In the past year, the 80s have made a surprising surge back to relevance in Hollywood. Movie remakes of 80s movies (Clash of the Titans), 80s toys turned into movies (Transformers), 80s TV shows turned into movies (A-Team), even movies about returning to the 80s (Hot Tub Time Machine).

We’ve decided to ride the wave back to the days of Space Invaders, the Delorean and of course, the King of Pop as we celebrate 80s Night in less than two weeks at Dodger Stadium (August 6th for those keeping track).

In honor of the decade that brought us Bon Jovi and  Big Hair, the entertainment for the evening will have an acid-washed tint to it. In addition, the first 20,000 fans will take home a limited-edition poster featuring Matt Kemp. We penciled in Kemp as the 80s poster-boy back in January, however, we didn’t determine the exact direction for its design until about a month ago.

As some of you may have seen on twitter and even Deadspin the resulting shoot will remind many of the days of “Thriller”, “Beat it” and the moonwalk.

Kemp was happy to lend his likeness to the poster, but I don’t think he knew exactly what he was getting in to when we agreed to take part in the photo shoot on Friday. We had a full wardrobe ready, with an authentic (read: costume shop replica) red leather jacket, aviators, fedora, white v-neck and of course, a silver glove! Matt already has a gold one to go with it, but once he slid the glove on, donned the fedora, and looked into the camera, MK channeled MJ pretty quickly. Using my iPhone as the soundtrack (hopefully DMN can enhance the audio on the Inside Dodgertown piece coming soon) Kemp gave us a few “he-heee’s” as he struck poses under the direction of Jon SooHoo.

The shot to be used is still to be determined, but Matt gave us plenty to work with and we’ll release the design on dodgers.com later this week. For now, start digging out the legwarmers and parachute pants (in Dodger blue of course) and plan on joining us August 6th as the Nationals come to town on 80s Night with their prodigal pitcher, Stephen Strasburg (born in 1988!), scheduled to pitch (perhaps against Kershaw, given that he’s also scheduled to pitch on Sunday due to his suspension). Here’s hoping Kemp proves to be the king of pop at the plate when the two face each other.

-Josh Lukin