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Episode guide: 907- Hobgoblins

Movie: (1987) Some not-too-bright teens pursue aliens — who make people’s dreams come true, then murder them — who have escaped from confinement.

First shown: 6/27/98
Opening: On the SOL, there’s a rash of unintentional on-turning
Intro: M&tB mistreat Pearl’s new couch, and soon regret it
Host segment 1: Crow presents: “Let’s Talk Women!”
Host segment 2: Bobo calls Crow’s crisis hotline
Host segment 3: Pearl is only briefly fooled by Mike’s cutouts
End: Servo has solved the Rick Sloane problem…or has he?; Pearl expresses her disappointment
Stinger: The hobgoblins enjoy a ride
1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (354 votes, average: 4.64 out of 5)

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• Wow. Well, there are bad movies, there are really bad movies, and then there are bad movies like “Hobgoblins.” It’s one of those movies where somebody is sure to say “even the riffing couldn’t save it.” If nothing else, it’s memorable. The riffing is as good as it’s been all season and the segments are all pretty strong, and all that adds up to a great episode.
• Paul, who was doing these a lot at this point, offers thoughts here.
References.
• This episode was included in Rhino’s Mystery Science Theater 3000 Collection, Vol. 8.
• Producer Rick Sloan famously lobbied to get this movie on the show, something that didn’t happen often.
• Sloan revisits the movie in this video.
• The whole “on-turning” thing is brilliant.
• The intro is also a gem. We can’t have nice things.
• Crow, it’s pronounced “cerberus,” not “cerebus.”
• Among the more memorable credit sequences is the opening credit sequence, in which Mike is forced to corral the bots as they understandably attempt to flee the movie.
• In segment one, Mike is reading Dickens’ “Bleak House” as the scene opens, while Tom is reading Richard Scary’s equally gripping “What Do People Do All Day.”
• That’s Beez in the grainy photo Crow shows during segment 1.
• I like that the TV says “Stony.”
• Once funny, now dead references: JFK Jr.; Hunter Thompson.
• I was completely taken in by segment 2. Never saw the twist coming.
• Is my disk defective or does the sound cut out during the door sequence after segment 2?
• Naughty riff: “You’re the expert on that.”
• The run of “parking” riffs just gets funnier and funnier.
• Segment 3 is particularly funny to me because of the the three complete different reactions of Brain Guy, Pearl and Bobo. Reminds me a bit of some comment threads… :roll:
• I wonder if Rick Sloane began to regret offering this movie, after the infamous “interview” at the end of the movie.
• The closing bit is probably the weakest of all the segments, but even that one is pretty funny.
• No roundup this week: Nobody who worked on this movie did any other MSTed movies.
• CreditsWatch: Directed by Mike. After this episode, Mary Jo took then next two episodes off from the writing room–I’m guessing that was so she could head to the coast to do the “Gorgo” segments.
• Fave riff: “Aha! And what brisk witticism will this chappie have to offer?” Honorable mention: “o/` It’s the 80s… do a lotta coke and vote for Ronald Reagan…” o/`”

218 Replies to “Episode guide: 907- Hobgoblins”

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  1. ‘Hobgoblins’ was the ‘Manos’ of the Sci-Fi Channel era. Sloane must have misheard peoples demand for a sequel.

       1 likes

  2. Spector says:

    This one ranks amongst my all time favorite MST3K episodes. A lousy rip-off of “Gremlins”, it is prime riffing fodder for our heroes. This is one of those episodes I recommend to friends who are casual fans of the show and interested in why I love it so much. This is the show at its very best and proof the quality of the show didn’t deteriorate when it moved to Sci-Fi and Trace left, at least during the first two years on that network.

    It’s also my son’s favorite episode. He was eight when this one was first broadcast and it was the first one he watched where he laughed all the way through. He especially loved the bit where Servo names the Hobgoblins. One of my favorite memories of his childhood was watching that particular episode and seeing him in stitches every time the Hobgoblins appeared. Wonderful stuff! Five out of five. Classic episode.

       2 likes

  3. Raptorial Talon says:

    Wretchworthy movie, great episode. It jostles to be in my top five, so the riffing isn’t absolute best of the best (mostly because of quantity issues, not quality), but hell, a true spectacle to behold.

    Incidentally, my friends and I devised a game, called “Yes, Yes,” where you assume a pompous “Rick Sloane” voice and try to explain how two random concepts are intricately related while attempting to sound like you know what you’re talking about. It’s fun.

    As for this movie being so horrible . . . well, yes, but soul-destroying like so many people here had said? Hobgoblins is offensive on a lot of levels, but Sidehackers, Monster-A-Go-Go, and especially Manos – among others – are definitely bleaker and harder to watch on their own. Hobgoblins makes me cringe, but at least it doesn’t make me assume a fetal position. It’s too goofy.

    In fact, I routinely use this episode to introduce people to the show, and they have loved it every time. It’s so out-and-out silly that initiates grasp the true meaning of MST3k immediately and intuitively. Along with Puma Man and Giant Spider Invasion, its part of my trifecta of “if you don’t see any others, see these” episodes (at least for people of my generation).

    Classic stuff.

       2 likes

  4. klisch says:

    Thanks CG (#50) I forgotten that they were given names. Good stuff!

       0 likes

  5. Travis says:

    From 5 :”Fun fact: the Club Scum M.C. is Daran Norris, who has gone on to be a prominent voice actor (Spiderman, Fairly Oddparents) and was Cliff the attorney on Veronica Mars.”

    Bonus fun fact: Road Rash (whose actual name escapes me) went on to be Zed of “Zed’s dead baby” fame in Pulp Fiction.

       1 likes

  6. Smoothie of Great Power says:

    Definitely a love/hate episode: Like others I hate the movie but love the riffs.

    Movie:
    * When I found out that Daran Norris went on to do voice acting, I noticed he married his wife, another voice actor who’s done a lot of video game roles I recognize, in 1988 and they’ve done several series together. I am happy to report that she was NOT also in Hobgoblins.
    * If anyone else thinks that Amy was cuter BEFORE she turned slut, raise your hand.
    * After seeing a video review of the uncut version of the movie (which is actually even more repulsive than the MST3K version) I learned that McCreedy blew up the vault as a means of petty revenge against the head of the studio for firing him. The reason why it was so important that no one was on duty was because the insurance company wouldn’t accept any claims for the studio’s policy in that case. With that great mystery solved I’m… going to go cry in the corner for even thinking about it that long.
    * Much like the enemy fighter ships in Invasion of the Neptune men, no matter how many Hobgoblins they killed, they neither added to or took away from their numbers.
    * Favorite riffs:
    “He wanted to crowd surf but no one would catch him.” – Mike
    “What just crunched?!” – Crow
    “The puppeteer’s knuckles must be pretty bloody by now.” – Servo

    Host Segments:
    * Crow apparently lost all memory of the various women who the crew encountered during the Deep 13 days.
    * When Mike begins dancing in his Hawaiian shirt, he bears an UNCANNY resemblance to Jim Carrey in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. It scares me.
    * Favorite line: Any time Bobo screams when Pearl is introducing the movie.

    Things I Learned From This Episode:
    * The rake is mightier than the sword.
    * Killing people by turning their fantasies and desires against them is potentially doing them good.
    * This is still easier to watch and far less offensive than the Star Wars Holiday Special.

       4 likes

  7. Travis says:

    Er, my mistake a few posts back. Road Rash was the shop owner in Pulp Fiction. Or, “The Spider” if you will. Hopefully I got that one right, it’s been awhile

       1 likes

  8. mikek says:

    Sampo: “even the riffing couldn’t save it.”

    No, that dubious honor belongs to Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Even the combined efforts of Cinematic Titanic and Rifftrax wouldn’t make that movie watchable.

       1 likes

  9. I’ve seen a few people mentioning the Fontanelles music in here. You might want to search for them on eBay; Rick Sloane actually sells Hobgoblins soundtracks on there that include all the Fontanelles songs from the movie and a few that weren’t used. The “Buy It Now” price is about $5, and Rick autographs them.

    #7: Of course it didn’t come up in the episode, but it has come up elsewhere. An earlier version of Hobgoblins was written before Gremlins, but the hobgoblins were supposed to be a more nebulous unseen threat. When Gremlins got big the little guys were added in; it was much easier to get funding and distribution by being more like Gremlins.

    #32: Believe it or not, but they actually used makeup to make McCreedy’s actor look older for the “modern” points in the movie, so his regular look was probably somewhere between the versions we saw in the movie.

    #40: A favorite riff of mine, too. :)

    Admission: I own ricksloane.com. I bought it last year on a whim, but when Rick emailed me I actually started putting a bit more into it and boning up on my Hobgoblins knowledge. Haven’t updated anything in a few months, though.

       2 likes

  10. touches no one's life, then leaves says:

    I don’t suppose it matters, but 4 Hobgoblins escaped, and at least 3 were killed, right? So how could there have been more than one to rush back into the vault at the end? Parthenogenesis, I guess.

    So after 30 years of guarding the Hobgoblins, McCready blows them up. Just think, if he’d done that IN THE FIRST PLACE he might not have wasted so much of his life. Then again, he MIGHT have, but at least he would’ve had more of a fighting chance…

       5 likes

  11. kismetgirl88 says:

    I love the host segment with the Pearl’s couch. You would think Pearl would know better but no. Crow in feety PJ is SOO cute. Nice see his legs.

       5 likes

  12. rcfagnan says:

    “Look at that guy wave gel in front of the light” is my favorite riff from this one, if only because of Mike’s intonation and delivery. For me season 9 is middling episodes (Projected Man, Phantom Planet, Deadly Bees, Space Children) peppered with a few home-run episodes (ThePumaMan, Werewolf, The Final Sacrifice, and, yes, Hobgoblins). Dynamite host segments and riffs. When I first saw this episode, I was afraid they were going back to the whole “every week every movie is the worst movie ever made” that finally played itself out in “Being From Another Planet,” but this movie is AWFUL. Someone earlier (I’m too lazy to go back and look it up) claimed this was the first true Maw-of-Hell episode of the SciFi era; I disagree, after all there was “Giant Spider Invasion” and “The Incredibly Strange Creatures…” and “parts: the clonus horror” (by e.e. cummings). I consider all of those movies maw-of-hell caliber, though really only GSI can rival Hobgoblins for loathesomeness.

       1 likes

  13. bad wolf says:

    I always enjoy Crow’s “Cerebus” faux pas, as it sounds like he is a big fan of the long-running indie comic Cerebus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerebus).

       0 likes

  14. jimmy says:

    I found the accidential turn-on segment kinda unsettling. I don’t like to imagine any of the MST3K characters being turned on sexually.

       0 likes

  15. Johnny Ryde says:

    OW! MY FAJITA PLATE WAS REALLY HOT AND I TOUCHED IT!!!!!!

       2 likes

  16. Raptorial Talon says:

    “If anyone else thinks that Amy was cuter BEFORE she turned slut, raise your hand.”

    *both hands shoot up*

    “Much like the enemy fighter ships in Invasion of the Neptune men, no matter how many Hobgoblins they killed, they neither added to or took away from their numbers.”

    I’ve counted the total Hobgoblins in the film, and if memory serves, the minumum number is 11. The three or so that arrived in the capsule must have been busy in those 30 years.

    “This is still easier to watch and far less offensive than the Star Wars Holiday Special.”

    True that . . .

    —–

    “#32: Believe it or not, but they actually used makeup to make McCreedy’s actor look older for the “modern” points in the movie, so his regular look was probably somewhere between the versions we saw in the movie.”

    Aha! Just as I suspected. I knew he looked more normal without his winter eyebrows.

    —–

    “I found the accidential turn-on segment kinda unsettling. I don’t like to imagine any of the MST3K characters being turned on sexually.”

    For God’s sake, do NOT watch Girl in Gold Boots. For your own protection.

       6 likes

  17. Zeroninety says:

    Colossus Prime wrote: “Starting from the writing it seems as though it was penned by a forty year old who just learned English five years ago, has the mind of a twelve year old, and was recovering from a recent head first fall down the stairs.”

    But I’m pretty sure Tommy Wiseau *didn’t* write this screenplay! :lol:

    (And it’s tearing me apart!!)

       1 likes

  18. Colossus Prime says:

    “#56 * If anyone else thinks that Amy was cuter BEFORE she turned slut, raise your hand.”

    Sort of like Ally Sheedy in The Breakfast Club. Way more attractive on the first 95% of the movie vs. the end when Molly Ringwald helps doll her up.

       2 likes

  19. Colossus Prime says:

    #67

    I don’t know if I’m happy or sad that I know what you’re talking about. :)

       0 likes

  20. Apollonia James (yeah, right) says:

    This episode is fun to watch… it’s horrible, yes, but entertaining in its horribleness; not one that puts me to sleep if I watch it on a lazy Sunday afternoon, like some other episodes I could name. Favorite two riffs are both centered around Daran Norris’ character: “he looks like one of those cat clocks!” I never caught that line until I’d watched the ep multiple times, but I knew exactly what they were talking about. And, of course, the little “nnggyuh!” grunt they vocalize when he makes his spastic arm gesture just cracks me up.

       2 likes

  21. Fart Bargo says:

    Great episode for any MST3K era. The rakes of death dance was certainly hilarious with the great back ground music spurring the taut action forward.

    As mentioned previously, there is a fairly recent docu with most participants present. Props to those folks who rolled with it. The only one that remains a mystery is the actress who played Amy. Anyone have any information?

       1 likes

  22. Apollonia James (yeah, right) says:

    And of course, how could I forget one of the naughtiest riffs I ever heard on the show:
    MC: Sorry, the donkey mud wrestlers must use the REAR entrance…
    Crow: Well, you’re the expert on that…

       1 likes

  23. Joe says:

    Dieser Blog sieht wirklich sehr gut aus. Um sowas richtig geiles zu entwerfen muss man sich schon lange Zeit nehmen und ne Menge Ahnung haben.

       0 likes

  24. Skibz says:

    I’ve actually had the pleasure of having met Rick Sloane when he was screening a few of his other films in Los Angeles last year.

    He seems overly proud of the fact that ‘MST3k’ did ‘Hobgoblins’ and that it’s considered one of the worst movies ever made; “its better than being totally forgotten”, I believe is what he said. He also said that he submitted a few of his other films to ‘MST3k’ and was really pushing them to riff on his ’86 flick ‘The Visitants’, but Best Brains passed on it to do ‘Hobgoblins’, claiming they didn’t want to riff on a blatant comedy…though, in regard to ‘The Visitants’, “comedy” is a term used loosely.

    I always liked ‘Hobgoblins’…it’s sleazy, but I found it easy to watch straight, though the MSTied version is definitely one of my favorite episodes. ‘The Visitants’, on the other hand, was incredibly hard to sit through, and would benefit from a riffing if nothing else.

       1 likes

  25. Bat Masterson says:

    I wish I had more money in 1999 – I really wanted to buy that creepy cardboard Mike when they did the prop auction.

    Member F.D.I. MURDER! Death guaranteed for up to fifty thousand DIE!

       2 likes

  26. NormalVIew82 says:

    Maybe I’m just desensitized after years of watching crappy movies, but I’ve never been able to understand the disgust that people show for this particular “film”. I find it colorful, silly and grungy but it doesn’t offend me or chip away at my soul. Same with “Red Zone Cuba” it actually keeps me interested even without the riffing for some odd reason.

    If any characters disgust me it’s the teens in “Zombie Nightmare”. They kill a guy then go on their merry way making out in hot tubs or actually enjoying the taking of a life. The “Hobgoblins” gang are just broad stereotypes, completely harmless.

    I’m actually inflicting this episode on my more than willing “Test Subjects” this Sunday as a part of my own weekly experiments in the LROL (Living Room of Love) and you can bet I’ll be singing along to “It’s the 80’s, do a lot of coke and vote for Ronald Reagan!”

       3 likes

  27. JustinT says:

    I’m so happy I was able to find a copy of Volume 8 this year so I could finally watch this episode. It’s become one of my all time favorites.

    This is one of the worst movies they ever did, everything about this movie is AWFUL. I didn’t blame the Bots for trying to escape during the opening credits, or when they and Mike put the cutouts in their place to fool Pearl so they could escape the movie.

    For some people this one is so bad the riffing doesnt save it, it did for me and I was laughing my ass off. “There’s been an accident at the studio…” Crow “We made Hobgoblins!”

    The host segments are good too, with Crow’s “Let’s Talk Women!” being one of the funniest segments ever. I also loved how Pearl, Bobo and Brain Guy sold how god awful Hobgoblins was, esp with Bobo’s girl scream for emphasis.

    5 stars from me.

       3 likes

  28. Grognarrd says:

    Great episode.The worse, the better.I give it a good old Time Chasers “Rockin!”. ck #7 very funny! But i have one question, Sloane did Porn?! Makes sense, I guess.haha.

       0 likes

  29. Eric in NJ says:

    a great episode with great riffing and solid host segments! Mike’s line “Its the 80’s, do a lot of coke and vote for Ronald Reagan” has always been one of my favorites of all time :lol:

       2 likes

  30. Grognarrd says:

    Also, who let that German animal lover on here. You wacky European Zappa fans with your loud music,fax machines,hoola-hoops,you know the kids today.

       0 likes

  31. Steve K says:

    Meh. I found the accidental on-turning segment to be contrived and probably the most unfunny host segment of the entire show. And I find it very hard to watch this one because it’s obvious to me that the makers of this movie knew they were just making a cheesy movie. For me, that makes the movie itself harder to watch, and the riffs tend to ring hollow. Contrast this with Time Chasers, where they truly thought they were making a masterpiece.

       1 likes

  32. fireballil says:

    I may get a few objections, but I believe that this episode is to the Sci-Fi era as Manos is to the Joel/Comedy Central era. By that I mean that the movie is the worst of the Sci-Fi eps(how good can it be if the director offers it to them?), right up there with Manos as the worst of the whole series. As such, this makes it(along with Manos) one of the best eps of the series. All of the segements work well(though the intro is probably the weakest) and the riffing is some of the best I’ve heard,in particularly the Fishpicker song. I gave it five starts. Some of my fave riffs:

    Crow: ‘Paint my muscle car prune color, please!’
    Mike: ‘The army was looking for sharp people, and Nick qualified.’
    Tom: ‘Meet the Hobgoblins: Frankie, Sniffles, Bounce-Bounce and The Claw.’
    Also Tom’s counting parking scenes and the garden fight riffs.

       0 likes

  33. fireballil says:

    That was starts, not starts. Oops. :oops:

       0 likes

  34. fireballil says:

    Stars. :shock: Aagh!

       1 likes

  35. fantagor says:

    Fish Picker? No, no…Pig Sticker? Fig Licker?

    Club Scum isn’t just for scum, it’s for the truly vile at heart!

    Casio rakes make a great stocking stuffer!

    And if the van is a rockin’, feel free to barf on your shoes for an hour or two.

    Randy

       0 likes

  36. Sharktopus says:

    I’m sure it’s been mentioned already, but “Paint my muscle car prune color, please!” is one of my favorite riffs ever. And it’s so useful in everyday conversation.

       1 likes

  37. This Guy says:

    “Member, F-D-I-MURDER!”

    This episode gave me my barely-considered, spur-of-the-moment handle: “Here comes this guy. What’s he up to?” It remains a classic, despite the added difficulty of the attempted humor in the movie. A few observations:
    – I continue to be baffled by the protagonists’ insistence at the club that they’re “all underage.” Either they’re telling an incredibly feeble lie that “Pixie” just chooses to believe, or it’s a major case of Dawson Casting, because they all look to be in their late 20’s at least.
    – After the thug at the studio taunts Kevin by saying he (Kevin) doesn’t know how to use a gun, Kevin fires the gun in the air. Doesn’t that just prove the thug’s point?
    – #63: Maybe Crow’s “Cerebus” mention was intentional–after all, Dave Sim is a deranged misogynist, so he’d fit in well with this movie. Also, ‘kipedia says that the title came from a misspelling of “Cerberus” in the first place.
    – Taking a cue from the epic garden-tool fight scene, I’d suggest a weekend discussion about “best and worst fight scenes in a MSTed movie,” but there really aren’t any good fight scenes I can think of, so it’d be more like “worst and least bad fight scenes.”
    – Crow’s “In Search of…” style documentary is delightfully insane. I love those signs that indicate that 500 years of solitude may have driven poor Crow completely ’round the twist.
    – Apparently, the standard reaction to a hobgoblin attack is to grab the hobgoblin and hold it to one’s face as tightly as possible. This brilliant technique was also seen in one of the movies with bats in it, possibly It Lives By Night. Victim: “Aaaaargh, get it off me!” Creature: “Hey, I’d love to oblige, if you’d just let go!”

       4 likes

  38. Sharktopus says:

    Also, “Just let go of the puppet!” is not only funny, but sound advice in numerous situations.

       1 likes

  39. Opus says:

    I’m clearly in the minority in saying I don’t like this episode. It violates Mike Nelson’s creed that a MST movie has to be bad, but can’t be purposely bad (“There has to be some intention of quality by the filmmakers” is the quote I remember). It’s just waaaaay too campy and intentionally awful for me to enjoy it being MSTied.

       2 likes

  40. Meadows says:

    Eeewww…in the “Revisited” clip, Sloan is rockin’ some major forearm veins! They look like they’re gonna pop through his skin! Yuk.

       0 likes

  41. Brandon says:

    “Burgess Meredith is in there reading…”

       1 likes

  42. JCC says:

    “That blonde woman waving her arms around like a windmill is on a par with Steve Alaimo’s dance moves.”
    =================================
    She dances like one of the chimps from Lancelot Link.

    Favorite riff sequence:
    Servo:[disgusted]Eeeuugh…
    Crow:I wonder if he knows his face looks like that?
    Mike:He can’t…
    Crow:Someone should tell him.

       3 likes

  43. Skibz says:

    @89, I’m convinced that the film is purposely campy, but not purposely “bad”. It seemed like there was an sincere attempt to make an actual, enjoyable horror-comedy, albeit on a severely low budget (‘The Visitants’, for instance, cost $8,000), only it turned out…well, the way it did.

    “Hobgoblins 2”, on the other hand, tried way too hard to replicate both the campiness and the incompetence of the original in a way that can be described as intentionally bad, and it was absolutely awful. If you watch the two of them together, you can definitely sense that “Hobgoblins” is not “deliberate”, compared to a film that is.

    God, am I actually *defending* ‘Hobgoblins’? :???:

       9 likes

  44. UberNeuman says:

    Dennis! Dennis!

    I wanna play Tennis! :mrgreen:

       1 likes

  45. sjk says:

    This is my favorite episode ever, ever, ever. Almost every single riff is pure gold. Also, Hobgoblins fascinates me with its badness.

    I agree that I don’t think this movie was intentionally bad. I think some of the humor was supposed to be corny, but that’s not the same thing as an intentionally bad movie.

       2 likes

  46. MPSh says:

    Some films really capture their time. As “Angels’ Revenge” is to the ’70’s, so “Hobgoblins” is to the ’80’s. Trust me, I was there.

    My favorite naughty riff: “Oh boy, this is going to be gr- oh, I’m done…”

       2 likes

  47. Cornjob says:

    This movie hates you personally, and leaves you asking, “what did I ever do you?” This movie makes me look forward to the extinction of the human race. Andrew Dice Clay would be embaressed at the mysogeny, which is almost ugly enough to distract the audience from the hateful depiction of everyone and everything else. Not even Leech Woman, High School Bigshot, or Beast of Yucca Flats were this pointlessly misanthropic. I mean, I hate the human race as much as the next guy, but you don’t see me going around and making films like this. Other MST films are just incompetant bad, but Hobgoblins has a moral compass that falls somewhere between Boxing Helena and Cannible Holocaust. I just realized that this is the first critique of an MST3K movie where I dont even mention anything specific from the film. The riffing is good, but with so many other episodes to watch I rarely subject myself to this one. Rick Sloan, may God have mercy on your soul. And I don’t even believe in God.

       4 likes

  48. fathermushroom says:

    Kiss Kicker ’99

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0DPvBFqBPg

    As one of the posters there says, it’s silly and incomprehensible but I like it.

       1 likes

  49. “Someone’s rubbing puppets on us!”

    I’ve only seen two movies where I was actively convinced that the movie itself hated me and was out to hurt me. This was one of those movies. As such, it ranks #2 on my list of Worst Movies The SOL Crew Watched. None of the characters are even remotely likable (even Mr. McCreedy only blows up the vault because it gives him childish, petty revenge against the studio owner), no one’s even attempting to act, the plot has more holes than the average sieve, and the ending shows us that the whole stupid thing could have been prevented by just blowing the damn things up in the first place (it’s almost a reverse “Monster A Go-Go”). Do NOT use this one to break people in to the show, as it will invariably end very, very badly.

    The host segments are fantastic. The involuntary on-turning bit is awesome, both because I like the Robert Palmer song AND because there’s nothing sexual about the on-turning until Pearl’s entrance. It also shows just how far Bill’s come as a puppeteer; the eye roll and various little twitches here really convey aggravation on the part of Crow, which is a nice touch. Crow’s documentary on women is my 3rd favorite Bill Crow moment, and the mustachioed man cracks me up every single time. Bobo’s bit is cute, and the attempted luau escape is nice, especially for letting Observer play the obviously-most-intelligent one, something oddly rare.

    The guys’ hatred of the movie is palpable, and it shows in the riffing. Brutal shots at the movie and the director at every turn; given that the movie deserves them and worse, it never feels overbearing, as it did at times during Overdrawn at the Memory Bank. Probably my favorite thing in the whole movie follows the infamous “Well, you’re the expert on that” line. You can hear the other guys chuckle, and Kevin lets out a seemingly shocked “Wow.” Another one of those little things that make it feel like you’re among friends (as they say, misery loves company).

       3 likes

  50. Wampa Joe says:

    While people may be able to make a case that the Comedy Central years were more consistent overall, I could counter that the Sci-Fi years contained the best episodes of the entire series. Hobgoblins is one of them. This is a another “scummy” teen horror comedy like Zombie Nightmare, but this time the repulsion is adequately delivered by Mike and the ‘bots.

       1 likes

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