The Mystery Science Theater 3000 Collection, Vol. 8 (Hobgoblins / The Phantom Planet / Monster A-Go Go / The Dead Talk Back)

Description

Journey once more through the portals on the Satellite of Love to the best of the worst that cinema has to offer. Joel, Mike, and their "robot friends" do another hilarious orbit around four full-length features, presenting the kind of skits and wisecracking commentary that are clearly written by the culturally insane. Review: I finally found one!!! - This set has been out of print for so long I thought I'd never find an affordable copy. Well thanks to someone on desertcart, I snagged one for under forty bucks! Yay me! This is really a great collection, here's my break down of each episode: HOBGOBLINS: Legendary episode from the Sci-Fi era, though I think its a bit overrated. This turgid, god-awful Gremlins rip-off has got to be the absolute worst 80's movie the SoL crew has ever had to sit through. Writer/Director Rick Sloane manages to insult the audience's intelligence throughout the entire picture, with tons of terrible jokes, irritating characters, deplorable views towards women, non-existant special effects, bland direction, and lots and lots of scenes of people parking and leaving their vehicles. Its excruciating, and easily in the top 10 worst movies they've EVER done on MST3k. Like MANOS (another excruciating film), unfortunately, Mike and Co. are struck speachless with this films badness, and while there are some very funny, very memorable riffs, they're somewhat few and far between, with mostly dead air and groans of agony inbetween. Its worth seeing, as the movie reaches depths of badness that few others can dig down to (thank god), but know what you're getting into. THE PHANTOM PLANET: Another Sci-Fi episode, and one of the seemingly endless string of B movie space operas MST3k did. The movie itself is cheesey, but not super bad, this one actually kinda feels like a crappy episode of the original Star Trek (so like... half the episodes of the original Star Trek). Actually, I was surprised by how much funnier this episode was than I remembered it being when I first saw it on TV. The jokes are non-stop and there are so many dumb characters to make fun of that I was just rolling. The stuff they say about the elderly leader of the alien planet, the dog monsters, the KFC planet, the fruity philosophical guy that dies at the beginning, everything just makes for good good riffing. Really funny stuff. A great episode. MONSTER A-GO GO: The only Joel episode in here, this one is a solid contender for "Worst Movie Of All Time." I'd say its worse than Manos, actually, since Manos at least has an ending and was made by people who didn't know any better and were in way over their heads. But the people behind Monster A Go Go? They don't have any excuse for this wreck, they actually made other movies. Thankfully, as dull and awful as this movie is (and it is SO dull and SO awful), the riffing is good and it makes the movie a bit easier to get through than Manos. Also, the short about Ice Dancing before the movie is oddly creepy and therefore hilarious. A fine episode, even if the movie itself is extremely painful. THE DEAD TALK BACK: Not a fan-favorite, from what I understand many find it boring. After giving it a few views, I have to disagree. In fact, I like it much better than HOBGOBLINS! True, its a dull police procedural with lots of long scenes of the two detectives drilling the suspects with questions, but the characters are all so stupid and laughable (the scientist who claims to be able to talk to the dead looks like Justin Timberlake from the SNL "D*** In A Box" sketch, and his voice is honkier than Kermit the Frog) that it gives Mike and the Bots tons to work with. They are truly on fire here too, as they immediately pounce on any gap in the dialogue (and between the overwrought acting and the sub-Dragnet hardboiled detective speak, there's tons of gaps!) with tons of great jokes. Sure, the short before the movie was kind of dull (its a sales film about chest freezers, clearly never meant to interest or even be seen by anyone outside the industry) but the movie portion of the episode had my wife and I in stitches. A great episode! All in all a very worthy volume, and I'm very happy I found an inexpensive copy! Review: "Paint My Muscle Car Prune Color, Please!" - I will admit that I bought this set for one primary reason: "Hobgoblins." I think that aside from Manos and the Coleman Francis experience, this is perhaps the most amusingly amateurish film ever seen on MST3K. I had seen all of these episodes several times, and I like them all, but "Hobgoblins" is a real treasure. "Hobgoblins" (episode 907,) a clear "Gremlins" rip-off, has some of the worst acting and worst dialogue ever in a movie. Add to that the most ridiculous puppets ever seen in a "horror" movie and this one is a sure fire winner. My two favorite scenes are the duel with garden weasels (no kidding) and the musical and puppet war scenes filmed inside "Club Scum" ("She's dancing and cleaning the acoustic tiles!") This is truly one of the epic works in the annals of MST3K. The writing for Mike and the bots is absolutely at the top of the series, and the subject matter is so eminently skewerable as to make this a true treasure in any cheese-lovers movie collection. "Monster-A-Go-Go" (episode 421,) is a little gem from schlockmeister Bill Rebane and concerns the recovery of a horribly mutated astronaut in the most unlikely looking spacecraft ever seen on film and the terror he wreaks on humanity. This is so ultra-low budget that at one point an actor has to actually mouth "brrrrring" to simulate the sound of a phone ringing. I laughed so hard when I saw that I had to rewind about five times. The film has a wonderful surprise ending (no spoilers here) which really is a surprise mostly because it is such a total and complete non sequitur. This is a truly amazing piece of cinema. It is also served with a horrendous nightmare of a short called "Circus on Ice" which feature vast numbers of people skating is silly ways, and includes the only "deer hunt on ice" ever filmed (I hope.) "The Dead Talk Back" (episode 603,) is a pretty boring and predictable psychic phenomena movie featuring the cast of a boardinghouse and their associates pitted against each other to pin a murder (by crossbow and curtain rod!) on each other. A scientist with the most amazing facial hair issues I have ever seen uses his machine (apparently a wad of aluminum foil) to talk to the dead girl and finger her killer. Don't miss the dramatic ending! (Yawn...) This one features a short called "The Selling Wizard" which is about modern commercial ice cream storage units. This is a fairly inoffensive short by MST3K standards, and features a spokesmodel who is actually cute by 1950s criteria, though somewhat possessed by refrigeration demons. "The Phantom Planet" (episode 902,) is an old black and white classic about an astronaut marooned on a distant planet where he has to fight a very silly duel (he takes the noble road of sparing his victim's life, of course) and overcome his feelings for an alien woman (well, two alien women, actually, one of which is mute.) This was years before Captain Kirk dreamed of such flights of fancy. My favorite part of the film is a truly remarkable, yet insanely loopy speech by a junior space officer about the nature of beauty and the fundamental goodness of humanity, which the MST crew mercilessly mocks through the remainder of the film. Overall, this is a very strong set, and any fan of obscure or cheesy films will love all four of these movies. I highly recommend this set.