It’s A Commodore 6!
Posted on | January 18, 2008 at 6:15 am | 8 Comments
One of my favorite shows of the 90s was Mystery Science Theater 3000 (aka MST3K), which went from a local TV show on a Minnesota station, to a mainstay of the Comedy Channel / Comedy Central, and finally ended up on the SciFi Channel for its final seasons. It featured a man (originally Joel Hodgson, later Mike Nelson) trapped on a satellite in space by some mad scientists and forced to watch bad movies with his two robot friends, Tom Servo and Crow T Robot. The three of them were shot in front of the movies as silhouettes and would make comedic quips throughout the movie. Most of the movies were forgotten science fiction or horror d-movies, though there would be the occasional teenage rebellion flick or TV cop movie. It was a very funny show, although the premise kind of ran its course after awhile. Nevertheless, I managed to get most of the episodes on videotape. Frequent commentaur InfK and I initially met because we were both fans of the show and hung out on alt.tv.mstk3 (or whatever it was; I’m sure Ben will correct me). He was local at the time, instead of living on the other end of the world like he does now.
Anyway, the collective unconscious of the universe must have decided it was time to revive this premise, as there are no less than three groups of ex-MSTies now producing similar ventures. The first out of the gate was Rifftrax!, headed by Mike Nelson with help from Kevin Murphy (the second Tom Servo) and Bill Corbet (the second Crow). They produce downloadable audio tracks that sync with a DVD and make fun of the movie. The advantage of this is that they can riff on any movies, not just bad free ones in the public domain – no copyright hassles. The downside is that there’s no visual element – it’s like listening to an extra commentary track on the DVD. They’ve done a lot of movies. I really should check some out. I bet Star Wars Ep 1: The Phantom Menace is a hoot. And there’s always Star Trek V.
And then there’s the flash animated web-only MST3K series produced by original series producer Jim Mallon along with some other people from the show. I haven’t really dwelved into that, but I guess I should.
Finally, there’s Cinematic Titanic, which has the most fan-friendly pedigree of the lot, and which most closely matches the aesthetic of the original show. Creator Joel Hodgson returns with buddies in tow: Josh Weinstein (the first Tom Servo), Trace Beaulieu (the first Crow/Dr Forrester), Frank Conniff (TV’s Frank) and Mary Jo Pehl (original show writer/Pearl Forrester). The five of them watch bad movies and riff on them while you see their silhouettes off in the lower corners of the screen. They are self-distributing their efforts as a series of DVDs, the first of which, The Oozing Skull, has just been released. I purchased it and recently watched it.
The movie is an extremely low budget horror/science fiction romp about a brain-switching experiment gone horribly wrong. There’s a lot of chase scenes, and the final third of the movie or so has many of the principles wandering around in the California (?) hills for no good reason. The “monster” had some of the worst makeup I’ve ever seen – they didn’t even bother to glue his skullcap on completely in the back. It’s perfect fodder for this sort of mockery. The comments by the gang are as witty as ever, and it definitely brings tears of nostalgia to my eyes. Having five voices instead of three gets a bit confusing and manic at times, especially if you’re trying to figure out who is saying what. It hues pretty closely to the MST3K formula without the backstory and out-of-theater skits, though they will occasionally stop the movie in order to riff longer on a single frame, and to use props and guest actors in what appear to be minor attempts at in-theater skits. There are no robots/puppets though, and that’s a shame.
It’s all well done, and I recommend it to fans of the show. Nevertheless, I do feel the concept doesn’t have a lot of life left in it and I was bored from time to time. The movie was a bit too dull and though it was awful, it was maybe not quite awful enough, if you know what I mean. But hey, it’s hard to try to find the next Manos: The Hands of Fate.
Pet Peeve of the Day:The Cinematic Titanic DVDs are distributed sans packaging. All you get is the disc. Really. In a tyvek sleeve that’s also the mailing envelope. The screen printing on the disc is well done though. I know they’re trying to save costs and all, but when I pay some $15.94 for a DVD, I want a little something more to show for it. Also, there are no extras on the disc. The menu has only “Play Movie” and “Chapters”. I would’ve liked at least a little interview with the creators. Maybe next time.
Latre.
Comments
8 Responses to “It’s A Commodore 6!”
January 18th, 2008 @ 1:44 pm
A little behind the curve on this one, Flasshe… And you forgot Nelson, Murphy, and Corbett’s “Film Crew” thing (described in my post linked above).
I watched one of the Film Crew things…it was pretty good, but there’s no point whatsoever to its framing device, and the skits were pretty bad. I too just got my copy of The Oozing Skull, but I haven’t watched it yet.
I wasn’t too impressed by the animated site when I visited it in November – I should check back, I guess.
January 18th, 2008 @ 2:17 pm
A little behind the curve on this one, Flasshe
I do remember reading your blog entry now. But since it was over two months ago that I read it, the brain cells that retained that memory fled to Cabo long before I wrote my entry.
January 18th, 2008 @ 4:05 pm
As much as I try to retain as much geek cred as possible, most the MST3K movies were too bad to watch with or without witty commentary.
January 18th, 2008 @ 10:30 pm
What kind of rates do your brain cells get on such trips? Because mine can never find a good deal, and I always end up electing to just have them stick around but do brainless things like type comments on other people’s blogs…
January 19th, 2008 @ 5:20 am
Star Trek V? That movie kinda makes its own gravy, I’ve always thought. Like how Letterman will show clips of the President stammering during a speech – yeah, it triggers a chuckle, but Bush does most of his own comedy without embellishment. I’m not sure if it’s possible to deconstruct something as bottom-scraping as TrekV…
That said, I did once see parts of a “open captioned for the visually impaired” version of Trek V – a soothing female voice would talk over any quiet parts of the movie, describing what was happening onscreen. It was a hoot and a half, though of course unintentionally so. I’ve no idea where to find this version (it may even have been a trial balloon of a service or company which never took off; I got hold of it through contacts in the video production biz but I highly recommend it to anyone who gets a chance The description of Kirk’s “trim, sinewy body” during the opening scenes freecliming at Yosemite alone will hook you, unless you’re dead inside.
I look forward to Cinematic Titanic even though I, too, will miss the Bots. I even plan to try and get into the forums on the website – maybe we’ll find Creepy Guy?
For those of you keeping score at home, here’s the earliest post I could find of Roger’s on the old-fashioned Internets.
January 19th, 2008 @ 7:57 am
Hey, posting that link violates at least one of my rules (which you may or may not know about; I keep secret rules). But I may keep it up. For now.
Sheesh, the embarrassments of youth, even if that “youth” was only 15 years ago…
Internet youth?
January 19th, 2008 @ 8:49 pm
That 1992 post mentions an MST3K drinking game…and as it happens, my revision of that is still the first item that comes up on a Google search of that phrase….
A claim to minor fame…
January 21st, 2008 @ 4:24 pm
hues or hews?