Chopping Mall

Episode 70: Chopping Mall (1986)

Theme: Guilty Pleasures
Hosts: Oz & Curtis

This week, Oz and Curtis kick off the Guilty Pleasures theme with a movie marriage so chaotic it practically wheeled itself out of the 80s on tank treads: Night of the Comet meets Short Circuit with a splash of Paul Blart: Mall Cop — NOT the one where he goes on vacation. The result? Chopping Mall — the only film bold enough to say, “What if a shopping mall installed three budget Roombas with tasers, lasers, and the body count of a slasher villain?”

Join your two favorite members of the Let’s Talk About Flix-verse as they unpack:

• How protector bots look like Johnny Five if he joined SWAT and immediately lost his morals.

• Why every couple in this movie chooses the same furniture store bed, which raises many questions and even more health code violations.

• How Mike’s gum-chewing is so aggressive it should’ve been listed as a fourth robot antagonist.

• Why Ferdy’s blind-date chair spin is the most dramatic moment in furniture-store history.

• How Leslie jogs away from a deathbot like she’s stuck at 0.5 speed on a treadmill.

• Why the head-explosion scene is the single greatest “I didn’t sign up for this” moment in mall security history.

• How the killbots develop the strategic intelligence to stage corpses like they’re auditioning for CSI: Food Court Unit.

• Why Rick’s third-floor golf cart attack is both heroic and wildly OSHA non-compliant.

• How Allison becomes a one-woman demolition crew armed with a flare, paint thinner, and pure spite.

• Why “Thank you, have a nice day!” is the most polite kill phrase in cinematic history.

From Barbara Crampton’s pepperoni-pizza romance to mannequins used as decoys, from tase-happy murder Roombas to mall-walker-level aggression, Oz and Curtis walk through a film that proves the 80s were a magical time where anyone could survive a lightning storm, a rogue robot, and a pizzeria manager who desperately needs a hairnet.

Final Verdict

Oz — 8 Pieces of Consistently Chewed Gum
Curtis — 71 Orange Juliuses
Both — Still wondering how this movie contains zero chopping.