I used to love watching this show with my dad in the early 2000's, but soon they stopped showing it. About a month or two ago, I was browsing the shelves of my library's television section looking for DVDs of The Office (which I will probably also review later on). Directly above the O section was the M section and the first thing that caught my eye as I stood up (the O's were down low) was Mystery Science Theater 3000 Vol. 10.2. I pulled it out and looked it over and saw that one of my favorite episodes was on that volume. I promptly went and checked it out and soon enough, I was back into the show.
The concept of the show was a very good one. Its about this guy who watches terrible B movies and cheezy old films anywhere from the 40's up to the early 90's. While watching the show, he provides a humorous commentary with the help of his two robotic friends Servo and Crow. At the beginning, end, and periodically during breaks in the movies, the three of them do little skits and such.What I didn't realize as a kid (or if I did, I forgot) was that there are loose storylines between these skits. The man was also trapped in space with his robot pals and was being forced to watch the movies by two evil scientists (later a woman trying to rule the world). These storylines are mostly kinda stupid, but I guess this was a low-budget kind of production. The producers probably spent most of the show's budget securing the rights to show the movies they show and less on the "host segments".
As I started watching the show on DVD, I discovered something else I never knew when I watched the show before: Mike Nelson wasn't the only main human character. When the show started, the guy who had to watch the movies was a guy named Joel Robinson (Robinson was obviously a "Lost In Space" reference). I did not know Joel existed, or even that the "Mads" (Dr. Forrester and TV's Frank) existed either. I had only ever seen episodes where Mike was the main character and was being sent movies by Pearl Forrester (who apparently is Dr. Forrester's mother) and her accomplices Bobo the human-gorilla alien and "Brain Guy" the Observer. I watched several episodes with Joel, but felt that they just weren't as funny. Maybe its because I was introduced to the series with Mike and preferred him, but I also think it had to do with the fact that the robot characters (who always remained the same) didn't quite bounce off him the same way they would Mike.
All in all, even with Joel, the show is still one of the funniest shows I've ever seen. Here is a list of some of my favorite episodes to date:
1. Giant Spider Invasion (by far the best one ever)
2. Teenage Strangler
3. Space Mutiny
4. Time Chasers
5. Invasion of the Neptune Men
6. Pod People (my favorite Joel episode)
7. This Island Earth (aka MST3K The Movie)
8. Prince of Space
9. Giant Gila Monster\
10. Boggy Creek II
No comments:
Post a Comment