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Final Episode of MST3K to Air Today
Masem writes "The last produced episode of MST3K, which will
wrap up all 10 years of it's run, and tell
us the fates of Mike and the bots, will
be airing Sunday at 11pm EDT on SciFi.
The episode itself is called "Danger: Diobolik!",
a German spy-non-triller. (There's a episode
that's been held back until Sept from this season,
but it's not the final final episode). "
Final episode? Bah, now we won't get to see Star Wars mistied. (as they ough to be...)
mst3k is going off the air because they have run out of movies. well, that's not totally correct. see, they only can afford to go after the real cheappo's, they would love to do the show with titanic and the sort, but that would cost a rather absurd amount of money. after the hundreds of low budget movies they had the rights to, they have run out. the tapes are available somwhere(i have seen them at suncoast video and a few other stores), even a collection of shorts. i find it hard to believe that there are slashdotters that didn't like mst3k, i thought everyone here was a fan. harumph!
and how do you spell his name?
Thanks for the flaimbait, sparky. You truly missed out on the humor of MST3K if you think it was simply about watching "a bunch of other idiots watching idiotic movies." MST3K provided a humorous take on material that just begged to be laughed at. If you didn't understand the humor, it was probably mostly over your head. So you can go watch Friends or reruns of Seinfeld and continue to dilute yourself that they're actually funny shows or offer any originality when they don't. MST3K was something different in the barren landscapes of television and movies. Very refreshing. Look at what we get from Hollywood these days. I can easily draw a parallel between stock MUDs and the films Hollywood has been putting out: where executives think they'll make the best movie ever by just throwing together hackneyed concepts from old movies. Godzilla was utterly blatant. The subplot with the snotty reporter that kept undercutting the hard working woman is taken almost directly from Die Hard; the scene in the stadium with the mini-zillas was direct from Jurassic Park. Television shows are similarly afflicted with this odd self-aggrandizing, self-referential need to remake what was popular. Ally McBeal, Felicity, 90210, Party of Five, Friends, Seinfeld, etc., all are or were stupid, stupid shows that got an audience from idiots like you.
Your comments, any way you look at them, are completely tasteless. Even if one is to accept that MST3K sucked (it didn't), you have just thanked a network for putting hard-working people out of work. You're just another one of those people who doesn't understand that just because they're on TV, doesn't mean they don't have real lives and that doesn't mean it's not a job. Yeah, so thank you for being an inconsiderate asshole.
That was close to the WORST T.V. show ever made. The fact that people were stupid enough to sit and watch a bunch of other idiots watching idiotic movies was depressing.
It's certainly not the writing staff, since it's largely unchanged. Mary Jo Pehl ("Mrs. Forrester"/"that fat lady") and Michael J. Nelson have been writers on the show for a very long time, far before they were in front of the camera full time (Mike did a number of bit parts, including Torgo in "Manos": Hands of Fate [damn that had to be the worst movie ever made] and a brilliant impersonation of the A&E Biography guy; Mary Jo was the Magic Voice for a while, I think).
Some of the shows haven't been very funny, especially when you compare them to some of MST3K's best work. But I think last week's episode, Squirm, was hilarious, and both Final Justice and The Final Sacrifice were well done. I think the problem hasn't been funding of the show, but selection of movies and, most of all, the lack of any kind of advertising support for MST3K. Although they were well aware of the dedicated fan base, it's very difficult to keep up the quality when you're not getting any advertising (I can't recall, before the recent campaign for the last show, when I last saw MST3K get advertised) and, thus, not a whole lot of new viewers and no real incentive (the truly dedicated fans will stick with it even if you're subconsciously not putting a lot of effort into it). The SFC, itself, by the way, didn't pull the plug, but its parent company (the one that owns USA Network as well) did. OTOH, SFC is guilty of not putting any advertising dollars into MST3K and wasting time and money with movies bad enough to be on MST3K and, worse, shows like Sliders.
Best Brains have not quit, and have made it clear that they would love to do, at the least, an eleventh season of MST3K. However, there is little to no chance of Rhino producing direct-to-video episodes of MST3K: the production cost (of which the movie licensing fees are a considerable part) are simply too much for Rhino Video to consider it. This is straight from the mouth of the Rhino. None of the original on-camera cast is with the show any more, but a lot of the original staff is there, including Mike Nelson who has been the head writer for a long time (well before he replaced Joel). The show, at times, has had serious lulls, however this has been primarily due to the SFC restricting the movies to just Sci-Fi ones, a lack of new viewership (coming from a lack of advertising; you must remember that every comedian is in the business for laughs, and when the only laughs you're getting are the same ones you got five years ago, it's hard to put your heart into your work), and troubles with oscillating staff.
A lot of people gave up on MST3K when Joel left, and even more when Frank and then Dr. F went. Which was unfortunate because they never gave the show a chance to get back on its feet. Mike has done a brilliant job of taking the SOL in a different direction, and he's a different kind of leadman than Joel (i.e., he's not trying to be Joel, he's being himself and being damn funny). The show has all the elements to be as funny as it ever was in place, which can be seen by just watching any of a variety of very funny shows that have aired in the past year. The SFC's parent company chose to cancel the show at the worst possible time: when it was just rising from a lull. If it does get picked up again, I'll be more rabid a fan than ever before.
What annoys me is that after the first show on Sci-Fi, they pretty much stopped promoting it until the final episode. In the meantime, you see commercials for Sliders and all of that other crap every 15 seconds.
Why did Joel leave, anyway?
He chose to. Nothing more, nothing less. It's just the kind of guy he is. He was an incredibly popular comedian at one point in his career, with several appearances on SNL (when it used to be funny) and even offers for his own sitcom. He turned down all TV offers and quit comedy. This choice cost him the chance to establish the current trend of sitcoms with comedians that are being overpaid, he had a lot of money and a bright future. It's sort of like Barry Sanders leaving just an average year's yardage away from setting a new record.
Joel just doesn't like to be nailed down to the same thing for too long, so in the fifth season of MST3K (episode #512 to be exact), he left. Five years was a long time, and MST3K was at the height of its popularity around that time. Mike, however, has been more than suitable in taking over the SOL. A lot of people thought the show could never be the same without Joel, that it could never be funny. Well, the show isn't the same with Mike: he's a different kind of guy; but the show is still funny. People who think the show stopped being funny when Mike replaced Joel should note that Mike was the head writer during the best days of MST3K, and continued to be the head writer up until the end of this season's production.
Give the guy a chance. The show is funny.
I heard a rumor that the "B-Movie Channel" was thing about picking up MST3K. It looks like a good fit to me. Here's the e-mail response I got from them:
Hello Rick,
Thank you for your comments. Yes we are considering to possibly do something
with MST3K. Please sign up on our mailing list to get the breaking news when
it happens.
Have a good day
Dennis
I suggest we fans send them a lot of mail requesting them to pick up the show and promising to subscribe to their channel if they do!
Rick
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
The first time they were cancelled, someone (I can't remember who) at BBI said that they would really like to stick around until they have the opportunity to get ahold of Cliffhanger...
Here's hoping someone has mercy on the world and lets the show go on.
Feed Magazine has a great column about the end of MST3K and its cultural significance. You can find it here.
Forester (Trace Beaulieu) was the heart and soul of MST3K after Joel left. he was Forester, Crow, and a good chunk of the subtle pop culture references that really made the show shine in CC. His absence sort of robbed the show of it's more colorful side.
Joel's last show? I believe it was 'The Brain That Wouldn't Die'. I don't remember the skits, only that Joel got into an escape pod and blasted for Earth. Last scene was Forester knocking Mike in head with a wrench, or somesuch, much like the intro w/ Joel from before.
They weren't picking the films. The Sci-Fi Channel chose which movies they did. For some reaosn, SFC said that the movies must be sci-fi, which was a rather serious restriction. Mind you, not all of the movies MST3K got ahold of were low budget. The Hercules films, This Island Earth, etc., were epic films in their time.
Anyway, if you can honestly tell me that you would much rather watch "Manos": Hands of Fate or The Girl in Gold Boots or Jack Frost or that weird movie with the Sampo or Squirm or The Brain That Wouldn't Die or Pod People or Angel's Revenge or Mitchell or Final Justice or The Final Sacrifice or The Incredibly Strange Teenagers Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-up Zombies (or whatever the exact name of the film was) or Eegah stand-alone rather than see them riffed, I will eat my own article (er, well, maybe not).
It was Dr. Erhardt, who was Josh Weinstein, also the voice of Tom Servo. Josh threw a hissy-fit about the show's move to being scripted and some other stuff. I believe Erhardt's first name was Larry, but I might be wrong.
I think I'd give Attack of The The (sic) Eye People a chance. Once. Then I'd go raving mad...
I can't believe Sci-Fi channel is so lame. With all the star trek rip-offs it has, and all the bad movies it plays (not counting the ones on MST3K), it cancelled the only good show. I remember watching it on TV before comedy central ever existed. And I don't care what people say about Mike sucking more than Joel, they were equally funny... I didn't see much of a change. Except Pearl Forrester, that was kinda lame. I watched the final episode last night, and boy was that hillarious (MY LEG IS TURNING ONE DIMENSIONAL!!!!). It's so frikkin sad to see it go. With MST3K gone and no scheduled tapings of Mr. Show left.... I guess South Park is all that's left on TV to watch.
My favorite part in any MST3K episode is actually fairly recent, it's this story about these cult ninja's and this guy is looking for his dad, and they come accross a Ted Kazinski(sp?) looking guy, and the kid's like "Did you know my dad?" and Tom Servo jumps in with "Know him?! He was delicious!!!". I couldn't stop laughing for like 5 minutes.....
-- My neighbors dog has a four inch clit.
Yeah. Diabolik is an Italian (not German. They could never make anything this funky) comic strip from the sixties about a ninja-looking superthief and his exploits. He's clever, he's deadly, and he's always a success with the ladies. What more can be said? The Beasties' video was a parody of this movie.
There are a number of fan sites that are focused on getting MST3K picked up. Check out: http://www.mst3kinfo.com/satnews/index.html for a list of these sites! And don't forget to send a letter to your cable company asking them to dump SciFi for something better (and send a copy to SciFi)!
sells videos (I recomend Laserblast)
What if we want movies that are no better than Laserblast?
-- Rick
And I have to admit, it was pretty funny. The movie they picked as the last was REALLY bad. I mean, it's been a long long time since I've seen a movie that bad. (Though, Titanic springs to mind...but I digress).
I almost lost it when Diabolik and the main bad guy jumped out of the plane and they were falling and having a conversation at the same time. Pretty funny stuff. And it's even funnier to think the people that made this thought it was good!
--- "It's not enough that I succeed...everyone else must fail."
Joel's last show? I believe it was 'The Brain That Wouldn't Die'.
No, no, a thousand times no. Go boil an egg.
Joel's last show (and one of my favorite episodes) was Mitchell, starring (if one can call it that) Joe Don Baker as a lumpy cop who chases after some lumpy villains while spilling beer all over the place.
"Why would anyone *do* this with Mitchell, Joel?"
"Baby oil? NOOOOOOOO!"
-- Rick
(drmike makes OK sign with fingers)
"It stinks!"
Thank goodness I have episodes 101-512 (Joel eps) and 40% of the KTMA episodes on tape. It might be awhile till we see the first 5 seasons on TV, and maybe never if there are licensing problems reshowing the movies they Mist'd.
I really wish DVD-RAM and a good hw mpeg capture card had good linux support, I want to move all 140+ tapes to DVD...
Push the button frank...
What the heck is a hamdinger, anyway? I've yet to figure this out, yet it at least used to play a major role in MST3k...
Man, I wish I didn't keep forgetting to watch it, specially now that some of their good later shows (like "Trucking With Death" and "Time Chasers") have been making it into reruns. This last season has kinda sucked, but seasons 8 and 9 were generally pretty good.
Does anyone know where I can get some of the other episodes on tape, though? I know that some of the important ones (such as Mitchell) are carried by Rhino, but I really want to see the last few Comedy Central episodes, particularly the very last one. Also the first Sci-Fi Channel episode, though I'm sure that'll show up in reruns soon enough (unless I missed that already, pfeh).
---
"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.
"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.
Quine "quine?
I can't believe this has happened. Sci-Fi has so much shit on their channel that I can't believe they dump a show because of low ratings. I do not care who picks it up: AMC, PBS, anyone, as long as I can get the channel where I live.
:)
We Slashdotters should make an effort to save this show. There is so much crap on TV. Every year networks pump out show after show after show of the same stupid sitcoms. We don't need that many. But the most original show on TV right now gets cancelled.
Anyway, my feeling is that there's gotta be enough rabid fans out there who love MST3K for it to be worthwhile for some network to pick it up.
On a related note, what the hell is happening to the Comedy Central episodes? Is Comedy gonna show re-runs? Or will they sell them? We can't let them just keep those episodes in a storage room somewhere, they're a national treasure
it's actually not such a weird match.
AMC has a devotion and a love of movies much like the one's MSt3k rifs. Luckily, they also have a sense of humor --so they can accept Mst3k. Plus, much like CC years ago, they really need to increase their ratings. One way to do this is to take a "quirky" show that can grab huge amounts of people who largely ignore the popular shows.
------- Oh damn.... the Sigfile escaped... -Great OM
www.rhino.com
sells videos (I recomend Laserblast)
------- Oh damn.... the Sigfile escaped... -Great OM
I'm one of those that thought the show really went downhill when Joel left.
Then it really went downhill when Trace and Frank left also. Though the new guy they had doing Crow sounded just like Trace.
I thought the movie was pretty funny though.
Oh well...all good things must end.
--- "It's not enough that I succeed...everyone else must fail."
Let's face it folks - 10 years is an incredible run for any show, especially one that so few people get. I'm just glad that years ago I figured out that this show would probably be the only one in television history not to be perpetually rerun in the future, and got them all on tape...
I wish I had those old episodes, if I were you I'd make copies and sell them on E-Bay(if it's not illegal). You could probably make a lot of money. Actually, it probably is illegal.
The problem with almost all MST3K shows (except those based on movies in the public domain) is that they depend on having the rights for the original movies as well as for the show itself. I believe when MST3K first did a lot of the CC-era movies, they got the rights for a limited time-period, which meant that after that time-period expired, they couldn't broadcast that show anymore. To be able to re-run them all would mean that someone would have to renegotiate the rights to use all of those movies, and let's face it, MST3K has always gotten such poor ratings that no TV executive would even consider it worthwhile.
The Fu Mancu episode was so bad even Joel & the bots admitted it. Near the end of the episode they didn't even have the energy to make the jokes about it.
The mads even acknoweledged this and hi-fived each other for bumming out Joel and the bots. Heh.
I was a fan of the show when it first made it on to Comedy Central, but ever since the movie, I haven't been able to see the show since it moved to Sci-Fi
There are some problems with re-running the shows though. In order to do that, you need to get permission from the people that made the films.
As of the case on who owns the "original" shows from comedy central, I'd put my money on CC, since Best Brains production did produce them FOR comedy central.
Isn't licensing a bitch sometimes, especially when used in a manner such as this? I just want the Gammera shows on tape, and the final episode of Joel and the Final Final, and I can die happy
(Allready own the movie)
The Secret Government Ego Project
It's prime time to start taking the MST3K treatment to all media, not just ones that someone happens to purchase the "rights" to. (Apparently the licensing fees became a significantly larger cost for the MST3K producers.)
For some time now, fanatics have been riffing off the junk scraped from USENet with "mistings". That's an ok start.
And we're all familiar with that brilliantly-inspired by horribly-design (ie, closed-standard) ThirdVoice annotation system.
We need a better 3rd-party annotation standard for web-based media. This should lead to a nice solution for broadcast-TV & VCR. I mean, when "convergence" comes along, do you really think you'll be watching TV and have the itch to "click on" a ballplayer just to find out what his batting average is with 2 runners on in the seventh during a meteor shower?
Nooo... you'll have your choice of armchair broadcasters all across this great web, spinning their own plot, analysis, and all that in the name of postmodernism!
At long last they finaly made it home =]
MST3K was ruined when Joel left... Now, in memory of MST3K: "Sandstorm, Joel! Sandstorm!" "Pizza, Pizza!"
has anyone forgot about Joel??????
look behind you Matt!
I have a soft spot for "The Blood Waters of Dr. Z." REminds me of the good ol' days of "Manos".
... OF MY PLAN!!!"
... my thermos of napalm!"
Also one of the few recent episodes where I nearly fell out of the chair laughing at one of the skits.
"Soon you will become wedged in the bulkhead
"The Starfighters" is also a good Mike episode.
"Yes, welcome to minute six of the glorious refueling sequence."
"Uh oh
-- Rick
Yeah. But it really reached silliness critical mass with the gold ingot.
"We've melted it all down into one huge ingot! It weighs 20 tons!"
From that point onwards I just could not stop laughing. "Invest... me... wisely...!"
If anyone is interested in seeing my tour pics of the Best Brains studio from several years ago, let me know and I'll put 'em up on a web page.
"But "MST3K"'s values -- reflex irony, hatred of everything outmoded and aesthetically dated,the paranoid fear of the imagination and the absences that might wake it -- are simply those of the dominant culture. "
Hatred, paranoid fear - is this a review of a puppet show or of a Leni Riefenstahl film? Somehow I get the feeling that this guy is as much fun at a party as a can of tear gas...
Sci-Fi channel is INFOMERCIALS. How about that perky CUMPUTER VIDEO PROFESSOR lady! Or how 'bout the TURKEY ROASTER! Or how 'bout that REAL ESTATE program that will MAKE YOU MILLIONS! Or how 'bout the DECORATIVE PAINT rollers! Or how 'bout THE JUICEMAN (love those hairy eyebrows and electrolytes and vitavegamins)!
If you saw an ad for it in the US, then it probably wasn't MST3K. Sci-Fi put more marketing effort into the series finale than it did through its entire run. In fact, the finale ads were the first I've ever seen for the show. That lack of support and the shifting time slots are what killed MST3K.
--
#19845
I'd like to get on the list.
I also loved that at the end it's supposed to be a positive note that he's left in solid gold.
's not German... Italian made -- based on a very popular 60's anti-establishment comic book series. Loads of fun, hope they treat it right :)
But BB didn't sound too upset about it. After ten years they probably want to do other things.
There are fan MiSTings floating around of Highlander 2 (so-so, it's one of those movies that's too painful to counteract) and Star Trek 5 (absolutely hilarious), though they may only be around the northwest US.
Damn, MST3K is one of the best shows ever!!!! Why does it have to be cancelled? This sucks.... ;)
Someone will have to make MST4K
I used to love the show but after 10 years the idea of a bunch of puppets ranking on bad movies has become boring and tedious. They should have taken the cue from Seinfeld and quit when they were on top!
are they really quitting? i can't belive that. i just started watching those guys about a year ago :) are there any arcvhives with their shows? there are only few ones i can find at local videostores. also what about mst3k t-shirts and other fun stuff?
...sie sind nicht grün
After 10 years of great shows, it has come to an end. Crow, Tom Servo, Mike, Gypsy, Mrs. Forrester, Brain Guy, Bobo, I'll miss you all.
By the way MST3K merchandise can be found here
Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis.
~
I wouldnt quite say that the Sci-Fi broadcast part of the series is the "top of their game"... ever since it left comedy central, its been kinda going downhill... Dont get me wrong, its still IMO probably the best tv show on the air today, but the first season with Mike, and almost anything with Joel is better than most of the new episodes...
Yeah, the apes are humorous.. but they're not TV's Frank and Dr. Forrester.
Justin
"Short, tall, fat, skinny, from the highest king to the lowest man, everyone uses the potty." - Brak
Excuse my ignorance, but what is MST3K? Does it have anything to do with the "Diabolik!" at the end of the Beastie Boys "Body Movin'" video?
It's hard to believe that they made a voice-over show less interesting than Beavis and Butthead, but they did. Good riddance.
I'll compensate somebody for taping the final MST3k and sending it to me. Please please please.
eric.harley@autodesk.com
see now, Seinfeld was still good and should have kept goin, and so should MST3K....MST3K is still as on top as they ever were before (except maybe from when on Comedy Central - more exposure)
Second, there's an extra showing of the episode
at 9 pm EDT on SciFi tonight. It will also
be on at 11pm, and then next Saturday at
11am EDT. After this, MST3K will only be shown on Saturdays
at that time slot (LOUSY!)
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
go, right now and (rent || buy || borrow || barter with sex for) one of the episodes w/ joel, and fear for your immortal soul, having made such a blasphemous statement.
Somebody get our flag back!
C'mon now, people...MST3K has Sucked ever since Joel Left...mike is a lame wanna-be-funny-guy with no timing and a delivery like a block of wood. Now Joel...THERE'S a Funny Guy. If you've just started watching MST3K in the last few years, you should really try to find some episodes from the first 4-5 seasons to see what i mean. (Especially my favorite, "Manos: The Hands of Fate") ToxickDonkey
It is on the Sci-Fi channel which all but guarantees year after year of re-runs of the existing episodes.
It's been a good run, but all things must end. Let the show die a quiet, dignified death. There's still plenty of good entertainment out there, and plenty of good parodies of that entertainment. Seek it out and give them your time and business. Oh, and circulate the tapes. There's nothing wrong with that.
"A god outgrown immediately becomes a life-destroying demon."- Joseph Campbell, "The Hero With a Thousand Faces"
"Why doesn't he just go straight to the flame?" - Crow
"Because the man is a true professional." - Joel
I would add Werewolf and Riding with Death. Extremely good Mike episodes from last season.
It's a Unix system - I know this.
"Could you show me how this gun works?"
"Sure. Stand up against that wall."
Maybe only 1 gag in 10 made me laugh. When they average 20 gags a minute, that's still a lot of laughs.
Why did Joel leave, anyway?
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
JUST WHEN I FINALY GET THE SCI-FI CHANNEL! ack! just in time for the last episode at least. Oh well, I havn't seen anything since comedy central cancled it. I also agree that after joel left it lost a lot, it was still good, but no comedy creation will ever match MST3k with joel (well, maybe UCB, but thats debatable).
Indeed, with all the Yank shows we do get in Canada, you'd think that one of the myriad new cable stations we have (Space, Comedy Channel) would pick up MST3K re-runs.
Odd that this topic came up this weekend, I just rented MST3K:The Movie last night (For the nth time.) Other than that, all I've ever seen are videos from friends in Vancouver lucky enough to get it out there.
Laugh while you can, monkey boy!
Thanks for the URL. That was an excellent article. MST3K could only lampoon those films which had no Pepsi advert campaign backing them. The undeniable fact is that most flicks shown on MST3K are more imaginative than the crap in the theatres right now--Star Wars PM included. It's funny how so many so called "geeks" like to fancy themselves as outcasts on the fringe of society, when in reality they buy into the McDonalds culture lock, stock, and barrel.
Their early years on Comedy Central while Joel was on were the greatest. I would tape an episode I liked and watch it 3 or 4 times. When I feel like I've accomplished something positive, I'd listen to their musical "He tried to kill me with a forklift!", and when I was down I'd listen to Tom Servo's moving tribute song to Tibby the turtle. Aside from Joel leaving the show, their quality of movies they made fun of were horrible. Movies like the Giant Gila Monster and the Gamora/Godzilla series were some of MST3K's best work because those were movies that were bad, but made you keep watching because it was amusing to make fun of. Most of the movies MST made fun of on SciFi and the later years on Comedy Central were just bad (like 80s low budget scifi and european movies) and made you want to change the channel. When they made the move to SciFi channel, the newer characters were horrible. Just listening to them insulted my intelligence and had to change the channel just because of them. So good bye MST3K. You had a good thing going, but you kind of screwed it up yourselves.
I remember seeing Castle of Fu Manchu episode too (where the mad scientists kinda broke character and apologized to Joel and the bots for showing this movie). I actually got through that whole episode (it took me 3 tries to finally do so) only because Joel and the others had to sit through it as well.
But you'd think they'd learn their lesson from movies like those. If it was hard to do that movie, why continue to do movies as bad as those for the next 5-6 years? How can you not change the channel?
You don't know anything about movies if you think that they ran out of material. You can go to any film convention and *buy* ("bad") movies from flea market mystrey bins for a dollar per reel. Forgotten movies. Movies worse than anything *ever* shown on MST3K. Without question there are not enough years in 10 lifetimes to see all the bad movies.
It was Laurence.
Sorry guys for the AC but i wanted to say this one quick-
Joel came up the show concept, and for that I am eternally grateful. Joel was also one hell of a comedian and showman. Those first few seasons I have taped are a personal treasure. But....
I see this type of comment far too often in any MST3K chats or discussion to not say this:
Mike Nelson has been head writer for the show since being aired on the Comedy Channel (no, I didn't screw up, they aired the show before merging with Ha! and becoming Comedy Central). A good part of the jokes we all laughed to tears over were Mike's comments during the ten or so times they watched a film to make an ep. Mike's also responsible for aleast 80% of all the original music in the show. No, I did not say he wrote the theme song! I would never blaspheme so strongly. ;D
Before I rekindle an ugly old flame war, few of which I have seen worse of, I will try to move closer in to the realm of fact by saying, "Watch a KTMA ep." They ad-libbed it. Ugh, I'm a MSTie straight through but those puppies are tough to get through sometimes :).
P.S. Ya' know, I never see anyone complaining that Jim Mallon's involvement of the actual show went almost to nil. Pat does a good job, but sometimes I miss the old Gypsy. (gave a good excuse to rewatch the ep. so I could make out what Jim/Gypsy said :)
The Journeyman
jrnyman@usa.net
Last night, my friends and I held a wake for MST3K, then signed on-line to mourn in bits and bytes. It was sad, but a ten year run is a damn good run for any show.
We take comfort in the fact that it isn't dead, however. There are websites that have text 'MiSTings' such as (Website #9 and SVAM, and there are rabid MST3K fans everywhere. Some of us circulate amateur MiSTings on video or audio tape as well.
Dead? Hardly. As long as there's drivel, ranting, and shallow pop culture, we'll be there with quips.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
No really. It has an awful lot of rabid fans (like me) who would pay good money to see the show. PBS doesn't care about ratings --since thwey don't have ads (okay some of the shows sometimes have "sponsors" ) all Pbs cares about is donations.
We have to save MST3K!
------- Oh damn.... the Sigfile escaped... -Great OM
I remember watching MST3K when it was local on KTMA in the Twin Cites back in '89. It was great. This was before they started to play all those lousy b/w 50's films. There was a variety of Gamera, 80s and weird foreign films. FOr the last couple of years, it just went downnhill especially when people kept leaving the show.
I never did like that show anyway, so I will not miss it. Maybe they'l put some better movies in its place.
Only 'flamers' flame!
The novelty wore off about 9 years ago. The movies weren't that bad at all. I would have enjoyed watching the movies without the lame commentary. The movies should have been allowed to stand on their own merit. Essentially the show was cowardly; picking low budget movies with threadbare production values as something to ridicule take no guts. Wouldn't it have been much better if they had picked films like PRETTY WOMAN or DANCES WITH WOLVES for ridicule? That would have been funny!
I, too, was there before the days of Mike and the Brain Guy, before there was even a TV's Frank (easily the best character on the show). Ah, the low budget'ed'ness of it all. It will be a show that I will miss. Not for the viewings it got as I sat alone, but for the viewings in a group, as this was a show that was meant to be watched with others. With that in mind, a collective bowing of heads will be issued.
To change the subject, I was wondering if anyone had any info on the long lost Thanksgiving episode which was shown once on Comedy Central never to be seen again. What was it about? What movie? That sort of thing. Please, I need that fill. Even the Unauthorized Guide has nothing on this episode except that it did exist but was never seen again. Thanks.
Bryan R.
Bryan R.
The price of freedom is eternal vigilance, or $12.50 as seen on eBay.....
Ummm...remember these early CC stinkbombs?
Castle of Fu Manchu
Monster A-Go-Go - "there was no monster..."
Robot vs the Aztec Mummy
By themselves, they were *completely* unwatchable. Even MST'd, they are pretty tough (I feel asleep trying to watch Castle of Fu Manchu several times).
I know there are a lot of folks out there that think the show ended when Joel left, but the truth is, despite how good Joel, Trace, and Frank were, the star of the show has always been the writing. And that's remained consistently good through the show's run.
While I'm waiting for my account info to get mailed to me, I figgered I'd chime in here. I've been watching MST since the early days on CC, and I don't think the newer cast has lost a step at all. The problem is that when they signed with the SFC channel, they were limited from the start. They got a crappy timeslot, with no reruns (Hey, how many times can you watch First Wave, Sliders, and Farscape in one week?) and then SFC tells them that they can _ONLY_ parody Sci-Fi related movies. So you wouldn't be able to see time honored classics like 'Mitchell', 'Mannos', or even 'Catalina Caper'. I hate to bag on SFC too much, but they mishandled MST and lost what could have been a decent show to build solid programming from. Whoever the brainiac is that made this call should be killed with a forklift 0-).
I'll chime in with the rest that are saying that the show's best days were behind it. The early Mike episodes were OK, but after Frank and Dr. Forrester left, things started to slide. I watched maybe a half dozen new episodes, and nothing really stuck out at me as being hilarious, as oppsoed to the Joel days, when we had "Master Ninja Theme Song," "Rock climbing, Joel," "They tried to kill him with a forklift!" and of course, "Hikiba!"
None of the new shows had anythingthat memorable, for me at least. So, I say, 10 years is a nice long run, let's let it go.
For the heady days of Joel. I used to love that show, and I even got to see the very first MST3K Live! event in Minneapolis at the Uptown theater. But the show needed to end. Mike was never close to as amusing as Joel (in fact, i never have watched an entire 'Mike' episode), and then TVs Frank left, and..what was left? Nothing. Keep circulating the tapes!
Bah! The horrible lack of MST3K in Canada is admittedly atrocious (though I think out in parts of Alberta there's some station that carries it).
MST is a redeeming item for the Yanks in my eyes. I have but one line of wisdom of which I think we all can share in it's simple elegance...
MIKE BROKE THE HUBBLE! MIKE BROKE THE HUBBLE!