Mystery Science Theater 3000 ( MST3K ) is an American television comedy series created by Joel Hodgson and produced by Alternaversal Productions , LLC. The show premiered at KTMA (now WUCW) in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on November 24, 1988. It was aired on The Comedy Channel/Comedy Central for seven seasons until the cancellation in 1996. After that, it was taken by The Sci-Fi Channel and aired for three seasons until another cancellation in August 1999. The 60-episode syndication package titled The Mystery Science Theater Hour was produced in 1995. By 2015, Hodgson led a crowdfunded awakening of the series with 14 episodes in the eleventh season, released on Netflix, in the US, on April 14, 2017, with another season to follow in the near future. To date, 211 episodes and feature films have been produced.
The show originally starred in Hodgson as Joel Robinson, a janitor who was caught up against his wish by two mad scientists on Satellite of Love and was forced to watch a series of B movies as part of a plot of scientists to take the whole world. To maintain his sanity, Joel made a number of robot friends - including Tom Servo, Crow T. Robot, and Gypsy - to accompany him and help him humorously comment on every movie while playing, a process known as riffing. Each two-hour episode will feature an entire movie along with associated public domain films, with Joel, Tom, and Crow watching in silhouettes from a row of theater seats at the bottom of the screen. The scene is framed with interstitial sketches. The cast of the event changes during its duration; especially, Joel's character was replaced by Mike Nelson (played by Michael J. Nelson) in the fifth season of the event. Other cast members, most of whom are also writers for the show, include Trace Beaulieu, Josh Weinstein, Jim Mallon, Kevin Murphy, Frank Conniff, Mary Jo Pehl, Bill Corbett, Paul Chaplin, and Bridget Jones Nelson. The revival featured new lead acts, including Jonah Ray as a new human test subject, along with Felicia Day and Patton Oswalt.
MST3K 'Initial release did not garner a high audience, but the popularity of the event spread through word of mouth through the Internet from its fans known as MSTies (or "Mysties" "), repetition repeating and syndicated, and offering home media produced by Rhino Entertainment and currently Shout! Factory, which together with Hodgson now has the rights to the show and supports the revived series. MST3K is listed as one of the < i> Time magazine "100 Best TV Shows of All Time" in 2007, and TV Guide has recorded MST3K as one of the premier television shows. The Peabody Award in 1993, was also nominated for two Emmy Awards in 1994 and 1995, and for the CableACE Award from 1992 to 1997. The performances were considered highly influential, contributing to social television practice, and former cast members similar projects based on movie riffing, including RiffTrax (taking place in 2018) and Cinematic Titanic. MST3K also reveals some old movies that have fallen into obscurity or have received little or no public attention when initially released. Many of these films were later identified as one of the worst films ever made, notably Manos: The Hands of Fate .
Video Mystery Science Theater 3000
Premise
While the cast members of MST3K have changed throughout history, the premise of the show has remained relatively unchanged: first-person test subjects Joel Robinson (Joel Hodgson), then Mike Nelson (Michael J. Nelson), and most recently Jonah Heston (Jonah Ray) - has been imprisoned on the Satellite of Love spacecraft by mad scientists and their minions (collectively called "the Mads") and forced to watch a series of bad films to find movies that will drive test subjects mad.
To maintain his sanity, Joel built himself a series of live robots (bots) from sections above Satellite , and which subsequently remained on board with other test subjects. The 'bots include Tom Servo, Crow T. Robot, Gypsy (in charge of running satellite operations) and Cambot, the silent recorder of the experiment. Crow and Servo join humans as they watch movies in theaters Satellite ', and in order not to go mad, the trio often comment and mask over it, a process known as "riffing". At regular intervals throughout the movie, the host leaves the theater and returns to the bridge from Satellite to sketch (the "host segment") that mocks the movie being watched.
Maps Mystery Science Theater 3000
Format
The general format of the episode MST3K remains the same throughout the running series. The episode is about 90 minutes in running time (excluding commercial breaks) and begins with a short introductory segment in which the human host and 'bot interacts with Crazy People before being sent a movie. During the tenure of Joel Hodgson and Jonah Ray as hosts (and for a brief period at the beginning of the Mike Nelson era), the host and Mads were involved in a "discovery exchange" in which they each exhibited their latest discovery. Flashing sirens and lights ("Movie Sign") then beckon to the character to enter the theater.
In theater, human hosts and 'bots' Tom and Crow sit in a row of theater seats, displayed in silhouettes along the bottom of the screen, a Hodgson approach called "Shadowrama". The three then riff on the film (which is sometimes accompanied by one or more shorts) when played for them and the audience. Sometimes silhouette formats are used as a source of humor or as a means of creating sensing censor bars for scenes containing nudity. The show transitions in and out of the theater through a "door order", a series of six doors that open or close when the camera (as if Cambot) passes through it.
At regular intervals throughout the episode, the characters leave the theater and do the sketches that are usually inspired by the show/short movie show, often using the original song and supporting comedy. Some sketches carry new or recurring characters or other devices; the host will consult an external camera "Rocket Number Nine" to indicate events that occur outside of Satellite , and "Hexfield Viewscreen" will be used to communicate with other characters from the ship's bridge. At the end of each sketch, "Movie Sign" is triggered again and characters must reenter the theater.
During the Hodgson period on the show, the final sketches above Satellite often include reading fan mail from "MST3K Fan Club". The fan letter reading declined during Mike Nelson's tenure as host and was dropped completely after the event moved to Sci-Fi Channel. The final sketch of an episode usually ends at The Mads, with Mad leading asking them to "push the button" to end the transmission and transition to the credit sequence. After the credits, the funny short clips from the presented movie are played as "stinger" to end the episode.
In 1995, the limited episode selection was repackaged into a one-hour show titled Mystery Science Theater Hour, which was intended to be more suited for off-network syndication. In this case, the original episode was split into two halves about 45 minutes each excluding the advertisement. New plays leading and ending each episode include Mike Nelson describing television host Jack Perkins in a parody of the Perkins' Biography series in the mock flattery of the episode MST3K that is being shown.
Production history
Drafts
Hodgson is credited for designing the concept of the event. Before the show, Hodgson was a rising comedian from Minneapolis after moving to Los Angeles and performing on Late Night with David Letterman and Saturday Night Live. He was invited by Brandon Tartikoff to be on the NBC sitcom starring Michael J. Fox, but Hodgson felt the material was not funny and rejected. He further becomes dissatisfied with Hollywood's attitude when they try to double their offer, earning what he calls "disrespectful healthy" to the industry. He moved back to Minneapolis-St Paul, took a job at a T-shirt printing factory that enabled him to think up new comedy ideas when he got bored. One such idea is the foundation of MST3K , a show for riffs on film and it will also allow him to display his comedic-style humor.
Hodgson says that part of the idea for MST3K comes from the illustration for the song "I've Seen That Movie Too" (drawn by Mike Ross) in liner notes from Elton John Goodbye Yellow Brick Road album, showing the silhouette of two people in the theater watching the movie. Hodgson also likens the arrangement of events to the idea of ​​pirate radio stations that broadcast from outer space. Hodgson credits Silent Running , a 1972 science fiction film directed by Douglas Trumbull, as it may be the biggest direct influence on the concept of the show. The film is set in the future and centered on humans, Freeman Lowell (Bruce Dern), who is the last crew member of the spacecraft to contain the last remaining Earth forests. His remaining friends consisted of only three robot drones. MST3K and the character Joel Robinson sometimes reflects the nature of hippies like Lowell. Hodgson wanted to feel the show to appear on its own, and to quote an example of a crude mountain mount used during Saturday Night Live sketches of "Night at Freak Mountain" which received a funny reaction from studio audience as the kind of aesthetic he wanted to show.
Both old movies and music inspired some of the event's character names as developed by Hodgson. The name of this event comes from the promotional words "Mystery Scientist" used by Harlan Tarbell magician and drama on behalf of Sun Ra band, Myth Science Arkestra. The "3000" added to the common practice spoof adds "2000" to the show and the name of the product in the light of the 21st century to come, and Hodgson thinks it will set his show to make it "3000". Dr. Forrester is named after the main character of The War of the Worlds . The Satellite of Love is named after a song of the same name by Lou Reed. Crow T. Robot was inspired by Jim Carroll's "Crow" song Catholic Boy, while the name Rocket Number 9 was inspired by the original name of the Sun Ra Interstellar Low Ways album.
The theatrical footage, the main component of an episode, was filmed in "Shadowrama". The "chair" is a black painted foam board behind the chair (towards the camera) for the host, and the stage for Crow and Tom puppets. The host wore black clothes while the robot dolls were painted black; the screen they watch is a white luma lock screen to create a silhouette appearance. The actors will follow movies and scripts through television monitors located in front of them, to create the illusion of theater as a whole.
The "door order" was created for the transition from the segment of the comedy into the theater segment, which Hodgson took inspiration from the Mickey Mouse Club, noting that the similarity with title credits Get Smart Satellite of Love with additional inspiration taken from bone-to-ship transitions in the 2001 film: A Space Odyssey. Hodgson wants to use "motivated cameras" for shooting, a concept related to motivated illumination; in this mode, all shots appear to be taken from the actual camera that is part of the scene to make the scene seem more realistic. This led to the creation of Cambot as the host robot will speak during the host segment or record them while in the theater, and Rocket Number Nine to show the recording outside of Satellite of Love.
The theme song of the show, "Love Theme from Mystery Science Theater 3000", was written by Hodgson and Weinstein, who helped bring together some of the broader narrative elements of the show, such as Mads and Joel being part of the experiment. The song was composed by Charlie Erickson with the help of Hodgson in the style of Devo, The Replacements, and The Rivieras (especially cover of their song "California Sun") and sung by Hodgson. Early performances used foam letters to create event titles, but they later created a spinning-moon logo of fiberglass spheres 2 feet in diameter (0.6 m), covered with foam insulation and letter pieces from additional foam pieces. Hodgson feels they need a movie logo with a rotating effect as opposed to a flat 2D image, and although they imagine more detailed props, with the letters being the highlight of this month's building, they have no time or budget for the complexity project and go with what they have. The music numbers will also be used as part of the host segment, which Hodgson says comes out naturally from the riffing process; they will find themselves sometimes singing along with the movie, not just riffing it, and taking it to extend the song into the host segment.
era of KTMA (1988-1989)
Hodgson approached Jim Mallon, when the KTMA production manager, a low-budget local television station, with his idea of ​​a riffing performances on film, uses robots created from common objects. Mallon agreed to help produce the pilot episode, and Hodgson was hired in local area comedian J. Elvis Weinstein (originally going by Josh Weinstein but later changed to J. Elvis to distinguish himself from Josh Weinstein, a famous author for The Simpsons ) and Trace Beaulieu to develop a pilot show. In September 1988, Hodgson, Mallon, Weinstein, and Beaulieu shot a 30-minute pilot episode, using segments from the 1968 science fiction movie The Green Slime. The robots and sets were built by Hodgson as a whole. Joel watched the movie itself, and was assisted during the host segment by his robot, Crow (Beaulieu), Beeper, and Gypsy (Weinstein). Hodgson uses a narrative whose character named "Joel Hodgson" (not yet using his character name Robinson) has built up Satellite of Love and launched himself into space. The camera work was done by Kevin Murphy, who was hired by KTMA. Murphy also created the first door order and theater seat design. This early episode was recorded at Paragon's Dead Cable Studio and customer service center in Hopkins, Minnesota.
Mallon met with KTMA station manager Donald O'Conner the following month and managed to register for thirteen episodes. Production events are generally done in a 24-hour cycle, starting with Mallon offering several films from the KTMA library for writers to choose from. Riffing in this episode is ad-libbed during filming using notes made during the initial appearance of the selected movie. The show has some minor changes from the pilot - the sets are turned on differently, robots (now Crow, Servo and Gypsy) join Joel in the theater, and the new back door order between the host segment and the theater is shot. The dalangs work personality into their robots: Crow (Beaulieu) is regarded as Groucho Marx robot Tom Servo (Weinstein) as "AM busy radio DJ", and Gypsy (Mallon) is modeled after Mallon's mother has a "golden heart" but will be confused when faced with a difficult task. The development of the theme song of the event will lead to the formation of elements for the ongoing premise of the show, with Hodgson now portraying himself as a Joel Robinson character.
Mystery Science Theater 3000 airs on KTMA at 6:00 am. on Thanksgiving Day, November 24, 1988 with the first episode, Invaders from the Deep , followed by the second episode, Revenge of the Mysterons from Mars at 8:00 pm. Initially, the event response was unknown, until Mallon set up a phone line for viewers to call. The response was so great that the beginning of 13 episodes extended to 21, with events running until May 1989. Hodgson and Mallon negotiated to secure the rights to the show for themselves, creating Best Brains, Inc., agreeing to share the ownership of the idea equally. During this time, fan clubs were founded and the show held its first live show at Scott Hansen Comedy Gallery in Minneapolis, to a crowd of over 600 people.
Despite the success of the event, the overall loss of the station forced it to file for bankruptcy reorganization in July 1989. At the same time, HBO sought to build stable performances for their new Comedy Channel cable network. HBO approached Best Brains and asked for their material samples. Hodgson and Mallon provide a seven-minute demo reel, which leads to the greenlighting network MST3K as one of the first two shows taken by the youth network.
Comedy Central era (1989-1996)
The Comedy Channel offers Best Brains $ 35,000 per episode but allows Best Brains to retain show rights. The Best Brain is also able to keep local production into Minnesota, not a network desire for movies in New York City or Los Angeles, as it will cost four times more per episode, according to Hodgson. Best Brains set up an office and warehouse in Eden Prairie for filming. With widespread but limited budgets, they are able to hire more authors, including Mike Nelson, Mary Jo Pehl, and Frank Conniff, and build a more expansive set of robotic dolls. They create the character of Dr. Forrester (Beaulieu) and Dr. Erhardt (Weinstein) and make a larger narrative of each episode as the "experiment" they tested on Joel.
MST3K is considered a signature program of the Comedy Channel, generating a positive press about the event despite the limited availability of national cable channels. After the second season, The Comedy Channel and rival cable comedy network HA! merged into Comedy Central. During this period, MST3K became a series of signatures of newly combined channel cables, evolving from 13 to 24 episodes per year. To take advantage of the show's status, Comedy Central runs a 30-hour "Turkey Day," marathon from episode MST3K during Thanksgiving 1991. This tradition will continue through the rest of the Comedy Central era. While the event did not attract large audiences compared to other programs on Comedy Central, such as reruns of Saturday Night Live, dedicated fans and attention continued to show events on the network.
Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie was produced during the half-part of the Comedy Central era and had a very limited theatrical release in 1996 through Universal Pictures and Gramercy Pictures. This featured Mike and the bots that were targeted by The Earth Movie . Forrester. Although well received by critics and fans, the film is a financial disappointment because of its limited distribution.
Writing and filming
The cable network is able to provide a wider library of movies for the Best Brain to riff from. To ensure that they will be able to produce a funny episode, at least one staff member will watch the suggested movie entirely, generally ensuring that the movie will be the ultimate joke across; Conniff stated that he often had to watch twenty films overall before choosing one to use for the show. In one specific case, the second season episode with the film Sidehackers, they only took the first part of the film before taking the decision to use it, and only later found out that it contained a scene of rape.. They decided to remain committed to the film, but cut off the offensive scene and had to explain the absence of suddenly affected characters to the audience. After that, they carefully examine the entire film, and once someone is selected and guaranteed the right, committed to completing the episode with the film. Gaining rights is handled by the cable network. Some licenses are required to purchase the rights of the movie in the package, with poorly selected films included in the catalog of good films, making the negotiation strange because the network is only interested in bad movies. At other times, the rights to the movie are not properly documented, and the network will follow the chain of custody to find the copyright owner to secure broadcasting rights.
Unlike the ad-libbing riffs of KTMA, the riffs were written earlier by the author. The average episode (about 90 minutes walking time) will contain more than 600 such riffs, and some with over 800 riffs. Riffs are developed with the entire writing staff watching movies together multiple times through, giving satire and jokes as the movie goes, or identifying where additional material will help for comedy. The best jokes polished into the script for the show. Riffs were developed to keep pace with the characterization of Joel, Mike, and 'bot. Furthermore, the authors try to remain respectful of the films and avoid making negative riffs about them, taking into account that Joel, Mike, and 'bots are friends to the audience while watching movies, and they do not want to sound like jerks even if the negative riffs will be funny. Hodgson states that their goal in writing riffs is not to make fun of movies because some are often mistaken, and instead consider what they do as "a variety show built behind a movie".
The average episode production of MST3K during the Comedy Central period takes about five to nine days after the movie is selected and the rights are secured. The first few days are generally used for watching movies and scripting riffs and live action segments. The following days are then commonly used to begin the construction of all the props or sets required for the live action segment while the authors hone the script. A full rehearsal will be held, ensuring segments and props work well and perfecting the script. The host segment will then be filmed on one day, and the next theater segment. The last day is used to review the completed work and fix the main mistake they caught before considering the full episode. The live scene only uses a special, practical effect, and there's a bit of editing after the editing is done.
Cast changes
Weinstein left the show after the first Channel Comedy season, reported in disagreement with Hodgson about using scripted instead of ad-libbed jokes. Murphy replaced him as Tom Servo's voice, describing 'bots as a cultured individual, while Dr. Erhardt replaced with Frank TV (Conniff).
Hodgson decided to leave the Half Season half series due to his dislike of being on camera and his dissent with Mallon's producers for the creative control of the program. Hodgson also stated that Mallon's insistence on producing a film version of the event led to his departure, leaving his rights to the MST3K property to Mallon. Hodgson then told an interviewer: "If I have the mind to try and get it done, I'd rather stay because I do not want to go, it seems I need to do it." Although they held a call casting for Hodgson's replacement on the camera, the crew found that no potential actor really fit the role; Instead, after reviewing Nelson's experiment with a bot, the crew agreed that having Nelson (who had appeared in the guest roles on the show) replacing Hodgson would be the least thrilling approach. Joel's replacement by Mike will cause "Joel vs Mike flame war" which is often joking among fans, similar to the discussion "Kirk vs Picard" in Star Trek fandom.
Conniff left the show after Season Six, looking to get into events in Hollywood, On screen, Frank's TV was soon replaced by Dr. Forrester, Pearl (Pehl).
Cancellation
In the sixth season of the event in 1996, Comedy Central has begun creating an identity for its network under the new leadership of Doug Herzog, which will lead to successful performances such as The Daily Show, Win Ben Stein Money and South Park , leaving MST3K as network weirdness takes up limited program space. Herzog, though stating that MST3K "helps put the network on the map" and that its fans are "excited", believes it is necessary to change the situation because the rating is down and not excited. Network canceled MST3K after the seventh season of the seventh episode.
The Channel Era of Sci-Fi (1997-1999)
The show staff continue to operate as long as they still have the finances to work with. MST3K fan base ' is holding a writing campaign to keep the event alive. This effort led the Sci-Fi Channel, a subsidiary of USA Networks, to take the series. Rod Perth, the program president for USA Networks at the time, helped bring the show to the Sci-Fi Channel, proclaiming himself a big fan of the show and believing that "the science fiction genre takes itself too seriously and that this event is a great way to lighten our presentations own ".
The writing and production of performances have remained relatively unchanged from the period of Comedy Central. Before the new 8 series begins filming, Beaulieu chooses to leave the show, feeling that everything creative will be produced by the Best Brain will belong to Mallon, and wants to have more of his own creative ownership. To replace Dr. Forrester, two new sidekicks for Pearl were introduced: Professor Bobo (Murphy) and Observer a.k.a. "Brain Guy" (Corbett). In addition, Corbett takes over the voice of Crow and the doll and the best brainer Patrick Brantseg takes over Gypsy in the middle of the Eight Season. With this replacement, the original cast of the series has been submitted.
MST3K ran for three more seasons on the Sci-Fi Channel. During the era of Sci-Fi, the Best Brains found themselves more limited by the network: the smaller collection of films available and they were asked to use science fiction films (as network name and program focus), and the USA Management executives managing the show wanted to see the bow stories and have more demands on how the show should be produced. Conflict between the Best Brain and network executives will ultimately lead to the cancellation of both events. Peter Keepnews, writing for The New York Times, notes that frequent player changes, as well as poorer film selection that is more boring than strange in its execution, has caused the show to lose its original. interesting. Other campaigns to save the show were installed, including some MST3K fans contributed to a full-page ad in the Daily Trade Variety magazine , but to no avail.
The 10-season Final, The revival of the Netflix era (2017-present)
Kickstarter funding
Since around 2010, Hodgson has been trying to bring back the MST3K , driven by the appreciation of the fans of the cast and crew 25 years since its inaugural show and the success of the Cinematic Titanic project. Hodgson also considers time to be ideal, with non-traditional outlets such as Netflix taking the original series, and crowdfunding success for entertainment projects. However, Hodgson needed to regain the rights to the series, which was then still held by Mallon and Best Brains. In 2013, Hodgson teamed up with Shout! The factory, the distribution company that handles home media releases MST3K , and completes negotiations with Mallon to purchase the rights to MST3K for the seven-digit amount in August 2015, allowing the Kickstarter Campaign to fund the revival to go forward. Hodgson felt the Kickstarter approach was necessary so that the style and approach of the show would be determined by fans rather than over the network if he was looking for traditional broadcasting funding, as well as to demonstrate demand for performances through successful campaigns.
Kickstarter was launched in November 2015, looking for $ 2 million for the production of three episodes, with targets stretching with additional funding for 12 total episodes. The Kickstarter effort was led by Ivan Askwith, a consultant who also worked on the Veronica Mars campaign and Casting
Hodgson believes that revival will require new players, considering the players have completely changed in the original series. Comedian Jonah Ray plays Jonah Heston, the new host of Satellite of Love, watching and scolding the films. Hodgson had met Ray while recording the episode The Nerdist Podcast , and felt he would fit. Crow's and Tom Servo's voices were provided by comedians Hampton Yount and Baron Vaughn, respectively, both of whom Ray recommended to Hodgson. Hodgson felt it was important for Ray to have his opinion of who would play these parts, as it would help Ray feel comfortable in that role. Felicia Day plays Kinga Forrester, daughter of Clayton Forrester and one of the new Mads in charge of the experiment, now operating from a moon base known as "Moon 13". Day has been one of the last to be cast, because Hodgson has written the concept for Forrester's daughter while casting Ray and the others. Hodgson has met Hari in 2015 Salt Lake Comic Con, where he expressed his love of MST3K to him. Hodgson has seen Hari's appearances on shows like The Guild and Dr. The Hidden Singing-Together Blog , and feel he matches his idea for the character he imagines. Patton Oswalt plays Kinga, Max, or because his character prefers to be known, "TV's TV of TV's Frank"; Hodgson had planned to invite Oswalt, an old friend and a self-confessed MST3K fan, as a special guest writer for the episodes of the revived series, but decided during Kickstarter that he would also fit in front of the camera. Rebecca Hanson, an alum from The Second City, took on the role of Gypsy and Synthia, a replica of Pearl Forrester who helped Kinga. Har Mar Superstar leads "Skeleton Crew", a house band in the Kinga nest.
Pehl, Corbett, and Murphy came to the revival, repeating their roles as Pearl, Brain Guy, and Professor Bobo, respectively. Hodgson opened the show to feature one of the other cast members to make a cameo appearance or help in the creative process. However, Nelson, Weinstein, and Beaulieu stated that they would not be involved with the rise of MST3K; Nelson said, "The brand is not mine, and I made and have made (almost) zero dollars out of it for quitting production in 1999." Conniff notes on his Twitter that Shout! The factory will "cut [former cast members], at least financially" on profits from the series. In addition, other brilliant acting on new episodes include Neil Patrick Harris, Jerry Seinfeld, and Mark Hamill.
Writing and filming
Hodgson aims to follow what patterns are made for fans' favorite episodes of the original series, borrowing the same from the Joel and Mike era; He notes there are about thirty episodes that he and the fans agree universally is the best show, and expect to use this as a template as the basis of the new show. New episodes include the Inventory Exchange which has become part of Joel's era of performances. Additionally, while not required by the Netflix streaming format, this new episode includes a bumper that will wrap around a commercial break if it is displayed on a network television; Hodgson considers this break necessary as a "ceiling cleaner" as well as to support the narrative for Kinga trying to commercialize on the brand MST3K .
Behind the scenes, the lead author is Elliott Kalan, former head writer for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. And Harmon and Joel McHale also wrote for the show, along with the cast members on screen. Hodgson also brought guest writers to certain episodes which included Justin Roiland, Dan Harmon, Rob Schrab, Nell Scovell, Ernie Cline, Pat Rothfuss, and Dana Gould. In addition, Paul & amp; Storm and Robert Lopez compose original songs for new episodes.
The Awakening retains a direct, artificial look from the original, a decision that Hodgson must put against others involved in production. Set and prop designers include Wayne White, Pendleton Ward, Rebecca and Steven Sugar, and Guy Davis, while the special live and practical effects were planned by Adam Savage. Among other staff included restoring the MST3K crew, including: Charlie Erickson, who composed the original theme song and composed new theme themes and other music arrangements; Beez McKeever, who works on original props and designs costumes and props for new events; Crist Ballas does hair design and makeup; and Paul Chaplin, one of the original authors of the show to help write new shows, along with contributions from Pehl and Corbett. Hodgson himself remains unseeded as an executive producer for the remake, though appears briefly as Ardy, one of Kinga's henchmen who sent the episode film Jonah. Hodgson is assisted by Kalan, Richard Foos, Bob Emmer, Garson Foos, Jonathan Stern, and Harold Buchholz. The awakening was produced by Satellite of Love, LLC, Alternaversal Productions, and Abominable Pictures.
Production for the new season begins on January 4, 2016, with movie selection and script writing. The movie selection was narrowed to about twenty films as of February 2016, with rights guaranteed to about half, while Shout! The factory is working to guarantee worldwide distribution rights to others; Hodgson notes that the films are newer than those used in the original series, with "maybe one" from the 1950s/1960s, but did not want to reveal what these films until the episode aired as having the greatest comedy effect on the audience.
Filmmaking and most of the production is completed in September and October 2016 in Los Angeles with a very busy schedule. In revival, Ray, Yount, and Vaughn recorded riffs for all fourteen episodes in a sound studio for one week, allowing them to better align the riff with the movie. It also helps to simplify the process of making a movie theater segment, because they only need to portray the parts. The 'bots are controlled by several dalangs both in theater and in skits; Yount and Vaughn use radio-controlled equipment to move the 'bots' mouth, while members of The Jim Henson Company help manipulate the body, allowing them to achieve an effect they can not perform in the original series sequence as Crow appears to run on his own. All plays for episodes are completed in one day, which does not allow them to make multiple picks unless required.
Supporters of higher-level campaigns can see the first episode on the show "Red Carpet Kickstarter Screening" shown in several theaters during February and March 2017. Fourteen episodes were released on Netflix on April 14, 2017, although Kickstarter supporters had the opportunity to see episodes- episode in the days before this.
During the 2017 "Turkey Day" Marathon, Hodgson announced that Netflix had gained the twelfth-season successor of MST3K .
On June 1, 2018, Hodgson released the Kickstarter update announcing that season 12 will begin filming on June 4th and will contain six episodes, written to encourage bingewatching.
Cast
- Notes
Episode
At the end of the Sci-Fi era, a total of 197 episodes of MST3K in ten seasons have been produced. This excludes the The Green Slime pilot episode, which is used to sell the concept to KTMA but otherwise never aired. The revived event currently consists of a season with fourteen episodes, bringing the number of episodes to 211.
None of the KTMA episodes are playing back nationally or have been released to home videos due to rights issues. Some people consider that the first three KTMA episodes are "missing episodes," because no copy of the fans is known, but master copies of all these episodes still exist according to Mallon. In November 2016, Hodgson reported that master copies of two episodes of "Invaders from the Deep" and "Revenge of the Mysterons from Mars" have been found. Episodes were made available to Kickstarter supporters of the new series on November 25, 2016.
Credit in the first four seasons at Comedy Central includes the phrase "Keep on circulating tapes" to encourage fans to share their VHS recordings with others (since Comedy Central is not widely distributed), although copyright practices are questionable. Although the phrase was removed from credits for legal reasons, the concept of "continuing to distribute tapes" was hosted by event fans to continue helping to introduce others to the event after its broadcast.
Marathon Turkish Day
Annual events, both in the Comedy Central and Sci-Fi Channel era, are Turkish Day marathons that take place on or near the Thanksgiving holiday. The Marathon will feature between six and twelve episodes of re-broadcast, often with new interstitial material between episodes of cast and crew.
After the series rights acquisition, Shout! The factory has streamed the Turkish Day marathon on Thanksgiving Day since 2013, broadcasting six episodes of MST3K and wrapped with introductions from Hodgson with other cast members at any given time. Turkey Day 2015 coincides with Kickstarter for the revival of the event, while Turkey Day 2016 includes Ray's new co-hosting host with Hodgson. Turkey Day 2017 was hosted by Hodgson, Ray and Felicia Day, and ended with a surprise announcement that the show has been updated for another season.
Home videos and digital releases
The home video release of MST3K is complicated by the licensing rights of any flagship movie and any shorts, and because many national television episodes have not yet been released to home videos. Through the current distributor, Shout! Factory, more than 100 films have been cleaned for home media distribution. With the release of Shout from volume 39 episodes of MST3K by 2017, the company anticipates that only about a dozen episodes from 197 of the original series that run will never get to home video due to licensing rights issues from the films shown.
The original home media release was released by Rhino Entertainment, originally started with a single disc release before switching to the four-episode semi-regular volume set. According to Hodgson, the people in Rhino who were involved in the distribution of MST3K finally left Rhino and joined Shout!, Helping convince the publisher to get the rights from Rhino. Since 2008, all releases MST3K have been through Shout! (including some reprints of the first Rhino volume) and usually a multi-episode volume or themed package.
In 2014, 80 episodes of the show are made available for purchase or rental on the Vimeo streaming video site. Yelling! has uploaded several episodes to YouTube with annotations, as documented by The Annotated MST fansite, to explain some sources of jokes in the riff. In February 2015, Shout! launched its own streaming service, Shout! TV Factory, the episodes selected from MST3K are included in the service. Selected episodes are also available on demand via RiffTrax starting November 2015. Twenty episodes of the MST3K season were previously released by Netflix in all regions to anticipate the resurrection series.
All season 11 episodes were released on the DVD/Blu-Ray box set on April 17, 2018, which includes the documentary behind the making of the first resurrection season.
Adaptations
Syndication
In 1993, the event staff selected 30 episodes to be divided into 60 one-hour segments for The Mystery Science Theater Hour . The first series repackaged of the halfway show lasted from November 1993 to July 1994. Reruns continued until December 1994, and it was syndicated to local stations from September 1995 through September 1996, allowing the station to run the series in a slot-hour, or original two-hour version. MST3K returned to television for the first time in ten years in July 2014, when RetroTV began broadcasting the series on Saturday night, with an encore on Sunday night. The following year, they began performing on PBS member stations. In the summer of 2016, Sinclair Broadcast Group and the MGM network, Comet, took the series for Sunday night's weekly game; Incidentally, CW Sinclair station, WUCW in Twin Cities, originating from the series when KTMA-TV, carrying Comet on their second subchannel, returns the series to its original home for the first time in 27 years.
Feature Film
In 1996, Universal Pictures released Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie , a film adaptation where Mike and bots riffed Earth Island . The film was released in DVD form in the United States by Image Entertainment. Universal re-released the film on DVD on May 6, 2008, with a new anamorphic widescreen transfer, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound mix and original footage of the film.
In 1996, the book, The Amazing Colossal Episode Guide (written by a number of cast members), was released, containing a synopsis for every episode from season one to six, and even including behind-the-story screen too. Inside, Murphy tells two stories about the celebrity reaction he encounters. In one, the player goes to record eponymous Dennis Miller; when they were brought backstage to meet Miller, comedians began criticizing the MST3K actors for their movie selection to mock at the recently-appearing "Space Traveler" episode (re-branded version of Oscar -Watch movies Marooned ). Murphy also discusses how he met Kurt Vonnegut, one of his literary heroes. When he mentioned his show and premise to Vonnegut, the authors suggest that even people who work hard on bad movies deserve respect. Murphy then invited Vonnegut to eat with his group, which Vonnegut rejected, claiming that he had other plans. When Murphy and his friends had dinner, he saw Vonnegut eating alone in the same restaurant, saying he had been "confronted... but well confronted" by one of his literary heroes.
Dark Horse Comics announced on February 16, 2017 that they had planned the MST3K comic book series set for early release in 2017. In June 2018, Dark Horse confirmed that the six-issue series will be launched in September 2018, which will feature Jonah and bots riffing on public domain comic books. Hodgson watched the writing.
Other appearances
In 1996, during the promotion for the film, Nelson and the bots were interviewed in a character on MTV, and were spotted in a raucous recording silhouette of MTV News. Also that year, Hodgson was a featured guest on Cartoon Network Space Ghost Coast to Coast. In 1997, E! The Network's
In 1997, PlayStation Underground videogame magazine (Volume 2, Number 1) included Best Brains-produced MST3K on one of their promotional discs. The video opens with a host segment of Mike and Bots that plays some PlayStation games, just to go to the theater to rant a few videos from past magazines. This feature is about seven minutes. The Easter egg on the disc has some behind-the-scenes footage from Best Brain Movies recording the sequence.
In 2007, a new online animated web series, called "The Bots Are Back!", Was produced by Mallon. The series is planning a weekly adventure featuring Crow, Tom Servo, and Gypsy, with Mallon repeating his role as Gypsy and Paul Chaplin as Crow. However, only a few episodes were released, and the series was abandoned due to budget issues. Common internet responses to webisodes are mostly negative.
Hodgson and the team for the revival of 2017 announced the MST3K "Watch Out For Snakes Tour" during mid-2017 covering 29 cities in the United States and Canada. Jonah and the Bots riff on one of two movies for the audience, both Elegant (which has been featured in the original version of MST3K , and popularized the riff "Watch for snakes," but featuring a new riff for this tour) or an unexpected surprise movie: Argoman the Fantastic Superman . The tour featured Ray, Yount and Hanson who repeated their roles as Jonah Heston, Crow and Gypsy/Synthia. Vaughan is not available to perform the Servo because of the birth of his son and the role was covered by Tim Ryder. The tour also features Grant Baciocco as Terry the Bonehead, a pre-recorded performance from Day and Oswalt as Kinga and Max, and a direct introduction from Hodgson.
Hodgson and Ray have also planned to tour at the end of 2018 on the 30th anniversary of MST3K in a format similar to a 2017 tour. Hodgson will re-show Joel Robinson and riffs with Ray and bot during events this.
Reception
In 2004, the show was listed as # 11 on the flagship TV Guide article, "Top 25 Culture Shows Ever!", And included a sidebar that read, "Mike Nelson, writer and star (replacing maker Joel Hodgson ), recently spoke to college audiences: "Nobody is over 25 years old. I have to ask, "Where do you see this show?" I think we have some kind of timeless quality. "" Three years later, TV Guide rewrote the article, and hit MST3K to # 13. In 2007, the event was listed as one of the "100 Best TV Show of All Time" Time magazine. In 2012, the show is listed as # 3 on Entertainment Weekly ' s "25 Best Cult TV Show of the Last 25 Years", with the comment that " MST3K taught us that snarky comments can be more entertaining than the real media. "
The relaunch in 2017 is generally welcomed with similar praise as the original series, in keeping with the event premise spirit but with enough improvement to make it accessible to a modern audience.
Reactions by parodies
The reaction of the people parodied by MST3K has been mixed. Some important negative reactions include Sandy Frank's reaction, which holds the rights of some of the Gamera movies parodied on the show. He said he was "very unhappy" by the mockery directed at him. (The crew once sang "Sandy Frank Song", which says that Frank is "the source of all our pain", "thinking that people come from the trees", Steven Spielberg "will not reply to his call", and implies that he is too lazy to make his own movie). Because of this, Frank reportedly refused to allow the show to be re-broadcast after the MST3K rights ' expired. However, this may actually be a rumor, as other rumors suggest that the price of movie distribution rights Gamera increases beyond what the BBI was able to get as a result of the event's success. According to Shout Factory, the Japanese film studio, Kadokawa Pictures is horrified by the MST3K treatment of the five Gamera movies so they refuse to let Shout release episodes on home videos. Brian Ward (one of the members of Shout! Factory) explains to fans on the official Shout forum! The factory website they try as best they can to convince them, but the Japanese take their movie Gamera very seriously and do not appreciate that they are ridiculed. However, Shout finally was able to remove the episode for a special release in 2011 because rights in North America shifted from Japan to another entity, North America that has no such doubts.
Kevin Murphy once said that Joe Don Baker wanted to beat up the performers for attacking him during Mitchell . Murphy then said Baker might mean by joking, though Mike Nelson said that he deliberately avoided meeting Baker while both happened to live in the same hotel. Jeff Lieberman, director of Squirm , is also very angry with the treatment of MST3K of the film.
Director Rick Sloane was shocked at his treatment of the conclusion of Hobgoblins , in which Sloane himself mercilessly mocked the film's final credits. In a 2008 interview, however, Sloane clarified his comments, saying that "I laughed throughout the episode of MST3K , to the end.I did not expect the humor to suddenly become my own expense.I felt embarrassed when they pulled out pieces boxes and pretended to interview me, I was caught, I have never seen them dismantle other directors before on the show. "However, he praised the success of the MST3K episode by inspiring him to create a sequel Hobgoblins , released in 2009.
However, others are more positive: Robert Fiveson and Myrl Schriebman, producers of Section: The Clonus Horror , say they are "flattered" to see this movie appear on MST3K . Actor Miles O'Keeffe, film star of the Cave Population, called the Best Brain and personally requested a copy of the MST3K treatment from the film, said he enjoyed their cheating. what he considers to be a real experience; according to Hodgson, O'Keeffe said his friends always booed his performance in the movie at the time, and he appreciated the treatment of MST3K. In the form of essay and poetry E. E. Cummings-esque, Mike Nelson paid tribute to O'Keeffe with a mixture of humor and fear.
The reason Rex, stars of Earth Island , has also appeared on MST3K and MST3K credits by introducing the movie to a new generation. The Time Hunters crew held a night party when their filmmaking MST3K was aired and, while the mixed reaction, director David Giancola said, "Most of us are fans and know what will happen and we were laughing out loud and drinking too much.I had an explosion, never laughed so hard in my life. "
Adam West, the 1960s star of the Batman TV series, starred in the Zombie Nightmare , another movie MST3K was ridiculed. The West apparently did not hold a grudge, as he hosted the 1994 "Turkish Day" marathon where episodes featuring the Zombie Nightmare were premiered. Mamie van Doren (which appeared on episode 112, Untamed Youth , and 601 episodes, Girls Town ), Robert Vaughn (episode 315 episode, Teen Cave Man < i>, which he called the worst movie ever made) and Beverly Garland (which has appeared in many movies MST3K - the movie Roger Corman) also hosted the marathon. Appreciation
In 1993, MST3K won the Peabody Award for "producing an ingenious eclectic series": "With reference to everything from Proust to 'Gilligan's Island,' 'Mystery Science Theater 3000' combines great writing and intelligent with an incredible B-grade terrible movie ". In 1994 and 1995, the event was nominated for an Emmy Primetime Award for Exceptional Individual Achievement in Writing for Variety or Music Program, but lost both times to Dennis Miller Live. Every year from 1992 to 1997, it was also nominated for the CableACE Awards. The DVD release has been nominated for the Saturn Awards in 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2018.
Influence
Through MST3K , many obscure movies have been more publicly visible, and some have been considered the worst films ever made and voted into the Bottom 100 in the Internet Movie Database. Of note is Manos: Hand of Destiny , dimmed by MST3K in its fourth season. Manos is a movie with a very low budget produced by Hal Warren, a fertilizer seller at the time, took the courage of a scriptwriter to show that anyone can make a horror movie. The film is suffering from many production problems due to its limited shooting equipment, and many critics describe the results using a riff from MST3K , that "each frame of the film looks like the last photo someone knows". The episode of MST3K featuring Manos is considered one of the most popular and best episodes, and brought manos into the public light as one of the worst films ever produced. The film gained followers of the sect, and there is currently an attempt to return the film to the high-definition quality of the original film roll. MST3K also recounts three films directed by Coleman Francis; The Cuban Red Zone, The Skydivers, and The Beast of Yucca Flats, which brought awareness of Francis's directions and low-budget films, similar to Ed Wood. MST3K was also brought to the center of the lackluster works by Bert I. Gordon, especially the giant B-movie monster, who got attention through the show, and many Japanese kaiju films were imported and dubbed through Sandy Frank producers, especially those in the Gamera series .
MST3K riffing style ' to mock movies, movies, and bad TV shows has been used in other works. In 2003, the Deadly Cinema television series, starring Jami Deadly, debuted, featuring players who make fun of bad movies, MST3K -style. In 2004, the ESPN Classic Cheap Seats series, debuting, featuring two brothers mocking the old sports event clip, MST3K -style, and noteworthy for containing episodes in where MST3K cast members briefly appeared on a cameo to mock the host's own drama. In 2008, the live-to-DVD comedy and comedy series Incognito Cinema Warriors XP debuted, which used the same segment of "video-segment segment", events created, while displaying characters and the plot is completely original. ICWXP received the same sect followers, even earning praise from former MST3K host Michael J. Nelson. In 2010, the television series The movie is Sucks! (and his predecessor Ed's Nite In ), starring Ed the Sock and co-host Liana K and Ron Sparks, debuting. It features players making fun of bad movies. However, creator Steven Kerzner quickly pointed out that MST3K is not "the creator of this kind of format, they are just the most recent and the most famous". In 2011, the motifs of theatrical silhouettes were parodied by golf commentator and talk show host David Feherty in an episode of Feherty . She is shown sitting in front of the big screen and "riffing" while watching footage of golfer Johnny Miller and joining the theater by the stuffed chicken (Frank) and the gnome statue (Costas).
Furthermore, the riffing style of MST3K is considered part of the effect of successful DVD commentaries and YouTube reviewers and Let's Play style commentators. DVD releases for both Ghostbusters and Men in Black use a format similar to Shadowrama for the "in vision" comment feature. The concept of social television, in which social media is integrated into the television viewing experience, is significantly influenced by MST3K . These social media practices from live-tweeting riffs and jokes on broadcast shows, such as for movies like Sharknado , are rooted in MST3K . The MST3K approach has inspired Internet movie critics to make comedic movie reviews approaches, such as through RedLetterMedia and the Junkies Screen, which are considered to be more than just snarking in movies but aim to help viewers understand the flawed film and techniques and their use in films that are less acceptable.
Direct public riffing performances have been organized by various groups in various cities in the United States and Canada, including Cineprov (Atlanta, Georgia), Pancake Master Theater (Austin, TX), The Gentlemen Hecklers (Vancouver, BC Canada), Comedy Determined (Kansas City, Missouri), FilmRoasters (Richmond, Virginia), Moxie Skinny Theater 3000 (Springfield, Missouri), Riff Raff Theater (Iowa City, Iowa), Twisted Flicks (Seattle, Washington), and Turkey Shoot (Metro Cinema in Garneau, Edmonton , Alberta, Canada). Canadian sketch comedy group Loading Ready Run produces the Unskippable show for the Escapist website, which applies the MST3K premise to the video game play scene.
Fandom
MST3K , broadcasting during the emergence of the Internet for the public good, developing a huge fan base during its ever-expanding broadcasts. The show already has a post-based fan club, which can be written by people and some letters and pictures read in the next episode, and producers encourage fans to share their episode recording with others. At its peak, the "MST3K Fan Club" has more than 50,000 members, and Best Brains receives over 500 letters each week. Event enthusiasts generally refer to themselves as "MSTies". Usenet newsgroup rec.arts.tv.mst3k.misc and rec.arts.tv.mst3k.announce was founded in the mid-1990s for announcements and discussions related to the show. A type of fan fiction called MiSTings, where fans will add funny comments to other typically bad fan fiction works, are very popular in these groups. The fan-run website Satellite News keeps track of news and information about related performances and projects from its cast members. Another fan site, The Annotated MST , is trying to catalog and explain all the obscure popular culture references used in a particular episode.
In addition to fandom performances, a number of celebrities have expressed their love for the show. One of the most famous celebrity fans is Frank Zappa, who went as far as calling Best Brains, calling MST3K the "funniest on TV" according to Beaulieu. Zappa became a show friend, and after his death, episode 523 was dedicated to him. Other famous celebrity fans include Al Gore, Penn Jillette, and Patton Oswalt.
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Source of the article : Wikipedia
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