I actually think the concept behind 'The Screaming Skull' is a fantastic idea for a horror movie. The problem was that it was done just about as incompletely as possible. The plot should have been shopped around to a better writer/director and it would have been a great 50s horror flick.
There are some other 'fair' MST3k movies that are just boring, paint by numbers action flicks (made funny by riffing - Mitchell being the best example).
Mitchell and Final Justice (you think you can take me? Go head on!) are definitely two examples of movies that were competently made, just really generic, but I think that was to the episodes' benefit, the fact that they were watching movies of a certain quality.
Diabolik, the final episode of the TV series, is another one that's actually pretty good, but cheesy enough to make it perfect for riffing.
Sometimes movies that are completely incompetently made can be interesting in their own right like Manos, but honestly I find the REALLY incompetent movies to be kind of frustrating, not as interesting to me as episodes with better movies.
Some movies that really straddle the line are Hobgoblins, terrible, but so bizarrely 80s* that it'd be interesting to watch on it's own or movies that you probably wouldn't want to watch on their own but they make great episodes like Pod People and Future War.
But all in all I definitely prefer a movie, even MTS3K ones, to have some level of competent production or some level of interestingness beyond the riffing, I guess it was an issue with budget that so many of the movies were just complete trash, which is a bit of a shame, imagine if they were able to get some more high profile stinkers.
*funny story about Hobgoblins, when I saw that episode as a kid the sheer 80ness of that movie actually creeped me out, as a 90s kid I was very familiar with the 80s but I had never seen something THAT 80s and THAT bizarre a take on 80s culture before, I'm not kidding when I said it genuinely creeped me out, because it was so radically different than the culture I was growing up in and familiar with, but we're only talking about a decade prior to the then present day, it's crazy how much things can change in ten years.
Heck even with the voice the idea of "Alien From LA" is one with potential. (Though Kathy is a very fine meatbag.)
Instead of remaking classics like Terminator or LotR yet again, I really wish Hollywood would remake those rough gems MST3k would find instead. Even werewolf's idea of a curse returning because an old skeleton was found has some real potential in it.
It a shame they don't remake more bad movies with potential and try to improve them.
In fact has Hollywood EVER done that beyond unofficial ripoffs like the aforementioned The Island ripping off Parts: The Clonus Horror?
Parts:The Clonus Horror was such a good idea it was ripped off as "The Island" decades later. I believe the makers of Parts sued and it was settled out of court for over 7 figures. Those kinds of cases are usually thrown out of court, too. But apparently it was so shameless they couldn't ignore it and thought it was better to settle.
Gee, I wonder who the brainless hack was who stole the idea for a movie that was MST3K fodder. Cough*AlexKurtzman*Cough
What's funny about The Island to me is while I never saw it an actress who voiced a character in an anime I liked had a small roll in that movie and actually briefly mentioned in this in one of the commentary tracks on the US dvd, she said "I'm in The Island!" in a kind of embarrassed way, which is fitting.
