1306-Demon Squad

Film Year:  2019

Genre:  Noir, Horror, Fantasy

Director:  Thomas Smith

Starring:  Khristian Fulmer, Erin Lilley, Leah Christine Johnson

MST Season:  13

Host:  Joel

The Movie

*I HAVE SURVIVED WATCHING THIS MOVIE UNRIFFED*

There's this Jack Black movie from a while back called Be Kind Rewind where he and Mos Def are video store employees (remember those?) who accidentally erase every tape in their store.  To try and save the impending disaster of customer service they decide to "home brew" remake every movie they have starring themselves using a home camcorder.  The results of their "remakes" are about what you would expect, but the people of their little community absolutely love them and they become an unexpected hit.  To be blunt, I always thought that movie was kinda dumb.  In some weird way however, Demon Squad made me appreciate its premise a bit more.

Demon Squad in several ways reminds me of the type of movie Jack Black and Mos Def would make in Be Kind Rewind, only maybe by people who look to be a bit more professional.  This movie certainly wasn't made by two dipshits with a VHS tape, though by the standards of indie filmmaking by 2019 standards this film is very low tech.  Like lower than the cost of an episode of Mystery Science Theater (even original series...maybe not KTMA).  For low-budget filmmaking, this movie is more ambitious than something like Clerks so it stretches its money pretty thin.  If I were to compare Demon Squad to any film featured previously on Mystery Science Theater it would be Final Sacrifice, and I mean that as a favorable comparison, mind you.  That movie was made by film students who had access to some equipment and went out and made something.  Demon Squad has that same vibe, as if they could be filming on their local street and the director is telling all the actors "Okay, say your lines quick and let's beat it before the cops come."  In spirit I'd say it's also close to Time Chasers, where it's clear the filmmakers have a very specific movie they want to make, don't have a lot of money to do it, but decided "Fuck it, we'll do it anyway, and have fun making it."

The film's story does come off like it was adapted from fan fiction lying around for the TV show Angel or the comic series John Constantine:  Hellblazer that has been reformatted with original characters to avoid getting sued, while also paying homage to established film noir tropes that most audiences would likely be familiar with ("A mysterious woman walks into the cynical detective's office..." ect).  Demon Squad tells the tale of supernatural detective Nick Moon and his assistant Daisy who are recently visited by the beautiful heiress Lilah Fontaine, who hires them to search for her missing father.  As the duo dig deeper into the mystery, things become more nefarious and complicated than they initially appear.

Surface level, there is a lot that can be dismissed about Demon Squad.  The cinematography is soft looking, the music is barren, the sound quality is both inconsistent and often trashy, and its story feels more like a riff on pop entertainment than anything with high artistic merit.  But that's only if I approach this movie like a film critic, which I pride myself in not being because fuck that noise.  Demon Squad isn't a normal movie and I feel shouldn't be judged like it is.  It's a movie with certain limitations and resources made by people who got their hands dirty and took the time to put together something with what little they had.  They even had the audacity to put in make-up, puppets, and special effects, sometimes crude ones, but this is an example when bonus points for effort should be awarded.  This is a movie where it seems like its own existence is a reward for the people who made it.

What probably crosses Demon Squad over into its own level of enjoyability is its cheekiness.  Everyone involved in the production knows this whole thing looks and feels kind of silly, so there is a level of taking it just serious enough to make it feel like a narrative but goofing around just enough for them to feel like they're admitting to the audience "We know what this is, just play along."  And for a movie this low on the totem pole of cinema, I'd actually say that there's a good argument that can be made that the acting in this movie is pretty solid.  It's community theater style acting, but it's charismatic community theater style acting.  The big drawback to the actors is that they feel like they're at war with the sound equipment, which drains out their line delivery to the point where sometimes it sounds garbled up.  Some of the make-up effects might have ate up the boom mic budget, not sure.

The worst thing I can say about Demon Squad is that it's a movie that will provoke a cynical reaction from cynical viewers who will dismiss it immediately.  However, and I cannot stress this enough, it is not a cynical film itself, which is something I can't say for a lot of films on Mystery Science Theater 3000.  It's people with a camera having fun, and they can't guarantee that the audience that stumbles upon their creation has a good time but they're clearly of the attitude "If you get it, you get it."  There is something innocent and pure about that, and I'm personally in favor of it.

The Episode

It seems hard to believe.  Nearly thirty years after it aired on Comedy Central, Mitchell is no longer Joel Hodgson's final episode.  I'm still processing this information, but the Father of Mystery Science Theater 3000 is back in the driver's seat.  He no longer has Kevin Murphy or Trace Beaulieu at his side, but this is an event nonetheless.

Was it worth it?  Was it worth taking away his classic final episode for the nostalgia sell on the new season?  I'm going to say yes.  I laughed a lot during this episode and I enjoyed seeing him back in his classic role, which he makes it feel like he had never left.  It doesn't scratch my list of top ten Joel era episodes, but Joel has a lot of solid heavy hitters under his belt and that was always unlikely.  The downside?  Now my nostalgia is weeping for a new Mike episode.

So, how is Joel back?  I believe last we checked in on him he was managing a hot fish shop.  But at the end of Doctor Mordrid we saw Dr. Erhardt travel through time to pick up an old host from the series and it was either Joel or Mike.  Judging by the surprise on Kinga and Synthia's expressions, they must have been expecting Mike.  Unfortunately while Erhardt succeeded in bringing an old host onboard, he botched going to the past and snatched Joel up in the year 3000 instead, because Joel is living a thousand years in the future?  And he's trapped on the Satellite of Love again in this time?  I don't know what's up with any of this and it's a bit convoluted and odd, but considering Dr. Kabahl is a character from the future as well, maybe all of this is going to tie up in a neat little package by the end.

But whatever reason Joel has for being over a millennia old, it's fun to see him back, even without his Bots, so the Mads just steal Emily's and give them to him.  They are certainly showing the strengths of the flatimation format with this episode, because the green screen allows them to change their Satellite of Love set in an instant.  They created a new flatimation set based on Joel's second through fifth season SOL bridge design and it looks adorable.  They even created a new version of Joel's doorway sequence, which looks far more charming than the reformatted hallway from the Netflix seasons.  Joel's host segments feel like they're ripped out of a classic episode of the series, as they use the bar from the movie to set up a Cheers parody, play improv comedy for the Mads, and have a fun Invention Exchange where he turns Tom Servo's head into a mood ring inspired light (while Max has drill gun lassos or something).  He also gets to meet Pearl for the first time, which absolutely blew my mind because I don't think I've ever realized these two characters never crossed paths (not even in Soultaker).  Also he tweaks Servo to his factory voice setting.

Factory voice setting?  Oh, did I not mention this?  J. Elvis Weinstein returns to the series, not only as Erhardt, but he also voices Tom Servo for half the episode.

If you're nerding out right now, you're my kind of MSTie.

This isn't exactly a surprise really.  Jonah let it slip last year that they were looking to get J. Elvis and Bill Corbett to play Servo and Crow in Joel's episodes last year before Bill publicly said he had been approached but turned down the offer.  A few livestreams back Joel talked about riffing with both J. Elvis and Conor McGiffin in his theater segments, which was an odd combo to throw out since they were both Servos (J. Elvis had played Crow in two episodes of KTMA, but honestly it would have been weird if they had brought him back to voice Crow.  I mean, I know Kelsey Ann Brady's Crow is divisive, but no thanks).  J. Elvis riffs the second half of the movie, while Conor riffs the first half, and the role of Crow is relegated to Kelsey Ann Brady throughout the entire episode.  Since Joel's episodes were filmed after Nate Begle departed the series, Kelsey doesn't appear to be dubbed in this episode.  Oddly enough, despite being a puppeteer who has handled Crow, she isn't listed as his puppeteer in the credits, which cites Grant Baciocco (who plays Waverly and handles Hampton Yaunt's Crow).  I'm assuming Kelsey voiced Crow similarly to how Hampton Yaunt voices him, with a mouth controlling trigger while she watches from off-camera.  At any rate, I think Kelsey's riff delivery is a vast improvement on her previous episodes, because she's allowed to play him as she would play him instead of retrofitting herself over someone else's performance in post.  Her riffing delivery in this episode is fabulous and it definitely has me more excited for the future of her on this series.

Speaking of riffing, it's about time we discussed the movie portion.  Now, I have no idea how it was decided who was hosting what episode this season.  Someone could have read all the titles out loud and Joel, Jonah, and Emily could have yelled "DIBS!" at any moment, or they could have picked them out of a hat.  But whatever the case may be, Demon Squad is a very interesting film to give Joel.  This movie is a bit different than the types of films he has riffed in the past, even taking Cinematic Titanic and the live tours into consideration.  If you were to sort every Mystery Science Theater film by release date (which I have done because boredom and curiosity), the most recent film that Joel had tackled before Demon Squad was 1987's Robot Holocaust, which he riffed all the way back in the first season.  Skipping two whole decades of film, now he has Demon Squad on his riffing resume, which is currently the most recent film on the series (taking that title from last season's Atlantic Rim).  When he announced he was coming back for this season and they later announced the films for the year, I would have assumed he would have wanted to take films that would call back to his time on the show, like Gamera vs. Jiger and The Million Eyes of Sumuru.  Instead he threw us a curve ball to keep us on our toes.

I'm on the record saying I get a kick out of this movie.  This is my third time watching it and I still think it's the cutest thing I've ever seen (I even own it on DVD at this point).  But when you have a movie that looks like it's held together by duct tape and superglue, then there is a lot to make fun of.  The movie has a lot of dramatic pausing, allowing the riffers to get their little additions in, while the somewhat tacky production value can provide some reliable fodder.  They add their quips to the movie's own quips, as Nick Moon does his badass one-liner over a bad guy and says "The doctor is in," and Joel continues "And there's a copay!"  His assistant Daisy sasses him about her being the only applicant for her job, to which Joel responds "Another LinkedIn success story!"  I adore the riffs on Daisy's premonition power, where her eyes turn white as she reads people, which prompts up Crow's quick prophecy "WINTER IS COMING!"  One of the biggest laughs of the episode for me was a romantic scene between Nick and Lilah where they're about to kiss, but Nick hands her a gun instead, causing Crow to lay out the most perfect line "I brought protection!"  Sometimes the most on-the-nose thing you can say is still the funniest.

And of course, one of my favorite lines of the season:  "It's the Men's Warehouse repo men!"

A part of me wants to play it cautious about overrating this episode.  I have several unique factors that are inclining me to love it, the first of which is that I think the movie is an absolute joy, which not everyone else will see it that way so buyer beware.  I thought Doctor Mordrid was a blast too, though I was more refrained on my enthusiasm for that one because the commentary was weaker.  Also this episode plays with an obvious nostalgia toybox by bringing Joel Hodgson and J. Elvis Weinstein out of riffing retirement and playing out the episode like the golden days.  I was smiling ear to ear for ninety minutes straight.  Will others?

But the hell with it, I throw caution to the wind because I AM the wind, baby!  A good MST episode is partially about its mojo and whether you can groove with it and Demon Squad is full mojo and I am fully in sync with the tune.  This is an episode I'll be giving full marks to, because a fun movie and a lot of laughs are too good for me to pass up.  I see this becoming a favorite comfort episode in the future.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Classic

The Livestream

Hello darkness, my old friend...tech issues are back in the Gizmoplex, knocking this stream back a good solid eighty minutes after it was supposed to start.  This time we didn't even have White Dot to entertain us!  I want my money back just for that alone!

Nah.  As far as I'm concerned I've already gotten my money's worth.  This season has been steadily improving after it's middling first two episodes and it got to a point where I got an episode I consider S-tier.  Beyond Atlantis and Munchie were close but each had at least one aspect that tempered them for me.  Demon Squad isn't a perfect episode either, but I'm on top of the world when I watch it and I roll with laughter.  This Kickstarter has already paid off.

Still, don't stop making those remaining seven episodes, dammit.

But while everything is off to a late start, our folks at the livestream make it worthwhile to stick through it.  Our stream tonight is cut into halves, one to talk about the show and one to talk about the movie.  It's understandable, because they're in a situation where they have an episode that has a lot to talk about on their end while they once again managed to score special guests involved in the film itself.  The first half has host Matt McGinnis bring out returning original castmembers Joel Hodgson and J. Elvis Weinstein to discuss returning to the theater after all these years.  Emily Marsh is here too, who only has a slight cameo in the episode but wrote for it as well.  They have some questions for J. Elvis about reprising his roles as Servo and Dr. Erhardt after all these years.  J. Elvis doesn't seem to think it's that big of a stretch, claiming Erhardt isn't that deep of a character so it was pretty easy.  They also talk about Servo's voice tinkering in this episode, which Joel claims was a callback to the early days when J. Elvis would change Servo's voice and they'd write it out as Joel messing with his voicebox.  

Joel also gives some insight as to why Demon Squad was selected as his big return movie, which is not an overly complicated answer, where it just came down to film selection scheduling and they thought the riff script would work for Joel.  Slight peek behind the curtain, this question was asked by someone named "Thomas," but that Thomas was actually Demon Squad's director Thomas Smith who posted the question on the Discourse's Q&A forum.  That's fun that they had his question picked and they slyly played coy about who asked it (or Matt didn't notice, either or).

But J. Elvis kicks off after a half hour, and Matt wheels out the special guests for the night (not that J. Elvis isn't special...oh you know what I mean!), who are the filmmakers responsible for Demon Squad:  director/co-writer Thomas Smith and his wife and co-writer/co-star ("Daisy") Erin Lilley Smith!  I was excited to see them tonight, because I've had pleasant interactions with them on social media for the last few months and they are absolutely lovely people who have a ton of interesting tidbits on this movie.  They have done interviews about how it came together (here is another one made last year after they found out it was going to be on the show, unfortunately Erin didn't get a song in the episode like she wanted) and have shared some photos and factoids on Twitter that were fun to see.  It was great to see them discuss this movie with this group of wonderful people who brought their film to a new audience!

Thomas and Erin have so many fun facts about this movie, as I hoped there would be because it's such an interesting and scrappy production.  There is a bit of discussion about how they came up with the concept, claiming Nick Moon was a side character in an abandoned story that they decided to set an entire movie around.  They discuss their inspiration, which ranges from The Maltese Falcon to John Constantine to Kolchak the Night Stalker.  A lot of excellent tidbits come from special effects work, as they confirm that some of the make-up did come from a Spirit Halloween store like Max claimed in the episode, and also talked about their Frankendemon prosthetic, which they called a budget buster.  They also point out that this creature was also used in Star Raiders, which was a RiffTrax Live event a few years ago and now I totally have to rewatch it.

Joel can't help but admire what they were able to do with so little, especially the green smoke effects.  Thomas and Erin even point out an effect that nobody noticed (including myself) where they weren't allowed on the upper story of the house that was used as Lilah's mansion, but cheated a shot where one of the villainous Stitchers was looking down from above by green screening the actress and compositing her into the image.  It's totally seamless and this info actually floored me.

They talk a bit about the locations they worked at and Joel can't help but ask if a riff was correct about them filming in a Burger King basement.  They say no, but another riff about the bar previously being a Pizza Hut is right on the money (which is amazing that they hit a bullseye on that, if you think about it).  Speaking of locations, one of the Discourse members brings up that he was a regular patron of that bar and offered photo evidence to back it up, which brought some spectacular reactions from Thomas, Erin, and even Emily.

Emily can't mask her joy during this livestream, because she is like me and is a fan of this movie.  She talks about how she enjoyed watching a movie that was her generation of cheesy movies and even Conor McGiffin texts her to tell Thomas and Erin "Thank you for making a movie that was actually fun to watch."  Full agreement here.  TEAM NICK MOON!  You can tell Emily is touched by Thomas and Erin talking about how they met and not only became a couple but started making zero-budget films together.  She also excitedly looks up Thomas and Erin's first film, The Night Shift (no not the Ron Howard directed Henry Winkler/Michael Keaton/Shelley Long movie), after the duo casually mention it and claims she's going to find it ASAP.

I think Emily is one of those people who I would just crash on the couch with, find some garbage on Tubi, and just shit talk an entire night away with.  This is my entire vibe, man.

I had so much fun tonight.  This episode is already a favorite of mine and sitting down with the cast and crew of both the show and the movie and see them get into a delightful roundtable discussing all facets of the show that make me love it so much.  I'm almost disappointed we have to wait a full month for another episode, but they've been spoiling us with the biweekly scheduling lately.  Maybe I need the tribute event and accompanying short to cool down.

But even considering that, all I can say after this livestream is "Demon Squad 2 when?"

#RestoreTheNickMoonVerse

Oops, wrong screenshot!