Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Rifftrax -

[BootlegPopeye]

I actually think the concept behind 'The Screaming Skull' is a fantastic idea for a horror movie. The problem was that it was done just about as incompletely as possible. The plot should have been shopped around to a better writer/director and it would have been a great 50s horror flick.

There are some other 'fair' MST3k movies that are just boring, paint by numbers action flicks (made funny by riffing - Mitchell being the best example).

 

[Flexo]

Heck even with the voice the idea of "Alien From LA" is one with potential. (Though Kathy is a very fine meatbag.)

Instead of remaking classics like Terminator or LotR yet again, I really wish Hollywood would remake those rough gems MST3k would find instead. Even werewolf's idea of a curse returning because an old skeleton was found has some real potential in it.

 

[XYZpdq]

Heck even with the voice the idea of "Alien From LA" is one with potential. (Though Kathy is a very fine meatbag.)

Instead of remaking classics like Terminator or LotR yet again, I really wish Hollywood would remake those rough gems MST3k would find instead. Even werewolf's idea of a curse returning because an old skeleton was found has some real potential in it.

There was the time that Michael Bay ripped off Parts

 

[Starscreams Cape]

What Overdrawn at the Memory Bank and Quest of the Delta Knights have in common is that they're both not great, but have interesting ideas.

You can see with slightly reworked scripts and much, much bigger budgets they could actually have been good movies, there was a kernel of a good idea there, Overdrawn at the Memory Bank especially is kind of amazingly ahead of it's time for 1985 what with the whole theme of virtual reality and other stuff like "scrolling up cinemas" on the computer predicting stuff like online streaming (I have in fact sometimes joking refer to watching something on streaming as ""scrolling up cinemas")

And Quest of the Delta Knights is just flat out a cool plot wasted with a low budget, you can very easily see the kind of movie the screen writer had probably hoped it would be versus what got filmed.

If there's one issue I have with MST3K it's that the vast majority of movies they played were absolute garbage that would be unwatchable without the riffing (Manos: The Hands of Fate being a perfect example), the best episodes tend to be the ones where the movie would be pretty entertaining on it's own even without the riffing.

Parts:The Clonus Horror was such a good idea it was ripped off as "The Island" decades later. I believe the makers of Parts sued and it was settled out of court for over 7 figures. Those kinds of cases are usually thrown out of court, too. But apparently it was so shameless they couldn't ignore it and thought it was better to settle.

Gee, I wonder who the brainless hack was who stole the idea for a movie that was MST3K fodder. Cough*AlexKurtzman*Cough

 

[Dom Cruise]

I actually think the concept behind 'The Screaming Skull' is a fantastic idea for a horror movie. The problem was that it was done just about as incompletely as possible. The plot should have been shopped around to a better writer/director and it would have been a great 50s horror flick.

There are some other 'fair' MST3k movies that are just boring, paint by numbers action flicks (made funny by riffing - Mitchell being the best example).

Mitchell and Final Justice (you think you can take me? Go head on!) are definitely two examples of movies that were competently made, just really generic, but I think that was to the episodes' benefit, the fact that they were watching movies of a certain quality.

Diabolik, the final episode of the TV series, is another one that's actually pretty good, but cheesy enough to make it perfect for riffing.

Sometimes movies that are completely incompetently made can be interesting in their own right like Manos, but honestly I find the REALLY incompetent movies to be kind of frustrating, not as interesting to me as episodes with better movies.

Some movies that really straddle the line are Hobgoblins, terrible, but so bizarrely 80s* that it'd be interesting to watch on it's own or movies that you probably wouldn't want to watch on their own but they make great episodes like Pod People and Future War.

But all in all I definitely prefer a movie, even MTS3K ones, to have some level of competent production or some level of interestingness beyond the riffing, I guess it was an issue with budget that so many of the movies were just complete trash, which is a bit of a shame, imagine if they were able to get some more high profile stinkers.


*funny story about Hobgoblins, when I saw that episode as a kid the sheer 80ness of that movie actually creeped me out, as a 90s kid I was very familiar with the 80s but I had never seen something THAT 80s and THAT bizarre a take on 80s culture before, I'm not kidding when I said it genuinely creeped me out, because it was so radically different than the culture I was growing up in and familiar with, but we're only talking about a decade prior to the then present day, it's crazy how much things can change in ten years.

Heck even with the voice the idea of "Alien From LA" is one with potential. (Though Kathy is a very fine meatbag.)

Instead of remaking classics like Terminator or LotR yet again, I really wish Hollywood would remake those rough gems MST3k would find instead. Even werewolf's idea of a curse returning because an old skeleton was found has some real potential in it.

It a shame they don't remake more bad movies with potential and try to improve them.

In fact has Hollywood EVER done that beyond unofficial ripoffs like the aforementioned The Island ripping off Parts: The Clonus Horror?

Parts:The Clonus Horror was such a good idea it was ripped off as "The Island" decades later. I believe the makers of Parts sued and it was settled out of court for over 7 figures. Those kinds of cases are usually thrown out of court, too. But apparently it was so shameless they couldn't ignore it and thought it was better to settle.

Gee, I wonder who the brainless hack was who stole the idea for a movie that was MST3K fodder. Cough*AlexKurtzman*Cough

What's funny about The Island to me is while I never saw it an actress who voiced a character in an anime I liked had a small roll in that movie and actually briefly mentioned in this in one of the commentary tracks on the US dvd, she said "I'm in The Island!" in a kind of embarrassed way, which is fitting.

 

[Flexo]

There was the time that Michael Bay ripped off Parts

Right. And I have a soft spot for the island and think it could have been a good example if the legal issues weren't such fubar.

 

[BScCollateral]

I've kind fond of Soultaker myself. I'm rather fond of films that try to create a new monster instead of doing "Vampire #782."

And, of course, there's the famous "Russo Finnish Troika", which are all very good films, where most of the humor comes from the terrible localization and admittedly subpar special effects.

 

[Starscreams Cape]

And, of course, there's the famous "Russo Finnish Troika", which are all very good films, where most of the humor comes from the terrible localization and admittedly subpar special effects.

I think I heard somewhere that the cast loved doing those nutty Russo-Finnish movies. Good riff fodder and the movies are interesting to watch while not necessarily being "good".

 

[Deadman]

Was going to post a link but then I realized SFDebris' videos have been nuked again. So here's the first of his series on mst3k (yes, he started on season 2) with a lot of background info. If there's further interest, I'll upload more.
View attachment 2129582

love to see more of this. sfdebris hasn't been fast enough reuploading his archive.

 

[Dom Cruise]

I've kind fond of Soultaker myself. I'm rather fond of films that try to create a new monster instead of doing "Vampire #782."

And, of course, there's the famous "Russo Finnish Troika", which are all very good films, where most of the humor comes from the terrible localization and admittedly subpar special effects.

Soultaker is another one that isn't too, too bad, there's clever touches like the blond mullet guy showing up later as a Soultaker himself.

Timechasers is another one that had some interesting ideas, it's a bit sad with these movies because you can see what the screenwriters were going for and they did have some clever ideas but the filmmakers lacked the budget to pull it off.

I guess you can say there's B movies that are just cheap crap that was cranked out and no one had any pretensions it'd be good and then there are B movies that really are trying to be good, where actual effort was put into it but there's only so much you can do with a small budget and something like a time travel movie needs some money behind it.

 

[Starscreams Cape]

Soultaker is another one that isn't too, too bad, there's clever touches like the blond mullet guy showing up later as a Soultaker himself.

Timechasers is another one that had some interesting ideas, it's a bit sad with these movies because you can see what the screenwriters were going for and they did have some clever ideas but the filmmakers lacked the budget to pull it off.

I guess you can say there's B movies that are just cheap crap that was cranked out and no one had any pretensions it'd be good and then there are B movies that really are trying to be good, where actual effort was put into it but there's only so much you can do with a small budget and something like a time travel movie needs some money behind it.

I agree about Soultaker. It could have actually been very good if they had made the Soultakers a little more monsterlike. Joe Estevez in a black suit with eye makeup immediately removes any fear.

Plus I must confess the lead woman (also director) was not too bad for an 80's movie chick.

 

[bifftango]

I agree about Soultaker. It could have actually been very good if they had made the Soultakers a little more monsterlike. Joe Estevez in a black suit with eye makeup immediately removes any fear.

Plus I must confess the lead woman (also director) was not too bad for an 80's movie chick.

Maybe I could interest you in Andy Sidaris's oeuvre, hmm?

Soultaker is made by that bleached-blond guy with the quasi-skullet going on.

 

[Starscreams Cape]

Maybe I could interest you in Andy Sidaris's oeuvre, hmm?

Soultaker is made by that bleached-blond guy with the quasi-skullet going on.

I did see Hard Ticket to Hawaii. It delivered what it promised.

My mistake on her directing, she actually wrote the screenplay. Vivian Schilling.

 

[Flexo]

I did see Hard Ticket to Hawaii. It delivered what it promised.

I picked up his collection of films the other day for $5. HT2H is definitely the most entertaining for multiple reasons. But hey if you want to see your favorite 80s playmate in action you probably can.

love to see more of this. sfdebris hasn't been fast enough reuploading his archive.

Sorry last night I had problems. Will get some more later today.

 

[bifftango]

I did see Hard Ticket to Hawaii. It delivered what it promised.

My mistake on her directing, she actually wrote the screenplay. Vivian Schilling.

I didn't word that very well. I meant the bleached-blond skullet guy makes the movie (work) for me because he's supposed to be so cool... but isn't. He didn't actually make the movie.

 

[Starscreams Cape]

I didn't word that very well. I meant the bleached-blond skullet guy makes the movie (work) for me because he's supposed to be so cool... but isn't. He didn't actually make the movie.

I agree completely. Jim McMahon look alike.

 

[Flexo]

Chuck of SFDebris history on MST3k season 3 today. Also including a brief aside on what it was that got Mike Nelson discovered.

 

[Starscreams Cape]

Chuck of SFDebris history on MST3k season 3 today. Also including a brief aside on what it was that got Mike Nelson discovered.

View attachment 2143843

For S3 I'll always have a soft spot for 321 Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, as it was my introduction episode. But Cave Dwellers is a solid choice for best of the season. I actually saw that movie in the theater when it was known as "The Blademaster". Still the only movie I ever walked out of.

 

[Flexo]

For S3 I'll always have a soft spot for 321 Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, as it was my introduction episode. But Cave Dwellers is a solid choice for best of the season. I actually saw that movie in the theater when it was known as "The Blademaster". Still the only movie I ever walked out of.

I learned once that it is a holiday staple in South America. It is... something special. I think the other Santa Claus film is a bit more riffable but I can't deny you that polar bear or Tor.

 

[Flexo]

Next up, season 4 where the show hits its stride.