speed on the dvd I can watch an episode that would take an hour, with commercials, in about 25 minutes and not miss a thing. I'll try to check out next episode when George Takei stops by to see if they can authenticate a Star Trek phaser.
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