My favorite is still Manos, the Hands of Fate. When Torgo is trying to touch the mother and Crow pops up with, “When carnies flirt!”
I’ve been buying the DVD sets as they come out and I am a huge fan. My favorite line is the “Schhhhhhhmucker’s Raspberry Preserves”, which I think is from the Trumpy episode.
Joel ruled, though. Not that I don’t love Mike. But Joel ruled. I still have my Info Club card around somewhere.
The Bots would do a riff somthing like, “This is just like Star Wars, except it’s not very good” or “This is just like two thousand one…needles jammed into my eyes.”
I love Manos: The Hands of Fate and Mitchell, myself.
“Mitchell… Mitchell… Mitchell… Eye on the sammitch!”
However, I never was able to watch it very consistently (by the time we had Comedy Central, it was off, and by the time we had Sci-Fi, they’d stopped making new episodes), so I have no opinion on when it died.
He tried to kill me with a forklift!
I so remember discovering that show, after working late in the clinic, getting home at 10:30 or so at night, reheating dinner, and channel surfing. It hit me right between the eyes with the humor! The first one I remember seeing was one of the ones with George Reeves in it, with the white jungle queen. Priceless. I laughed so hard I nearly aspirated!
My goal is to get the short with “Mr. B Natural” in it on either tape or DVD. That brief film was just so wonderfully wrong in so many ways. I’ve been unable to get a copy so far.
“Ken! Ken! Ken!” “Oh, great, a planet of Judy Garland impersonators!”
I didn’t start watching until Sci-Fi, and then only pretty late, so Mike is my favorite.
But I love them all. There’s enough variety in the show, but the premise never truly changed.
I have a ton of sound clips.
Mike Nelson came to Pittsburgh a few years ago, and I didn’t learn until the last minute and I wasn’t able to go and see him. I cried myself to sleep that night.
Your wish is my command, sort of
Scroll down to “Mr. B’s Lost Shorts”. This is currently the only way to get an official copy.
Oooh, are we going to start sharing MST First Time stories? Mine was when I was flipping channels and saw a Godzilla movie! Cool! And then…there were these guys down in front making fun of the Godzilla movie and they were funny as hell. I spent all summer watching it. I was like 15, 16. It was in the Comedy Central days.
My favorites were always the shorts.
The best was Circus on Ice.
Tom [singing]:
These two girls are quite a pair
they come from your worst nightmare
no whenever you see pink
you’ll think
we’re doomed
They are agents of Satan…
Joel: Tom…
My favorite part of this episode was the song:
“With a pickle mind
We get the nipple beer
Steady as she goes
We’re flying over trout
Ghetto down the highway
At the speed of light
All I want to feel now
Is the wind in my eyes
Sack o’monkeys in my pocket
My sister’s ready to go…
Hear the engines roar, now!”
And Joel’s great line, “This song needs a hook.”
I was flipping through the channels, stopped on The Comedy Channel and was surprised to see a movie playing. This was back when all their programming was two-hour blocks of mostly stand-up. It was some color post-apocalyptic movie very very much from the mid-80’s (I think it was Robot Holocaust). At one point, two young women run out of the bushes to attack our heroes; they’re both wearing tights and leg-warmers and headbands and ripped Flashdance-style shirts. Crow says, “Um… are you Wendy, or Lisa?”
And I thought Joel and Mike were both great (Mike was the head writer during Joel’s years) but I have to say I did like Joel’s delivery better. I stopped watching when they switched to the Sci-Fi Channel, but only because I’ve never lived anywhere that gets Sci-Fi. I thought the show held up really, really well with all the departures, until Trace Beaulieu left. The new guy Bill Corbett did a fine job with Crow’s voice, but he had really really tough shoes to fill.
One of my favorite episodes ever is the aforementioned Vahrvulf, and it was well into the sci-fi years. “He’s must be circling that gas station because it’s the weakest in the herd.”
Now I’ve just got to stop quoting the show at random in everyday conversation.
“Vhat you and your friends are doing is incradabul.”
“I’m HUGE!”
“This movie’s really not very good!”
“Hmmm… little potatoes.”
“Is there anything I can’t conquer? Hot damn!”
“Well, I can see how you’d say tha… HEY!”
“It STINKS!”
And you have to love that character in the recording studio wearing the “I Am a Virgin” t-shirt. “Good? They’re the BEST!”
“Quick, let’s fold her.”
“Stop the madness!”
My first MST3K was “Wild Rebels” (from the second season, when it was still the “Comedy Channel.” BTW, a good episode guide can be found here: http://www.mst3kinfo.com/episodes/). I came across it while channel-surfing, too, back in the summer of '91 (since the original airing was Nov. of 1990, I must have been watching a repeat). I probably caught it halfway into the show, but was so fascinated with it that I decided that I’d watch every week. From then on, I set aside every Saturday evening from 6-8pm to watch it.
When watching a “normal” movie that seems to stop dead–black screen, or desolate landscape; no characters, no dialog–just say in a querying, timorous voice: “he-- hello?? movie??”
The best part was when they did the host segment with Joel and the bots performing that scene, and TV’s Frank was wearing the “virgin” shirt.
One of my favorite host segments was the “Patrick Swayze Christmas” song (inspired by “Santa Claus Conquers the Martians”). For several Christmases thereafter, my brother and I would remember the show by reciting the lyrics (if not by actually watching his videotape of that particular show).
I’m a Joelist. Mike’s okay though. I think the hardest I ever laughed at MST3K was during the Failure song from The Day The Earth Froze. “Are you with the Bride… or the FAILURE?”
Another one that you still see on Sci-Fi is “Track of the Moon Beast,” which has that incredibly absurd scene where they try to scare the hero with some incan ceremonial mask but he’s such a lame actor he just kind of looks around. Then the woman is so apologetic you’d think she ran over his dog. I think it’s that episode with the hilarious host segment on The Band That Played California Lady.
–Cliffy
P.S. IT’S SODIUM!!!
The first MST3K I ever saw was the The Thing That Couldn’t Die. I knew I was a fan when I literally hyperventilated from laughing.
“Thank you, chastity amulet!”
My first experience was Sidehackers. I was hooked forever.