1312-The Bubble

Film Year:  1966

Genre:  Science Fiction

Director:  Arch Oboler

Starring:  Michael Cole, Deborah Walley, Johnny Desmond

MST Season:  13

Host:  Joel

The Movie

*I HAVE SURVIVED WATCHING THIS MOVIE UNRIFFED*

During the Kickstarter for this season of Mystery Science Theater, Joel had made the comment of having just screened a movie that "ruined our day" and he felt was "The New Manos."  The movie he was referring to was a little flick called The Bubble (which coincidentally came out the same year as Manos).  So, with those large expectations, what is The Bubble?

The Bubble is a paranoia sci-fi thriller about a husband and wife who make an emergency landing in a small town just as their baby is about to be born.  After their little miracle is brought into the world, they begin to notice the people of the town act like odd zombies who move around in a near-lifeless drone.  Chilled by everyone's behavior, they try to leave and find that the entire vicinity is surrounded by a sort of plastic shield.  Theorizing that the entire town is trapped in a dome created by aliens, they conspire to make their getaway.

Of course, it's a story we have seen before.  One of the first things to pop into one's head when thinking about this movie is the Stephen King novel Under the Dome, or even The Simpsons Movie.  Those both came out many years after The Bubble, but we can see similar stories being told way back in the days of Twilight Zone with Where is Everybody? or The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street.  Twilight Zone very much seems to be on The Bubble's mind, as it plays out very much like an average episode where characters find themselves in strange surroundings and have to guess what is going on and how to navigate through them.  The problem is your average episode of Twilight Zone is a half an hour long, while The Bubble takes a concept that might make a swell episode and expands it to three times that length.  It feels like it's taking forever to get from one plot point to the next and when it doesn't, it feels like it's running circles as the audience is ready for the narrative to be three steps beyond what it's doing.  I'd like to stress, the premise of The Bubble is fine, it's just dull.  It gets so stale that the audience begins to feel like a trapped animal along with the characters.

The movie could almost be some sort of performance art, because it's replicating the feeling of being in a cage to an audience that was supposed to be watching a movie about people trapped in a cage.

The movie gets so aggressively unpleasant as it goes, which seems to be intentional based on how unsafe the characters are feeling.  Things just start getting befuddling after a while, as our characters seemingly kidnap a can-can dancer from town and take her along with them for no reason at one point and, even then, hardly acknowledge her existence.  Things tip to a breaking point as our characters are feeling so helpless that they start talking about mercy killing their baby and even possible cannibalism as food becomes scarce.  I'm not sure if I'm feeling the right anxiety at these scenarios that the movie intends however, because it wants me to be worried about what's going to happen and instead I just feel like I'm stuck watching this thing and I'm very uncomfortable with that.

Moving away from the story, this production was filmed utilizing what was a supposed new 3D technology called Space-Vision, which has tech specs that I'm sure would bore most viewers, so I won't repeat them, though the film's director Arch Oboler has a varied career that somehow ended with him pioneering new 3D technologies, also directing 3D films Bwana Devil and Domo Arigato.  The acting is reasonably solid with notable performers in the leads, including Mod Squad star Michael Cole, Gidget Goes Hawaiian title performer Deborah Walley, and singer Johnny Desmond in a supporting role.

Is The Bubble "The New Manos?"  I'm going to say no.  The thing about Manos is that it's such a bizarre film from a production standpoint that it's hard to get a foothold on to figure out what you're supposed to think of it.  The only other film I can think of that matches Manos in that category is Birdemic:  Shock and Terror.  The Bubble is a functional production, so it already has a leg-up on Manos.  It's just an unhinged one that is trying to be a ride but results in the viewer claiming "I want to get off."  It's a shock to the system in trying to stick with a movie to the very end and it doesn't even pay off for those who do.

The Episode

The hype for this movie led straight into the episode, where Kinga starts championing this film as the one of the worst things they've ever shown, and our test subject is none other than Joel, who is like "Okie Dokie" and takes it in stride.  For a flick that has been hyped up as the worst of the season, as well as the worst since the relaunch, very little is made out of it since that.  Crow gets pissed off at it once or twice, as the movie's lack of momentum irritates the Bot, but the only real reaction to the quality of the film is Crow coming out of the theater saying "Well, that sucked."  Munchie got more feedback than The Bubble.

As an aside note, I would argue that The Bubble is indeed the worst movie this season.  Or maybe the most unpleasant, depending on your definition of worst.  Mileage may vary depending on your tolerance for Munchie.  Some might even hate Demon Squad more (those people are incorrect, and I will fight them).  It's hard for me to say that this movie is worse than Carnival Magic though.  At least The Bubble maintains some semblance of a premise.

The Bubble is one of those episodes that I feel I'm going to need time with.  The problem I'm having with this episode as it's freshly released is that it's one of those episodes with a movie that sucks the air out of the room.  Mystery Science Theater 3000 should be primarily a fun experience, and sometimes the movie can be a bit too overbearing to really take in an episode on first viewing.  Episodes like Monster A-Go Go or the Coleman Francis films had to grow on me as I eventually appreciated what they brought to the table.  Even Manos left me a bit blindsided after my first viewing, and as I recovered, I began to realize that I didn't even have an opinion on the riff because I was too focused on the movie.  I'm a bit fortuitous on The Bubble in that I had watched most of the movies this year before the season started, The Bubble included, so I was already familiar with it.  But like the bubble in the film itself, this movie seems pretty impenetrable.  I got a steady stream of chuckles from this riff, but my biggest laugh of the episode came from Synthia's final line before the end credits, well outside of the theater.  The Bubble is a bad movie, but it's one that's hard to make funny.

That's not to say I didn't think the commentary offered much, because there are good lines tossed at it.  I like how Joel and the Bots mock the male lead's constant theories as to what's going on, because The Bubble doesn't so much as have an explained story so much as it has his character try and guess what the story is.  They're even a little dirtier in this episode than they normally are with the relaunch seasons, coming up with more risque jokes that toe that "family show" line (including Crow saying a certain T-word while punning during a breast-feeding scene).  I'm glad they still have that spirit in them.  Where was it during Batwoman and Sumuru?

I enjoyed the host segments of the episode.  A couple of them are setting up the premise for next month's holiday special season (series?) finale, The Christmas Dragon, as Joel, Jonah, and Emily crack out an entire plan in that Dr. Seuss rhyming schtick they've been doing whenever they've interacted for the last few episodes.  They plant the seed in Pearl's head to suggest to Kinga that she should put all the hosts on one Satellite for an all-host episode, which Pearl seems keen on.  They have my curiosity on this, so I'm intrigued to see what is in store.

Another segment that tickled me was the segment where Tom Servo confirms he can't see in three dimensions, which goes along with all the weird vision problems that Servo's bubble seems to have had over the years.  Joel creates a pair of goggles that allow Servo to enter the world of The Bubble, which goes about as well as you'd expect.  The Invention Exchange features Joel creating popcorn seasonings out of other theater foods and Kinga creates eyeglass protectors for your face that backfire for Max.  The intro to the episode is almost a bonus Invention Exchange, as Joel and the Bots show off a bunch of Star Trek influenced rebranded products.

I can see The Bubble being a bit of a polarizing episode.  I think there are going to be factions that love it, factions that just can't get past the movie to give the episode a fair shake, and factions that think the whole thing is boring and wonder what the hubbub was about.  I think every episode of the series has people split into those categories, honestly, though usually one is bigger than the others.  The Bubble is hard to gage because I'm not fully prepared to cement what I think about this episode yet.  If I were to say what I think right now is that I had a few good laughs but was mostly indifferent to it.  Compare that to my feeling of "I feel like I got hit by a truck" that Manos left me with, and I can't help but think the experience was underwhelming.

⭐⭐

Average

The Livestream

I'll confess to being a bit disappointed in this livestream, because it feels to me like they were rushing through it.  I believe most of these aftershows run around fifty minutes (give or take), while this one ran less than forty.  Mostly this stream consisted of Matt McGinnis, Joel Hodgson, Devon Coleman, Mary Jo Pehl, and Tim Ryder in sort of a support group circle talking about their feelings toward this movie.  Matt has nothing but hate, Joel is fascinated by its vibe, Devon compares it to having an eternal flight layover, Tim is frustrated by its meandering, and Mary Jo just says it stunk.  They all have thoughts and theories as to what kind of movie it's going for, and Tim even did some wiki research on the director (like I do for this blog, lol).  A lot of the conclusions mimic the ones that I was thinking of when I first watched it several months ago.

There is no Q&A session to speak of; the second stream in a row lacking one (third if you count the Devil Doll tribute).  Normally I wouldn't mind missing out on frothy fan questions like if "If you were an alien, what town would you bubble?" or whatever the fuck, but this stream did need to be beefed up a bit.  It all feels like a very slight justification for why they chose and hyped this movie by bringing in the people on staff who hated working on it the most.  I'm not even entirely certain why Mary Jo is here, because other than playing Pearl at the end (which is something they don't talk about), she didn't have anything to do with this episode.  I won't complain about having more Mary Jo in my life, though.

There is only one real question brought to the table for the talking heads, and it's mostly an excuse to plug a poll in the Discourse forum.  Maybe it's to plug the Discourse forum in general, because it seems the writing is on the wall and Twitter is getting demolished, so they probably want that community to flock there to keep in touch with the people working on the show.  Anyway, the question of the night is what is the single worst movie featured on the series.  Joel sticks to his guns and says Manos (and The Bubble), while Matt and Mary Jo hate Red Zone Cuba, which Matt claims he has never finished.  Tim brings up Monster A-Go Go, which he also claims he hasn't finished (but knows the ending to? Maybe through reputation?).  Devon has some very detailed feelings about Overdrawn at the Memory Bank, which is a movie that's constantly reminding him about a better one.  Matt says the chat brings up Castle of Fu Manchu.

All worthy choices, but I'm team Manos.  It's probably the boring selection, but I can never forget the first time I watched that movie and nothing else comes close.  Monster A-Go Go is probably a sturdy second but isn't worse than Manos because that fake telephone ring alone is hysterical.  Worst movie Mike riffed is probably Red Zone Cuba or Hobgoblins, for different reasons, while the Jonah flick that left a bad taste in my mouth is Carnival Magic.  Emily doesn't have a huge selection so far, though Beyond Atlantis is easily the worst one.

Spoiler Alert:  The Christmas Dragon is a doozy, so I think that's probably the worst flick featuring Emily's participation.  It just hasn't aired yet.  But her Bots both watched The Bubble, which is admittedly worse.

And that's it.  Matt plugs the Vault Picks this month, as well as spoiling the Turkey Day line-up (which will feature two Gizmoplex episodes in Santo and Beyond Atlantis).  Other than that, it's just Bubble venting, rough movie talk, and bye-bye.  It's slighter than I've come to expect from a livestream, but hey, maybe Matt just wants to curl up and cry from having to watch this movie again.

There won't be another stream this month outside of the Turkey Day marathon, but in mid-December we'll have four streams within four days concluding with the release of The Christmas Dragon.  I don't think it takes a genius to figure out that we're getting tibute events for Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, Santa Claus, and The Christmas That Almost Wasn't.  Or did I just ruin the Gizmoplex's Christmas presents to us?

1311-The Mask

Film Year:  1961

Genre:  Horror

Director:  Julian Roffman

Starring:  Paul Stevens, Claudette Nevins, Bill Walker

MST Season:  13

Host:  Jonah

The Movie

*I HAVE SURVIVED WATCHING THIS MOVIE UNRIFFED*

Psychiatrist Dr. Allan Barnes receives news that one of his patients has committed suicide, who had been claiming to be having nightmares about death, blaming these nightmares on a mysterious tribal mask.  Dr. Barnes then finds that his patient has sent him a package containing the mask.  Barnes finds himself drawn to this mask and eventually puts it on...

Oh wait, wrong movie.

So, it turns out that this mask brings the evil in one's soul to the surface and Barnes begins seeing psychedelic imagery of death whenever he wears the mask.  Eventually he finds he is unable to stop putting on the mask, becoming addicted to it like a drug.  But the more he wears it, the more he begins to crave taking another person's life.  Eventually he is all...

According to the notes on the Kino 3D Blu-ray of this movie, The Mask is said to be the first horror movie filmed in Canada (I have no clue if this is true or not).  Wikipedia notes it as one of Canada's biggest marketing pushes in the US at the time, leaning heavily on the film's 3D novelty.  The entire film wasn't in 3D, mind you, but rather all of the scenes in which Dr. Barnes puts on the titular mask and sees a bunch of images of people with melted faces and skulls in sequences that are like Mario Bava meets Carnival of Souls.  People were signaled to "PUT THE MASK ON" by hearing that repeated line of dialogue in the film and were supposed to put these cute things on their faces:

These sequences are the movie's highlights, as they are pretty effectively spooky and will effectively burn their psychedelic imagery into a viewer's brain.  There are three sequences in total and each is as memorable as the last.  If the rest of the movie were as memorable, this movie would have it made.

I'd hesitate to call The Mask a bad movie, because when it's hitting, the movie is on fire.  The issue that becomes problematic with it is its stilted script.  Barnes is a dull character to center the film around, and while the addictive nature of the film is interesting, the corruption of his soul isn't.  He turns from okay guy to psychopath fairly quickly in the narrative which causes the movie to peak early with few places to go.  It tries to create some tension between him and his fiancé, and there is an interesting note in the climax where he tries to put the mask on her face and it doesn't work on her, implying he's either insane or she has no evil in her soul.

Other tension is at work with Barnes relationship with supporting characters, including a secretary who is attracted to him and a detective who is investigating his patient's death.  The former has a pretty poor story arc in the film, as she's almost a non-entity in it then suddenly is in love with him as if the audience should have known all along.  He then nearly chokes her to death and she still decides to be alone with him in that aftermath, where he again tries to kill her and she's like "WHAT?"  As for the latter, I get why his character is necessary in the narrative, but his motivation is often all over the map.  Most of the time he's butting in for practically no reason at all and the movie writes it off as "a hunch."  He's a very assumptive detective that seems to care little for evidence.

The Mask is half of a great movie and half a dull one.  If it worked on its own humanity element, then maybe the element of man's "evil nature" would be more powerful.  Instead, it just feels a bit like an engine that can't stop sputtering that roars to life in five-minute intervals.  It's a cool movie nonetheless, it just doesn't hit the high it aims for.

The Episode

To hell with Avatar:  The Way of Whatever, this is the 3D event of the year!

The Mask was selected to be the first Mystery Science Theater 3000 Halloween Special, which might be stretching it a bit as we've done horror movies like this in the past, but they're correct in saying we've never had an episode that is strictly Halloween centric.  We've had several Christmas specials and we've had a Thanksgiving special, but nothing directly Halloween themed.  It's also the first MST episode released in 3D*, with a movie that was made with 3D sequences to suit the format.  It's not MST's first 3D movie though, as both Robot Monster and Revenge of the Creature were originally released in the format.  Also, the next movie featured, The Bubble, was released in 3D as well.

*Of note, the episode isn't entirely in 3D.  The Mask was originally released as a partially 3D movie and the episode reflects that, presenting only those sequences in 3D and the rest in plain ol' 2D.  The host segments of the episode are also mostly 2D, but they give us a treat by presenting the entire closing segment in 3D, including a fun 3D door sequence out of the theater.

So, let's unpack this 3D gimmick.  Is it worth the effort?  Well, it could have been worse.  Here's the deal, 3D can easily be a hit and miss experience (often due to how much effort is put into it, as post-Avatar 3D post-conversions in 2010 proved).  Anaglyph 3D, like this episode was released as, is easy to get angry at, because even if it's good it will kill your retinas.  This makes the selection of The Mask for this episode seem pretty smart, because it allows you a break from the 3D to let your eyes rest.  As for the 3D quality, some shots are better than others.  The 3D is at its best when there are large sets to show off, giving scale for the format.  If it's just a face onscreen, it looks flat.  Things jutting out at the screen do successfully pop out, so that's a success.  I was the most impressed with the 3D during the final host segment, which is much smoother than the 3D in the movie and is very consistent looking.  It kind of made me think not filming the entire episode for 3D is a missed opportunity.  But hey, let's be optimistic and say one day maybe they'll make another 3D episode.

The episode is also available in a 2D option.  So, if you just don't care, you can just skip all of this and are pissed at me for not talking about the episode itself.

The Mask is a pretty solid episode, though I'm going to have pause about it because of another technical detail about it:  The sound mix.  Overall, I found the mixing of the season to be excellent.  Several of the films shown have benefited from the series tinkering with the volume; Demon Squad had a barely intelligible mix that made the film hard to listen to that was raised up for the MST episode, while Batwoman had an aggressively bad dub that was softened in its episode.  There has also been some mostly good (but still noticeable) work on dubbing Kelsey Ann Brady as Crow into episodes in post.  The Mask is probably the first bungle, as the volume on the film is so low that following the episode becomes a chore.  I definitely needed a second viewing on this film to work an opinion on the riffing.

*Note:  The aftershow livestream notes that I wasn't the only person complaining about this.  Matt McGinnis and Joel Hodgson say they're going to tinker with the sound mix and put up a better version of the episode by the time the downloadable version is released next week.  Stay tuned, I might update this review when that happens.

But while that threatens to make The Mask feel worse than it is, the comedy does bring joy, especially if you're in a Halloween mood.  There are a lot of references to horror movies littered about, including Halloween III ("Seven more days till Halloween, Silver Shamrock!") and Return of the Living Dead ("If you want to party, it's party time!").  Working in this movie's favor is that there are long stretches of pantomime and sequences without dialogue, which means there is a lot of room for jokes.  Creativity is abundant during the mask scenes, which are so unique in MST3K history that it genuinely feels like uncharted territory.  Underneath that, the episode can fall a bit mixed.  Riffs tended to be a bit goofy and playful, but sometimes the joke feels a bit unearned.  Crow wording out the title "The Mask" to the tune of the Pink Panther theme is cute, but it doesn't really hit.  The detective character has a lot of references to Frasier thrown in his direction and I don't really understand why (do they think he looks like Kelsey Grammer?  Because he really doesn't).  The zingers of the episode aren't really of the "Throw your head back and laugh" variety, as I find myself thinking back to cute little punchlines like the lady lead opening the door for the homicide detective and Tom Servo asking for her "Wait, was I murdered?"  I had a good time watching this episode, but the biggest laugh I had came early on, as a woman is killed in the opening scene, causing Servo to comment "Avenge me, True Crime podcast."

But hey, at least they kept restrained on the Jim Carrey movie references.  And they kept the Son of the Mask references to a respectable zero.

The episode also keeps the horror movie vibes in the host segments, including a rather fun song called Monster RSVP, where Jonah and the Bots have sent out Halloween Party invitations to various movie monsters and read out all of their reasons for not attending.  The final 3D segment is a lot of fun, as Jonah tries to pay off the 3D gimmick of the episode but finds his plans usurped by the giant mask head from the movie, who uses 3D better than he does.  Jonah and the Bots also show off their Halloween costumes, as Jonah is dressed as Tom Adkins, Servo as Pinhead, Crow as Crow, and Max as "Mad Max Headroom," and Rebecca Hanson has a fun role as the movie's landlady in the same segment.  The Invention Exchange sees Jonah showing off roundtable of Halloween masks while Kinga and Max have specialized Ouija boards.

I liked The Mask but didn't love it.  The 3D gimmick was a fun little experiment, though I'm not certain it amounted to anything worth hyping up the way they did.  I might just stick to 2D viewings for this one and keep the Kingavision glasses as a memorabilia item.  I had a good time watching it and that's exactly what I hope for, and I for one welcome black and white films back to the series with open arms.

⭐⭐⭐

Good

The Livestream

In one of our longest aftershows, our livestream event is a full-blown costume party with a bunch of hosts and a couple of GPCs.  Matt McGinnis is back as the Master of Ceremonies, and he is dressed as Perico, the beloved comic relief from Santo in The Treasure of Dracula.  From there he introduces Jonah Ray (who is dressed as Rick Moranis in Ghostbusters), Joel Hodgson (Jimmy Buffet Fan), Rebecca Hansen ("Subaru Forrester"), Yvonne Freese (Beaker from the Muppets), and Emily Marsh (Muriel from Courage the Cowardly Dog).  Everyone looks great, with special props to Jonah's helmet, Emily's glasses, and Yvonne for just going the full nine yards.

They get into a bit of discussion about their Halloween traditions, of which Emily and Matt relate their sad tales of when people told them they were too old to be Trick or Treating in high school (nuts to that, I say, because you're never too old for candy).  They also unveil a lot of behind the scenes photos from filming the episode, the final segment in particular, showing off Yvonne with the skull puppet and her incredible screaming take.

The bulk of this livestream is devoted to showing off the winners of the Mystery Science Theater 3000 Costume Contest, as they throw up a bunch of cool photos of fans in their wild cosplay and read off which ones they've chosen as the best and which ones were voted by the fans to be the best.  There is a little disappointment in that often the crew-chosen and fan-chosen costumes would be the exact same one which robs us of diverse winners, but sometimes the costumes are just that good.  While I'm not going to read off every single winner, some of my favorites included a Steampunk Joel Robinson, a young lady's awesome Tom Servo costume, a little girl's adorable Kinga Forrester coat, and a really creative recreation of the opening title host segment in Cave Dwellers.  I definitely agree with the top prize highlight, which went to a woman named "Turbo" who turned herself into the Gizmoplex itself!  She formed the Kingadome into a skirt, while coming up with some wildly creative ways to MST up the upper half of her body, including turning her arm into a functional GPC.  Really awesome work, and a great job to everyone who put the effort into submitting into this.  All of this is much more than I could have done.  I can barely type words on a computer screen and call it a "review."

That's about all to be said about this livestream, which was girthy but because of the amount of time needed to cover each subject.  There is no Q&A or the like because they just don't have time for one.  But it's hard to complain about something so trivial when we get to see photos of MSTies celebrating the show they love.

"Balance Beam for Girls" & A Tribute to Devil Doll

The Short

The glory of gymnastics is one that has been adored by many, most of which were wee ones who watched Mighty Morphin Power Rangers in the 90's who thought Kimberly's gymnast abilities were equal to a form of martial arts.  Here we have an old training film that shows off a gymnast working some moves on a balance beam, likely so students could study it and then try it themselves so if putty monsters attack they could kick them in the face.

I'm assuming all of this is accurate to gymnastics.  It would be pretty fucked up for this film to exist if it weren't.  The film doesn't really walk us through the steps of proper routines, opting instead just to show them performed with some slight commentary.  Balance Beam for Girls plays out like one of those "How To..." Goofy cartoons, only done with a straight face and less pratfalling.

In fact, I think there is a gymnastics Goofy cartoon.  Maybe I should watch that instead.

But before I do that, this short is given to Emily's crew, who do an adequate job.  There are a bit too many soft jabs like "Well, this is an unfortunate angle." and the like.  Y'know, commentary that points out things that might be humorous if they played it up.  Instead, we get jokes that are like "Think of how funny this would be if we made fun of it."  The pullback gags like this are a bit of a downer.  They can push a little further with lines commenting on the sexual nature of certain positions, such as the "straddle," which Emily has the narrator defend with "Stop snickering!  I didn't name these!"  It's still a bit of a pullback joke, but it works better.  They tend to get funnier when they throw in some silly pop culture references, like a gratuitous slow motion scene causing Crow to wonder if they're watching the Snyder Cut, or a rather perfect Saturday Night Live reference to "SUPERSTAR!"  Balance Beam for Girls is a bit of a rebound with jokes like that, which makes it a fun one.

Thumbs Up

👍

The Livestream (The Stinger?)

Hey, guess what?  I have a new laptop so I'm not as bitter as I was for the last two events.  However, similar to the Secret Agent Super Dragon event, I wasn't able to watch this one live, but that was because of a work scheduling issue and not internet woes.  Things wound up being so busy that I didn't get to watch the event in full until a week later, but all things considered I'm in pretty good spirits this for this one because I'm not typing this on a tiny screen with hand cramps.

After our brand new short, we get a special presentation of the episode Devil Doll (review here), which is a very rock-solid season eight entertainer.  I was very happy with this as the October tribute selection and was very engaged in watching it again because I laughed the whole way through.  We also get a few extra bonus sketches from the modern crews.  Emily's Bots are very in tune with what the Great Vorelli is all about, as they have a pair of segments where they tell Emily of how many things they've transferred souls into and even put Emily under a hypnotic trance.  Jonah and his Bots are more into the Halloween spirit, but Jonah ruins the mood showing up as a "bloodsucking umpire."

The aftershow, or what Tim Ryder is now name-trialing as "The Stinger," has Tim, Rebecca Hanson, Jonah Ray, and Hampton Yount participating in a few rounds of a Jackbox game called Trivia Murder Party 2, which is a trivia and minigame competition that takes about fifteen minutes a round.  While the game is kinda cute, the big issue I have is that there is very little interactivity in this stream.  There is some joking around and a couple of laughs, but a good portion of it is concentrated silence, which isn't all that entertaining to watch.  But some of their reactions are fun so I'll give it a slight pass.

Discussion topics are light, though they discuss some of their favorite Halloween movies.  Tim shares his latest tradition, which is watching the Adam Sandler vehicle Hubie Halloween on Netflix every October because he's not a horror guy (I'm wondering if we can convince him that Barbarian is a sequel to Hubie Halloween so we can get him to watch that for lulz), though he does have a slight fondness for The Blair Witch Project.  Hampton has just watched The Gate and Jonah praises Deadstream on Shudder (which I've heard good things about and may have to watch in the near future) while saying he was weirded out by Men (which...yeah, of course he was).  Jonah also talks about a few horror projects he's participated in recently, including his own feature Destroy All Neighbors.

Speaking of horror featuring MST alums, Baron Vaughn directed a segment of a movie called Scare Package a few years ago and that's totally worth watching.  Last Drive-In version if you can.

Festivities are light outside of all of this and there seems to be an acknowledgement that there isn't too much meat on the bones of tonight's stream, so they showcase the DVD bonus feature The Puppet Master, which is an interview with Devil Doll producer Richard Gordon on the making of the film.  The whole stream is an overall okay experience wrapped around a fun episode, but it didn't quite engage me like I hoped it would.

1310-The Shape of Things to Come

Film Year:  1979

Genre:  Science Fiction

Director:  George McCowan

Starring:  Jack Palance, Barry Morse, Nicholas Campbell, Anne-Marie Martin, Carol Lynley, John Ireland

MST Season:  13

Host:  Emily

The Movie

*I HAVE SURVIVED WATCHING THIS MOVIE UNRIFFED*

One of the more landmark names in the history of science fiction is H.G. Wells, who of course gifted us such classics as The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds, and The Invisible Man.  I used to read a few of his books as a kid myself but one that I hadn't gotten around to was a book called The Shape of Things to Come, which was a story about a future that is ravaged by plagues and wars, reverting to less advanced civilization that rebuilds from the ground up with new ideals.  At least that's the gist of it that I can get from skimming the Wikipedia overview.  I don't know if that summery is entirely accurate or not.

Anyway, pop culture moves on to another landmark in science fiction, a movie called Star Wars released in 1977.  Suddenly feature films set in space are big business and many are rushed into production.  Some became classics, like Alien, while some wound up on Mystery Science Theater 3000, like Starcrash.  In the heat of this science fiction boom to capitalize on the name of a noted science fiction author probably seemed like a smart advertising plan in the moment, and H.G. Wells was probably the best name you could use.  The problem was that Wells didn't really have any space operas under his belt.  I guess you could reinvent War of the Worlds into one if you really needed to, but the George Pal adaptation was still highly regarded at this point and I imagine nobody was interested in touching it.

The Shape of Things to Come had been adapted to film before with a film called Things to Come in 1936, which apparently was fairly loose itself but more faithful than this film.  This version of The Shape of Things to Come pretty much borrows the title and maybe a few character names and nothing else, instead creating an original space adventure to capitalize off of Star Wars.  This movie shows man having been relocated to a moon colony following the ravaging of Earth from the Robot Wars (Robot Wars is a prequel in my headcanon and you can't change my mind).  They find their way of life in danger when Jack Palance suddenly appears with an army of robots and insists that he is the new emperor of the galaxy.  It's up to a scrappy group of dogooders to fend off Palance on the distant planet of Delta 3.

With little knowledge of the source material, I instead have to judge this movie based on its own merits, which are uneven.  Here's the deal, the models in this movie never don't look like models, but a lot of the designs are neat to look at and I admire the crafting of them if nothing else.  If you squint really hard, this movie almost passes off as the original Battlestar Galactica series from the 70's.  But looking at it eyes wide can show it's a much shoddier production, with lackluster costume design and some bulky and clunky not-too-intimidating robot antagonists.

The movie does have some inherent cheese factor that helps keep it afloat though, so B-movie enthusiasts will find it of interest.  The music is overbearing and often silly in how large it feels in comparison to mundane things onscreen.  There is a slow motion sequence in a "gravity vortex" which is hilarious and makes the wormhole sequence from Star Trek:  The Motion Picture look like nuanced cinema.  And then there is just Jack Palance, who is Palancing it up a storm.  I haven't seen him Palance it up like this since Tim Burton's Batman.

The Shape of Things to Come is a crummy movie, but it's not a painful one.  It's enjoyable under the right circumstances and even a bit funny and entertaining.  I had fun with it, even if it does staple a dead man's name on its poster for a tasteless marketing ploy.

The Episode

As if The Million Eyes of Sumuru wasn't enough, this season needed another film that was already featured on RiffTrax and Shape of Things to Come drew the short straw.

Incidentally "loosely based on" adaptations of H.G. Wells' work are also no stranger to MST3K.  We've seen a handful in the past, namely Village of the Giants (based on Food of the Gods) and Riding with Death (based on The Invisible Man).  As a sideways relation, we also had Alien from L.A., which was "inspired by" Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth, as well.  We have an honored history of bastardizations.  The Shape of Things to Come is just the latest.  And whew boy is it a doozy.

Probably my big fear of this episode going in was that the riffers were going to ride a "This is nothing like the book" joke too hard, which is funny once or twice but constantly bringing it up can derail an entire experience and make it boring.  Mystery Science Theater doesn't really have a history of that, as it's more of a pitfall that RiffTrax falls into.  I'm pleased to say The Shape of Things to Come doesn't do this, but it's not that great of a riff despite this.  The Shape of Things to Come is an easy target, almost endearingly so.  Emily even states this movie is "kind of adorable, in a factory reject Beanie Baby kind of way."  That is a bit of the tone set with this effort, which plays with it but doesn't desire to really kick it.  It's almost a coasting vibe.

It's hard to pinpoint anything that really goes wrong.  Unlike the last few episodes (Batwoman especially), it does feel like our riffers are taking advantage of the openings they're given and taking a shot.  My reaction tended to default to "Heh, that's cute" rather than a full blown laugh.  Set design being compared to Hershey's chocolate because of its texture and style is pretty clever.  I didn't really laugh, but I appreciated the gag.  I liked the running joke of the two young leads romantic tension being interpreted as full friend zone, and that had some okay material that never really induced a huge reaction.  At the same time there are moments that feel miscalculated by the tiniest fraction which ruins the joke.  There is a moment where a character admires the majesty of space and Crow does a Monty Python and the Holy Grail reference with "It's only a model," which is a funny line in Python but doesn't work here because nothing being shown is an actual model.  There is also a moment where Emily and the Bots do the gag where they assume the movie is over and get up to leave, but it feels like they hit their mark too early as they stand awkwardly for about two seconds before the punchline finally hits and effectively ruining the timing.  It feels like we're a little off our game here and they're just taking a bunt with this movie.

I'm not too crazy about the Host Segments of this episode either.  I think the roast party hazing of the movie's obnoxious robot Sparks is pretty cringe in it's intentionally bad humor.  It feels like it has slight redemption when Emily takes center stage in the conclusion and gives it a more dramatic payoff than anybody was expecting, then absolutely wins the night with her final line of "Excuse me for trying to show my range!"  It's not enough to save a segment that I had already written off, but it's a hell of a note to end on.  Emily also steps up for a podcast called "The Shape of Crimes to Come," which hits more high notes than the previous segment, but is little more than a few great potshots at podcast entertainment stretched to fill time.  The most enjoyable segment for me was Emily explaining the concept of love to the Bots, of which her descriptions of what love is are both hilarious and sadly honest.  It's very much the same type of segment you would have seen during the best years of the Joel era, like the "What is hell?" segment from Eegah.  We also get an Invention Exchange featuring a drink rollercoaster and Turkey Corncob Holders.

And we get a full minute of Waverly and Growler!  Yay?  Can we get some more screen time for both them and Mega Synthia, because they're all dying from neglect.

A part of me thinks it's unfortunate that Emily and her crew came in as hot as they did with Beyond Atlantis.  It's almost as if they burned out after that jackpot inaugural effort because everything they've been in since has hit much softer.  With Emily's final effort with her Bots this season (but hopefully not the last overall) it hurts to call it humdrum, because I like this team so much, but it just doesn't get my juices flowing.  The group started with a bang but ended with a whisper.  I really wanted them to deliver us something special, like Jonah's crew did with Gamera vs. Jiger and Joel did with Demon Squad, but unfortunately it looks like we'll have to see if they have another season in the pipeline to see these performers deliver a truly great episode.  The Shape of Things to Come was not it, and that's all I'll say for certain as of right now.

⭐⭐

Average

The Livestream

The answer to the question that no one asked is yes, my laptop is still down and this is another entry I have to type out on my phone.  I'm so happy I had a lot of this season prepped in advance, so this was really just a few paragraphs to finish off, unlike the previous stream which I had to build from scratch.

Yes, I'm going to keep being a little bitch about this.  I'm at this point in the review and I already have hand cramps.

Anyway, tonight's stream has Matt McGinnis, Emily Marsh, Jonah Ray, and Kelsey Ann Brady, with special guest star:  tech issues!  Different tech issues that we're used to though, as this time we have a delay in the feed.  What's interesting is that the delay progresses as each member is introduced.  We start with Matt, who is slightly off-sync, then we see Kelsey is a little more off-sync, then Emily comes on completely off-sync, and Jonah's feed is an absolute travesty.  It gets a bit problematic as everyone starts talking over each other, because you can tell from their video they're having a hard time telling when they're each talking.  It's messy and glorious. 

There isn't a whole lot of time spent discussing this episode, and I can't tell if that's because they're not too enthused about it either or if they're just getting sidetracked because Jonah's end of the feed has a low flying helicopter that interrupts their train of thought from time to time.  Apparently someone is stuck on a trail near where Jonah is at, and Jonah's attempt at mood lighting with a sunset (which is admittedly very pretty) meant he's sitting outside where the action is taking place.  They discuss how incomprehensible the movie is, a little bit about Sparks, and a little bit about Jack Palance (though even more about how to pronounce his name).

Viewer questions are a nice half and half of production and fluff, and even when the questions get fluffy they tend to have substance behind it.  There is no silly "If you were Jack Palance, what kind of robot army would you build?" or whatever the fuck.  No, non-productive questions tonight are more interesting than that.  One viewer ponders that since this movie doesn't bear any resemblance to the book it's named after, is there any film that bears little material to source material that they have strong feelings about.  Kelsey is one of many Avatar:  The Last Airbender fans who hates M. Night Shyamalan, while Emily brings up the notorious Stephen King lawsuit against The Lawnmower Man and also gets very bitter about the Hobbit trilogy (though her Guillermo Del Toro slander will not stand with me).  Jonah just talks about Stephen King in general and how his short stories tend to make better movies than his full novels.

My counterpoint and addition to this conversation:  The Running Man.  Unquestionably one of the greatest movies ever made and bears no resemblance to the novel it's based on, and thank god for that.

There is also some talk about puppets and what their favorite puppets are.  Kelsey just loves Gonzo, while Jonah loves characters who are people in giant puppet suits.  Emily talks about her love of The Dark Crystal and is a little less fond of childhood mainstay Thunderbirds (I love Thunderbirds, goddammit).  My puppet contribution:  I don't know if you'd call them puppets or not, but Jim Henson's creations for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are absolutely beautiful.

Production questions are more about writing that filming.  One question asks what normally derails a writers' room, to which Jonah frankly responds "The writers!"  They turn the discussion into a lot of points about how the writing process works, how they decide to deliver jokes in the final product, and even how they figure out how much time they need to fill.  There is also a question that is very poorly worded but brings out a solid discussion of whether a celebrity is more enjoyable to make fun of than a lesser known actor, of which Jonah points out one of the best things MST3K can do is take a nameless side character and tack on a personality of their choosing on them.

Time seems to be cut short tonight because this stream is only forty minutes long.  I'm not sure if it's a mercy killing or not, because the helicopter on Jonah's end seems to be throwing them off.  Kelsey also makes a brief joking reference to being in the middle of the hurricane in Florida, which I'm not sure is true or not, but if it is stay safe, Kelsey!  It's all a bit in-and-out tonight, but to their credit nobody is half-assing it.  They might be in a rush to leave, but everyone seems happy to be here.

And speaking of leaving, my fingers are stiff and I am done.

"Cavalcade" & A Tribute to Secret Agent Super Dragon (MST3K Sepecial)

The Short

At long last, Mystery Science Theater 3000 has enough clout that it can feature a Best Picture Academy Award Winning film.  Kinga should be proud.  That film is Cavalcade, the 1933 film that tells a generational saga of life in England...

Hold on a second...I'm being told that this Cavalcade is actually something different.  It's actually an industrial short showcasing various livelihoods in rapid succession (a "cavalcade," if you will).  We get to see those great American workers as they build communication towers and automobiles, work with lead, and, most importantly of all...ostrich racing.

Cavalcade is just a ten minute salute to American ingenuity, hitting you so hard with constructive achievements and moving onto the next one before you get too bored.  It has a sort of "Gee whiz!" enthusiasm underlining it that might get someone curious about one subject or another.  Basically these sort of shorts accomplish what can be done in a quick YouTube video today, except you don't have to search through all the cat videos and engagement grifters to find it.

Still...those ostriches came out of nowhere.  Is that still a thing?  I might change careers if I can get in on that.

On the riffing end, we have a bit of a surprise, as for some reason this short is selected for Pearl Forrester and Dr. Lawrence Erhardt.  A curious selection to be sure, but a welcome one.  The former Cinematic Titanic performers of Mary Jo Pehl and J. Elvis Weinstein hit the theater to show off their chops and they hit a home run with what is easily the best short the Gizmoplex has offered yet!  Mind you, these Gizmoplex shorts haven't quite been series highlights (as Court Case has been the best one so far, and that was only fairly good), but I will say that Cavalcade successfully brings in that classic short flavor into the theater and it offers up a lot of retro outdatedness to successfully mock.  Mary Jo and J. Elvis are quite exceptional here, offering up quality quips that bring plenty of belly laughs.

"The Paradox of Lead."

"If it's so dangerous, why does it taste so good?"

If I were to nitpick one thing, I'd say the ostrich segment, while funny, never takes off with its brazen oddness.  It feels like it should be the epic and memorable conclusion, but it winds up just more of the same.  I guess I'll have to settle for this being quite funny instead of hilarious, though what Cavalcade does make me desire is to see more of Mary Jo and J. Elvis in the limelight.  These are two exceptional talents and Cavalcade shows off just how much they bring to this franchise.

Thumbs Up

👍

The Livestream

I've been doing what I can to keep my finger on the pulse of these new Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes and special events, but this one was cursed.  I was all set and prepared to watch it the night it streamed live, but my internet completely collapsed from under me.  I tried to get it steady throughout the short, of which I was initially under the impression that it was Joel and Emily in the theater because I was only seeing frames of it and not hearing dialogue.  The minute I finally heard a riff I finally realized that it was actually J. Elvis and Mary Jo and I was missing something special.  But my internet would not cooperate and I had to give up for the night.  Since I had already missed the short and I'm not too fond of Secret Agent Super Dragon (review here), paired with how the last few tribute events only offered DVD bonus features as the aftershow, I retired for the night instead of watching on my phone.  I finally watched what I had missed during my lunch breaks during work that week.  I missed a great short and an improv RPG event, and now I was irritated.

Making matters worse was I was going to watch the event in full this weekend for review, but my laptop completely went belly up, which means I'm typing all of this on my phone until I can get it fixed and you better appreciate me right now because this suuuuuuuuuuucks.

Anyway, tribute event.  Excellent short, not so great episode, excellent aftershow.

Listen, the episode selections for the tribute shows aren't going to please everybody.  I'm sure there are some fans who aren't crazy about some of the episodes already selected and are probably ecstatic that Super Dragon is at the center of attention here.  This event is for them.  And whether of not I think Super Dragon is that good or not, there is some interesting presentation experimentation going on.  Instead of the "surgically enhanced" look that Pumaman was going for, they do play around and try to work the episode into filling HD screens in a way that might please more people.  This time they do something similar to what old Disney Blu-ray discs would do for movies like Snow White and Dumbo and add theater curtains to the side of the picture where the full frame black bars would be.  This is a smart use of it, because it would look good in the Gizmoplex virtual theater, adding to the Gizmoplex experience.

The added new content with Jonah and the Bots sees them mocking the jazzy Secret Agent Super Dragon theme host segment, relating the Bots still hear from Mimzy the Atomic Powered Robot, and Crow claims he has given up screenwriting to grift books on screenwriting to people who think they can do it.  Emily and her Bots have a segment, where Emily is being given spy gear by her Bot quartermasters is a fun idea, but the weird decision to constantly have the group change their accents in extremes (shifting from suave British to Cockney to Scottish ect) makes it very odd and a little unpleasant.  The show concludes with a new rap from Ross Bryant, the brilliant mind behind Mother Crabber, who takes Joel and the Bots' failed attempt at a theme and builds an actual song around it.  It's no Mother Crabber, but it's fun.  And there is even a bonus surprise, as they advertise our next episode, The Shape of Things to Come, and it's introduced by that classic Comedy Central announcer from the 90's, Penn Jillette!

Thrown in are some pre-recorded segments of Emily, (Kelsey's) Crow, and (Conor's) Servo thanking select Kickstarter backers, and Crow also reads a fan letter.  Whether this is the new way they're doing the name reads, I'm not certain, but I think it's an improvement over the stop-and-halt way they were doing it during the livestreams.

It's also possible they're just doing this specially for this stream because they wouldn't have been able to during tonight's show, which is a special role playing game called DIY Spy hosted by Tim Ryder, who puts rookie spies played by Emily, Conor, and Kelsey through hypothetical scenarios.  Like a lot of improv, it can have its ups and downs based on what the performers have to work with, but Emily, Conor, and Kelsey are game to see everything through to the end.  Emily is the MVP of the night, who brings us a character named Missy Livingston, who is obviously inspired by the Cockney homeless Eliza Doolittle from My Fair Lady.  Emily is seemingly the most mentally prepared and the most suggestive, throwing out more ideas of how to proceed than her teammates.  She seems to know that she is overwhelming the stream a bit too, sometimes refraining herself so Conor and Kelsey can influence events as well.  But Emily's ideas are so colorful and interesting that most of the time they'll default to what she suggests.  If nothing else, it makes me want to see a performance of My Fair Lady starring Emily.  Conor's character is Danny Landon, who is an excitable and nerdy rookie, while Kelsey goes femme fatale, puts on a ridiculous sunhat, puts on your stuffy southern belle accent that we heard so much in Demon Squad, and names herself Miss Chevious (get it?).  It can get a little confusing telling "Missy" and "Miss" apart as Tim refers to them, but whatever.  It's just fun and games.

Biggest laugh of the night goes to Emily (of course it does), who describes how she's going to use a bicycle pump to create and EMP grenade, which causes Conor to turn red in the face and fail at stifling his laughter.  Emily makes matters worse by seeing just how much she's affecting Conor and continually pumps it to make him laugh harder.  Flub of the night also goes to Emily, who says on air "Have you seen this shi...Have you seen this?"  I heard that, Emily.  You're on notice.  Random moment of the night goes to Kelsey, while they're assigned to eat sentient enemy pickles, who just reaches off screen, grabs a jar of pickles she happens to have lying around, and starts eating.  Now that's method.

After a couple of stale livestream events which just gave us an episode and a DVD bonus feature most MSTies have already seen, this event was a breath of fresh air.  It was fun, it was creative, and it was out of left field.  It also shows that they can still surprise and delight and just deliver a good old fashioned good time.  I don't know if they have anything else unique coming up, but this was certainly one that promises exciting things.  And all of this built around an episode I don't even like, so kudos.

1309-The Million Eyes of Sumuru

Film Year:  1967
Genre:  Thriller, Spy
Director:  Lindsay Shonteff
Starring:  Shirley Eaton, George Nader, Frankie Avalon, Klaus Kinski
MST Season:  13

Host:  Jonah

The Movie

*I HAVE SURVIVED WATCHING THIS MOVIE UNRIFFED*

Many might be familiar with Sax Rohmer's infamous villain creation Fu Manchu, though fewer might be familiar with another series of novels he wrote with another antagonist named Sumuru.  Sumuru is basically Fu Manchu again, only sexist instead of racist.  To the surprise of nobody, the producers of the 60's Fu Manchu films starring Christopher Lee also decided to bring Sumuru to the big screen, with less yellowface and more bare skin.

Sumuru is a lady criminal mastermind with an army of women at her disposal.  Her master plan sees her agents to marry the leaders of the world and murder them.  However her plans are threatened by a pair of smarmy and horny agents from America.  Their misadventures continuously come to a head (pun intended?  I don't even know anymore) as these guys make love and kick ass all the way to Sumuru herself.

In the more sexually liberated world of the 1960's, spy films of the era were shameless about utilizing women who used their curves as a weapon to distract from their own deviousness and, more importantly, sell tickets to men, because bad girls were hot.  The Million Eyes of Sumuru is something of a inevitable peak of that, as all women featured are dangerous, shapely, and very ready, willing, and able to show off their bodies.

Million Eyes of Sumuru isn't unentertaining, as there is a very primal 60's pop entertainment value at play (and, let's face it, the mostly female cast is hard for any male to resist).  It's a bit problematic in that it pretends to be about female liberation and empowerment, yet as the plot moves forward we see Sumuru's plans thwarted by women in their army who seemingly just discovered their lust of male body parts, and turn on their master simply out of desire for the male leads in the film.  In the end we get a movie that clearly thinks its feminist but feminist in a way that still has men dominating women.

Of course, if you want to deep dive into those themes you can argue the film is anti-Sapphic as well.  If you think about it, the film is about a large group of alienated women who only trust each other and don't wish to be associated with men, while being subservient to their queen dominatrix Sumuru.  If that doesn't scream lesbian undertones, I don't know what does.  Not to mention a fear of homosexuality in general, as these women are inherently evil.  Then going back to the men of the film turning the women through sex, one can definitely say the ultimate message of the film is that all that's needed to turn a gay girl straight is the male member.

The movie's humor can be a bit of a double edged sword too.  The main characters have so many wisecracks and are so unphased by the violence happening around them that they almost border on parody.  This isn't exactly a James Bond-ian suave one-liner type of dynamic that's in play (though it might be intended) as they see people they've interacted with moments before get killed and even crack jokes at their expense, which is weird and tacky.  This movie might even have been intended to be seen as a parody because of this, as there is a certain argument that can be made for its off-center tone.  I don't think it quite works in either direction, because it just winds up offputting.

But, if you're into 60's adventure flicks, Million Eyes of Sumuru has its pleasures.  Action is abound, and intrigue is in play for a while.  I'm charmed by the idea of the girl power premise, even if it doesn't quite deliver on that.  If someone were to debug the idea of a femme fatale spy organization seeking world dominance and make it less problematic this could be a fun idea for a franchise, but as is Sumuru doesn't hit the mark.  I was almost entertained, though I probably would never be interested in watching it again.

Million Eyes of Sumuru was followed by a sequel several years later called The Girl from Rio.  There is a RiffTrax for this movie, as well as Sumuru, so there's an easy way for fans to double feature these flicks without having to watch them straight.

The Episode

Another film prominently featuring lady abdomens and navels so soon after The Batwoman?  Why, Mystery Science Theater, I'm flattered and bashful all at once.  But I'm not going to say no!

"This one sounds familiar."

"Shhh."

The new seasons of Mystery Science Theater 3000 seem to fulfill a pattern of bringing in a movie selection as a nostalgia play from a series fans recognize from the show and also picking a movie that was already used for riffing fodder by sister project RiffTrax.  For season 11, the nostalgia pick was Loves of Hercules while the RiffTrax pick was Wizards of the Lost Kingdom.  For Season 12 they combined into one with Ator, the Fighting Eagle.  In season 13 we received Gamera vs. Jiger for our nostalgic warm fuzzies while we also have The Shape of Things to Come down the pipeline, which was already given the RiffTrax treatment.

Then there is Million Eyes of Sumuru.  The thing about Sumuru for all us seasoned MSTies is that it was featured on MST back in the KTMA days, so this in essence is like "Nostalgia Pick 1.5" for this season, after seeing Gamera's return a few episodes ago while also calling back to the KTMA reriffs of Season 3.  One could also argue it's the candidate for "RiffTrax Did It" film of the year, but MST had this movie first, so I'd argue a veto might be order of that title.  Maybe we should meet in the middle and say it's two flavors in one bite, like Ator!

"Who was the man?"

"You da man, my lady!"

I'm happy they picked Sumuru because the KTMA episode is half fun and half dead.  But even if it were a great episode, there was plenty of room for improvement over what KTMA had to offer.  And it's a weird movie that offers a lot of strange stuff to showcase, so it would be interesting to see what a scripted commentary could mine from it.  And whatever can be said about the episode, it's certainly an upswing from the first one.  Humor is solid, and there were some jabs that got me to bark a laugh at many points, though I hesitate to name anything that made me roll.  But this movie tends to wander around and stumble into its plot accidentally, which gets Jonah and the Bots to amp up its more absurd elements to colorful results.  There is an assassination scene late in the movie that is a domino effect of nonsense sequentially tumbling in motion, and as it gets crazier, a character shouts "It's a girl!" at the would-be assassin, prompting the trio to just yell "CONGRATULATIONS!" like they were at a gender reveal party.  I don't think this riff normally would have gotten a reaction out of me, but the chaotic nature of the scene just kind of set it up as a punctuation to absurdity, and I laughed more than I probably should have.

I'm tempted to restate my criticism of Batwoman and say there are some easy wells to tap in this movie that the rebooted show always seems nervous to take advantage of.  But if there is one advantage Sumuru has over Batwoman it's that Jonah's crew is a bit more adventurous with where it sails than Emily's was in the previous episode.  While humor isn't quite as risqué as it could be (and believe me, this movie is asking for it), riffs do cut deeper into the sexist/sexy themes of the movie without getting too naughty or trashy.  Throughout the movie Sumuru's army are depicted as Karens, slumber party girls, chattering cheerleaders, southern belles and the like, while sexual situations are tip-toed and given a few catcall-style jokes to push it a little.  They can get a little randy if they need to, as during a scene midway through the film we see George Nader pass two giant doorknockers and Crow just lets out the on-the-nose line "WHAT KNOCKERS!" which I will freely admit made me laugh.

The host segments have ups and downs.  I found myself most amused when the fraternity energy between Jonah and the Bots was at its fullest.  I really enjoyed the segment where the Bots are obsessed with how tall Jonah is (likely because they have the more petite Emily to compare him to now) and just roughhouse with him.  By comparison, the segment where Jonah plays a prank on the Bots (with a wig) is kinda lame, but Crow's aggressive reaction toward Jonah at the end is hilarious.  More movie-focused, they taunt just how aimless the heroes of our movie are and play with coded messages in acronym, both of which are cute ideas that didn't really land.  Down on Moon 1, Dr. Kabahl has notes and Kinga gets a song honoring all the lady supervillains throughout history.  The Invention Exchange includes coffee that wakes you up with your deepest, darkest fears and mundane workplace Skittles.

Sumuru is an upswing from the little-too-straight-and-narrow-but-spirited Batwoman, though I'd still advise against using films like this unless you're going to fully commit to what they have to offer.  It feels like there is something of a Girl-in-Gold-Boots-like minor-gem to make in this movie but they won't handle it the way it's asking for and it's frustrating to see movies like this wasted.  It's a funny episode that rests on the lower end of offerings of the season, though this season has been largely consistent, so saying it's a lesser offering isn't really raking it through the coals.

⭐⭐⭐

Good

The Livestream

This livestream almost seemed like a direct response to my complaint about the last one, where I said it was too fluffy and not substantial, in particular noting the lack of real production talk.  This time Matt McGinnis gathered up a group of people from the writer's room, some of which we haven't seen before on the stream, namely Devon Coleman and Tammy Golden, and it was absolutely lovely to see the duo live and on camera after all the social media interaction I've seen them do.  Also here is Tim Ryder and, finally guesting on a stream for more than five minutes, Felicia Day!

This is a very fun, very substantial conversation about the writer's room.  They answer a lot of questions about joke writing, filling up allotted time, and how many times they watch the movie.  They talk about having any desire to watch films again after using them on the show, to which Devon sings praises of Doctor Mordrid and Kinga describes very colorful things that she would do if she had to watch Munchie again.  They even discuss the Sumuru's prior usage on MST, which Tim says he decided against screening because he didn't want to cement himself to previous jokes like he did during the Eegah live tour.  I would say that since Sumuru's previous episode was a KTMA show, he didn't really have much to worry about.  However Matt does provide a comparison between the openings of both the new version and the KTMA version, of which both feature a reference to supermodel Twiggy.

Of note:  Matt claims they have no master copies of KTMA episodes, which is unfortunate though it's contradicted by the quality copies of Invaders from the Deep and Revenge of the Mysterons from Mars that were released, as well as high quality KTMA material that has been released in general (admittedly before Shout purchased the show from Jim Mallon).  Perhaps they don't have copies of all the KTMA episodes or they got lost in transition?  Dunno.  But the KTMA clip they use is definitely recorded from television, though it feels cleaner than my personal copy of the episode.  Don't know where they got it from, if they did their new remastering process on it, or if it was just a taped copy for the MST archives.  At any rate, Tim is happy they don't have to display time and teperature anymore, to which Ivan Askwith provides a Cambot style joke at his expense.

The writers have this sort of weird fondness for this movie that they'll dog but do so with such warmth.  They have fun dissecting the weird creative choices of this movie and postulate some theories.  Sometimes they come up a blank, and Felicia can't figure out why everyone is indifferent to death in this movie (which is admittedly very odd).  They get a few good digs in at the height differences between George Nadar and Frankie Avalon while also trying to figure out just what the hell was up with Klaus Kinski's weird role in the film, prompting the biggest laugh of the stream from Devon who claims Klaus told them "You get a day to shoot with me because that's how long it takes for Werner Herzog to track me down."

Fan questions are a lot better during this stream than the previous one, and they prompt some delightful discussion and joking around.  Matt and Tim react to some of the user names, including "Bob Dole" and "Q" (the latter gets an absolute homerun response from Tim, "You can't just switch forums like that!").  The stream's final question is a bit of a fizzle and pop, as they revert to one of those hypothetical questions that haunted the last stream and it's a not very interesting one (though it doesn't help that Matt misreads it).  Basically it's about board spaces on a potential MST Monopoly, but nobody can really run with the idea.  Tim does host a mini-rant about how much Monopoly sucks, and Felicia wonders if MST Clue could work, but the question is almost granted a mercy killing as the stream runs out of time.

They also announce a new cosplay contest for Halloween, with the winner to be announced during the livestream of The Mask.  I've already lost.