80s babies can we even explain what 'Earnest' was and why he was something in pop culture to gen z and beyond??

[Ed MOTHERFUCKING G]

This dude was everywhere...and had one schtick...a backwoods hillibilly with a friend named Vern we never saw, and he said 'knowwhatimean?'




he had a fukkin SPRITE SPONSORSHIP on some Michael Jordan shyt

fast forwad to 15 minutes or so...he's doing commericals for FINANCIAL SOFTWARE

I guess he was like...WHITE MADEA...but i didn't even get it then

 

[Jaguar93]

Not a 80s baby but he lives in the same realm as the Madeas, Peewees, and Mr. Beans.

 

[MurderToCassette]

RIP Big Jim Varney

 

[Ed MOTHERFUCKING G]

RIP Big Jim Varney

wow he's been dead since 2000? thats crazy

 

[Grifter]

He was a commercial character like "Where's the beef?", Charmin Squeeze, or you can call me Ray. Somehow made megabig like an SNL skit. Today it would like Flo from Progressive having movies.

 

[Monoblock]

Was watching Andy Griffin on Pluto and realized he jacked this whole character from
Ernest T. Bass even down to the attire.

 

[MenacingMonk]

Hold up, Gen Z fukks with Ernest?

I remember watching some of them when I was a kid. Don’t remember the a tual movies tho.

Dude was like Larry the Cable Guy before Larry.

 

[Saysumthinfunnymike]

I haven't thought about this dude or those movies in years. I remember seeing 'Earnest Goes to Jail' a few times but when I was a kid one of my go-to Halloween movies was 'Earnest Scared Stupid' ... It used to be creepy

Of course I was young as hell, it's probably dumb as shyt if I were to revisit it

 

[JLaw]

Same lane as Peewee Herman and early Jim Carrey. They were real life cartoon characters.

I watched Ernest Scared Stupid with my nephew recently and it holds up

 

[Leonard Washington]

Earnest was hilarious to 7 year old me

 

[MajesticLion]

Been a trope from Gomer Pyle all the way through Dewey Crowe and beyond



Different impact now. Half the country took it to heart that they should live up to that trope AND be in politics/culture wars.

 

[Leonard Washington]

Was watching Andy Griffin on Pluto and realized he jacked this whole character from
Ernest T. Bass even down to the attire.

so that's why Sam Jackson or Bernie Mac called a goofy cac Earnest T. on Soul Men

 

[duck]

I remember dude was a markiting genius. Back in the days before there was a cartoon network or disney or whatever, saturday morning cartoons were the shyt. He used to alway have his commercial then started off like "hey vern" nobody to today knows who the fukk vern is. But he still gathered enough attention to sell some tickets to dumb ass movies

 

[Tommy Gibbs]

Same lane as Peewee Herman and early Jim Carrey. They were real life cartoon characters.

I watched Ernest Scared Stupid with my nephew recently and it holds up

I loved Ernest goes to camp. He was so good as Ernest, that when he wasn't playing that character, I had no idea it was him. When the Beverly HIllbillies movie came out in the early 90s, I used to love that film. It took me 3 watches before I realized it was Jim Varney as Jed Clampett haha

 

[Heelmatic]

I remember these movies but not really. I know I thought that shyt was funny though. There was one where he was hoopin, absolutely ridiculous


I saw them on some streaming service, don’t remember which, and thought about showing one to my kids but i can already see them being like wtf is this