Buy This DVD Box Set Now By Clicking On The Text Link Below!
The Mystery Science Theater 3000...
MST3K Stars: Joel Hodgson, Michael J. Nelson, Trace Beaulieu, and Frank Conniff
Featuring The Voices Of: Trace Beaulieu and Jim Mallon
B-Movie
Stars: Peter Lawford, Alan Hale, Pat Butrum, Jack Palance, Arthur Godfrey, Jim
Backus, Miles O’Keefe, Lisa Foster, Charles Barromel, Choe Wong, Hugo Astral,
William Anton, Oscar Martin, and Frank Brana
MST3K
Writers: Joel Hodgson, Michael J. Nelson, Trace Beaulieu, Frank Conniff, Mike
Dodge, Bridget James, Kevin Murphy, Mary Jo Piehl, Jim Mallon, and Colleen
Williams
MST3K
Hosted Segment Director: Jim Mallon
Created
By: Joel Hodgson
Producer:
Jim Mallon
Executive
Producers: Joel Hodgson and Jim Mallon
Feature
length: 379 minutes
Languages:
English Monaural Sound
Subtitles:
N/A
Packaging:
Four-Disc Digipack Gatefold Within A Cardboard Slipcase
Chapter
Stops: 20 For The Features/9 For “Shorts – Volume 1”
Sound:
Monaural Sound
Year
of Television Broadcasts: 1991/1994/1998/DVD Release: 2003
Home
Video Distributor: Rhino Home Video
MPAA
Rating: Not Rated
Reviewer:
Mark A. Rivera
In
the not too distant future, aboard the Satellite of Love one human being and his
robot companions are forced to watch terrible movies transmitted to them by a
mad scientist, obsessed with finding the right bad movie to break the human
spirit. Armed with nothing but their wit and sarcasm, fans watched and laughed
at the mix jokes, jabs, and even the occasional colorful skit with remarks that
are broad enough to cover the mainstream to the obscure. “Mystery Science
Theater 3000” aired successfully on Comedy Central and Sci-Fi and even had a
feature film release. Rhino Home Video has been distributing various episodes of
the series with ten available separately on DVD-Video and an excellent
collection of fan picked episodes in a four-disc box set. I loved that set so
much that it was among my top ten TV on
DVD-Videos reviewed at GENRE ONLINE.NET
in 2002. Now Rhino has grouped four more fan favorite episodes and released them
for the first time ever on DVD-Video. Unfortunately or maybe fortunately the
uncut b-movie versions were not available so the four discs in this new set only
contain the MST3K episodes themselves. Two of the episodes feature Joel Hodgson
and are from the 1991 season, one features Michael J. Nelson from the 1994
season and the final disc is a 1998 compilation of short films hosted by Tom
Servo featuring both Joel Hodgson and Michael J. Nelson separately with their
robot friends for each short and if anyone has ever seen how the crew of the
Satellite of Love tear apart a short industrial or public service announcement,
then you can imagine the comic potential that comes from such gems as “The
Home Economics Story,” “Body Care & Grooming,” and “A Date With Your
Family” among six others.
The
series is an imaginative blend of low-tech sci-fi complete with imaginative
puppets designed by Hodgson to create the signature characters of Crow, Tom
Servo, Gypsy, and the unseen except for the opening credits Cambot. Trace
Beaulieu is the mad scientist “Dr. Clayton Forrester” who with henchmen
“TV’s Frank” (Frank Conniff) provide some comic relief between the
character skits aboard the Satellite of Love and introduce the b-movie our
trapped hosts are forced to watch and hopefully turn an otherwise terrible film
into a laugh out loud comic experience.
Disc
one features’ “Angels Revenge,” a movie so bad Mike remarks, “This
movie’s an insult even to one-celled animals.” Cave Dwellers” is so bad
that the opening and closing credits show scenes from some unnamed film. “Pod
People” is the funniest of the feature film episodes within the four-disc set.
The aliens look like two kids wearing gorilla suits with an aardvark head and
while one is murderous and the other is innocent, the humans might do more
damage to their own in this flick than the aliens, lest we forget anyone who had
to sit through this film before the MST3K crew got to it and perhaps we should
feel sorry for them too.
Each
episode of “Mystery Science Theater 3000” is presented in their original
broadcast aspect ratio of (1.33:1). The videotaped portions with our cast look
great on DVD with no color bleeding or artifacts, but the b-movies reveal a bit
of the video artifacts when we see the imprints of our commentators making fun
of the films. Two-Channel Monaural Sound is provided for each film on each disc,
but there are no captions or subtitles encoded onto any of the DVD-Videos.
Sadly
there are no extra features like a behind-the-scenes featurette or a new
interview with any of the creative team members behind “Mystery Science
Theater 3000,” which is a shame since this box set, like the previous set is a
perfect showcase for featurettes like interviews and whatnot. An six page insert
containing scene selections and a list of all the episodes available at the time
of this writing on DVD and VHS is included within the Digipack style cardboard
gatefold that comes within a cardboard slipcase with a spinning wheel on the
cover where the image of one of the show’s characters driving within the
street cars on the box cover as well as a scene from one of the films in the set
and there is a movable blimp on the cover too. The packaging shows some thought
and makes the pairing more special for the fans. In fact I still prefer this
packaging to the art used on the individual keep cases.
I
hope future collections will include some more memorable b-movie episodes, like
“Gamera,” and some more extra features. The main menu on each disc is
animated with a motion transition to standard interactive still frame scene
selection menus and all are easy to navigate. If you are a fan of this series,
you can’t let this new box set pass you by. “The Mystery Science Theater
3000 Collection: Volume 2” is available on DVD-Video now from Rhino Home
Video.
©
Copyright 2003 By Mark A. Rivera
All Rights Reserved.