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Weekend Discussion Thread: Host Segments You Just Didn’t GetAlert longtime MSTie Jenny suggests…
I’ve always been a bit baffled by the “emotional scientist” sketch from episode 210- KING DINOSAUR. Too many layers. What segment would you pick? 123 Replies to “Weekend Discussion Thread: Host Segments You Just Didn’t Get”Commenting at Satellite News
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Gotta agree with 48, ericj you really need to relax with the Mike hate. You realize he was the head writer for the apparently far superior Joel years right? Did the guy beat you up and eat your lunch growing up or something? Give it a rest.
I agree with JCC (#48). If every sketch had to fit with the movie, then they’d get boring and stale. I say that the fewer rules comedy has, the better. (Could we have REALLY survived ten years of invention exchanges?) My favorite sketch ever is in “Laserblast” when Mike assumes the persona of Captain Janeway.
#51: “You realize he was the head writer for the apparently far superior Joel years right?”
From what I’ve seen of Eric’s wisdom, anything that’s substandard even in the Joel years is automatically Mike Nelson’s fault.
#46,
There is absolutely nothing wrong with running gags, especially when it gives everyone the chance to shine (as the Cheating host segments did.) And I decided to refresh my memory on Starfighters, and it turns out that there was another segment to do with the movie (debriefing Mike). So I was mistaken somewhat in my appraisal of Starfighters. Furthermore, I went over the ACEG, and running through the 36 eps with Mike as host in seasons 5 and 6, about half had host segments that were directly related to movie elements. So the writers were almost as often just as inspired by the movies as they weren’t. That seems to me to be a reasonable rate of parody, especially for a show as funny as MST3K. And those segments that didn’t have anything to do with the movie included the Nummy Muffin Cocoa Butter segments and the Star Trek switcheroo segments (neither of which I have seen, but would dearly love to).
That’s about all from me. Sorry for the longwindedness.
Years of watching Python trained me to look at host segments I didn’t get and just go wherever they led. Sometimes somehing doesn’t make a lot of sense, but it can still be funny. Servo imitating Streisand from “A Star is Born” is pretty much on the same level as John Cleese turning into Long John Silver for the “Lake Pahoe” sketch; both are from out of left field, yet I can still laugh.
One personal example, though, was Mike’s Hexfield appearance as Valeria in “Rocketship X-M”, but that was only because I hadn’t seen “Robot Holocaust” yet. When I finally did see that one at ConventioCon I, I wanted to stand up on my chair and shout, “Now I get it!”
Still, “Eight of Chris Lemmon”? Huh?
This is an awesome topic. I’ve enjoyed reading the resonses
@48 – It’s that extra bit of sarcasm, thoroughly warranted by the movie’s own inexplicable actions. A host seg that does nothing but imitate Pod People or I Accuse My Parents has almost nothing in it but simply re-enacting the strangeness of the movie, and it’s hilarious. :)
(And not just MST3K–Commander USA could do some nasty-silly skewerings of his week’s movie, back in the early days of USA Groovie Movies…It’s a tradition expected of all Saturday-afternoon movie hosts.)
For Joel to turn the completely unmemorable Viking Women/Sea Serpent into a salute to waffles was just trying to get an episode written out of not that darn much to work with.
But with the Mike era not even seeming to choose its movies with any care, and then just turn the camera back on their own character selves every time they left the theater, it came off smug and lazy. If the movie’s bad enough, there SHOULD be something there to work with…Wild World of Batwoman, and all they could make fun of for the entire episode was the Cheating short??
Daktari was a kids show in the 60s staring Marshall Thompson. He was a veterinarian somewhere in Africa, working on wild animals. Daktari was supposedly Swahili for doctor.
Here’s something weird. I pulled up a video of the Daktari opening on Youtube. Ross(Sidehackers)Hagen was in it.
Oh ok, I got what Daktari was just not the stool part. Dark and tarry stool, ok now I get it. I guess Joel wanted to get that joke in before he left. I was waiting almost 20 years for that?
Do we have any evidence that EricJ is not actually Joel?
@canucklehead, I guess it’s just personal preference but I think it was supposed to be funny seeing singers most people hate dying. I can dig it.
Another ep that didn’t bother having too many movie related segments was Hercules in 502 (besides the amazon women sketch at the end and the constellations segment). I assume this was because they’d done all they could with Herc at this point. At the time I had no damn clue what the match game was and I’m still not too sure who Hamilton Joe Frank and Reynolds are.
#46-
As a point of order, the “running gag” in The Dead Talk Back does not begin until the second host segment, the third host segment, while bracketed by the guitar solo, does focus on an actual element of the film (the overlong and interminable interrogation sequences), and the end also relates to the film (the concept of killing someone by arrow), while the intro’s focus on “pinpoint marketing” parallels the pitch in the short. That’s three segments based directly on what they viewed.
Wasn’t the Eight of Chris Lemmon line simply a nod to the fact that he was acting in the fox show “Duet” at the time?
I agree with you, Kenneth Morgan. I think a lot of sketches was in the Monty Python stream-of-conscience vein. It didn’t have to make sense, it just had to continue the flow of silliness.
Actually I find ‘Joey the Lemur’and ‘8 of Chris Lemmon’ are made funnier by their inclusion in ‘The Last of the Wild Horses’ show-length running Star Trek ‘Mirror Mirror’ parody. Only now they’re made even weirder by it being TV’s Frank & Dr Forrester doing the sketches in this reverse world.
#63: “That’s three segments based directly on what they viewed.”
You forgot the first host segment, in which the Bots host a radio show called… drum roll… The Dead Talk Back. So that’s four.
Of course, not that it matters to Obvious Troll.
Jbagels #61: Do we have any evidence that EricJ is not actually Joel?
More likely it’s that Washington Post writer (Tom Shales?) who still hasn’t gotten over Joel vs. Mike. As Jim essentially noted in the 20th Anniversary DVD set extras, the whole Joel vs. Mike flamewar reached the patheticness of Mac vs. PC (and that was pretty pathetic).
After a recent viewing of “Teenage Caveman”, I’m baffled at a line from Crow while said ‘teenager’ is tending to the fallen equestrian:
“We have bowling and miniature golf and we make fun of you guys ’cause we’re so stupid.”
His delivery cracks me up but I wonder if this is from the minds of the Brains or from some movie/TV show?
I wasnt sure about the whole Waffle thing in Viking Women, did the SOL have a waffle fest ?
In Monster A GoGo – the I dont Get you thing was odd
Godzilla vs. Megalon – the popcorn sketch
the Klack thing was odd until I read the comments
Now that I know about Dark Tarry Stool all I can say is ewwwww
I also have segments that I dont like but who doesnt….
that whole Nummi Muffin coco butter i could do without (Sorry to those who like that one)
:) :) 8-) :-X :rotfl: :-)) :-D
Since we’re bringing up things we didn’t “get”, has anyone ever confirmed what that is Crow is humming in the Monster a go go “I don’t get you” segment? “hum diddy hee hee hooa hooa”.
The EAAAAAARLLLL HOLLIMANNNNNNNNNNN sketch always confuses me. It mildly amuses me, but mostly I’m just like huh?
@jbagels (#62)
Yeah, to each their own. The sketch just falls rather flat with me, but I agree that other people might find it funny.
I’ve never seen Hercules, only the first two…
Hee hee, reading the responses to this one has been fun. It really is a generational thing, unfortunately, and I am also one of the lucky(?) ones who just happened to watch a LOT of television, reruns and all, growing up. I will admit to having never watched an episode of ADAM-12 or Mod Squad, both of which were referenced a lot, but I knew that they were shows. And I agree with whoever mentioned Flying Circus, that may have also conditioned me to just let a bizarre sketch play out and see where it goes….or doesn’t, as the Pythons would abandon sketches halfway through all the time.
One amusing memory-I recall watching the episode with the “Ingmar Bergman Tells A Joke” sketch with someone who had never seen a Bergman film, so that was a bit awkward. A similar situation arose when Crow and Tom performed “Love Letters”.
#45-The Great Race, huh? Wow, I’ll have to look that up.
#69-Orville Redenbacher always did the commercials for his popcorn, though towards the end of his life, possibly due to health problems, he started doing them with his grandson Gary, who would do most of the talking. The Brains just took that set-up and turned it into something hilariously dark. It is to me, anyway, I put that sketch towards the top of my faves. :cigarette:
I love not completely understanding a joke, because that means I get to figure out what it means. Then again, I love research, so that might just be me.
@44: It’s from the “X Marks the Spot” New Jersey driving short before the movie. At the end, the judge in the afterlife asks the audience if they are qualified to make a decision on the guilt or innocence of Joe the Driver.
There was actually 3 Hercules movies before that so imagine how bored they were with the premise by then.
I’m another person who’s always been a bit baffled by Rex Dart, but I also find it funny and don’t really care about how out of left field it is. If a segment is funny, I don’t focus too much on understanding the logic behind it.
On that note (and at the risk of feeding a troll) I don’t really see what the big deal is about movie-related host segments versus non-movie related ones. As long as a host segment is funny, what’s it matter whether or not it connects with the movie? And personally I’ve never seen any correlation between movie-relatedness and quality; there have been stinkers taken straight from the movie, and great sketches that have nothing to do with it. Others have already pointed out that there really wasn’t a nose-dive in movie-related segments post-Joel, so I’ll just note that there were likewise plenty of “running gag”-type host segments during the Joel era too: Waffles, Timmy, the demon dogs, the Asimov bomb. Selective memory seems to play a big part in these “everything after Point X sucked”-type arguments.
Good sketches… not-so-good sketches… sketch about the movie… sketch not about the movie… it all comes out about even, in both the Joel years and the Mike years. It’s allllll good. Relax, everybody. 8-) <— It's cool.
I’m 45 and can’t think of a single bit I didn’t get. I think it’s Alzheimers.
Watching “The Corpse Vanishes” for the first time the other day, there’s a host segment where Joel’s having his hair cut by Crow, and they’re having barber-barbee small talk. I got that much, but not WHY they were doing it. It wasn’t related to the movie, and never had a punch line or evolution from one minute to the next.
@ #79,
It kinda doesn’t have a point. It’s just Joel and the gang poking a little fun at their upper-midwestern roots.
Plus, it’s kind of a sharpened up version of a host segment they did in their KTMA days.
If you’ve ever lived in a small town you tend to get the joke. One of my ‘honorary’ aunts used to do home permanents for some of the older ladies in the small town where she lived when those ladies couldn’t get to a hairdressers several miles away. My mom would sometimes drag me along on some of those visits and trust me… The chit-chat was pretty much exactly the same… only accomapnied by the smell of permanent solution.
@Slager..Agree 100%! I think sometimes we read too much into certain things when we shouldn’t.MST3K related or not.. :yes:
@80,
I didn’t get a lot of the specifically endemic bits regarding accents, behaviors or even store names like Maynards until I started travelling to Minnesota on business on a regular basis. Now I get it.
And whether or not the skits or gags were tied to the movie or not were never a concern of mine. I never found anything too abstract, and if I didn’t get it I would write it off as being targeted for someone else. After all there were times that jokes seemed to be just for me.
On the rare occasion they did get a little out there it forced me to do a little research or wait until a point in time where someone I would be watching it with would shed some light on a jokes unique origin.
I’ve now been watching this show for 20 years and am still finding easter eggs on repeat views. Who could ask for anything more?
Amen, #69, I agree on the ‘nummy muffin’ thing. It ruins the whole episode for me.
@74, I got that. I just don’t understand what the Brains are they trying to say. What’s the point? Is the point that there is no point or is there something they’re trying to get across?
#84 – I think it’s simply a jab at the weird penchant for these kind of cautionary shorts to try (badly) to heavy-handedly involve YOU THE WATCHER. Like how in What About Juvenile Delinquency? where absolutely nothing is answered, and the short just stops dead and asks WHAT DO YOU THINK? It’s less a point and more having fun at what was a trope before tropes became a trope. As if anyone was gonna watch this and actually think about it in any serious fashion.
Plus, it’s an excuse to have Trace monologue weirdly.
@85
Ahhhhhhhh! Now it all makes sense! Thank you!
The Waffle Sketch was a bit random and though mildly amusing it never hit the level of “silly and hilarious” for me. It always seemed an odd premise for me and I like the silly, goofy child-like fun of many of the host segments from the first few years.
The Mike Listens To Creeping Terror Music Endlessly Sketch was something that I never saw that much humor in. Mildly amusing at best. Goes on way too long and way past the point where we get the idea.
Many of the host segments after Joel left lost their “innocent fun” and even though I understood most of them I thought they lost the charming, innocent child-like luster they had more reliably in the first 5 years. Consistency on host segments got quite hit or miss for me and my wife after Joel left the show. There are some bright spots though. Wild Irish Ireland and Tubular Boobular Joy are amongst the best host segments ever.
Personally I’m a huge fan of most of the “it’s not working sketches”, they really tapped into something I enjoy and find really funny. That includes Emotional Scientist, the combo of bad soap opera with scientific biography was boisterous fun.
Well, if you like sketches, then this next week’s episode (“The Giant Gila Monster”) has one of the most blatant example of the theme. Personally, I don’t find them funny, and I think I was one of the first people on this board to point out HOW MANY OF THEM there are and how tiring they get. If you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all.
The only segment that makes me pose any questions was that 1 during season 8 I believe when Mike was starting the show with a little backstory but the bots kept having him push further and even further back until he was explaining the very first few weeks he stared his temping job. Of course all I can ask here is, Why? Why? Why?
@ #23
Hey, it’s “Touch Conners!” Now I get the Mannix thing AND I get why they knew that guy in Swamp Diamonds. Thanks for clearing that up… Actually made me chuckle.
Some other guy pointed to EricJ’s real identity a long time ago (a guy who was active on the boards during MST3K’s original run) on several Rifftrax threads, and I thought nobody would care about that information. Boy was I wrong.
@89: I believe that was the prologue of The Undead.
Loads of stuff because we didn’t those shows/films in the UK. For example Gilligans Isalnd never aired here and Godzilla movies never or rarely shown. Being a film/TV buff helps. I only know about ‘fake shemps’ because of Sam Raimis commentary on the Evil Dead.
Thing is with MST3K, just relax, jokes are like buses. If you didn’t get a gag another one will be along in a few seconds….
@ #93 (The GR)
No “Gilligan’s Island”? No Godzilla movies? You have my genuine sympathies.
Of course, I went through the same thing with Python. It was decades before I found out just who Reginald Maudlin or Biggles were. I just filled in the blank with “politician” and “hero-type guy” and rolled with it.
@84 – I got that. I just don’t understand what the Brains are they trying to say. What’s the point? Is the point that there is no point or is there something they’re trying to get across?
The “Am I qualified?” sketch was just taking one funny movie dig and beating it into the ground for emphasis (a la the Cheating and Mr. B host-seg debates).
For some reason, I always immediately associated Crow’s monologue with the “Things I can do in my community” Girl Scout gag from “Kentucky Fried Movie”. :)
@93 – No Gilligan? (And we felt guilty that Are You Being Served? has a comfort-food cult audience over here.) And not only that, but no Shemp-vs.-Curly debates? What DO you talk about over there, Eastenders??
I got to agree with Sampo & Droppo 221 & Stef & Thomas K. Dye about Tom’s Barbara Streisand bit in 610 – “he Violent Years.”I’ve never seen the remake of “A Star is Born”, so I just thought it was a take-off on Ms. Streisand’s bouts of stage fright. Not sure what the heck it has to with “The Violent Years”. And to make matters worse, whenever I play this movie at night, Tom’s hysterics always manages to wake someone in my house up, so now I have to lower the volume on the TV real low until it’s over.
No Gilligan’s Island! Then you never saw the musical version of Hamlet.
“Hamlet my dear the problem i fear
is avenging your father’s death.”
and
“Never a borrower or a lender be.
Take my advice. Stay out of debt…
There’s just one little thing that you should do,
to thine own self be true.”
(Now match the opera with the song. :)
@6, 69, et al.: I recall reading (perhaps on this very site somewhere) that Willy the Waffle came about because Viking Women was originally paired with “A Case of Spring Fever”, starring our favorite spring-defending demon, Coily the Spring Sprite. But they changed the short out for “The Home Economics Story”, and for some (likely time- or budget-related) reason, they stuck with the Waffle host segments, even though they now had no connection to the short, the feature, or what we generally think of as logic or reality.
So a sensible joke along the lines of Mikey the Mike Sprite becomes one of MST3K’s most famously hilarious non-sequiturs.
I was actually referring to Willie the waffle talking about advertising in (I think) Bride of the Monster seemingly out of nowhere.
As for your theory about the waffle segments, I think that was just non sequitur wackiness. The waffle theme was in full effect right from the opening segment before a short would have been shown. I always liked it but then again I always liked waffles. Mmmmm waffles.
I have to agree with lancecorbain on the Redenbacher sketch. Didn’t have anything to do with the movie but it was hilarious. Especially when Crow starts shouting “I’m the god! I’M THE GOD!” and Servo still tries to get in the product name in the midst of his sobbing. “I’m the god!” also became one of my favorite things to just shout out of the blue.