Movie: (1990) A small-town inventor builds a time machine, only to see it misused by a greedy corporation.
First shown: 11/22/97
Opening: Mike explains what’s happened since the last show, but Tom just needs him to say “Lost in Space”
Intro: Mike & Pearl have a nice chat
Host segment 1: Tom sends Crow back in time to convince Mike the dude to stop taking temp jobs
Host segment 2: Crow succeeds and, returning to the SOL, finds Mike’s big brother Eddie in Mike’s place, and learns that Mike’s new future was worse than the old one
Host segment 3: Having seen the future, Crow returns to the past to keep Crow from performing his mission
End: Mike refuses to say what needs to be said, and, during another nice chat, Pearl points out a troubling detail
Stinger: “Matt, it’s time for you decide if you’re gonna be one of my team players or not”
• Another very strong episode, with great host segments (now that the Roman Times stuff has mercifully ended), a baffling movie, great riffing and a guest star of sorts in the theater.
• Paul’s take is here.
• This episode appeared on Rhino’s (and now Shout’s) “Mystery Science Theater 3000 Collection, Vol. 5.”
• Two notable things Mike’s surly, pun-hating older brother Eddie does: most notably he does two theater segments. Also, he pauses to grab a smoke at one point. It’s a very memorable turn for Mike.
• There was something very satisfying about Mike’s two little chats with Pearl.
• This episode got internet fans talking about the number of Crows that are out there — remember you also need to count the one that went back in time in episode 807- TERROR FROM THE YEAR 5000.
• Patrick gives his most powerful performance yet as the cheese factory worker. “Dude!”
• Tom’s “Nicknicknicknicknick” is a Firesign Theatre reference. We don’t hear them as much anymore.
• Nice callback to the old days with Mike’s reference to “chinderwear,” an invention exchange in episode 505- MAGIC VOYAGE OF SINBAD.
• Cast and Crew Roundup: None.
• CreditsWatch: Produced by Kevin. Directed by Mike. An intern named Scott Bowman worked on this and only this episode.
• Fave line: “I’m gonna buy some Liva-snaps and a hosta!” Honorable mention: “Oh, he’s like poo, alright.”
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The last three episodes of Season 8 really are a high water mark, and Time Chasers is a great installment in that trilogy. It’s also a terrific introductory episode because it ticks all the boxes: excellent riffing, a movie that is not especially punishing, and host segments that are effectively independent of the Season 8 story arc.
It’s such a good riff that I thought it was a mistake for Rifftrax to try to redo it, because unlike Manos or the Christmas movies, I didn’t think there was much room for improvement on the commentary front. Indeed, the MST3K episode is the funnier riff, but the Rifftrax Live show was still worth it for the unlikely experience of watching this movie in HD. Apparently, the new scan was made possible because of the license Rifftrax paid for, which makes this movie kind of a Cinderella story in that it’s probably benefited more from its mockery than any other of the show’s subjects. Doesn’t the story go that it broke even when Sci-Fi bought the rights in 1997?
Nick never said he CAN’T drive. He said he DIDN’T drive. So he has the ABILITY to drive but he rarely does so and THAT’S why he’s not very good at it. ;-)
Sadly, I love this stupid little movie enough to have ACTUALLY bought a copy of the Edgewood ‘Special’ Anniversary edition dvd, and……..wait for it……..YES, the Edgewood Studios “Official” Castleton t-shirt (size LARGE, btw, for anyone already planning their X-mas gift-giving list for their FAVE MSTies!!!), BOTH items, mind you, including a PERSONALIZED autograph from none other than Edgewood Studios auteur and head honcho, DAVID GIANCOLA, through their edgewoodstudios.com website !!!
PLEASE, PEOPLE…….somehow try to keep your OBVIOUS envy for me in check! After all, I put my Bugle Boys on one leg at a time, just like the rest of you….. ;-)
I can’t help suspecting that you’ve never worked with a golden spider-duck made out of molybdenum, though. HIM, I think you’d remember…
So, for trivia fans, Mike used to work for the Burnett Co. Dairy Cooperative (’cause, see, there’s a sign there). Another splinter group of the National Dairy Council?
How does a company have its own cooperative, anyway? Are they just making up bureaucratic stuff as they go along?
Manos: The Hands of…the Clock.
If I’m not mistaken and frankly what are the odds of that, The Master had risen after however many years in satanic hibernation and returned to that state at the end of “Manos.” This begs the question of just how long his former sleep lasted and how long his current sleep will last. Until 2041?
Because she could smell the corporate crap, of course. Back then, being rich and non-evil was almost as unheard of as a rich man passing through the eye of a needle. (Matthew 19:24 (not Matthew Paul))
Yet she seemed surprised when she learned that Robertson knew his time transport plans were going to send the future into anarchy or whatever and he just didn’t care very much. So she’d presumed he was evil but not that he was THAT evil. I guess.
The future’s so bright but he doesn’t wear shades.
It’s a mobius strip of a riffback.
And you can’t make an omelet without cutting some cheese.
A certain percentage of them, yes. Others become heterosexual agents or bisexual agents or…
To each their own. Scatalogical references bug me, man, they just really bug me…
I wonder if that’s more common among MST3K fans or among Martin Lawrence fans.
Or maybe it’s the way you fondle the melons and peaches…
“I thought we sprayed for filmmakers!”
Burnett County, not company. Burnett County, WI is right across the state line from Hinckley, MN.
My pick for best host segments after Pod People although mike and pearls talk beats the invention exchange in pod people. This is an episode where I feel mike and the bots took on a familyesque nature. I couldn’t imagine crow going back through time to stop Jonah from getting trapped on the SOL. Every host segment is awesome, Eddie is awesome, and what an perfect bad movie for the show. The riffing starts super negative on the hero but lightens up.. So many great moments and unique in its a fairly new movie for them.
A top 10 episode.
Oh, okay, thanks.
…
Wait, why would the county government be involved in the production of dairy products? Doesn’t sound very free-enterprise to me…
;-)
TOTALLY OFF_TOPIC, I’ve come across various Deviantart pages which offer versions of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen per genre, decade, and so on.
I hereby thus (no, wait, that should be thus hereby) suggest “Who would be on your MST3K League of Extraordinary Gentlemen?” as a non-episode thread topic. I suppose that could use some fine tuning, it’s up to you, I can’t make all your decisions for you…
And now, back on-topic:
The glove compartment?
Chekhov Shmekhov…
“It’s my gun. No, really, it’s my gun, it figures prominently in an upcoming sequence.”
Nick openly disapproved, downright scowled at this idea, though. He outright says “That’s not what I had in mind” OSLT. He wanted to find ways for us to stop shooting at each other. OSLT.
The preceding bit about him having thought of it and rejected it notwithstanding, though, being a genius never stopped anyone from being an idiot. It’s that old yolk about being an egghead…
Yeah, everybody who invents time travel has to do that because it’s an entirely fictional field of study so far.
Oddly, I heard that as “Stop ‘splaining!”
“Please, no more ‘splaining!” – from The Tick vs. Brainchild
“He travelled back to…my time, and had the misfortune to meet me. His clothes fit quite well, don’t you think?” Anyone, anyone?
BTW I’ve got at least three more posts pre-prepared so anyone who wants to avoid acres and acres of me better start chipping in quick. ;-)
The episode taught you well, then.
He was trying to irritate Eddie, of course, because Crow is, among so many other things, an immature little borderline sociopath. It’s just that Crow has no experience in irritating people who will outright HIT him…
It just occurred to me: Would Eddie be the father of the niece to whom Mike once gave a Devil Doll? Do we know if Mike supposedly has more than one sibling? Maybe Crow met him/her/them during the eleven years he spent with Mike’s family in an earlier (a-heh) time travel jaunt.
Why is it always about KILLING the pivotal Bob Evil, anyway? Why not abduct him as a baby and leave him to be raised by a loving family unit in some “primitive” village that the “civilized world” won’t even “discover” until, uh, 1985 or so?
My, the whole forum’s certainly buzzing about that Commodore…
Films have been depicting computers doing things that computers can’t possibly do for as long as there have been computers if not longer. ;-) For more action-packed Commodore action, see a film entitled (quite coincidentally with no bearing on the next episode) “Interface” (released in 1985, with which many people remain pre-occupied). This Star Chamber meets Mazes & Monsters non-stravaganza was filmed on an even smaller budget than “Time Chasers” with much worse actors, features quite possibly THE most incompetent cops in bad movie history, and its teacher protagonist makes Nick Miller look like Indiana Jones (if you kind of squint…) while SIMULTANEOUSLY being sharper than his female lead. Currently, it is, alas (if not inappropriately), available only on VHS.
Do you folks experience real-life in any capacity whatsoever? Stuff happens. A lot. People relocate. For all kinds of reasons. His prospects in New York dried up completely so he relocated a mere five hours drive away to live with his cousin and his cousin’s family in Rutland, Vermont until destiny beckons again. He’s a New York fish in Vermont water. It’s comedy graphite. ;-)
To be generous (a rather rare sentiment around here, to be sure), that could be taken to mean that during the struggle the plane kept flickering in and out of hyperspace from one century to the next and to the next and back again. Maybe, with work, it could ultimately have made the Kessel Run in a mere EIGHT parsecs.
So he’s kind of a…a tired-eyed guy, then?
Prove that they weren’t. I dare ya.
“Yeah, I made a movie that cut a lot of corners. What kind of movie did YOU make?”
Yeah, didn’t Steven Spielberg’s parents tell him the exact same thing? Or am I thinking of David Lynch’s parents? Or possibly Tobe Hooper’s parents? Or…
And, potential replies to subsequent remarks notwithstanding, my work here…is done.
But not elsewhere. ;-)
Wait, I stand corrected, it’s on DVD too. :-)
Oh, and yes, I botched the whole “I’m done” thing. Sorry about that. :-|
ADDENDUM:
Today, I got back from a trip to Johnson, VT. I wanted to thank my brother Bri’s colleagues at Johnson State for the picture and letter they sent after his passing. I talked with the Athletic Director for a while, and I mentioned Bri’s comment about, “We don’t mention the C-word.” The AD laughed when he heard it. JSC and Castleton are, indeed, rivals.