flash heelers

Watching the Flash Gordon movie on television.
The good one.
The one from 1981.
The opening scene is a classic.
We see Max Von Sydow playing Ming The Merciless sitting in a chamber with screens around him showing planets all over the galaxy.
From this chamber Ming can project cosmic disasters on those he views from afar.
His steel helmeted minion Clytus enters.
Ming says cheerily: "What have you got for me today Clytus?"
Clytus gestures towards one of the screens.
"It's a little newspaper group in the Sol system," he says. "They call it the Johnston Cupboard. Or the Johnston Box Room. Or the Johnston Press. Or something."
Max Von Sydow strokes his beard.
His own beard.
Not Clytus's's's.
"The Johnston Mess," muses Ming the Me musingly.
Clytus grins beneath his helmet.
"Are you going to destroy them your majesty?" he wonders eagerly.
Mings hands drift to a control panel.
The control panel has buttons that read earthquake, tornado, and total share price collapse.
He begins pressing buttons at random.
"I like to toy with parvenus first," says Max Von Sydow, "before annihilation."
Then the music kicks in.
It's the classic Flash Gordon theme.
Never been bettered.
Freddie Mercury sings:

"Heelers,
Ahhhhh Ahhhhh,
Saviour of the Irish newspaper industry.
Dern dern dern dern dern.
Heelers,
Ahhhh, Ahhhhhh,
Saviour of journalistic integrity.
Dern, dern, dern, dern, dern.(At this point of the song a recording of Barack Obama is heard saying: "The unprecedented solar eclipse is all the more reason to believe climate change is really taking place.")
Heelers,
Ahhh Ahhh,
Stands for every one of us,
He's for every one of us,
Right there for every one of us,
Every man, every woman, every newspaper, every magazine, every broadcaster with the possible exception of The Daily Mirror, The Irish Times, RTE and the Independent Group,
Oh Heelers.Dern, dern, dern, dern, dern.(We hear the sound of alarm buzzers. Then John Whelan a baldy git who once edited the Leinster Leader for a full five minutes is heard saying to John Fry current Chief Executive Officer of the Johnston Press: "General Karla, General Karla, James Healy approaching on a hawk man rocket cycle." General Karla replies with a lunatic shriek: "What do you mean, James Healy approaching??? Open fire, all weapons... Despatch war rocket Blackpool And Stockport Gazette to bring back his body... Cor blimey.")
Heelers,
Kabooom,
Dern, dern, dern, dern, dern, dern.He's just a man.
And he could always fail.
Remember he's nothing but a man,
He can occasionally get a bit annoyed,
About small things,He's an all round humanitarian
But not overly found of parvenu Brit bollockses,
And their Irish forelock tugging acolytes,
Ooooh Ooohh Oooh
Oooh Ooooh. Ooh Heelers.
Dern, dern, dern, dern, dern.(Evgenia Tarasova's voice is intercut with the song. She is heard saying: "James I love you, but we only have fourteen hours, twenty minutes and five seconds to save the earth.")Heelers.
Dern, dern, dern.(Brian Blessed's voice is heard saying: "Heelers is alive, alive, alive.")
Heelers,
Dern, dern, dern.
Heelers.
Dern, dern, dern, dern, dern.(Sounds of thunder and lightning fading out with the dern, dern, derns.)