Mystery Science Theater 3000: C/D, S/D.

I'm kind of fond of Racket Girls. That may be partly due to Eric's enthusiasm for it itt

I remember thinking the Coleman Francis movies were too painfully dull to get through, but eventually warmed to them and they're all three among my favorites. The Gamera movies, otoh.

Racket Girls is a seriously great episode. A double bill of that and The Sinister Urge is some weird high camp all around.

Even in MST3K, diva worship reigns supreme.

those casts are divas, huh?

Was mostly just referring to Gloria from Sinister Urge.

The intense dullness, or blankness perhaps, of the Coleman Francis movies is daunting, yes... I dunno, there's something so idiosyncratic and strange about them that they remain compelling. "Quirky" isn't the right word, but they're distinct. Amazingly, each one kind of finds its own way toward spectacular awfulness while still sharing a fundamental Francis-ism. The long rambling episodic narrative of Red Zone Cuba, the non-narrative of Sky-Divers, the essentially dialogue-free Beast of Yucca Flats... it's a hell of a body of work, one of MST's great discoveries.

As individual a voice as Ed Wood's, no question.

Ah, coffee - a Coleman Francis motif.

A new update:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mst3k/bringbackmst3k/posts/1430238

"Patton Oswalt has agreed to join MST3K as the Forrester's newest Evil Henchman... TV's Son of TV's Frank!"

...uh.

That's pretty surprising.

is it really, though?

Well... I just didn't think that well known of a person would have filled that role.

I hope that Joel is able to dial back some of the cynicism I'm sure Patton might push in the writer's room when they're pitching riffs.

did Oswalt's movie-fanatic memoir spend much time on poverty-row productions?

Patton feels like the most natural feel in the world for this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDUrw7j0UA4

all the feels

remember when he was nominated for an oscar? that was weird

cool this and felicia are good news.

I'm sure it is for some.

Anyway they've gone over $3.3 million so six episodes now planned.

Meanwhile, separately:

http://www.themadsareback.com/

Huh! Is it weird that I'm kinda more intrigued by the idea of seeing a live show by those two than by any of the existing variants?

Nope. Frank's become a very funny (lefty) political stand-up, and he's very good with an audience.

Okay, looking now to the archive -- Shout Factory's announced the next set:

315- Teenage Caveman
405- Being from Another Planet
524- 12 To The Moon
703- Deathstalker and the Warriors from Hell

Aside from Teenage Caveman being a slog with great comments and skits, this is a killer set -- I've wanted the last two on DVD for the longest time, and Being From Another Planet is just goddamn ridiculous. Be interesting to see what documentaries appear with this one; I've always wanted to know more about what the hell was behind 12 to the Moon.

Commenters on mst3kinfo.com point out that this means that Corman (as opposed to Arkoff/AIP productions, I gather) has finally been 'cracked' in terms of licensing, and we might start to see a whole lot of titles finally start to emerge. Here's what's remaining, via another mst3kinfo commenter -- and I admit I can't believe we've come to the point where there's just a little over two years to go, if they keep to the schedule of three box sets of four episodes a year, and can lock down the remaining rights, to a point where every episode bar the KTMAs will have seen a formal DVD at one point or another. (I half suspect the final hardest nuts to crack will be the two Godzilla movies.) That said a slew of the Rhino releases are out of print so I'm just glad I have those all already. There's a hell of a lot of good episodes that still haven't seen a formal release:

*Season 1*
Complete

*Season 2*
201 – Rocketship X-M
212 -- Godzilla vs. Megalon (brief DVD release, withdrawn)
213 – Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster

*Season 3*
305 – Stranded in Space
309 – The Amazing Colossal Man (VHS release only)
311 – It Conquered the World

*Season 4*
403 – City Limits
416 – Fire Maidens of Outer Space
418 – Attack of the The Eye Creatures
420 – The Human Duplicators

*Season 5*
Complete

*Season 6*
601 – Girls Town
602 – Invasion USA
605 – Colossus and the Headhunters
618 – High School Big Shot
623 – The Amazing Transparent Man

*Season 7*
704 – The Incredible Melting Man
705 – Escape 2000

*Season 8*
807 – Terror from the Year 5000
809 – I Was a Teenage Werewolf
814 – Riding with Death
817 – The Horror of Party Beach
819 – Invasion of the Neptune Men

*Season 9*
905 – The Deadly Bees
906 – The Space Children
913 – Quest of the Delta Knights

*Season 10*
1007 – Track of the Moon Beast
1013 – Diabolik

Turns out, BTW, the reason why Corman may have finally caved was due to this. Hadn't heard about it before!

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/roger-corman-lawsuit-blames-citco-784033

mst3kinfo commenter said:

He invested $73 million invested in a hedge fund run by corrupt fund manager. Only $13 million had been recovered, at least from last I heard. He may have lost as much as $55 million! Reports also say he’s looking to sell his whole Concorde-New Horizons film library.

love Frank... maybe i shd come to SF for Sketchfest

jeez Roger, you're almost 90, liquidate.

Also, I was thinking about this earlier and another mst3kinfo commenter put it into clearer terms:

Interesting to note that the new Kickstarter season would release to DVD/blu-ray around 2017 – the same time that the original series DVD releases would be hitting a wall. Perhaps Shout and Joel timed the new season with this in mind? They can’t make any more new volumes, so they will rely on a new series, releases of Rhino volumes, and (fingers crossed) KTMA volumes.

I do think there IS something to this, not necessarily an overriding factor, but at least a contributing one.

I forgot I'd even seen Teenage Caveman as the title conjures up something so, so different from what you get. You can only imagine how ripped off you would have felt at the drive-in. Vaughan was 28 but could pass for 40 and there's just nothing very teenagerish about it at all except for the stock "rebellion against the old ways" crap. Just a chore of a movie though I'm sure I enjoyed it fine as an MST.

Agreed, amazing that it's down to so few films left! I remember when they started coming out at all and it just seemed ridiculous, like one of those really really long anime shows getting adapted and there seemed no point in buying volume 1 since the odds of volume 123 ever coming out seemed slim to none. And yet here we are. A bunch of the "unreleased" ones are still heavy-hitters though - Incredible Melting Man, Escape 2000, fuckin' Human Duplicators (top ten episode for me).

Has there ever been discussion about releasing any of the KTMA stuff, even just say, one set of hand-picked ones for "fans only"? Or is it the case that those episodes don't even exist in archival form? I've been stymied trying to watch any of them by the whole nth-generation-VHS-copy-ported-to-youtube factor.

Well there was a bit of a rumor going around per one of Joel's Kickstarter comments about 'the EARLIEST MST3K episodes' or something like that as a bonus reward. Seeing as Season 1 is fully licensed by Shout Factory, it could just mean digital downloads of that, but perhaps something more? I honestly can't see it -- Joel has spoken before about how he looks pretty dimly on the episodes as very much them experimenting with the form, often very lackadaisically -- and it would mean a huge new amount of rights questions -- I think KTMA's estate (as such) has them rather than an incorporated Best Brains. But maybe it's the skit footage? In any event, given how there are a load of great/weird movies they did for that protoseason, plus the first three that have never surfaced in full, one can dream...

In any event, torrents are floating around of the full KTMA season as we have it, and I just used those.

https://i.gyazo.com/9e355b634c36cf2e96805facc5ce9c1c.png

T.B. on Facebook and twitter still seems a little ambivalent and not 100% onboard with nu-mst3k and tbh i think some of the casting feels a bit on the nose, like they're aiming for avclubbers more than trying to recapture the spirit of the original show.

lol xpost that's part of what i was referring to

You can't go SoL again.

Shit, I wish they were aiming for avclubbers, feels more like they're aiming for Nerdist.

The whole thing is a Nerdist/Geek & Sundry production, isn't it? It certainly feels that way.

feel like joel found a community of sycophantic successful people among the la comedy dude scene in the last couple years and when the rights came back to him he wanted to do it all himself/his way with his new pals. probably very organic and natural in joel's world but a total turn off to fans like me.

I like Vaughn and Yount, so I'm still somewhat interested

i still want to believe it could turn out being great and i'd look like a real jackass for doubting. but part of me already feels like it's a mistake, that just going through with the hype and the campaign and stuff has ended up damaging joel's reputation in my mind, or how i think about that lovable guy on the screen with the robots... it's stirred up some stuff we probably could or should have known about years ago (re: compensation, his relationships with the rest of the cast) but that everybody was apparently willing to keep under their hats. but this is basically a selfish response on my part: i don't want my heroes to have feet of clay. in real life, my heroes would like to find steady work doing something they love and who am i to tell joel hodgson not to follow his bliss? i dunno. again, maybe it could turn out being great.

okay one thing: wouldn't have killed them to make the host a woman. just saying. one of those things that i definitely didn't pick up on watching this show in 1993 but that now (very occasionally) really leaps out of me in 2015. show's a sausagefest aside from mary jo pehl. that doesn't reflect its fanbase imho, but it does maybe reflect the kinda gross feeling of a lot of actual real-life riffers who think they're funnier than they are, getting together and not actually being that funny. now i'm projecting my feelings from disappointing nerd podcasts back onto the show again and i know that's not really fair. blah! just saying.

Real talk

Yeah no disagreement with any of that.

And I think Kurt S said it right too a couple of posts back.

beyond the humor so much of the appeal of the original show was in its cable access show budget feel and how these cats just emerged out of minnesota with this amazing program. i started watching it around the same time as my friends started passing around crappy VHS dubs of john woo movies, and kids in the hall was on late night CBS, and it was just this really great time for off-the-radar cult shit.

i'm not gonna get too upset about it, i guess. the show is impossible to ruin for me at this point. it just reminds me a bit of the time they brought back WKRP in the '90s with michael des barres and tawny kitaen or whoever seemed like a great idea to cast at the time. i agree on the la comedy dude scene thing. the rest of the guys i think don't live in l.a.? pretty sure trace moved back to MN after his AFV gig wrapped.

New update

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mst3k/bringbackmst3k/posts/1432821

With this:

Finally: I've started reaching out to all of the original cast to make formal offers. I can’t share specifics, but Shout Factory has been working with me to figure out how we can make it work for everyone.

Before you ask, I don't know who will decide to come back and who won't. Some of them are busy with other projects, and a few of them have said they just don't feel like getting involved right now. Whatever they decide, I will respect their decision... but I'm hopeful that some of them will come back and join us. And if it doesn't happen now, maybe they'll come back in the future. The door will always be open.

Plus this:

On the next season of MST3K, I'm planning to put a set of official "Mission Patches" on Jonah's jumpsuit. You'll be able to see them on camera, and they'll look something like this:

https://ksr-ugc.imgix.net/assets/005/015/731/f59d3bbcde587b26eb3e668cf95f7388_original.gif?v=1449084901&w=639&fit=max&q=92&s=38e1d952e956317da4e601f20ee57f19

Anyway, as you can see, each patch states the number of "MISSIONS" that the host has been on, which is just something I wanted to do to give Jonah a sense of perspective on things. He's joining a pretty elite group, and I've seen him get cocky, so this set of patches represent a subtle "hazing" process for Mr. Heston.

hm, that seems like kind of a dick move

please let part of the hazing be he has to shave his goatee

or goatee beard, whatever the fuck that is

unrelated, but killing me right now:

"There's been an accident at the studio, sir."
"We made Hobgoblins."

Excellent unrelated joke

Also unrelated: Other Space S01E07 "Be a Buddy, Not a Bully!" was one of my favorite robot moments ever. Good use of establishing the buddy campaign early on just for that one joke.