How Was the Show?

Posted by Sampo, on February 17th, 2012

Did anybody go to last night’s sold-out “Plan 9 from Outer Space” riff in Los Angeles, featuring Dana Gould, Trace, Frank and Josh?

Love to get a report.

22 Replies to “How Was the Show?”

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Cheapskate Crow says:

February 17, 2012 at 1:43 pm

I don’t remember hearing about this at all, I would have considered making the trip.

1 likes

Kei says:

February 17, 2012 at 2:19 pm

I didn’t make the show, but I was playing D&D right outside the little theater at the back of Meltdown Comics and heard plenty of laughter. Then I had a cigarette outside with Frank, Trace, and Josh :)

7 likes

Mr. M. says:

February 17, 2012 at 2:39 pm

I was there. It was hilarious, although hard to tell how it ranked compared to the Rifftrax Live PLAN 9 show. Probably about equal. Dana Gould was actually really good at riffing the film, and turns out he’s a bit of a PLAN 9 historian/enthusiast so he offered some interesting bits of trivia mixed in with the riffing. (“Informative as well as entertaining!”)

Also present (and occasionally chiming in during the riffing with trivia of his own) was Larry Karaszewski, who was one of the screenwriters of the ED WOOD biopic. Gould noted that when he came to LA in the 90’s he befriended Maila Nurmi (aka Vampira), and sort of became to her what Ed Wood was to Bela Lugosi: someone who checked in on her almost every week, would take her to lunch, and frequently helped pay her bills. So that was an interesting little tidbit.

All in all, a great night of movie riffing. Only complaint is parking around the venue was all metered (through midnight!) with a 2 hour maximum, so I had to run out at one point and feed the meter. Stupid Hollywood.

4 likes

Mr. M. says:

February 17, 2012 at 2:44 pm

One more complaint: the theater was essentially a bunch of folding chairs set up in a back storage room with the movie being projected on a pull-down screen. In itself, not a problem, but unless you were in the very front row (which I wasn’t) you were guaranteed to have heads blocking your view of the screen. Sure, I suppose that’s keeping in the spirit of the MST3K “silhouettes”, but come on! People were continuously craning their necks to try and catch some of the details being riffed on. Luckily, I’m familiar enough with the movie that I basically knew what they were talking about, so it wasn’t that bad for me. But still a tad annoying.

2 likes

gebrown3226 says:

February 17, 2012 at 6:14 pm

I have to agree with Mr. M, all the way around. The riffing was hilarious, and seemingly ad-libbed most of the time, with the guys playing off of both each other and the stories that Dana Gould told in his introduction. Though I couldn’t really see what was going on up front, I could see Frank, and he didn’t seem to be working from anything other than the movie screen. I thought there was surprisingly little humor that overlapped with what Mike and RiffTrax had done with the same film in the past. (I wonder if any of them actually watched a RiffTrax version in order to avoid repeats?)

It’s true that the venue wasn’t particularly comfortable or efficient – I’m not sure how it works out for the other assorted performances they have there – but I got to see Trace, Frank, J. Elvis and Dana Gould perform live for $8. It was definitely worth the sore bottom and cramped neck, and I’ll go see them do this anytime they can do it. It would be a treat if Gould could find a way to pull in different combinations of the MST3K crew every once in a while! While I’m generally suspicious of anyone “watering down” the MST3K crew with outsiders, I thought Gould fit in very well.

I thank Mr. Gould for pulling this together, and hope this is the first of many!

4 likes

Joe z says:

February 17, 2012 at 11:20 pm

Please help me. Movies and TV now suck so bad, I can’t watch anything but reruns of MST3K.
Really, it all sucks so bad, we might as well be watching Russian TV in the 60’s and 70’s. Or Saddam Hussein TV.

Please bring back MST3K. I beg you. If only to get the SciFi channel movie crap.

Please help.

1 likes

Jbagels says:

February 18, 2012 at 9:44 am

@Joe z, there’s a lot of good tv on now. Breaking Bad, Boardwalk Empire, Homeland, Parks and Recreation, etc. I think it’s a golden age for television right now.

3 likes

Majorjoe23 says:

February 18, 2012 at 9:48 am

Joe, try Cinematic Titanic and Rifftrax.

4 likes

Joe z says:

February 18, 2012 at 12:10 pm

Actually, I do like ‘Walking Dead’ and ‘ Hell on Wheels ‘, But I don’t think I’ve laughed as hard as I do watching MST3K on any show or Movie since.

However, I will say that Science Fiction is not what the SciFi Channel is doing most of the time. I wish someone would start a real Science Fiction network.

2 likes

Zee says:

February 18, 2012 at 10:17 pm

Sure, TV sucks- in America. British television is ahead of us by lightyears.

2 likes

porp0ise says:

February 19, 2012 at 9:31 am

Joe z, as funny as MST3K is an old show that used to run on Spike TV called MXC. I guess it came out of Japan, someone got the idea to riff it in English. The eXtreme Challenges were hilarious in themselves, but with the costumes the contestants dressed in, the added sound effects, the riffing, and the skits, well, if laughter an help cure cancer, that show would be the best healing medicine around. I have no doubt that MST3K inspired the people who put this show on for us.

6 likes

Blast Hardcheese says:

February 19, 2012 at 3:08 pm

#11: MXC was absolutely hilarious, very much in the spirit of MST (although cruder, which I didn’t mind in the least). I remember being in Boston for a conference, and sitting in my hotel room watching an MXC marathon–almost didn’t make my session next morning, since I’d stayed up late watching episode after episode, nearly dead from laughter. It’s been replaced by “Wipeout,” which is a tepid imitation of the original concept, and without the brilliant dubbing/riffing. Does anyone know if MXC is out on DVD anywhere? I’d gladly pay money for episodes of that show.

0 likes

Matt D says:

February 19, 2012 at 4:24 pm

Mr. Hardcheese (great name), MXC is definitely out on DVD. I was in a Best Buy a few weeks ago, and saw a box set of the first two seasons of MXC. Can’t find it at Target though, and I don’t know about Walmart. So Best Buy or perhaps a Movie Stop (smaller video shop out here in New Jersey) would have it.

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Joe z says:

February 19, 2012 at 8:52 pm

Kenny Blankenship and Vince Ramano. Agree, terrific show. Wipeout is US knock off, Fridays on True TV. OK, but not as good as MXC.

2 likes

Blast Hardcheese says:

February 19, 2012 at 10:01 pm

Matt:

Thanks for the info–next time I’m at Best Buy I’ll hunt down a set. I imagine Amazon would provide, too–but I’m for instant gratification if I can find it.

1 likes

cityofvoltz says:

February 20, 2012 at 9:54 am

@ Joe z

I will echo the praise of MXC- all 5 seasons are well worth it- DVDS are on netflix, I think some episodes are on google video (or were).

Other funny new(er) tv. Robot Chicken. it requires, at times, a sick sense of humor (and cartoon network) but its gold in My book. And you can snag some of it at target;) Their star wars specials are all very good. Family guy isn’t as funny- but their star wars specials all get honorable mention

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Kei says:

February 22, 2012 at 1:54 pm

In college we’d pack our living room with people to play MXDC–Most Extreme Drinking Challenge–in which everyone grabs a drink and watches MXC. Whenever a contestant appears everyone has to call out whether the individual will “make it” or not, meaning survive the challenge without wiping out. If you guessed wrong, you drank. At the end of the episode, if someone you thought would survive made it into the Most Painful Elimination, you had to finish your drink.

There were also bonus drinks, like whenever a fan touches another person during the host segments.

1 likes

Kali says:

February 22, 2012 at 9:45 pm

Someone already has. I understand that Canada’s SPACE Channel is ten times better than the Skiffy (sorry, SyFy Venereal Disease) Channel. Sure wish we had access to SPACE.

Sorry I wasn’t in the area – though, it would be nice if they packaged this version for DVD. Then we’ll have five copies of Plan 9. :-)

#10

British television is always better. America just can’t do Doctor Who – can you imagine anyone here actually attempting to plug anything like it? (and to anyone who mentions the Movie, la-la-la-la-I-can’t-hear-you… )

BBC America does run Red Dwarf every six years or so, so that’s something.