Movie: (1978 original TV show episodes; 1986 compilation movie) Alien marauder Ken becomes a fugitive from his home planet, then joins the Earth spaceship Bacchus 3 to fight against his former masters. Meanwhile, his girlfriend Rita is sent on a deadly mission.
First shown: 8/17/91
Opening: Old Joel Robinson had a farm?
Invention exchange: The mads demonstrate their eye, ear, nose & throat dropper; Joel has invented a musical chair and there’s a special guest in Deep 13: Jack Perkins!
Host segment 1: J&tB stage a hat party
Host segment 2: Joel forces Crow and Tom to reenact a scene from the movie
Host segment 3: Crow and Tom are confused by the movie, so Joel helps out using Syd Field’s “Screenplay.”
End: Joel explains his buttons and reads a letter, in Deep 13, they’re still torturing Jack Perkins.
Stinger: “AHAHAHAHA….you’re STUCK HERE!”
• Wow, this was really a watershed episode. There’s so much going on here. The sketches are all great, the movie is mind-boggling and the riffing is everything you want from an MST3K episode. An instant and enduring classic. Plus, it’s full of phrases that immediately became part of the MSTie lexicon, from “You’re stuck here!” to the merry tune, “He tried to kill me with a forkliiiiift….” One of the best.
• This episode was on Shout’s “Mystery Science Theater 3000 Collection: Vol XXIV.”
• Love the opener. These folks have been around farmers and they know farmer talk. Tom’s “help ussss!” is priceless.
• Mike is also hilarious as Jack Perkins. Jack would return, and not just in Deep 13. The character of “the host” who introduced the “MST3K Hour” shows was loosely based on Jack, though he was never explicitly called Jack Perkins. By the way, the real Mr. Perkins reportedly found Mike’s impersonation as hilarious as everybody else did.
• Hopelessly dated line: “He’s in more trouble than ‘Hudson Hawk’ at the box office!” It seemed like a big deal at the time.
• Call forward: Tom mentions “Marooned.”
• The “Marooned” mention comes as part of a succession of bits Tom and Crow do in the theater when they pretend they are scif-fi geeks. Geek culture is now robustly defended by the members of its community. Did (does?) anyone who considers themselves part of that community have a problem with these bits?
• Vaguely dirty lines: Joel: “I wanna die in the thong section of Victoria’s Secret!” Also: “Speaking of punishing mercilessly….rooowrrr!”
• Literary riff: Tom: “Biff!” Crow: “Happy!” SOMEbody’s read/seen “Death of a Salesman.”
• Does this episode hold the record for the most callbacks? Among them: “Third planet from the sun shall be called…Earth” (Women of the Prehistoric Planet); a reference to the “geometric nucleus” (Cave Dwellers); “It was after the…Robot Holocaust;” “I was in Time of the Apes!” “…and a good friend” (Rocketship XM); “Trumpy, you’re stinky!” (Pod People) “Hikeeba!” (Women of the Prehistoric Planet.) “Hey, like the Wild Rebels!” “This must be the [fill in the blank]…I’ve heard them talk about…so much…lately?” (Gamera); “Rock climbing, Joel.” (Lost Continent). Did I miss any?
• Crow has a right to be concerned in segment two. Didn’t Gypsy have a six-foot foam scorpion stinger hanging off her butt during episode 113- THE BLACK SCORPION? There’s a precedent!
• I noticed something this time about the “forklift” song. The first time they sing “This is the chase, Rocky and Ken,” they do so before the movie reveals that it was Rocky driving the forklift (though Ken immediately suspects him and says so).
• When Joel punches the bots in segment 2, note how VERY GENTLY he punches them. He knows how fragile they are.
• Joel is great in the closing bit. “That’s portion control. Next question.”
• This week’s cast and crew roundup is a short one: screenwriter Keiichi Abe also was one of the writers for “Time of the Apes.” That’s it.
• CreditsWatch: Trace and Frank are still guest “villians” (misspelled) and Dr. F’s last name is still spelled “Forrestor.” Special Make-up: Crist Ballas and Glen Griffin. I’m guessing that’s Mike’s Jack Perkins getup. This was Faye Burkholder’s last episode doing regular hair and makeup.
• Fave riff: “Uh, you’re crying on my bombs.” Honorable mention: “Oh, those are bugs. They wash right off.”
