Naturally, we're all excited for Glen Powell's upcoming actioner The Running Man, a new take on the Stephen King story by Edgar Wright and Michael Bacall. (See the trailer here.)
Netflix didn't want to miss out on the fun, so in the (ahem) run-up to the new version coming out, it has started showing the original, 1987's The Running Man, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger as an ordinary guy taking part in a lethal gameshow.
And audiences have responded, because it's currently trending in the UK.
If you've not seen it, the film is… very '80s. Stephen King's blue-collar everyman Ben Richards is now a former military hero framed for murder by his superiors and played by noted guy-next-door Arnie in a yellow lurex catsuit.
He's pursued through a variety of movie sets by bodybuilders including Arnie's Predator co-star Jesse 'The Body' Ventura, all of whom are dressed like they're going on Robot Wars.
"Damn, this was so f**king fun, '80s out the wazoo," wrote one typical fan on Letterboxd of their experience discovering the film.
What to Read Next
It was also the absolute height of Arnold's 'zinger era' – after cutting a guy in half with his buzzsaw, he says: "He had to split."
"Half of his one-liners make zero sense," wrote another fan, "but god, he says them with swagger." Which is true, if by swagger they mean with absolutely no facial expressions at all.
But not everyone is carried away with the nostalgia: "Mick Fleetwood from Fleetwood Mac in elderly prosthetics is one of the most bizarre castings no one ever mentions. His character is even called Mick. Is he playing himself?!" asked one viewer.
There was more confusion for another recent traveller to the '80s zone, who said: "Wait, this doesn’t star Tom Cruise?"
Strange but true – Tom Cruise did not star in every film in the '80s. It just seems that way sometimes.
Despite being a heavy-handed satire – don't trust politicians! The TV lies to you! The public are idiots! – and its very era-specific aesthetic, the original Running Man did at least achieve one thing by predicting deepfake technology: at one point its stars are killed off on screen, only for the film to (quickly) reveal that the audience have been misled by the execs.
The Running Man (1987) is on Netflix now, and the reboot will be in cinemas 7 November 2025.
The new edition of Living Legends is here! Buy Gaga in newsagents or online, priced at just £8.99.
Editor, Digital Spy Chris has over 25 years' experience as a writer and editor, having worked as a journalist covering TV and movies since the '90s. Starting out as a TV listings editor at the Press Association, he was quickly hired by the nascent Heat magazine, where he rose to become Senior Editor, interviewing the likes of Simon Cowell, Boris Johnson and Paris Hilton. Over the years he has written about entertainment with clarity and wit for Heat, Elle, Q, The Telegraph and of course Digital Spy, and has served many times as a judge in the Royal Television Society awards. He has written and recorded a novelty single with Lord Lloyd-Webber, written scripts for the National TV Awards, made Noel Edmonds cry, accidentally punched an Inbetweener and stolen a small piece of rubble from the Battle of Hogwarts movie set. (They can't have it back.) LinkedIn
