Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Rifftrax -

[HumanHive]

I didn't hate the new seasons or the new cast but they definitely don't compare to the original series or even Rifftrax at their best.

No interest in the new Kickstarter nor the proposed subscription-based app Gizmoplex. I wonder if plans for the app will affect the various places that stream MST3K for free, like Pluto.

They’ll definitely start cracking down hard, but at this point I’m just gonna torrent and forget it.

 

[Commander X]

I've been listening to Nelson and Rifftrax writer Connor Lestowka's "372 Pages We'll Never Get Back" podcast, where they review books some chapters at a time. The first book was "Ready Player One", which they made fun of, and then recently they managed to get through "Ready Player Two", and now, for a change of pace they've started in on one of those "cozy mystery" series that there's a ton of e-books on Amazon of, not considering all of the traditional publisher series that have been published over the years. It's seemingly a new revelation to the two that this sort of mystery sub-genre exists (and that it has sub-sub-genres within it, like the paranormal cozies, or the cozies where an animal is one of the main characters). Only this time, in "The Quilters Push Back" by three people, the local quilting club in a Pennsylvania town must solve the mystery of who the new drug dealer in town is after a girl overdoses (rather stupidly after hooking up with a guy who turns out to be a pusher, and one night at his place she samples some of his samples he'd kept in his pockets while he's taking a shower).

 

[XYZpdq]

so which is your preferred Secret Theater Joel
Glasses Joel
or
Sports Coat With Shoulderpads Joel

 

[Commander X]

Been re-reading Mike Nelson's stab at writing a novel, the 2003 publication "Death Rat!". It's about one Pontius "Ponty" Feeb, a Minnesotan author of eighteen books, none of them page-turners, very well researched but dry non-fiction tomes with titles like Push Me, Pull You: The Importance of Railroad Handcars to an Emerging Industry, Better Than Great: A Maritime History of Lake Superior, and Where Did Amerigo?: Vespucci And The New World Order. After the owner of the small publisher Feeb writes for dies in a freak accident, his son liquidates the company and Feeb is out of a job. Desperate, only able to get a job at a medieval-themed burger joint and disgruntled at seeing the sort of junk that makes it on bestseller lists, Feeb decides to try his hand at writing fiction, cranking out a novel grounded in the historical minutiae of a small Minnesota village, as the residents fight for survival against a marauding giant rat in the 19th century.

Unfortunately, being an out of shape 60 year old, he finds himself rejected by publishers since they feel they can't sell him as an author of outdoor adventure. Jack Ryback, an aspiring actor and co-worker, agrees to pose as Ponty, since he's more of a square-jawed, broad-shouldered type manages to sell the book (without reading it) to a slick agent (who also doesn't read), and the book quickly gets a lot of hype and publicity. Jack, familiar with the sort of books Feeb used to write, however, sold it as a true story. Now, afraid they'll be busted for fraud, Feeb and Jack work to "convince" i.e. bribe the inhabitants of the book's setting, Holey, MN - Population: 38 -to play along and pretend their ancestors were really terrorized by a giant rat, and that they have so many stories to share with the media about it.

Obvious take-offs on Governor Ventura (a two fisted politico who shows up for events by rappelling out of a helicopter) and Prince (funk singer King Leo, who declares he feels a spiritual connection with the monster rat and starts to build a religious movement around it) bring their own agendas into the mix to complicate matters.

When Feeb's book looks ready to win a Minnesota literary award, author Gus Bromstead (a thinly veiled version of Garrison Keillor, target of some rather pointed lines on MST3K) is furious that some upstart may win the award instead of his latest entry in his series of books about life in "Dogwood Downs". So angry, he hires some Danish hitmen (who affect Minnesotan accents) to deal with the usurper.

So far this is Nelson's only foray into fiction; he's been interviewed about it here and there and revealed there were some struggles in getting the book into print; the book lost it's biggest supporter at the publisher when the man left the firm, and nobody else seemed much interested in championing it, so Death Rat was released with little fanfare or support and just sort of faded away.

 

[ditto]

So far this is Nelson's only foray into fiction; he's been interviewed about it here and there and revealed there were some struggles in getting the book into print

He should do what ex-Simpsons writer John Swartzwelder does and self-publish through Amazon.

 

[XYZpdq]

Been re-reading Mike Nelson's stab at writing a novel, the 2003 publication "Death Rat!". It's about one Pontius "Ponty" Feeb, a Minnesotan author of eighteen books, none of them page-turners, very well researched but dry non-fiction tomes with titles like Push Me, Pull You: The Importance of Railroad Handcars to an Emerging Industry, Better Than Great: A Maritime History of Lake Superior, and Where Did Amerigo?: Vespucci And The New World Order. After the owner of the small publisher Feeb writes for dies in a freak accident, his son liquidates the company and Feeb is out of a job. Desperate, only able to get a job at a medieval-themed burger joint and disgruntled at seeing the sort of junk that makes it on bestseller lists, Feeb decides to try his hand at writing fiction, cranking out a novel grounded in the historical minutiae of a small Minnesota village, as the residents fight for survival against a marauding giant rat in the 19th century.

Unfortunately, being an out of shape 60 year old, he finds himself rejected by publishers since they feel they can't sell him as an author of outdoor adventure. Jack Ryback, an aspiring actor and co-worker, agrees to pose as Ponty, since he's more of a square-jawed, broad-shouldered type manages to sell the book (without reading it) to a slick agent (who also doesn't read), and the book quickly gets a lot of hype and publicity. Jack, familiar with the sort of books Feeb used to write, however, sold it as a true story. Now, afraid they'll be busted for fraud, Feeb and Jack work to "convince" i.e. bribe the inhabitants of the book's setting, Holey, MN - Population: 38 -to play along and pretend their ancestors were really terrorized by a giant rat, and that they have so many stories to share with the media about it.

Obvious take-offs on Governor Ventura (a two fisted politico who shows up for events by rappelling out of a helicopter) and Prince (funk singer King Leo, who declares he feels a spiritual connection with the monster rat and starts to build a religious movement around it) bring their own agendas into the mix to complicate matters.

When Feeb's book looks ready to win a Minnesota literary award, author Gus Bromstead (a thinly veiled version of Garrison Keillor, target of some rather pointed lines on MST3K) is furious that some upstart may win the award instead of his latest entry in his series of books about life in "Dogwood Downs". So angry, he hires some Danish hitmen (who affect Minnesotan accents) to deal with the usurper.

So far this is Nelson's only foray into fiction; he's been interviewed about it here and there and revealed there were some struggles in getting the book into print; the book lost it's biggest supporter at the publisher when the man left the firm, and nobody else seemed much interested in championing it, so Death Rat was released with little fanfare or support and just sort of faded away.

I have a paperback of it somewhere. Got it as a present, think it was from my dad, might have been a buddy of mine who got into MST in the SciFi years.
Don't think I ever actually read it.

 

[Dom Cruise]

Been re-reading Mike Nelson's stab at writing a novel, the 2003 publication "Death Rat!". It's about one Pontius "Ponty" Feeb, a Minnesotan author of eighteen books, none of them page-turners, very well researched but dry non-fiction tomes with titles like Push Me, Pull You: The Importance of Railroad Handcars to an Emerging Industry, Better Than Great: A Maritime History of Lake Superior, and Where Did Amerigo?: Vespucci And The New World Order. After the owner of the small publisher Feeb writes for dies in a freak accident, his son liquidates the company and Feeb is out of a job. Desperate, only able to get a job at a medieval-themed burger joint and disgruntled at seeing the sort of junk that makes it on bestseller lists, Feeb decides to try his hand at writing fiction, cranking out a novel grounded in the historical minutiae of a small Minnesota village, as the residents fight for survival against a marauding giant rat in the 19th century.

Unfortunately, being an out of shape 60 year old, he finds himself rejected by publishers since they feel they can't sell him as an author of outdoor adventure. Jack Ryback, an aspiring actor and co-worker, agrees to pose as Ponty, since he's more of a square-jawed, broad-shouldered type manages to sell the book (without reading it) to a slick agent (who also doesn't read), and the book quickly gets a lot of hype and publicity. Jack, familiar with the sort of books Feeb used to write, however, sold it as a true story. Now, afraid they'll be busted for fraud, Feeb and Jack work to "convince" i.e. bribe the inhabitants of the book's setting, Holey, MN - Population: 38 -to play along and pretend their ancestors were really terrorized by a giant rat, and that they have so many stories to share with the media about it.

Obvious take-offs on Governor Ventura (a two fisted politico who shows up for events by rappelling out of a helicopter) and Prince (funk singer King Leo, who declares he feels a spiritual connection with the monster rat and starts to build a religious movement around it) bring their own agendas into the mix to complicate matters.

When Feeb's book looks ready to win a Minnesota literary award, author Gus Bromstead (a thinly veiled version of Garrison Keillor, target of some rather pointed lines on MST3K) is furious that some upstart may win the award instead of his latest entry in his series of books about life in "Dogwood Downs". So angry, he hires some Danish hitmen (who affect Minnesotan accents) to deal with the usurper.

So far this is Nelson's only foray into fiction; he's been interviewed about it here and there and revealed there were some struggles in getting the book into print; the book lost it's biggest supporter at the publisher when the man left the firm, and nobody else seemed much interested in championing it, so Death Rat was released with little fanfare or support and just sort of faded away.

Wow, I had no idea about this, but it sounds interesting, thanks for the info.

 

[Marissa Moira]

I'm just sad that the new show isn't a woke reboot.

Have some Faux chic black woman trying to be hip and nerdy read a bunch of safe jokes written for her while having zero chemistry with the puppets who are now too afraid to adlib shit or they'll lose their jobs.

 

[Optimus Prime]

I'm just sad that the new show isn't a woke reboot.

Have some Faux chic black woman trying to be hip and nerdy read a bunch of safe jokes written for her while having zero chemistry with the puppets who are now too afraid to adlib shit or they'll lose their jobs.

As dumb as the Forrester Clan is, even they have a line they won't cross.

 

[bifftango]

I prefer Mike's essay collections like Movie Megacheese. I think he excels at the written short form.

 

[Marissa Moira]

As dumb as the Forrester Clan is, even they have a line they won't cross.

It would be a meta Commentary on modern comedy.

 

[Starscreams Cape]

Update on the new MST3K kickstarter. They are halfway to their goal and it looks like Joel is coming back for an episode to riff. Also sounds like he's getting the message about going back to a DIY aesthetic rather than using a bunch of impersonal, unneeded CGI. Now if we can just get them to stop launching 30 riffs a minute.

Offer extended to all old cast members to come back for a guest slot, with an acknowledgment that they have their own things going on.

Finally, someone named Emily Marsh is essentially co-hosting with Jonah Ray from "another location". Color me skeptical.

Update 7: VIDEO MEGA-UPDATE: Plans for Season 13! The New Cast(s) of MST3K! And... JOEL might return to HOST MORE MST3K? · Let's Make More MST3K & Build The Gizmoplex!

Video Update: Major updates from Joel & the Cast Season 13: Our plan to get started fast! Season 13: Meet Our Newest Host(s)... including Joel?! Progress Report: Almost at $3.3M! Dear MST3K Preservation League, Hey, it's Joel again, back with that news I promised you, so.. let's...

www.kickstarter.com

 

[frozenrunner]

He should do what ex-Simpsons writer John Swartzwelder does and self-publish through Amazon.

All writers should self-publish at this point, tbh.

 

[Starscreams Cape]

A little research on Emily Marsh, not a ton of crazy leftist stuff, but a couple bits of TDS sperging.

 

[Commander X]

Been catching up on Rifftrax, a couple of their more recent entries take on a certain sort of film I think makes for great Rifftrax material - the direct to video action film.

In "Maximum Revenge" from veteran schlock director Fred Olen Rey, a team of standard direct-to-action goons take over a new maximum security prison that only has five prisoners in it so far, including a former detective who tangled with them before and ended up going to prison after he killed their high profile hostage, who was armed and in on it anyways. It's one of those really low-budget films where the low budget is shown via all the shortcuts they took - yes, the prison's opening has been "delayed" due to problems during construction you see, so they were only able to bring a few prisoners in at first, the hundreds of other prisoners are due to arrive sometime in the future!

Also, from 1998, "The Minion" which plays like "The End of Days" meets "It Follows" with a non-stop score that features at various times synths, electric guitars and classical style instrumentals. As 1999 winds to a close, an out-of-place knight is found in a sealed tunnel beneath NYC and a terrible archeologist is brought in to investigate why a medieval knight is there - upon discovering an artifact that has a back sealed with wax, she immediately slits it open with a knife to reveal a goofy looking key. Meanwhile, a body-hopping killer spirit possesses one person after another, causing each victim to overact badly, all in order to get it's hands on the key which will unlock it's master, the Antichrist from his prison. Dolph Lundgren shows up as a priest from a secret order out to prevent this, mostly by punching the possessed victims in the head with a spiked gauntlet.

 

[alright fine]

Here's your problem: the whole point of MST3K was doing an updated, retro-kitsch version of the old 1960s/70s horror host shows that littered every UHF station in every major and minor TV market. The letters to the hosts, the "trivia" about the movie, the pre-ad gags, etc, but with the added late-boomer/early-Gen X tendency to treat pop culture as fodder for ribbing and roasting. None of those signifiers mean a goddam thing now to anybody under, let's be generous, 40 years old, so the entire premise is shot to shit. It'd be like someone trying to do a gag referencing radio mystery shows or old-school vaudeville, all the cultural signifiers are gone and only hardcore nerds or very old people would get the jokes. And that's fine, except that the central added feature, the riffing, is so baked into post-Whedon culture that it has no real shock value or novelty to it. Rifftrax was the smartest way to keep the idea alive, and even that's kinda dying now, so keeping MST going is like trying to bring back an aging punk band and expecting anyone to be shocked or entertained by 50/60 year olds screaming over sloppy chords wearing leather jackets, or worse, their millennial nieces and nephews aping them. Some things are better left as nostalgia. I'm a huge nerd for old Lewis and Martin bits and 30s/40s Big Band music, but I know that shit is dead and gone and would never attempt to replicate them.

It's just weird knowing I'm old enough to have lived through that cycle, since I first saw MST in its initial Comedy Channel season when I was in high school, and now am watching it gasp and wheeze like a nursing home patient.

Get off my lawn.

 

[Deadman]

Here's your problem: the whole point of MST3K was doing an updated, retro-kitsch version of the old 1960s/70s horror host shows that littered every UHF station in every major and minor TV market. The letters to the hosts, the "trivia" about the movie, the pre-ad gags, etc, but with the added late-boomer/early-Gen X tendency to treat pop culture as fodder for ribbing and roasting. None of those signifiers mean a goddam thing now to anybody under, let's be generous, 40 years old, so the entire premise is shot to shit. It'd be like someone trying to do a gag referencing radio mystery shows or old-school vaudeville, all the cultural signifiers are gone and only hardcore nerds or very old people would get the jokes. And that's fine, except that the central added feature, the riffing, is so baked into post-Whedon culture that it has no real shock value or novelty to it. Rifftrax was the smartest way to keep the idea alive, and even that's kinda dying now, so keeping MST going is like trying to bring back an aging punk band and expecting anyone to be shocked or entertained by 50/60 year olds screaming over sloppy chords wearing leather jackets, or worse, their millennial nieces and nephews aping them. Some things are better left as nostalgia. I'm a huge nerd for old Lewis and Martin bits and 30s/40s Big Band music, but I know that shit is dead and gone and would never attempt to replicate them.

It's just weird knowing I'm old enough to have lived through that cycle, since I first saw MST in its initial Comedy Channel season when I was in high school, and now am watching it gasp and wheeze like a nursing home patient.

Get off my lawn.

It’s saddest fact is this would have happened anyway even if the show wasn’t canned by the sci fi channel and it somehow lasted to this day. Sure the faces would’ve been different, but it still would have followed zombie simpsons as a comedy show that would have overstayed its welcome, as you know everyone from the mike era would have left the show to pursue more projects with a much larger budget. (What’s even sadder is that JOEL is running this crap, and as a creator he should know better...)
As this point the only way to save the show is to have EVERYONE back at this point, and judging by the state of 2021 RiffTrax, even that has a shelf life.

Joel’s idea to make episodes featuring different cast just SHOWS he’s throwing down multiple things to see what works. Which sounds pretty desperate, IMO. At this point he should probably just give up and let the show die, lest he destroys the show’s legacy by continuing to pump out new Mst3k to he point where it outlasts the original from a time standpoint ala zombie Simpsons, as this article from the dead homer society points out:

https://deadhomersociety.com/2017/12/17/23491/amp/

 

[Stab You in the Back]

I've been listening to Nelson and Rifftrax writer Connor Lestowka's "372 Pages We'll Never Get Back" podcast, where they review books some chapters at a time. The first book was "Ready Player One", which they made fun of, and then recently they managed to get through "Ready Player Two", and now, for a change of pace they've started in on one of those "cozy mystery" series that there's a ton of e-books on Amazon of, not considering all of the traditional publisher series that have been published over the years. It's seemingly a new revelation to the two that this sort of mystery sub-genre exists (and that it has sub-sub-genres within it, like the paranormal cozies, or the cozies where an animal is one of the main characters). Only this time, in "The Quilters Push Back" by three people, the local quilting club in a Pennsylvania town must solve the mystery of who the new drug dealer in town is after a girl overdoses (rather stupidly after hooking up with a guy who turns out to be a pusher, and one night at his place she samples some of his samples he'd kept in his pockets while he's taking a shower).

The funniest part is how a bunch of old ladies writing about quilts seemingly know more about designer drugs than two savvy middle aged men from Minnesota.

 

[XYZpdq]

It would be a meta Commentary on modern comedy.

there was that bit before S11 came out where Servo and Crow were auditioning for BB-8 and Servo got all holy-than-thou about " 'beep beep'? you want me to say 'beep beep'? I have never said 'beep beep' in my entire life" which was pretty clever as a joke about an actor bitching about stereotypical dialog and the fact Servo's earliest form literally only said beep and was named Beeper

 

[HumanHive]

Here's your problem: the whole point of MST3K was doing an updated, retro-kitsch version of the old 1960s/70s horror host shows that littered every UHF station in every major and minor TV market. The letters to the hosts, the "trivia" about the movie, the pre-ad gags, etc, but with the added late-boomer/early-Gen X tendency to treat pop culture as fodder for ribbing and roasting. None of those signifiers mean a goddam thing now to anybody under, let's be generous, 40 years old, so the entire premise is shot to shit. It'd be like someone trying to do a gag referencing radio mystery shows or old-school vaudeville, all the cultural signifiers are gone and only hardcore nerds or very old people would get the jokes. And that's fine, except that the central added feature, the riffing, is so baked into post-Whedon culture that it has no real shock value or novelty to it. Rifftrax was the smartest way to keep the idea alive, and even that's kinda dying now, so keeping MST going is like trying to bring back an aging punk band and expecting anyone to be shocked or entertained by 50/60 year olds screaming over sloppy chords wearing leather jackets, or worse, their millennial nieces and nephews aping them. Some things are better left as nostalgia. I'm a huge nerd for old Lewis and Martin bits and 30s/40s Big Band music, but I know that shit is dead and gone and would never attempt to replicate them.

It's just weird knowing I'm old enough to have lived through that cycle, since I first saw MST in its initial Comedy Channel season when I was in high school, and now am watching it gasp and wheeze like a nursing home patient.

Get off my lawn.

Hard disagree. MST3k predicted a lot of modern internet reviewer/commentary/LP stuff, and all of the pre-covid Rifftrax live events I went to were sold out.

The real problem is with the modern Netflix streaming model. They don’t want long running shows that keep existing customers, they want new shows that will draw in a mythic new set of subscribers. MST3k fit well with the model of early 90’s cable, but modern streaming only cares about pump and dump.