Screenhead

Like that creepy dead kid from Pet Semetary and William Shatner’s career, Mystery Science Theater 3000 just refuses to die. Oh, sure, networks can cancel it, but it just keeps… coming… back!

Fans of the show were perpetually begging the cast and crew to lampoon the awful big-budget movies Hollywood was inflicting on us. Of course, licensing those films would have cost a small fortune (even for the flops), so the closest we ever got were the “Summer Movie Blockbuster Review” specials (I and II), where Mike and the ‘Bots poked fun at previews of big releases. Recently, with the advent of DVD and MP3s, head writer and MST3K star Michael J. Nelson has finally answered our prayers for big-budget mockery with RiffTrax.

So far, Mike has riffed on everything from Patrick Swayze’s Roadhouse to Britney Spears’ Crossroads, Star Trek to Star Wars, Battlefield Earth to Glitter, and even TV shows like Lost and Grey’s Anatomy. He’s been joined by celebrities like Neil Patrick Harris, but even more excitingly, his old MST3k cohorts Kevin “Servo” Murphy, Bill “Crow” Corbett, and Mary Jo “Pearl Forrester” Pehl. Not bad for 3 bucks!

The success of RiffTrax seems to have proven Mystery Science Theater as a viable concept again. And the old gang wasted no time (well, okay, eight years) bringing us MST3K Version 2.0. On July 10, Nelson, Murphy, and Corbett, released the first DVD in their “Film Crew” series. The conceit might sound familiar: Their boss, Bob Honcho, forces them to provide commentary tracks for awful movies. Midway through the film, they take a “lunch break” to discuss their progress. It’s almost like MST never left!

The first release (the plan is to release one per month) is Hollywood After Dark (AKA Walk the Angry Beach or The Unholy Choice) which poses the frightening question, “What if Golden Girl Rue McClanahan was a stripper?” Fortunately, the film was shot in 1968, so it’s a safe bet that Rue wasn’t clad in Depends, but unfortunately the results aren’t much more palatable. Future releases include Peter Graves (veteran of two MST-skewered films, The Beginning of the End and Parts: The Clonus Horror) in Killers from Space and The Wild Women of Wongo, both of which would have been right at home on MST3K back in the day.

The one downside? No more “shadowrama” (the technique used to put the outline of Mike/Joel and the ‘Bots onscreen), so no interaction with the screen. But the riffs are now a little more risqué, so it’s an even trade, I guess.

As if that weren’t enough riches for a Mistie, on June 26, the fantastic folks at Rhino Home Video released the 11th collection of four episodes on DVD, bringing the total number of episodes released up to 52 or one-quarter of the show’s run. Not that you can get all 52 anymore: Several of the sets and even some of the single-episode releases have been pulled from shelves because of “rights issues,” which is code for “Hey, Rhino, give us more money, or else.” Season 10 was released for all of a week before “rights issues” forced the set to be withdrawn – most likely because of the inclusion of Godzilla vs. Megalon, which reportedly has some convoluted ownership rights that Rhino didn’t have properly straightened out.

(Currently, sets 1, 3, and 9 also appear to be out of print, so I hope you snatched them up when you could. Rumor has it that the episodes still clear for release may be repackaged and re-released in the future. In the meantime, there’s always the Digital Archive Project.)

Set 11 is once again “Joel-heavy,” with only one disc from the “Mike Era,” and features the following gems:

The Ring of Terror (and short The Phantom Creeps Part 3) – Episode 206: Described as an ineptly written version of The Twilight Zone, the main film follows a college student who claims to be afraid of anything. Probably holds some sort of record for the “least convincing young actors” until Beverly Hills 90210 hit the airwaves. The short is Bela Lugosi proving he’ll do anything for a buck.

The Indestructible Man – Episode 409: Speaking of fallen cinema legends, here we have Lon Chaney, Jr., as an executed convict who comes back from the grave to exact revenge on people who watch this film.

Tormented – Episode 414: Here’s a tip for lovebirds everywhere: If your ex is going to fall to her death atop a spooky lighthouse, you should probably try to save her, because otherwise she’s going to make your upcoming wedding really difficult.

Horrors of Spider Island – Episode 1011: Promising terror and lots of skin, this film single-handedly manages to deliver the exact opposite, as a boatload of models get shipwrecked and then pestered by hairy spiders.

Suggested retail is 60 bucks, but online retailers (like Deep Discount) have it for almost half that.

So, fans, if you’re still cuddling your homemade Tom Servo at night and pretending that the final Sci-Fi episode never aired, rejoice! The new MST3K golden age is upon us!