1201-Mac and Me

Film Year:  1988

Genre:  Science Fiction, Fantasy, Comedy

Director:  Stewart Raffill

Starring:  Mac and him

MST Season:  12

The Movie

Witness the thrilling origin of that clip that Paul Rudd would always play every time he guested on Conan O'Brian.  Even when he was promoting Ant-Man.  ANT-MAN!  Imagine looking for footage of the latest Marvel movie and you get that shot of that kid in a wheelchair rolling downhill.

Mac and Me is a cheesy late-80's attempt to cash in off the popularity of Steven Spielberg's beloved family film E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial.  Like E.T., Mac and Me follows a group of kids in the suburbs who befriend a lost little alien who is trying to find his family.

Now imagine everything that E.T. did right was replaced by a bunch of creative choices that elicit the response of "Oh Jesus Christ, why did you do that?!"

Mac and Me was an instant crap classic when it came out, bringing about a slew of negative reviews and many critics calling it one of, if not THE, worst movies of the year.  The movie was even nominated for Worst Picture at the Razzie Awards, but lost to the craptacular Tom Cruise vehicle Cocktail (which incidentally was riffed by Rifftrax).  So Mac and Me has a bit of a reputation, yet I hadn't seen it until it aired on Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Yeah, it's pretty bad...I guess.

Mac and Me is more of a dumb movie than a painful one.  There are a ton of strange and bizarre hoops it jumps through to tell its derivative story.  I kind of admire that it jumps through as many as it does, with a sort of abstract, almost animated way of presenting the aliens, where they are living cartoon characters.  Mac and Me might even have been a better movie if they were animated characters, instead of people in really shitty suits.  Or maybe it would have just gone full-on Space Jam.  I don't know, but it's a kooky flick.

It's probably remembered most for its very aggressive product placement.  Most notably with McDonalds and Coca-Cola.  McDonalds is the setting for a fairly lengthy musical scene in the film (a good portion of it apparently is cut out of the MST version, mind you), while Coke is almost used as a prop.  The kids in the film almost always keep one handy, just in case the alien Mac is feeling down or hurt.  Then they bust out a Coca-Cola Classic and Mac is up and at 'em!

Drink Coke!  It'll cure what ails ya'!

It's a strange movie.  I didn't hate it, but I also didn't think much of it while watching it.  I think I see why it has such huge cult appeal, but I've seen too many movies like it or worse to think there is anything special about it.  I know it can't touch what I consider Mac and Me director Stewart Raffill's masterpiece, 1994's Tammy and the T-Rex, starring Paul Walker, Denise Richards, and a giant animatronic T-Rex puppet.  But maybe I was expecting too much for it to be genius on that level.

The Episode

Rejoice, MSTies!  Netflix has renewed Mystery Science Theater 3000 for another season...but on their own terms.  Our episode count in the previous season reflected a healthy Kickstarter campaign that overshot its goal and created bonus episodes to spare.  The problem is that Netflix is all about the "bingewatch experience," and you can't watch fourteen episodes of an hour and a half program in a single day (well, technically it's twenty-two hours long, so it's possible, but who's going to?).  Netflix will renew the show, but they want people to watch the entire season in a single day for...reasons, I guess.  So they just order six episodes and force a storyline to "encourage bingewatching."

I have...thoughts.

I do wonder if I should hold my tongue about this until my eventual season overview, but I think Netflix's "bingewatch experience" ruins the "television experience."  If an entire season of something was meant to be watched in a single day, it wouldn't be split into episodes.  Bingewatching can be a fun practice if I'm already familiar with a show and am doing it just for some me time, but when it's a brand new show, I don't see the merit.  Weekly episode viewing prompts discussion from the consumer and keeps a product in focus for a longer duration.  Pressuring viewers to watch an entire season in a single day can burn out interest and cause people to shift focus almost immediately.  This instant gratification demand that Netflix has created is why I try not to support the company if I can help it.  Netflix just...sucks.

That being said, new MST!  Yay!  I have to watch it all on release day or it will get cancelled, too.   Yay?  Oh shit, it's out on Thanksgiving and I have family commitments.  I have to watch it when I can and hope that's good enou.......oh.  Cancelled already, huh?  I guess I have nobody to blame but myself.

But here we are with the bingewatch season of MST.  The six-part marathon that wants us to watch all the episodes in a row.  How are they convincing us to binge though?  MST isn't exactly a binge show.  Episodes run too long, and it's hard to wrap arcs around watching a bad movie.  What scenario have they cooked up?  Why, it's a little thing called "The Gauntlet!"  Kinga is feeling particularly evil and decided that putting Jonah through one bad movie isn't enough.  Putting him through six in a row is better!  And hyping up the new season of MST we had cast and crew members daring us to run the Gauntlet with Jonah and the Bots!

First up, the E.T. knockoff with a McDonalds sponsorship, Mac and Me!

"It's just like that scene from Mac and Me where Mac came back to life!" - Crow T. Robot while watching Pod People

It's interesting to me that we've reached a point in MST3K where then-current pop culture references from previous episodes are now riffing fodder on it.  That particular quote above from Pod People was a comparison made by Crow making fun of a derivative scene, but he decided to say it's derivative of another derivative film (Mac and Me) when it should be derivative of the main source (E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial).  Though while Mac and Me does feature a resurrection, it's not Mac that gets brought back to life, so that kind of ruins THAT gag.

Mac and Me lends itself well to the riffing format.  While the film is comedic, it's so absurdly embellished that is helps fuel comedy at its expense as well.  The slapstick is over-the-top and the budget is so low that the film goes to absurd measures to try and pull it off.  All of this revs up Jonah and the Bots, who latch onto the film' wackiness and throw some wacky jabs at it to play up its stupidity.  They also get a kick out of the film's absurd product placement deals, which even sees characters using Coca-Cola to help heal the alien life forms.

"Dammit nurse, this is a Pepsi!  It doesn't have the unique healing properties of a Coke Classic!"

Outside of the theater, there is not much playing up this "Gauntlet" concept other than the intro and the outro, so the episode mostly stands on its own.  However, interestingly they do a format change.  They dump the little Moon 13 breaks from the previous season, which were pointless so who cares.  However the big news is that they drop a host segment from the structure of the show.  Before I grab my pitchfork, I think it's important to look at what this does for the way the episode presented.  The classic format of MST split the theater into four segments, which helped everything play out in half hour chunks in a two hour time slot.  With MST on streaming, the previous format is a bit needlessly archaic, and by splitting the theater segments into three instead of four, it creates a three-act structure.  This might actually be the superior framing for the streaming era of the show, in my opinion.  What I do know for certain is that the format of the previous season didn't work.

Though to be fully transparent, I have a gut feeling the reason the segment was dropped was because Netflix thought it would "binge better."  Maybe it was the right call for the wrong reason.

But while we lost a host segment, we still have a good amount here.  Jonah and the Bots communicate with Moon 13 through a series of whistles, like the aliens in the movie, while they parody the McDonalds product placement and dance number later in the movie.  The Invention Exchange features the Mads new drug, while Jonah and the Bots create a spam and Pez hybrid called Spez.

And as for the payoff to last year's cliffhanger where Jonah was devoured by Reptilicus Metalicus, Jonah tries to tell his tale but nobody cares.  I love it!

Interestingly the opening to this episode is one of the few (only?) times Cambot appears onscreen, as Servo and Crow reformat him for more mobile cinematography.  And a Cambot in motion does look pretty good, let me tell you.  In fact, I like the brighter and softer production design in general this season.

During promotion of this season, Jonah talked about how Joel initially wanted Mac and Me to be the big closer of the season to end the Gauntlet on a high note.  Jonah convinced him to make it the premiere instead insisting that Mac and Me was too infamous of a bad movie and "People would have watched it first anyway."  I see both sides of the argument, though it feels to me like the worst movies of the Gauntlet come out right out of the gate and Mac and Me would have been better used as a punchier finale, as opposed to Ator, The Fighting Eagle, which is relatively tame for a bad movie (or they could have used Atlantic Rim for the finale, which is arguably the worst movie of the season).  But regardless of where Mac and Me fell during the season, it's definitely one of the more enjoyable and hilarious episodes of the Gauntlet.  Maybe even the best.  The Gauntlet never really produced a great episode in my opinion, but Mac and Me does come pretty close.

Good

PRETTY NIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICE!

The DVD and Blu-Ray

Shout Factory brought Mac and Me to Earth on the DVD and Blu-Ray box sets of Season 12:  The Gauntlet.  Audio and video were both pristine, and, while there were no special features on the disc, it shared a disc with the following episode, Atlantic Rim.  Those who contributed to a pledge drive fundraiser got a special collection with a bonus disc, deemed the Pledge Drive Edition.  My copy happens to be that particular set.

617-The Sword and the Dragon

Film Year:  1956

Genre:  Fantasy, Adventure

Director:  Aleksandr Ptushko

Starring:  Boris Andreyev, Shukur Burkhanov, Andrei Abrikosov, Natalya Medvediva, Yelena Myshkova

MST Season:  6

The Movie

Originally released in Russia under the title Ilya Muromets, the name of its protagonist, The Sword and the Dragon is a heavily edited version imported to the US by Roger Corman.  I'm sure that doesn't do wonders for its coherency, but the gist of the film does come through.  This particular film is a generational fantasy saga about Ilya Muromets, who inherits a legendary sword and a trusty steed, and quests to become a great warrior of his country and defend it from invading forces.

If these Russo-Finnish films seem similar, it's mostly because they're mostly made with largely the same crew.  The Sword and the Dragon is from the makers of The Day the Earth Froze and The Magic Voyage of Sinbad, and it certainly feels it.  I kind of like The Sword and the Dragon the best of these three movies, because I think the attempt at a warrior's life story is pretty interesting and, as always, these fantasy films bring some unique, playful, and cool, if somewhat wacky, visuals.

That being said, like all of these Russian epics, The Sword and the Dragon goes full speed ahead and leaves the viewers a bit in the wind.  It trusts the audience to keep up, which will probably be easier for those familiar with its folklore.  The Sword and the Dragon is just a whirlwind of fantasy adventure and swashbuckling action, and for some people, that's what the doctor ordered.

The Episode

As per normal with the Russo-Finnish films, the movie is doing all the heavy lifting.  The riffers are just there to enhance it.  And with the crazy, bombastic fantasy on display, The Sword and the Dragon is just as deliciously flavorful as the previous films.  Mike and the Bots latch onto the larger-than-life characters and wacky displays of spectacle and go to town with their embellishment of each, which makes the episode constantly fun and engaging.  These films never disappoint.

The host segments are a bit more uneven, but mostly okay.  I have a suspicion that the movie was running short for them, because a few segments run exceptionally long.  Oddly enough, those are the bits I really enjoyed.  I really like the "A Joke By Ingmar Bergman" sketch, which is a slow, long walk for its gag, but is mostly just a lengthy parody film fans will recognize and enjoy.  The other lengthy sketch is "SupercalifragilisticexpialiWACKY," which is a parody of a parody basically.  It's a riff on a zingy political satire performance like this that would get on stage and take rapid potshots at the government.  What I like about this segment is that it makes fun of how lame performances are, but it has a roundabout way of being funny because of how unfunny it is.

Other segments include a short re-enactment of the film and a visit from Ilya Muromets, who is now the owner of a pancake house for some reason.  On the Mads end, Dr. Forrester and Frank meet their new neighbors, who happen to be ladies (played by Bridget Jones and Mary Jo Pehl), but Dr. F and Frank don't know how to talk to girls.  This segment seems to be a giant dig on comic book nerds and sci-fi fans not being able to attract women, which can be a bit mean spirited.  However the segment does go an extra mile in stating that it's actually the introverted personalities of the Mads that is making the situation awkward, and not their hobbies in general.

While it seems like I have more to say about the host segments than the riffing, that's mostly because the pleasurable riffing experience is more or less just "It just works."  The flashy spectacle and fun ribbing is always a good combination, and it always has been. Fans of The Day the Earth Froze, The Magic Voyage of Sinbad, and even the eighth season's Jack Frost will want to seek out The Sword and the Dragon, because it is every bit as funny.

Classic

The DVD

Shout Factory brought us to the magic land of The Sword and the Dragon as a part of their Volume XXIV collection.  The video transfer occasionally had a slight flicker on the top of the screen, not too bothersome, while audio was solid.  The sole bonus features where a pair of shorts, Snow Thrills and A Date With Your Family.  Of the two, A Date With Your Family is the better one but it's an odd inclusion.  A Date With Your Family had already been released on DVD on Shorts Volume 1, and the episode it was featured with, Invasion USA, was released two volumes later.  There was really not much clamoring for the short to be a bonus feature.  Snow Thrills, on the other hand, was the short featured with It Conquered the World, which has never seen release and Snow Thrills was never on a shorts compilation, so it's inclusion is more welcome.

Mystery Science Theater 3000: Volume XXXIII DVD Retrospective

Release Date:  July 28, 2015

Buy it here!

Episodes featured:

Daddy-O

Earth vs. the Spider

Teen-Age Crime Wave

Agent for H.A.R.M.

Thirty-three volumes into Mystery Science Theater 3000, and we still are getting some absolute bangers.  You would think they'd run out of great episodes at some point, but we have some great ones for the MSTies this time.  A couple of my all-time favorites grace this volume, with Teen-Age Crime Wave and Agent for H.A.R.M.  The Joel episodes are quite exceptional as well, with the very solid Daddy-O and Earth vs. the Spider.  My favorite of the set is easily Teen-Age Crime Wave, which is a riot.  The "loser" of the set?  My least favorite is Daddy-O on the basis of the weak short.  But there are no losers as far as MST Volume XXXIII is concerned.

One noteworthy thing about the episodes in this set is that it features the two episodes where the movie runs short and they fill up time by stopping and restarting the credits at various times due to a running gag, with the button being broken in Daddy-O and Frank getting maced over and over again in Teen-Age Crime Wave.  Bravo by putting both of these in one package!

Average Rating (out of 4):  3.5

Audio and video is exceptional across the board.  This box set's bonus features are mostly film related, so good news for people like me who like learning more about the movies.  There are making of features for both Daddy-O and Earth vs. the Spider, while Teen-Age Crime Wave and Agent for H.A.R.M. have interviews with their respective stars, Tommy Cook and the late Peter Mark Richman.  The highlight is a documentary on the career of Teen-Age Crime Wave producer Samuel Katzman called Film It Again, Sam.  Impressive stuff there!  Also included are Mystery Science Theater Hour wraps for Daddy-O and Earth vs. the Spider as well as theatrical trailers for Earth vs. the Spider and Teen-Age Crime Wave.

There is no changing it up for the cover art, which is Shout Factory's stock design featuring the theater seats at the bottom, the MST logo in the upper left corner, and the roman numerals XXXIII in the center in green.  As always, the real star of the show are the Steve Vance covers for the individual cases on the inside.  Daddy-O features Crow as our singing hero at the top, while Tom Servo cruises around below the logo in a convertible and a blonde wig.  Earth vs. the Spider features to two bots as the teenage heroes of the film, running in terror from the giant spider looming above them atop a building.  Teen-Age Crime Wave features Servo and Crow as outlaws Mike and Terry, pointing their revolvers at anyone who dares look at them.  Agent for H.A.R.M. features Servo as the desirable spy Adam Chance, while he holds his sexy bikini-clad co-star, played by Crow.  Disc art is traditional movie title logos against a starry backdrop.

The menus continue the weird mini-puppet aesthetic from the previous set, still using the same basic idea that the CG menus did...just with puppets.  Daddy-O has Crow and Servo having breakfast with the feisty female lead.  Earth vs. the Spider sees a giant spider entering the Satellite of Love bridge and spraying Crow and Servo with webs.  Teen-Age Crime wave has Mike and Terry busting in on Crow and Servo, pointing guns on them.  Agent for H.A.R.M. plays with the episode's host segment arc, and features Mike in a prison uniform as visions of accusations from the cast fly around him.

BUH DUH BAH DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

If one wants a healthy and reliable sampling of both the Joel and Mike eras of the series, Volume XXXIII is a must own.  The one slight down side is that the Mike episodes easily outweigh the Joel episodes, however with episodes this funny it doesn't really matter.  If you're a MSTies, this is one set that needs to be on your shelf.

522-Teen-Age Crime Wave

Film Year:  1955

Genre:  Drama, Crime

Director:  Fred F. Sears

Starring:  Tommy Cook, Molly McCart, Sue England, Frank Griffin, James Bell, Kay Reihl

MST Season:  5

The Movie

A classic example of Hollywood's juvenile-delinquency-put-on-film genre of the 1950's, Teen-Age Crime Wave is a halfway fetishizing of the lawless lifestyle and a tsk-tsk'ing of a couple of kids who "need some good parenting."  The film tells the story of Mike and Terry, a pair of underage criminals who get busted in a getaway.  Also there is nice girl Jane, who is in the wrong place at the wrong time, but gets taken to court as an accessory and she and Terry get convicted of robbery.  Mike, who made his escape, busts the two dames out, and he and Terry take the reluctant Jane with them so she won't alert the cops.  The trio take refuge in a remote countryside farmhouse, taking an older couple hostage while Mike and Terry figure out what to do next.  But time is running out on them quickly.

There is something of an allegory in play with Teen-Age Crime Wave in that the primary story of the film is about parental figures trying to reach troubled teenagers and convince them to turn their life around.  It's a thankless task, as Mike and Terry are one dimensional characters who do have sob stories in their narrative, but seemingly are in this lifestyle because they choose to be there and they like it.  They are counteracted by characters like Jane and Ben, the older couple's visiting son, who are together individuals seemingly because they have stable homes.  But the mirror of lifestyle doesn't always work, because Mike and Terry are "in it for the kicks," so to speak.  It comes off at more than one point that they're doing this not out of necessity, but because it's fun.  That is, until we get to a conclusion where things aren't fun anymore, and boy, they should have listened to those old people!

The movie is a bit too bare bones to fully flesh itself out, and it constantly squanders the complicated relationships that it could put on display.  Mike and Terry would be engaging if Mike weren't a generic tough guy wannabe and Terry weren't a generic sidekick moll.  Being an innocent caught in the middle, Jane should find some place in this narrative but she never does.  Instead she screams and whines about not wanting to be here.  I mean, I'm sure that's true, but why is she here in this story?  The tragedy of a good person being taken down by the bad deeds of others is a decent arc, but it doesn't really go anywhere and it comes of as a shallow propaganda of "don't do bad things because they hurt good people."  That's a nice sentiment, but it's wasted.

Teen-Age Crime Wave is a moderate little crime drama that doesn't last too long, and it's reasonable to not expect too much from low-budget, superficial productions like this.  At the same time, one can easily see how many things could be added to it to make it a better movie.

The Episode

"This movie is forty minutes of heart-driving living room action!"

The beauty of riffing Teen-Age Crime Wave is that in many ways the film is one of the most scenery chewing one-set plays the show could ask for.  The film mostly follows one-note personality characters, and they spend a lot of time in one area just getting pissy at each other.  There is a lot of personality to project with the comedy, and project they do.  They ride these traits hard, and take the conflict between each and make it funnier.  It works.  Teen-Age Crime Wave is a riot from start to finish, with it's stereotypical bad kid whack-jobs invading a quiet Christian family's home, leading to many a funny scenario as they execute their stupid plan of just pointing a revolver at people for a few days while they grunt at them.  This episode is wildly fun.

"I'm afraid you're going down, Kitten.  Hard."

The host segments tend to be a little lower key, with a space deli, a Mentos commercial parody, and a tribute to "The Doughy Guy."  Cute, but not memorable.  However, this episode is noteworthy for being the last gasp of the Invention Exchange on the series, which was completely phased out until the reboot on Netflix in 2017.  The last two episodes didn't really feature one, but this episode reintroduces the concept as Dr. Forrester introduces Satan's Jockstrap Mace Mousse, and Mike invents a jetpack to try and escape.  Perhaps Dr. F just found that Mike wasn't taking the tradition seriously and ended his inventing days right here.

Really this is mostly an excuse to set up a gag we had last seen in Daddy-O, where the movie is running short so the episode pads out time with a comedy setup where the closing credits start and stop over and over again.  This time Frank keeps hitting the button, only for the feed to start back up and have Dr. F sneak up on poor Frank and spray Satan's Jockstrap in his eyes.  If Frank's screams of agony make you laugh (and why wouldn't they?), this is a series highlight.

I find Teen-Age Crime Wave to be something of a sleeper hit episode.  Very few people talk about it, but whenever I discuss it with someone there always seem to be positive feelings.  I personally think it's a laugh riot, and one of the funniest episodes of, not only the season, but the whole series.  I always hope one day that it might get its due for just how funny it really is.

Classic

TURN IT OFF!  TURN IT OOOOAAAAAAAARGH!

The DVD

Shout Factory surfed the Teen-Age Crime Wave in their Volume XXXIII collection, with solid video and audio.  Bonus features included a documentary on producer Samuel Katzman called Film It Again, Sam:  The Katzman Chronicles.  Narrated by Tom Weaver among other film historian interviews, this doc covers Katzman's diverse career, from working on classics like Earth vs. the Flying Saucers, disasters like The Giant Claw, making cheap B-pictures starring Bela Lugosi (The Corpse Vanishes include), serials starring Batman and Superman, his tenure with Elvis Pressley's filmography, and even small-scale teen dramas like Teen-Age Crime Wave.  What a career!

Following that up is an interview with star Tommy Cook, called From Jungle Boy to Teenage Jungle.  Cook covers his career of a child actor leading up to filming Teen-Age Crime Wave, which concludes with a fairly lengthy account of filming our featured movie, including preparing for his moment that closes the picture.  The interview doesn't really go past that point, even though Cook had a career well into the 70's, including television cartoon voice work and also co-starring in the Rifftrax'd feature Missile to the Moon.

Also included is a trailer to the film.

1205-Killer Fish

Film Year:  1979

Genre:  Horror, Thriller, Heist

Director:  Antonio Margheriti

Starring:  Lee Majors, James Franciscus, Karen Black, Margaux Hemingway, Marisa Berenson

MST Season:  12

The Movie

Lost in the slurry of killer critter (aquatic or otherwise) inspired by the success of Jaws, Killer Fish didn't even have the distinct honor of being the first film about man-eating piranha released in Jaws's wake.  That honor went to, in the surprise of the century, a film called Piranha, a low-budget film produced by Roger Corman and directed by a very young Joe Dante.  Killer Fish came in second place, over a year later.  For a moderately budgeted Italian knockoff film, Killer Fish actually may have had a bigger budget than Piranha, which is something that can't be said of many Italian knockoffs.  But Piranha was much more fun to watch.

That being said, I still think Killer Fish is kind of a hoot.  It doesn't have the gleeful creature feature vibe of Piranha, but for films of its type, it's not without its charms.  It actually manages to have a flavor unique to itself by combining the creature feature with a crime caper, as the primary premise of the film involves jewel thieves retrieving their stash from the bottom of piranha infested waters, only to find themselves adrift in the middle of it with no way out.  The movie is way more fun if you think of it as Catalina Caper but with little fish that will strip the flesh off of your bones.

The Six Million Dollar Man himself, Lee Majors, takes protagonist duties with a twinkle in his eye.  On the opposite end of the spectrum is Beneath the Planet of the Apes (and City on Fire, KTMA fans) star James Franciscus as our human antagonist, who wishes to have all those gems to his greedy, greedy self to the point he, of course, is eventually fish food.  There are very little surprises to the story, but to an extent that's part of the fun.  We know where Killer Fish is going, who is going to live and who is going to die.  Like an episode of a formulaic episode of the TV series you tune into every week, I find myself willing go through its familiarity with a smile on my face.

The Episode

We're in round five of Kinga's Gauntlet and Jonah and the Bots are showing no signs of fatigue.  And considering they've been given a fairly watchable movie for this bout, it's easy to see why they're in such good spirits.  Compared to the micro-budget genre fare that Kinga's been handing out so far in this marathon of hers, Killer Fish is mostly a refreshing change of pace.  In fact, it almost feels like a real movie.  The leisurely pace of the film never quite feels like a detraction, probably because of that fact.  The riffing feels very boisterous, as the tone of the theater keeps everything feeling like a party.  The gags can get goofy with the visual cues, such as Crow turning to a little fish to chase actresses or Growler entering the theater as if he is a tour guide at Universal Studios.  The riffing probably has a bit more gusto than I personally think would have matched this movie (I would have liked to have seen a more relaxed but aggressive Season 9 approach to it), but luckily there are some solid laughs at its stoic seriousness.

Controversially, the episode has a fairly unique scene in the theater where Gypsy, Growler, and Waverly join the riffing trio for a musical number while the movie is playing, which is a much more elaborate version of a similar but smaller musical scene in Starcrash last season.  I've heard some grumbling about this, but prepare for my hot take:  I fucking love it.  There is a subtle genius to the tune of the number they present, because there are riffs within the song that still correspond the movie as it unfolds in front of them, and it's vibrant and playful.  Is it worth interrupting the movie for?  Here's the thing, the sequence in which they write the musical number over is a lengthy scuba diving sequence with no dialogue.  Theoretically they could have riffed it like normal and everything probably would have been fine.  They instead took a swing to spice up a humdrum sequence of very little and tried to turn it into one of the most memorable moments of the episode.  I fell in love with it.  Others are entitled to disagree, but I don't see anything evident in the episode itself that makes it any sort of detraction whatsoever that doesn't come down to "personal pet peeve" status.  It works, and it's fun.  I don't want one for every episode, but if they find circumstances like this again where they can play around, I'm going to allow it.

The host segments are on the slight side.  They're primarily film related, as Jonah and the Bots speculate on what type of "killer fish" they're going to see in the movie (Crow guesses piranha right off the bat, so he wins) or coming up with a battle plan for getting the group off their sinking ship and onto land without becoming piranha chow.  Segments with the Mads are equally slight, as Kinga sends Synthia into the archives to find the Idiot Control Now song for Dr. Erhardt.  The concluding "liquid music" gag at the end of the episode is a little daffy for my tastes, and not really that funny.  I did, however, enjoy the Invention Exchange, which has the Alchemy Glue (you need to believe it works) and the fun prop comedy of the Time Travel Oven.

There doesn't seem to be many people ranking Killer Fish very highly this season.  I think it's unfortunate, because I find the episode a lot of fun.  It enters the third act of the Gauntlet with a lot of energy and it spices up my interest in the six-part season long marathon.  And on its own it's just a really groovy episode.  I'd say it's well worth sailing these waters.

Good

The DVD and Blu-Ray

Shout Factory released this episode in their Season 12 DVD and blu-ray box sets, featuring great audio and video.  Like all relaunch episodes, it doesn't have any disc specific bonus features, but it shares a disc with the following episode, Ator, the Fighting Eagle.  My particular copy of this set is a Pledge Drive Edition, which was given out as a reward for participating in a fundraiser for the season.  The disc is identical to the normal release.

Mystery Science Theater 3000: Volume XXVII DVD Retrospective

Release Date:  July 23, 2013

Buy it here!

Featured Episodes:

The Slime People

Rocket Attack U.S.A.

Village of the Giants

The Deadly Mantis

Also Included:

Serial Variety Pack

Don't touch that dial, because another volume of Mystery Science Theater is here for our enjoyment!  And enjoyment shall be had from myself, as it has not only one of my favorite episodes from the series, but also the episode that made me a fan!  For my money, The Deadly Mantis is the must own episode of the set and I couldn't hit the preorder button on this one fast enough!  Backing it up is the rock solid Rocket Attack U.S.A. and the mostly enjoyable Village of the Giants.  The Slime People closes out the set, and it's fine but no highlight.  This is also the last box set that featured a sampling of all four eras of the classic series, which is always an A+ in my book!

For those who ordered the set through Shout Factory's website received a bonus shorts disc titled the Serial Variety Pack.  This disc collected the non-Commando Cody series featured on thr show, including The Phantom Creeps and Undersea Kingdom, also with the segments of General Hospital thrown in because why not?  It's a pretty good pack of shorts, more consistent than Commando Cody at least.  Not too diverse though.

Average Rating (out of 4):  3

For the most part, audio and video is fair.  The most notable exception is unfortunately Deadly Mantis, which has some larger picture flaws and is even missing a commercial bumper at one point.  The centerpiece of the set is a documentary called Chasing Rosebud:  The Cinematic Life of William Alland, who was the producer on Deadly Mantis as well as a number of Universal International monster films of the 1950's.  Extras also include interviews with actresses Susan (Morton) Frasier and Joy Harmon, while Mary Jo does an introduction for The Deadly Mantis.  Also included is Life After MST3K:  Trace Beaulieu, which chronicles Trace's career.

The box art is the standard Shout Factory art, which features the MST logo in the upper left-hand corner and the theater seats at the bottom, while the roman numerals XXVII are painted in maroon in the center against a starry backdrop.  As always, the real treat are the disc cases with artwork by Steve Vance.  The Slime People features the image of Crow and Tom Servo being surrounded by the titular monsters.  Rocket Attack U.S.A. shows Crow and Servo looking in horror as a missile is being launched.  Village of the Giants features a large Crow holding a small Servo in his hand.  The Deadly Mantis has Crow and Servo looking up at the towing monster.  The bonus Serial disc case is just a generic starry backdrop with posters for each serial displayed, while the theater seats sit down at the bottom.  Disc art is the normal movie logos against a starry backdrop.

Moving on to the DVD menus, The Slime People features Crow and Servo entering a butcher shop ran by Slime People (and apparently humans are on the menu).  Rocket Attack U.S.A. has the Crow and Servo helping a blind man into a fallout shelter, only to get locked out in the process.  Village of the Giants shows Crow and Servo auditioning the dancing giants.  The Deadly Mantis features Servo communicating with fighter pilots Mike and Crow as they combat the giant mantis, which is climbing the Washington Monument.  The menu for the Serial Variety Pack just has the posters for each serial against a starry backdrop, leading to each collection of shorts.

It's hard for me to not recommend this set on the basis of just how great Deadly Mantis is on its own.  There are some good backup episodes, but none that live up to it.  While I'd consider the other episodes to be "mood episodes" more than anything, I'd guarantee at least a few laughs from picking this set up, so definitely check it out.

Serial Variety Pack (MST3K Special)

The sixth and final direct to video shorts compilation follows suit in the previous, compiling a bunch of multipart serials (and one TV show) into a whole shebang.  In quality, it's a step-up from the previous Commando Cody disc because the riffing on all of these chapters is much more assured, diverse, and rapid.  That's not to say the entire disc is a winner though, as each serial has at least one chapter that is a dud, usually capping off the series before they decide to end it.  The exception is General Hospital, who had it's lackluster segment in the middle.  Because of that, General Hospital is probably the most consistently funny group in the collection, while Phantom Creeps and Undersea Kingdom both peter out instead of staying strong.  Also not helping is the fact that none of these serials have a definitive ending featured on the series, as Mystery Science Theater never completed them.  General Hospital especially was a thankless scenario, because soap operas by nature never have a definitive ending.

Momentum in serials is tricky, because each serial tells a story that couldn't hold a feature film and breaks them into fifteen twenty-minute segments.  Phantom Creeps has a lot of zest in their Bela Lugosi mockery, but as its story starts to wear thin, the serial gets tired.  A more confident effort in season four, Undersea Kingdom starts wildly funny, but wears out its welcome even earlier.  What saves General Hospital is that I suspect that all the segments came from the same episode, but soap operas are slow and uneventful anyway, so it can wear out its welcome before it starts.  Joel and the Bots really need to keep humor flowing to make any of these watchable, and while that isn't maintained, the effort is there.

The Phantom Creeps:  Chapter One - The Menacing Power

Original Episode:  Jungle Goddess

The Phantom Creeps is actually a far different beast than Radar Men from the Moon.  This serial stars Bela Lugosi as a mad scientist seeking to sell his maniacal inventions to enemy countries.  Seeking to sneak his way out of the spotlight, he plots to fake his own death and kill his enemies.

Lugosi is always a fun and committed screen presence, and he makes Phantom Creeps a far more entertaining effort than it needs to be.  It also helps that this chapter has a more engaging storyline than the last serial, which was more or less an excuse to get Commando Cody fly from location to location and punch people.  This one is more character driven and is a bit more interesting.

But the only real question I have is how many episodes will it take for the guys at MST to abandon this one too?  Let's watch and find out!

The Phantom Creeps is obviously done so Joel and the Bots can break out a Bela Lugosi impression and they do so with enthusiasm.  Thick Hungarian accents are all over the place during this short, and the line delivery is killer.  This is a massive step up from Commando Cody riffing wise, but can they keep it up with more chapters?

The Phantom Creeps:  Chapter Two

Original Episode:  Rocket Attack U.S.A.

Our heroes manage to escape the sabotaged plane from last week’s installment, though Dr. Zorka’s wife is killed in the crash.  Blaming everyone but himself, Zorka returns to his lab to resupply himself with his invisible belt and other sciencey stuff.  The good guys show up, leading to a road chase with an invisible man.

There’s already so much more happening in two chapters of The Phantom Creeps than we saw in all eight segments of Commando Cody.  I actually wish more serials were like this, because this one is moderately entertaining.  There’s still not much to talk about, outside of low budget effects (this invisible man has nothing on the one Universal put in it’s main features).  Bela Lugosi continues to be a commanding presence that very few serials have.

I find the riffing continuing to maintain consistency (“Stunned?  He took six bullets!”).  Creeps so far is a far superior serial effort over Commando Cody.

The Phantom Creeps:  Chapter Three

Original Episode:  Ring of Terror

Paying off whatever the hell the previous cliffhanger was (it gets tiresome trying to keep track) in typical anti-climactic fashion, the latest chapter of The Phantom Creeps features Zorka rescuing his sidekick Monk from captivity.  Monk then double crosses Zorka and steals a formula from him, before being captured again.

GOOD ONE, MONK!

This fairly redundant chapter finds the lulls of serialized storytelling setting in on The Phantom Creeps.  While the serial is still far more compelling than Radar Men from the Moon was, the repetitive nature can only stay at bay so long.  It would seem that the crew of Mystery Science Theater would agree, as this was the last serial short they would do until Undersea Kingdom in the fourth season.

Riffing feels a tad bit zippy but it doesn't really close the serial with a bang.  Goodbye Phantom Creeps.  Let those Bela Lugosi impressions rest until Bride of the Monster.

Undersea Kingdom:  Chapter One - Beneath the Ocean Floor

Original Episode:  Attack of the Giant Leeches

This serial's about to get soggy!  It's the Undersea Kingdom!  Life under the sea has seemingly been discovered.  Is it the lost city of Atlantis?  A generic batch of gung-ho, rag-tag serial adventurers goes exploring, only to be attacked in the process.

Undersea Kingdom is more Commando Cody than Phantom Creeps.  And yet an attack from Atlantis seems a bit more colorful than a rocket man punching the space men over and over again.  I'm not entirely sure how Undersea Kingdom played out, because we saw a lot less of it than we did of Radar Men from the Moon, but this first chapter is daffy fun.  It won't win any converts into the serial fan club, but those who like them will enjoy this tasty spoonful.

It's apparent how much more confident Joel and the Bots are with this than the were with previous serials as they fire on all cylinders at such a rapid rate of funny that there are very few moments without a laugh.  However it must be said there is more event and less monotony in both the first and last chapters of just about any serial you can name, so the challenge of riffing such a thing has hardly presented itself.  The real hurdles would have been latter on, however they only riffed one more chapter before giving up on serials entirely.

Undersea Kingdom:  Chapter Two - The Undersea City

Original Episode:  Indestructable Man

The Atlanteans discover our heroes in their midst and chase the intruders.  Over and over.

Boy let me tell you, if you love watching people in silly costumes ride horses this is the serial for you.  You'll get more than your money's worth here.  There is little else of value in this final taste of serials that Mystery Science Theater has given us.  The fact that there is so little story in the second chapter of Undersea Kingdom does not bode well for future installments.  I don't blame the show for dumping it because I was getting tired of it too.  Maybe all of the running back and forth meant something in the long run, but I'm not too enthused to watch the entire thing to find out.

Occasionally Joel and the Bots will latch onto something and turn it into something fun, but this second chapter didn't seem like a worthwhile return to the Undersea Kingdom.  I'm pretty happy with traditional shorts from here on out, thank you.

General Hospital (Part 1)

Original Episode:  Manhunt in Space

Abandoning Undersea Kingdom, season four’s attempt at a serial comeback, MST tackles the enigma of their entire shorts lineup:  segments of the soap opera General Hospital.  I’m not entirely sure if anybody has ever spoken out on why General Hospital was considered for the short section.  Perhaps they were seeing that serials were too monotonous and trying to figure out something else that could be serialized to take their place.  Whatever the reason, General Hospital is here, and boy does it suck.

This particular segment features a doctor/nurse love octagon bubble ready to burst, as a nurse plans a party to ruin her crush-doctor’s delusion that he can be with a woman who is engaged to another man.  Meanwhile a patient gets bad-ish news.

When I was babysat as a tyke my cousin used to watch soap operas all the time.  I don’t think General Hospital was one of them (her shows were All My Children and Days of Our Lives), but I grew to have an intense loathing of them at a young age.  Cheap “entertainment” churned out at a pace so fast it was impossible to have any sort of bar for quality, these things were merely meant to be afternoon killers for stay-at-home moms with a case of the mopies and jobless dads who want to see easy cleavage.  Seeing this vintage piece from the 1960’s proves that they haven’t really changed much.

In theory soap opera’s are ideal for riffing.  They’re melodramatic, feature little humor, and hold large amounts of dead space for commentary to fill.  As such, the riffing on General Hospital is good, and they pin this thing to a wall and pretty much ribbing it senseless.  If I were to cite a problem with it it’s that little-to-nothing happens in the segment, leaving the audience a little mystified as to what the point of it was.

General Hospital (Part 2)

Original Episode:  The Beatniks

Continuing on from where the last General Hospital segment left off, the party is held complete with a lot of awkward tension between characters who want to bang each other.  The audience is just screaming "Start the orgy and be done with it!"

And there is cake.  Very slow cake cutting.  Very slow cake eating.

I want cake.

This segment is probably the least memorable of the General Hospital shorts on the show, because less happens than usual (and almost nothing happens at all in the entirety of the story presented in the three segments overall).  People glare at each other and just look pissy.  That's pretty much the entire thing.  And yet, there is one more of these things to deal with.  Ugh.

The riffing on the General Hospital short doesn't quite take off the way the other segments of General Hospital do.  It has a few chuckles, though the dry uneventful story weighs the riffing down.  There's a genuine effort to keep things lively, as they note the somber mood since the first moment.  Despite not being a laugh riot, they liven up this lifeless party.

General Hospital (Part 3)

Original Episode:  Crash of Moons

In the aftermath of the previous segment's party, lead General Hospital stud drives his engaged girlfriend-wannabe home and tries to convince her she's marrying the wrong man.  Meanwhile the nurse who has eyes for Dr. McStudmuffin throws a fit about him driving her home.

After three segments General Hospital's tenure on Mystery Science Theater 3000 comes to an end.  I'm not going to miss it.  What more can I say about General Hospital?  The only reason it's not the lowest bar for television programming is that reality shows based on the Kardashians, "Real Housewives," and a bunch of idiots in Jersey Shore exist.  There's nothing really in General Hospital for me to comment on, so I won't even bother.

The melodrama and lackluster sexual tension is thicker than ever.  Like the other General Hospital segments I think the format sets itself up for riffing quite well and the riffing takes full advantage.  The three segments of this soap do blend in together after a while making it difficult to pick a favorite, but I do remember laughing a bit more at this one, with a killer pitch like "You don't love Ken!" and a perfect swing like "Like I love Ken!"  General Hospital in the long run seems to be an experiment on the show, and while it's not a fairly memorable one I'm glad it happened and I got some laughs out of it.