Are You Popular? (Rifftrax Shorts)

Rifftrax Year:  2008
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

Folks, I watched Mystery Science Theater when I was in high school.  I was never popular.

This short seemingly aimed at nobody in particular wonders on in a daze, trying to figure out if it had a point or not.  It tells the tale of a girl at school who a lot of boys like, and the way she balances dates.  That's about it.

I'm certain there was something quaintly informative about this short that's trying to burst out, but I fail to see how it was helpful at all.  Was it made for high school girls who need to know how to balance boys in their schedule?  Was it made for boys in an attempt to teach them how to approach girls who are popular with other boys?  What about the unpopular, low self-esteem girls?  Is it meant to make them wallow in self-pity until they get home, cry into their pillows, and long for the sweet embrace of death?

If you're looking for answers to any of that, Are You Popular? will answer none of them.

The riffing is fairly high quality, as the naive and obvious production comes under fire.  The boys love characters with a certain amount of self-aware awkwardness, which is every teenager in a short like this.  Mike, Kevin, and Bill will play up all of these flawed attributes with the greatest of ease and easily get a laugh.  One of the highlights is an out-of-the-box riff in which Kevin does a play-by-play of a boy asking a girl on a date as if he were a sports announcer, which is a brilliant run-on monologue.

One minor nitpick:  there is a moment in which the narrator brings up the idea of how much fun it would be to bring another couple home with them.  While this hilarious on its own comment is riffed on with the line "But it might be awkward the next morning," I really feel there should have been a riff that could have played like gangbusters here.  But maybe anything more might have been a bit too on-the-nose.

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