Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Rifftrax

What is your opinion on MST3k/Rifftrax

  • 1. Love it more than life itself and will sacrifice my first born child to glorify it's name

    Votes: 84 21.8%
  • 2. Love it

    Votes: 224 58.2%
  • 3. Meh

    Votes: 50 13.0%
  • 4. Hate it

    Votes: 9 2.3%
  • 5. What the fuck is a MST3K?!

    Votes: 18 4.7%

  • Total voters
    385
I've been wanting to get back into this show because I don't think I've actually sat and watched one since 2016, which blows my mind.

But because it's been a while and I'm out of the habit, I'm suffering choice paralysis on where exactly to begin again, any recommendations?

Also it ran in a pre-internet era and before multi-billion-dollar corporations started selling a soy-drenched, mass market version of "nerd culture" to retards. Idk exactly why, but those things seem significant somehow in explaining why MST3K worked circa the early 90's but trying to replicate it in 2021 fails.

MST3K was genuine, just a bunch of slightly dorky guys cracking jokes and having fun watching shitty movies on VHS in their basement. Nostalgia goggles are a powerful thing tho. When MST3K was good, it was great, but a lot of it was filler. I thought most of the heavily scripted "bits" fell flat - invention exchange usually wasn't funny and anything involving Pearl was terrible - but nobody watched the show for those parts. Usually the jokes came thick and fast enough to make the movie parts entertaining.

Closest thing to it now might be watching the RedLetterMedia guys getting drunk watching Best of the Worst, but that's not much of a substitute and pretty hit and miss itself.
A huge part of the appeal of the show was indeed how unapologetically and authentically nerdy it was, it was just the way things were back in the 1990s.

And that's something that you almost can't replicate in today's world of "geek chic"
 
I've been wanting to get back into this show because I don't think I've actually sat and watched one since 2016, which blows my mind.

But because it's been a while and I'm out of the habit, I'm suffering choice paralysis on where exactly to begin again, any recommendations?
If you're talking about Rifftrax, their Harry Potter and Twilight riff series are pretty consistently funny. If you want something standalone, try Eragon. Quite possibly some of their best work despite it being so early in Rifftrax that it's just Mike and Kevin.
 
I've been wanting to get back into this show because I don't think I've actually sat and watched one since 2016, which blows my mind.

But because it's been a while and I'm out of the habit, I'm suffering choice paralysis on where exactly to begin again, any recommendations?
If you mean MST3k, just go with crawling eye. Otherwise I'd pick something like Mike's first episode, or Manos. Season 3 is considered where the show hit it's stride so you could start there too.

And final sacrifice is always golden, right @Rowsdower?
 
I've been wanting to get back into this show because I don't think I've actually sat and watched one since 2016, which blows my mind.

But because it's been a while and I'm out of the habit, I'm suffering choice paralysis on where exactly to begin again, any recommendations?


A huge part of the appeal of the show was indeed how unapologetically and authentically nerdy it was, it was just the way things were back in the 1990s.

And that's something that you almost can't replicate in today's world of "geek chic"
I was a huge Joel fan back in the day, I never gave Mike a chance and stopped watching the show for a year or two. I picked it up again in the Scifi years and I'm glad I did. It made me realize that I'm actually a "Mike" guy (even though I respect the hell out of Joel).

Seasons 8-10 are, in my opinion, the best of the show. You had a machine running at peak efficiency. The riffs were a little esoteric but not muddlesome. What I liked most about the Scifi era was the chuckling that the guys did during some of the more incredible things in their movies. You got the sense it was a few friends cracking wise and trying to make each other laugh rather than trying to impress each other with their knowledge (aka Nu-MST3K.)

Final Sacrifice
Pumaman
Overdrawn at the Memory Bank...

All good place to jump back in
 
watching ep 405 - Being From Another Planet
at the end they go in hard on the idea that this was the worst movie they ever did to-date
I never really got that bit.
It's certainly a dumb and bad enough movie but it's got a relatively coherent plot, the effects don't fall apart, and if the title for the Film Ventures International re-release didn't blow the ending it would even have a decent twist.
I guess it was just sort of a way to pad out the closing credits?

I've been wanting to get back into this show because I don't think I've actually sat and watched one since 2016, which blows my mind.

But because it's been a while and I'm out of the habit, I'm suffering choice paralysis on where exactly to begin again, any recommendations?


A huge part of the appeal of the show was indeed how unapologetically and authentically nerdy it was, it was just the way things were back in the 1990s.

And that's something that you almost can't replicate in today's world of "geek chic"
For MST3k if you really want to go through from the start you're likely in the best position you can be now that the first two KTMAs are in circulation leaving only the third episode unavailable
as much as some of the early KTMAs can clunk along the first ep is nice enough and the second episode is actually surprisingly solid
season 3 is usually regarded as when they really hit their stride
I'd say look for movies you're interested in seeing and go from there
if you mean Rifftrax then I usually just catch whatever random thing is on cytube. the Harry Potters are usually decent enough efforts. I found Twilight to be not _that_ hot for the riffing. I respect that they pause and look stupid a lot but the guys saying "... line" got old by partway through the first movie
Rifftrax really seems to mesh well with shit 80s action movies, like Miami Connection worked really well for them. They covered Robo Vampire, a Robert Cop vs Hopping Vampire movie from legendary shitmaven Godfrey Ho.
Their riffs on the Batman serials aren't bad but they don't marathon so great, like Commando Cody there's only so many ways to make fun of the exact same intro credits over and over and over and over
also RT on Killers From Space was good. Peter Graves is Peter Graves in another horrible cheap pile of shit that he sincerely tries to get through.

but yeah you point about them being sincerely nerdy is very solid
like I remember when they had a sudden MASSIVE uptick in Dune jokes, it was in the wake of the time The Disney Channel showed the long af Smithee cut at like two in the fucking morning

Cinematic Titanic is probably worth a look if you like Joel-era riffing, too. That was the thing Joel was doing before Jim Mallon had a change of heart, was basically The MST Alumni Who Weren't Mike, Bill, and Kevin.
 
I was a huge Joel fan back in the day, I never gave Mike a chance and stopped watching the show for a year or two. I picked it up again in the Scifi years and I'm glad I did. It made me realize that I'm actually a "Mike" guy (even though I respect the hell out of Joel).

Seasons 8-10 are, in my opinion, the best of the show. You had a machine running at peak efficiency. The riffs were a little esoteric but not muddlesome. What I liked most about the Scifi era was the chuckling that the guys did during some of the more incredible things in their movies. You got the sense it was a few friends cracking wise and trying to make each other laugh rather than trying to impress each other with their knowledge (aka Nu-MST3K.)
The Sci Fi Channel era episodes are the only ones I saw as a kid, I've since watched a fair amount of Joel and Comedy Central era episodes and I like them a lot, but I would agree that, personal nostalgia aside, Sci Fi Channel was indeed the peak.

Final Sacrifice
Pumaman
Overdrawn at the Memory Bank...

All good place to jump back in
Overdrawn at the Memory Bank is probably my favorite episode that I've seen and I think the last one I've watched, wouldn't hurt to jump back in by revisiting an old favorite.
 
The Sci Fi Channel era episodes are the only ones I saw as a kid, I've since watched a fair amount of Joel and Comedy Central era episodes and I like them a lot, but I would agree that, personal nostalgia aside, Sci Fi Channel was indeed the peak.


Overdrawn at the Memory Bank is probably my favorite episode that I've seen and I think the last one I've watched, wouldn't hurt to jump back in by revisiting an old favorite.
I've still been meaning to catch Overdrawn At The Memory Bank for the full miniseries raw
it seems like it has a lot of pretty good ideas but it just didn't have the means to express them totally
 
It's based on a pretty good short story by John Barley. They just didn't have the money to make it properly.
also there wasn't anything even resembling a common shorthand for visuals of "cyber things are happening here"
Overdrawn is aesthetic af. Suprised the vaporwave scene hasn't rediscovered it.
one dude who was an online bro of mine described it as "it's not cyberpunk, it's cybersalaryman"
 
I've still been meaning to catch Overdrawn At The Memory Bank for the full miniseries raw
it seems like it has a lot of pretty good ideas but it just didn't have the means to express them totally
This is part of what makes it such a great episode is as bad as the movie is, it still contains a lot of interesting ideas, it's heady, forward thinking stuff for 1985, even "scrolling up cinemas" sounds like modern day streaming.

There's also something genuinely satisfying about it's ending and the overall the story of a guy fighting against a corporate monopoly, especially today.
 
This is part of what makes it such a great episode is as bad as the movie is, it still contains a lot of interesting ideas, it's heady, forward thinking stuff for 1985, even "scrolling up cinemas" sounds like modern day streaming.

There's also something genuinely satisfying about it's ending and the overall the story of a guy fighting against a corporate monopoly, especially today.
Oh yeah, there's been at least dozens of times I've watched the MST of Overdrawn while dicking around at work via youtube to appreciate the prescience of using your downtime to punch up some shit to watch
hell, literally today at work I used my dead time to queue up a mess of episodes of MST for a synchtube
 
Oh yeah, there's been at least dozens of times I've watched the MST of Overdrawn while dicking around at work via youtube to appreciate the prescience of using your downtime to punch up some shit to watch
hell, literally today at work I used my dead time to queue up a mess of episodes of MST for a synchtube
And stop and think how radical the idea of being able to watch a movie on a computer would have been in 1985.
 
And stop and think how radical the idea of being able to watch a movie on a computer would have been in 1985.
ehh, I was on a TI-994a and an Atari 800xl back then, the idea of "watch a movie on a computer" wasn't there yet but it would have been less of a stretch than brain downloads
but I can see where you're coming from at least
 
Oh yeah, there's been at least dozens of times I've watched the MST of Overdrawn while dicking around at work via youtube to appreciate the prescience of using your downtime to punch up some shit to watch
hell, literally today at work I used my dead time to queue up a mess of episodes of MST for a synchtube
The original slacker. Fingle preceded Dante and Randall from "Clerks" by eight years.
 
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