A guy in Pittsburgh interviews Mike.

Okay for the next four weeks were are choosing from among those massive 24-episode seasons, so we’ll expand your options: You are allowed to choose a top 10 with an honorable mention, and you can also pick a worst segment if you like.
Once again SEASON THREE ONLY.
Here’s mine, basically in episode order:
• New Age music from Some Guys in Space. — 303- POD PEOPLE: Topical (at the time), witty and has great interaction between Joel and Crow.
• Marketing mad dogs around the water cooler. — 307- DADDY-O: bright and funny and still fresh today.
• Song: “Hike Your Pants Up.” — 307- DADDY-O: One of the show’s great songs, and Joel just goes completely off the rails with it.
• Joel agonizes about being a 50-foot man. — 309- THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN: Aah! It’s a hilarious parody of a ridiculous moment in the movie! Aah!
• Old Joel Robinson had a farm? — 310- FUGITIVE ALIEN: One of those classic “Joel vapor locks” moments. Help us!
• Sarcastic banter over dinner. — 311- IT CONQUERED THE WORLD: They took the catty dinner scene from the movie and amped it up juuust a notch. Brilliant.
• J&TB read through Crow’s screenplay, “Earth vs. Soup.” — 313- EARTH VS. THE SPIDER: Funny from about four different angles, and everybody’s performance is letter-perfect.
• “Catching Ross.” — 315- TEENAGE CAVEMAN: One of those wonderfully chaotic looney toons moments on MST3K, and of course deeply cathartic.
• Mr. B. Natural: man or woman? — 319- WAR OF THE COLOSSAL BEAST: The classic debate, as a much a parody of debates as it is a commentary on the short. Great stuff.
• J&TB read their Christmas essays. — 321- SANTA CLAUS CONQUERS THE MARTIANS: Landmark moment on the series, always hilarious and heartwarming, even after a dozen viewings.
• Honorable mention: Tom pairs detectives with their appropriate pets. 324- MASTER NINJA II: The kind of sketch I always love: it makes no sense at all and nobody seems to mind.
• Worst segment: Joel attempts a spit-take lesson, but the dumb guy from the movie keeps appearing on the Hexfield. — 307- DADDY-O: Sometimes those hexfield visitors just kind of went nowhere.
Have at it!

It’s the weekend and time for another short from Rifftrax; and this one is DRM-free once again. The title — Safety: Harm Hides at Home.

At the Minnesota Film and TV Board, Mary Jo interviews Frank about his experiences in the recent writer’s strike.

First shown: 9/19/92
Opening: Tom Servo is color blind!
Invention exchange: Beanbag pants, recycled paper clothing
Host segment 1: The bots are playing soap opera, but Joel won’t play
Host segment 2: Space modifiers
Host segment 3: A visit from Winkie on the Hexfield
End: Crow is Joel’s guitar, Tom is the amp, letter, the Mads are stuck in their bean bag chairs
Stinger: Space traitor tosses a chair
(57 votes, average: 3.86 out of 5)
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• I don’t know about where you are, but where I am, a rather nasty strain of upper-respiratory infection is incapacitating vast swaths of the citizenry and last week I got it, or it got me, or whatever. I watched this flat on my back in bed, every so often making that quavery moaning noise that invalids make, and periodically laughing, followed by a series of horrible hacking coughs. So maybe it was my condition, but this this episode didn’t do a lot for me, mostly because both the dreary short and the dull, repetitive movie just sort of sat on my head (or my chest). I mean, is the spaceship on THIS pad, or is it on the THAT pad, zzzzzzz. Again, I may not have been the best judge.
• Where is Joel pouring that liquid when he is pouring it on Crow? Is it trickling down Trace’s arm?
• I love how, in the short, the doc tells his patient that his treatment for her apparently minor condition is TWO WEEKS in the hospital. How times have changed.
• When John “Dr. Hardy” Beradino appears, Joel says “Wow, he was old even then!” Beradino was in his mid-40s when that scene was shot. Wonder if Joel would still make that joke? I know I wouldn’t!
• As Daddy-O notes: “The syndicated television series ROCKY JONES, SPACE RANGER lasted only one season, because it lost a considerable amount of money. It was the first space opera to be shot on film, (which is why it survives so well today) and had huge overhead costs (sets, special effects, large cast) compared to other shows of the early 1950s. The show was popular with the viewing public and had no lack of advertising sponsors, but it became evident during its first season that it would probably never break even.” Hard to believe those were EVER bank-breaking special effects…
• Funny inside bit: Crow notices that the planet on the video screen looks like the MST3K logo and Joel mutters “You’re not supposed to know about that!” But why shouldn’t Crow know about it? In season 3, Joel says that the Mads “sell the results” of the experiments “to cable TV.” Did he think Crow didn’t hear that?
• Something about this episode seemed to push a lot of “Thunderbirds” buttons for the cast: they mention it a couple of times and Crow says “Scott Tracy!” at one point.
• During segment one, Crow mentions “mo-go-on-the-go-go-go” a W.C. Fields reference which we can now be pretty certain came from Frank, since he goes on at some length about it here.
• Nice reminder that Cambot is there at the end of segment 1. We sometimes forget but they seldom did.
• Callback: “I told you to find adventure not bring it home with you!” (City Limits); I’m a Grimault warrior! (Viking Women)
• I love that the movie feels it’s necessary to spend several minutes in a rather painstaking explanation of what an “orbit” is.
• Date reference: “What’s your position?” “Leaning towards Perot?” Wow that was a long time ago.
• Somebody says, “What is this, Radio Oz?” I’m proud of the fact that I get a lot of references, but this is apparently outside of my ken. Can somebody fill me in?
• This week’s annoying commercial: “THANK YOU, MR. SHEIK!” Surprisingly I couldn’t find it on the intartubes. When he yelled “I’d use ‘em all the time!” a lot of viewers wondered “How likely is that, really?”
• I had the same reaction to segment 2 this time that I’ve had in the past: “Did they really say ’space’ that much? I can’t remember them doing it even once.”
• Movie complaint: Winkie says “the ship won’t land on its tail” and then it does. Several times. What the?
• At the end, Crow has an acid-flashback to episode 310- FUGITIVE ALIEN, precisely 26 episodes ago, to be exact.
• Mike is a scream as Winkie and why is it that Frank always gets the little old lady parts?
• Um, Joel can call Earth? (I know, I know…)
• Fave riff: “I’m already sorry, Bobby.”

The first trailer for “Meet Dave”–the movie written by Bill Corbett and Rob Greenberg that was originally titled “Starship Dave”–is now streaming online at Yahoo Movies. You can also download the trailer in various formats there.

Also, the official web site for the movie is up. But right now all that’s there is a link to the trailer.

No word yet on what the next CT title is, so if you haven’t stopped by their site in the last little bit, you might have missed these recent blog posts:
• Josh on consumer confidence.
• Trace’s non-blog-post on the series “Life on Mars”.
• Mary Jo on getting her CSD.
• Frank continues his weekly movie lists with five great backstage musicals.

Sorry this is a bit late this morning: I’m a little under the weather.

Pick your top three host segments of season two, and give us a little explanation as to why.

Mine, in no particular order, are:

From episode 204- CATALINA CAPER: Joel vapor-locks as he remembers the ’60s.
I think it helps to be a certain age to appreciate this one. I’m almost the same age as Joel (a couple of years older) and this is a very funny take on that time period.

From episode 210- KING DINOSAUR: Crow asks “Am I qualified?” Wonderful wonderful writing a Trace just knocks it out of the park.

From episode 213- GODZILLA VS. THE SEA MONSTER: Song: “The Godzilla Genealogy Bop.” There are a lot of songs in season two, but this one is my favorite.

Honorable mention:
From episode 212- GODZILLA VS. MEGALON: Dysfunctional popcorn commercial. This isn’t as funny as it used to be, as the Reddenbacher family have faded from view, but it makes up for that by being incredibly prescient.

Oh and, a new feature: WORST host segment:
From episode 203- JUNGLE GODDESS: The “Bela’s OK Discoveries” infomercial. Infomercials were new then, but had already been parodied to death and there’s really nothing new in this. A total flop.

Those are mine. What are yours?

First shown: 9/12/92
Opening: Gypsy wants to watch the movie and Joel agrees
Invention exchange: The lawn baby, the womb-mate
Host segment 1: “Good-natured” brawling
Host segment 2: Crow’s “history” of Hercules
Host segment 3: The bots’ lame Hercules action figure
End: Laying the Hercules movies to rest, letter, Frank being chased by mower
Stinger: “Hercules! Help me!”
(64 votes, average: 3.98 out of 5)
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• This is a sneaky episode. I remember not liking it and thinking it’s the least funny of the sword-and-sandal outings, but on this viewing I warmed to it quite a bit. And I’d forgotten that it includes the classic line: “Today is dedicated to Uranus.”
• And I’d also forgotten that this is the landmark episode in which Gypsy watches a portion of the movie along with J&tB. Joel’s confidence in Gypsy is admirable, but let’s note for the record that, sadly, Crow and Tom’s instincts were correct. Gypsy is not down with the street.
• As we tune into Deep 13, Frank is noisily singing the “I sing whenever I sing whenever I sing” song from “Giant Gila Monster.”
• Joel says “Zatharatu” when he means to say Zarathustra. They keep going.
• Despite all the hoopla to the contrary, this is NOT the last of the Hercules movies.
• As Tom sagely notes: “This would really be exciting if I knew what was goin’ on.” All the excitement about Gypsy in the theater takes place when the movie tries to set up the plot, with the result that I never did really figure out what the heck is going on in this movie. Part of it has to do with the strange plot break that takes place after the first commercial. Before the commercial, there are portents of danger and Herc is tossin’ thrones around. After the break, Herc wakes up on a ship and everybody is smirking silently at him. The heck? Then there’s something about Atlantis and girls inn rocks and I don’t know what all.
• Does this story resemble any actual ancient tale? Was there ever a King Androcles (with or without a lion)?
• Gypsy’s riff: “They’re steam-cleaning the horses!” delights J&tB. Eh, not bad. Of her few riffs, I actually like “Oh, they’ve got a fun friend” better.
• By my count, Gypsy lasts 5 and a half minutes. Sheesh, Gypsy, these sword-and-sandal things are among the more watchable movies MST did! What a lightweight!
• Gypsy exits left. A few other chracters have exited or entered this way. Where does that exit lead? And how do they eat and breathe?
• Firesign Theatre reference: “…The Golden Hind”
• Crow falls apart almost immediately during the good-natured brawling. Trace rolls with it brilliantly.
• I never noticed before that, a couple of times, they do a needle drop on that musical sting that I think was originally composed for “This Island Earth” and that I’ve heard in a lot of Universal movies.
• Crow goes a bit overboard with the “I have my rights! It was Callahan!” bit. (For those who don’t know, it’s a reference to the movie “Dirty Harry.”) He does it five times by my count, practically every time the little guy in the movie has a line.
• Callback: “Hurry, Diana!” (Undersea Kingdom)
• My copy, from 1995, included the little “facts” about the movie as the commercial breaks ended. Two of them are only tangentally related to this movie–they discuss other actors who also played Hercules. Thin gruel.
• That’s Frank as the voice of the action figure when he says “I’m so sleepy…” but the final comment is by Mike. Wonder why they didn’t just have one of them do all the comments?
• Fave riff: Dear lord, the canary exploded!

The Jackson Citizen-Patriot, in Jackson, Mich., discovers Rifftrax.