Continuing Legend's MST3K Review Thread!

[Continuing Legend]

Continuing Legend's Reviews.

In No Particular Order.




907 Hobgoblins

MOVIE: Oh, god. This movie. This movie, this movie... I don't even know what to say. This movie is offensive to everyone. I'm an immature person who giggles at the word "penis," but the sex jokes in this movie just sickened even me. This movie hurts. And yes, that's the point of MST3K, I know. The movies are bad. But Hobgoblins just hurts on so many levels. It's not cheesy fun the way the old sci-fi flicks are. It's not even a horrid, boring mess the way Coleman Francis's movies are. It's just complete crap. I hate this movie.

RIFFING: I hate this movie. Have I mentioned that? And so it's a testament to the riffing that I have willingly seen this movie many, many times! Yes, a lot of the riffing in this movie is less joking at the movie and more yelling at the movie for sucking so much -- which is truer of the Sci-Fi era episodes in general -- but this movie... this movie just deserves it.

HOST SEGMENTS: Most of them are pretty average - nothing too terrible or too good. I do like seeing them try to escape from the movie. However, Crow's documentary on women, which leads him to the conclusion that they are a Bigfoot-esque hoax... I am willing to go so far as to say that this is possibly my favorite host segment OF ALL TIME. Though Trace will always be the definitive Crow, Bill's Crow quite often cracks me the hell up, and no matter the era (Joel, CC Mike, Sci-Fi Mike), Crow has always been my favorite. "Let's Talk Women" is just another reason why.

OVERALL: An absolutely terrible movie in the worst, most offensive way, thankfully made watchable -- and actually funny -- with riffing. Good host segments plus my FAVORITE host segment add up to a pretty great episode, all in all. However, unlike some of the more fun cheesy movies, if the opportunity to watch this movie on its own without Mike & the bots ever comes up, RRRRRUUUUUNNNNNNN!








303 Pod People

MOVIE: A really weird mess of several movies which come together stupidly. The movies involve poachers, a terrible "rock" band, and a girly-voiced boy. Girly-voiced boy (or, as the Amazing Colossal Episode Guide calls him, "the maiden-voiced kid," which makes me laugh) raises a friendly alien, Trumpy, while Trumpy's not-so-friendly brother goes around killing people, including the aforementioned poachers and members of the aforementioned band. Maiden-voiced kid abandons Trumpy in the woods at the end. Not black & white, but so goddamn foggy it might as well be.

RIFFING: Absolute top-notch. Although I've never seen this movie without the MSTing, I believe that due to the insane amount of fog and the overall depressing-ness of the movie, it would be pretty boring. Thankfully, the riffing not only makes me laugh, but makes the movie itself watchable -- something that doesn't always happen with dull movies like this.

HOST SEGMENTS: Wonderful. The song "Idiot Control Now," an attempt to re-create the garbled lyrics of the "rock" band of the movie, is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. A two-song episode, Pod People also features the song "Clown in the Sky," a rather beautifully sad song, actually! I'm generally a fan of MST3K songs, and this one delivers two great ones.

OVERALL: This episode is a classic, and with good reason. Absolutely worth watching several times, though I'm personally a little burnt out on the episode after watching it so damn much. Guaranteed the next time I watch it I'll laugh like an idiot all the way through, though.




Many more to come as I finish typing out my thoughts!

[Continuing Legend]

1007 Track of the Moon Beast

MOVIE: One of many episodes featuring a man named Paul who turns into a monster. What's up with that? Are Pauls just more susceptible to transformation? Anyway, the movie is pretty great. It fails in pretty much every way, and I love every minute of it. It has everything I like in a movie* -- a hideous man-beast named Paul, a cop who hooks his thumbs in his belt (which we learned is a staple of bad movies as far back as 706 Laserblast), an unconvincing and terrible actress as the love interest of the hideous Paul-beast (see also 904 Werewolf), a terrible folk-rock band, and Johnny Longbone, who should have his own spin-off TV show. So anyway, Johnny and Kathy (the terrible actress/love interest) play an incredibly stupid practical joke on Paul, which I'll come back to in the host segment review. Then Johnny makes an "authentic Indian stew," which, as evidenced by his deep sigh, is SERIOUS BUSINESS. Then... oh, hell, some stuff happens, Paul turns into a were-lizard because of moon rocks (oh wow), whatever. The movie is incredibly stupid, but it's pretty cute how hard it's trying.

*It should be noted that The Empire Strikes Back has none of these things and that I like that movie a lot. In other words, I lied. However, Johnny Longbone would make an awesome Yoda.

RIFFING: I taped this episode a long time ago, and watched the HELL out of it. It got taped over somehow, a fact which makes me sadder than you can possibly imagine. I haven't seen it in years. However, I can practically quote the episode in its entirety. I guess that goes to show you just how memorable this episode is to me. Just about every riff gets at least a chuckle if not a hysterical laugh out of me.

HOST SEGMENTS: Except for the Servo-shooting-a-satellite thing, which is kind of pointless and dumb, every host segment is great. I love the opening skit, where the bots go nuts with an onion blossomer and blossom everything in sight, including Servo's head. "Plunger, yum!" makes me giggle. And I love the bots replaying the practical joke on Mike, which works just as well as it does in the movie (in that Mike doesn't react at all, and yet Crow feels the need to apologize profusely for scaring him).

OVERALL: This is quite possibly my favorite episode of all time. I guess that makes me a bad person, since my favorite episode isn't from the CC era and, even worse, is from the hated season 10. Gasp! TOO BAD, I say. Too bad. I love this episode and I won't apologize for that.







910 The Final Sacrifice

MOVIE: This movie could be good. No, really. Don't look at me like that. Listen. The movie is immensely stupid and immensely Canadian, but the idea -- boy finds the secret behind his father's death, and it involves an ancient evil cult -- could be pretty great! However, the boy, Troy MacGregor, is played by, and I'm sorry, but there's no other way to say this, a pathetic loser. And Troy's buddy, Zap Rowsdower, a former member of the evil cult, should be a roguish anti-hero, Han Solo type. Instead he's a disgusting mullet-y, drunken loser, Canada's own Joe Don Baker, if you will. Plus, "Zap Rowsdower"? Zap. Rowsdower. That said, Satoris, the evil cult leader, is one of my favorite MST3K villains. He's ridiculous, of course, and the slow, deep voice is less menacing than funny, but I like him. In my vision of this movie, he stays. And so does Mike Pipper. Keep the Yosemite Sam voice. I love it. Can you tell I'm strangely fond of this movie?

RIFFING: Another reviewer, whose name I have forgotten, and for that I'm sorry, pointed out that a lot of the humor in the riffing seems to revolve around the name "Zap Rowsdower," which isn't actually all that funny. I respectfully disagree. I think "Zap Rowsdower" is EXTREMELY funny. And even without Rowsdower, there's so much about this movie that is just so very riffable -- the pathetic "hero" kid, the Yosemite-Sam-voiced Mike Pipper, the ridiculous mask-and-tank-top-wearing villains -- and Mike and the bots deliver great riffs all around, in my opinion. I've seen this episode possibly more times than any other, and I never fail to laugh myself silly throughout the entire thing. Yes, even at the repeated jokes about the name "Rowsdower." Come on! Say it! Zap Rowsdower! It's funny!

HOST SEGMENTS: The Canada-bashing song is a gem. As I've said before, I'm a pretty big fan of the MST3K songs, and this is no exception. And during the final theater segment, we get the bonus "Rowsdower Saves Us" song, so this is sort of a two-fer! The other host segments, two of which involve the bots getting hockey hair and Mike becoming a grizzled old prospector, aren't particularly funny, but they don't detract from the episode either.

OVERALL: When people mention classic MST3K episodes, rarely do they mention Sci-Fi episodes, but when they do, this is one that usually comes up. There's a reason for that. Definitely in my top 5.

[Continuing Legend]

816 Prince of Space

MOVIE: If you read enough of my reviews, you'll note that for the most part, the black & white movies featured on MST tend to bore me. It's just the combination of a dull movie plus no color... zzzz. But this movie is absolutely HILARIOUS even on its own. The villains are dressed as chickens and appear to wear no underwear. This is DISGUSTING, but also extremely humorous. The supposed smart scientists are ridiculously inept. Prince of Space is also kind of a moron. Also, what the hell do caustic vapors do IN SPACE?

RIFFING: A lot of people seem to think that maybe the Japan-bashing went too far here, or in 819 Invasion of the Neptune Men. I'm Asian, and I enjoy a good Asian-bashing joke, and I laughed hysterically at the supposed "bashing" of Japan in this and 819. The riffing was great all around, in my opinion. And there's nothing that cracks me up more than Crow's reaction to the giant monster on Krankor -- he just goes "Look at that! LOOK AT THAT!!!"

HOST SEGMENTS: "Dog and Bear" is, as many others have said before me, one of the best opening skits. Not my favorite (that might be the blossoming thing from 1007 Track of the Moon Beast), but definitely great. I love the time-delay skit, which was done PERFECTLY. Bravo. Mike turning into a little robot puppet was pretty funny, but my favorite part of that was when he suddenly returned to normal, his only explanation "I got better." Krankor is even funnier in color (Bill Corbett in a bright yellow chicken man suit).

OVERALL: Overall I like it very much. I wasn't a huge fan of the Roman times thing, which this episode introduced, but the Roman times thing didn't detract from one of the greatest Sci-Fi era episodes (I speak, of course, of 820 Space Mutiny). So, a great episode. Hey, has anyone seen my chicken puppet?




321 Santa Claus Conquers the Martians

MOVIE: This movie is just ridiculous. I have no idea who the hell its target audience is supposed to be, first of all. Not that it matters. Just think about it, won't you? Now, here's the problem: a movie this ridiculous should make me laugh on its own (816 Prince of Space, for one, does that a lot), but for the most part SCCTM is just annoyingly stupid instead of laughably stupid. There's not enough really going on and I don't like any of the characters enough for me to care one way or the other. Also I loathe Droppo. He's about on par with the henchman guy from Batwoman, who is just a little bit worse.

RIFFING: Look, let me get this out of the way. I know most MSTies consider this one a classic, and therefore I'm a little afraid to criticize it, but I'm not overly impressed with it. The movie is ridiculous and the riffing is pretty funny, but nothing really sticks out as PARTICULARLY funny. And I may have, um, watched it under the influence of illegal substances once. It wasn't any funnier. My biggest laughs come from the ridiculous polar bear costume (I mean "custume"), and the line "So she knitted him an extra beard?"

HOST SEGMENTS: "Patrick Swayze Christmas" is great, of course, but I'm not really a fan of the other host segments, maybe because I'm not Christian, so I never got into the Christmas spirit or whatever.

OVERALL: Sorry guys. I know it's a classic. I like it well enough. I just don't LOVE it.

NOTE: I haven't seen either 521 Santa Claus or the Cinematic Titanic version of this episode, but I plan to give them both a try and see how they compare.

[Captain Hygiene]

I love Track of the Moon Beast as well; it seems like there's a small (but larger than it used to be) contingent who really like this episode. It wouldn't be my number one choice but it's in the top 3 to 5 depending on my mood.