26 Strange Ways That Movies and TV Actually Affected the Real World

If you’ve ever used the term ‘You’re Toast,’ you can thank the Ghostbusters!
26 Strange Ways That Movies and TV Actually Affected the Real World

It’s no surprise that movies and TV shows have a huge impact on pop culture. But when Harry Potter actually revived the dying boarding school industry, you have to think, “Wow, that actually changed the course of some kids’ lives!”

Wait, did those kids think that it was the uniforms that gave Harry magical powers? That must’ve been a tough pill to swallow. Either way, here are a bunch of movies and shows that seriously affected the world around them…

The Handmaid’s Tale

Women are donning the red-and-white costume from The Handmaid's Tale as a protest symbol. The red cloak and white bonnet from the show has become a protest symbol for the women to fight for their reproductive rights. Women in Argentina wore the costume to demand the legalization of abortions in a mass rally. Activists in Ireland also wore the same costume to protest against the country's anti-abortion law. The outfit gives the women a way to protest without fear of being arrested. CRACKED.COM

The Big Bang Theory

The Big Bang Theory inspired people to learn physics. CRACKED.COM University admissions for physics degrees went up by 10% after the show had its first season.

Coco

Paracho, a small city in Mexico dedicated to making guitars, experienced a huge demand when Coco was released. PARACHO When sales boomed, the city decided to honor the movie by painting their iconic two-story high bronze guitar statue white to match the film. CRACKED.COM

Office Space

Office Space made life for TGI Friday's servers a little more dignified. NICE Cala : WITH - - II - I The Chotchkie's flair policy was taken directly from TGI Friday's, but when the film gained popularity, it became an object of ridicule and was phased out. When Mike Judge found out, he said he was happy to have made the world a better place in that small way. CRACKED.COM

Twilight

Twilight effectively ended a small town's recession. twilight Forks, Washington, the town where the story is set, had been suffering economically after the shutdown of its timber industry. It turned into an unlikely tourist spot after the film was released. CRACKED.COM

Star Trek

In honor of Star Trek, NASA's first Space CRACKED.COM Shuttle was named Enterprise. NASA United States Trek fans mailed hundreds of thousands of letters asking for that name. The White House obliged them and dropped its initial choice of name (Constitution).

Deliverance

Deliverance created tens of thousands of new river boaters (and killed some). Before Deliverance, a few hundred people paddled down the Chattooga river (where it was filmed) every year. After Deliverance, tens of thousands did. There were lots more drownings, too, and they'd get chalked up to Deliverance fever. CRACKED.COM

Peaky Blinders

CRACKED COM The UK's high-end department store John Lewis & Partners reported that sales of the flat cap (also known as the newsboy's hat) skyrocketed show thanks to the PEAKYBLINDERS

The Simpsons

The Simpsons changed how we talk. In 2005, University of Pennsylvania linguistic professor Mark Liberman wrote that the Simpsons took over both Shakespeare and the Bible as our biggest source of idioms, catchphrases, and sundry other textual allusions. GRACKED.COM

WarGames

Hacking was outlawed because of WarGames. After President Reagan watched WarGames, he asked if that could really happen. Не found out much worse could. So he pushed for anti-hacking legislation and, in 1986, signed into law the act that made most forms of hacking illegal for CRACKED.COM the first time in the U.S. WarGames clips were played during congressional debates about the law.

Fight Club

Fight Club inspired numerous real-life fight clubs, and multiple would-be bombers have cited their desire to create their own Project Mayhem. In the years following the film's release, office workers from Silicon Valley to Moscow have begun to pay membership fees to participate in underground fight clubs. GRACKED.COM

Avatar

James Cameron's Avatar captivated the audience with its immersive, fictional world back in 2009. This film also caused some fans to develop depression. One year after the film's release, fans flocked to Internet forums to admit that they had been feeling depressed after watching the film. Most of them remarked that after witnessing the beautiful world of Pandora, they couldn't stand the thought of not living in the fictional world. CRACKED COM

The Karate Kid

The CRANE KICK was created by Darryl Vidal for THE KARATE KID. It is widely considered by martial artists to be a move too impractical to be used in real life. UFC UFC UFC avidson.com CHARLES NUM Jenn TP UILA FIO That didn't stop LYOTO MACHIDA, a mixed martial artist, from using it to ко Randy Couture in a fight. The Karate Kid CRACKED COM

24

24 made cadets think that torture is the best method of interrogation. Brigadier General Patrick Finnegan, dean of the U.S. Military Academy, met with the showrunners to decry how they falsely portrayed torture on screen as being effective, revealing that it has become harder to convince some of his cadets to respect the rule of law and human rights. CRACKED.COM

Game of Thrones

Nowadays, Game of Thrones is more than a show - it's a college-level course. Some curriculums include medieval studies inspired by GoT, while others offer the study of the Dothraki language. CRACKED.COM

Inception

PhD student Steve Ramirez successfully implanted memories in the brains of mice based on an idea inspired by Inception. After earning worldwide attention, Ramirez nicknamed the study his CRACKED.COM Inception experiment.

The Simpsons

Lisa Simpson made young girls crazy for CRACKED.COM saxophones. UNINGFIELD ELEMENTARY SCHOOL When The Simpsons started airing, lots of pre-teen girls started playing the sax because Lisa played it. Band directors even had to turn away new saxophonists, or they'd have an all-sax band. In the '90s, Simpsons creator Matt Groening would regularly get photos of girls with their saxophones in his fan mail.

Rambo

CRACKED.COM Rambo (2008) gave the Karen rebel group in Myanmar a morale boost. The film's portrayal of the Karen rebel group struck a chord with the Burmese audiences. The film's quote Live for nothing, or die for something became one of the Karen rebels' rallying cries.

E.T.

Mars refused to grant permission for Steven Spielberg to use M&Ms in E.T. The Extra- Terrestrial, so Elliot instead uses a trail of Reese's Pieces to lure E.T. After the movie's release, Reese's Pieces received a huge boost in popularity, Hershey Foods overtook Mars as the largest company in the chocolate candy market, and Mars scrambled to release a number of peanut butter-flavored products. CRACKED.COM

Lincoln

CRACKED.COM Lincoln inspired two guys to research the Thirteenth Amendment (which abolished slavery) and they discovered that Mississippi never officially ratified it due to a clerical error. One of them contacted Misissippi's Secretary of State who then filed the paperwork and made it official.

Studio Ghibli

Studio Ghibli Fans Caused Problems Because Of A Rumor. People began trespassing in a shipyard to take Instagram photos after a rumor circulated that the spot inspired a famous scene in Spirited Away. The owner wasn't happy that they were a nuisance to residents and left all trash all over. CRACKED.COM

Portlandia

CRACKED.COM According to residents, Portland is a lot less weird due to PORTLANDIA Since its debut there has been a steady influx of new residents and tourists looking for the Portlandia experience, ultimately making the rent go through the roof. Much of the quirky city has gone through gentrification, making many neighborhoods unaffordable by the eccentric creative class portrayed on screen. The series' impact has led to a love/hate relationship between the people of Portland and the show.

Orange Is the New Black

GRACKED.COM ORANGE is the new BLACK In Minority Deport, Gloria is told about a (real) hotline that immigrants can call to receive a pro bono lawyer while in detention camps, but warned to keep it a secret, because if the people in charge found out about it, they'd shut it down. A few days after the episode aired, ICE shut down those call centers in Florida.

Mad Men

Lucky Strikes cigarettes experienced a huge sales boom because of Mad Men. When the show first aired, the company sold 23 billion packs a year. By 2013, that number had jumped to 33 billion, and experts attribute the boom to the show. CRACKED.COM

Ghostbusters

You're toast. That usage of the word toast was introduced to the world by Bill Murray's character in the movie Ghostbusters. CRACKED.COM

Harry Potter

Harry Potter revived the British boarding school industry. The number of students in boarding schools fell every year from 1987 to the mid-2000s, when Harry Potter got mega-popular. CRACKED.COM The Harry Potter effect was SO strong, top boarding schools had to build new housing to satisfy demand.

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