Joel/Mike and the bots had to witness some outright sleazy characters in the movies they riffed; both hero and villain. So it’s time to discuss who the outright sleaziest character witnessed in an MST3K movie.
My vote is definitely J.C. of Sidehackers due to his nearly homoerotic obsession with Rommel and outright physical and emotional abuse of his girlfriend. And yet, people still follow him! Let’s not even discuss the portions cut from the MST3K version as well.
My pick has got to be Dr. Bill Cortner, the “hero” of “THE BRAIN THAT WOULDN’T DIE.” Few MSTed movie characters peg the squick needle as often as he does.
What’s your pick?
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Good choices so far. I would have to go with both Leo Mcabe and Buzz from The Girl in the Gold Boots.
Hey sol-survivor (#12) — I’m surprised you didn’t choose Phil from the General Hospital shorts as I still remember your post devoted to him on Mighty Jack’s site.
#s 48-50: good stuff all around, and thanks for reminding me of Phil’s attractive skull. And you are ABSOLUTELY right about the Hobgoblins themselves! :)
Giant Spider Invasion is a sleaze progressive dinner for sure, but I think the Sheriff takes the prize. Yep, even sleazier than Dan Kester.
A close second would be the crabby astronomer played by Steve Brodie from Wild World Of Batwoman. I mean, for god’s sake, he rolled on her, man!
Granted, Ev Kester was sleazy, too, but she was still hot. I’d totally hit it — while she was sober. Drunk chicks are no fun.
Anyone mention the dad in Eegah for suggesting his daughter “be friendly” or something with Eegah. And the whole shaving thing. Ick.
If Girl In Gold Boots had been an Olympic event, Buzz would be number one on the medal stand, with Leo and his flunkie at no. 2 and no. 3, as they played the winner’s anthem, “Keep Your Gold Boots Movin'”.
I love how, in the climactic office fight scene, every time Critter landed a punch on one of those guys, Servo would say “splash!”. That’s just how friggin’ oily those guys were.
I’d give the Honorable Mention to Joni, Miss Pretty Mind, the pill junkie headliner in the go-go dance show.
#52-I would have mentioned good ol’ Phil, but I forgot. Here’s a little more info about the sleazebag.
sol-survivor: Phil was certainly a sleazebag — it read like a soap opera! :)
True, but that was actually Joe Estevez’s character disguised as the old lady. You know Joe Estevez should have quit acting and become a shoe salesman or something worthwhile.
My vote would be Claudius from Hamlet. Kills his brother, takes his throne and marries his sister-in-law.
Dang, definitely lots and lots of sleazy characters to pick from. Is it just me, or on average did the sleaze quotient increase in the latter years of the show?
A lot of the obvious and deserving ones have been mentioned already, making a guy like Umberto Scalli from Racket Girls seem almost benign in comparison. Even so, he deserves at least a mention for that scene where he persuades Beverly to go into prostitution to continue supporting her drug habit – yecch.
MITCHEL !!! ;-)
How about Joe from Racket Girls? It’s his 15th year in an unpaid internship!
and I have go with Yuri from ‘Werewolf’. He was greedy and didn’t let anyone stand in his way.
Truksardis from ‘Deathstalker’. He has a bride and he says he’s going to find another bride better than what he has already.
Dirk from Sinister Urge deserves a mention. He might not have been able to control himself, but here’s a guy who looks at pin-up photo’s to get in the mood to further his misogynist murder spree. Nice Guy. Personally the sight of a beautiful woman makes me feel in love with the world and in a mood to make a woman feel happy and loved. Guess I’m just not serial killer material. I wonder if Dirk was based on that creep that killed one of John Willie’s models and was the basis for the killer in the 1969 Dragnet movie?
The bikers in both Wild Rebels and Hellcats had loads of sleaze to go around. Their lives were a bit like non stop frat parties without the class and money.
Finally in the Succubus category: Betty from High School Big Shot should get a mention. Her jerk of a dad doesn’t begin to justify her willingness to use people with zero regard for the destruction left in her wake. At least Ann Margarette’s character in Kitten with a whip redeemed herself (if improbably) in the end.
I have one more nomination from King Dinosaur, Dr. Richard Gordon. He seems okay until any sort of an emergency occurs and then strikes out at the drop of a hat. I’m not sure what his problem was with Dr Bennet, but on two different occasions when she would get upset he would smack her silly! He also can be seen roughly grabbing and pushing her around in other scenes. I have always wondered if the two actors were a thing in real life and he would let go with the camera going claiming “method acting”? He also attempted to rub off Dr Martin’s nipple while injured. Finally, he detonates an atomic bomb for no apparent reason. Major Sleaze-anator.
I’m wondering if the villain in “Bloodlust” is less sleazy than the MAKERS of “Bloodlust”. That is one grossburger of a movie!
Sidehackers, Hellcats and Wild Rebels heavily tip the scales IMO.
going with Buzz from ‘Girl in Gold Boots.’
@65 the show definitely became darker as it went along. Season 6 is one big dark, awesome spectacle. I can’t get enough of it. Yay, Kitten With A Whip!
How about sleaziest creator…. Never met him, but rick sloane seems likely to make the cut as sleazy by his creative, uh, “elegance”
It’s been mentioned a lot already, but is there really a better answer than the characters in Hobgoblins? It transcends the characters so that the movie itself feels sleazy.
But besides that, isn’t there a movie they watch where the bots actually feel the need to shower after it’s over? What was that one? The image is so clear I’m sure I’m not misremembering that.
M’eh, I dunno, man. Compared to the smarmy, smirking Deathstalker himself, Troxartis was strictly an amateur. Troxartis could only wish to be as sleazy as Deathstalker.
Oh, yeah, him. Jeeeeezus… “Get the canteen! Get the CANTEEN!” Man, what a nasty bastard.
I had problems with that whole crew, for that matter. They all had interpersonal issues out the ass. How the hell did they ever pass the NASA psych evaluation?
You mean Bela Lugosi, don’t you? Lugosi and Karloff were contemporaries, appearing together in many of the classic Universal horror flicks of the ’30s, but it was Lugosi as the twisted bride-murderer in The Bride Vanishes.
(Old Horror Flick Geek Mode OFF)
Lots of great choices. I’d like to add all 4 of the main antagonists in the Master Ninja movies. They touched all the bases when it came to sleazy clichés.
@69 Tom and Crow take a shower after watching Eegah. There were probably a lot of other episodes where they mention feeling dirty after watching the flick, but this is the one where they actually do something about it.
@ #72: I pointed that out way back in post #11. And even you seem to have forgotten that the movie was called The Corpse Vanishes. :P
Though I can understand that last one, since the “corpses” are always brides.
the whole biker gang from Hellcats reek of sleaze…
Great topic!
How about Eric from “The Screaming Skull”? He probably killed his first wife, definitely tried to kill his second wife. All after spouting off to his neighbor/minister about how he wants to make her “happy”.
Honorable mention to the guys from “Zombie Nightmare”, who, after all, were going out to look for “sleazy chicks”.
How about the adolescent perv from the tour group who tries to get a look at the dopple woman’s breasts then switches her routing tag in Overdrawn at the Memory Bank? “Is it sexy?” Blech!
#66
But you have to remember, Buzz was just a child.
Wow! A lot of great suggestions I hadn’t even thought about. Two that come to mind that haven’t been mentioned, Jack Elam in “Lovers Lane” and the Queen from” Outlaw” married the king to kill him and slept with Whatley to achieve it. Doesn’t get sleazier than that
I’m sure sexual assault charges were in that kid’s future. With their system though, I bet that society would just dopple him as an anteater as punishment.
@74: Wow, has it been that long since I last watched Eegah? I need to change that. But yeah, there’s a movie with a lot of sleazy characters.
I nominate whoever thought of the little girl being one of The Master’s wives at the end of Manos. Hal Warren, maybe? That goes beyond sleazy.
The sodium guy from Horror at Party Beach. His sliding into Southern antebellum accents around Beulah and his offhand treatment of women scream sleaze to me.
It might seem like an easy answer, but Hal Moffett (aka The Creeper, aka The Brute) is a pretty good candidate. I mean yes, he’e got revenge as his primary motivation, but that doesn’t explain why he randomly takes out other people too – jewelry store guy, delivery kid, and most importantly: Joan Bemis.
Consider – Joan hadn’t done *anything* to him at all. The only one that did him wrong was Clifford Scott, and that was just being a bad study-buddy. But poor Joan – the terrible thing about Hal is that he wants to kill her (why? The answer is never made clear) *and* he lies to her seconds before he snaps her neck (“I won’t hurt ya!!”). Plus, he didn’t bring any EverClear to pour into the wapatoolie.
Bastard.
Gare.Chicago
Maybe because they’re so mind-numbingly goofy, but I surprised Wild Wild World of Batwoman and Angels Revenge haven’t come up. Professor Neon for the former and Jack Palance in the latter, maybe?
To pick a less-obvious target:
The entire cast of The Dead Talk Back seem to fit this model. Two different sex fiends in the boarding house, the police officer who wants to beat people, the kids who joke about wanting to see the body with the mother who may have killed their father, oily Pettini who seems to have boundary issues, our victim the extortionist and philanderer- quite frankly, something is wrong when the killer seems among the more reasonable sort.
The two traveling grifters from “Eye Creatures” – the “I’m going to walk off my great expectations” guy and the striped nightshirt guy – are heck’s own sleazy.
Let’s not forget Tiger from Wild World of Batwoman. He kidnaps a girl (twice), locks her in a cage, feeds her a supply of happy pills and takes her for walks on a leash. Yet at the end of the film, all is forgiven because he has now fallen in love with his hostage.
“To me that leash screams unhealthy relationship.” – Crow T. Robot