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Sampo & Erhardt
Sci-Fi Archives
Visit our archives of the MST3K pages previously hosted by the Sci-Fi Channel's SCIFI.COM.
I cannot believe we haven’t done this one, but apparently we haven’t.
This month was the 75th anniversary of the debut of “The Wizard of Oz,” (the movie I argue is the last, perhaps the only, commonly shared experience in America) and on another forum somebody has been asking “How many ‘Wizard of Oz’ references did they make?” I don’t know that anybody has ever counted them all, but let’s cite out favorites.
Mine comes from “Girls Town,” when Silver and Mary Lee’s gnarled mom yells out the window and Crow yells: “How would you like it if somebody picked apples off of you??”
Movie: (1977) Aboard the maiden transatlantic flight of a supersonic plane, mechanical problems and a killer virus cause a crisis for an all-star cast.
First shown: 2/19/89 Opening: Dr. F. is back from Vegas, bringing money, gifts and this week’s movie. They send it to Joel, catching him off-guard Host segment 1: Joel shows Servo what it’s like to feel pain Host segment 2: Gypsy has a sexy new voice … or does she? Host segment 3: Joel, Crow and Gypsy have a limbo contest; Servo provides the music. End: Viewer mail. (137 votes, average: 4.31 out of 5)
• This is a movie I’d have loved to see them tackle again. It’s got everything: stupid plot, a huge “Fantasy Island”/”Love Boat” cast, hackneyed story lines, the works. And it sure is a breath of fresh air after so many weeks of Sandy Frank.
• References.
• The opening is very similar to a segment in episode 105- THE CORPSE VANISHES.
• Portions of the theater segments were included on the MST3K Scrapbook tape.
• Local jokes: “We can bail out Midwest Federal.” “They look like they got their suits at Foreman & Clark.”
• At one point Crow mispronounces a word and Tom immediately mocks him for it. It’s the kind of thing they seldom did later on.
• Pre-riff: I said, “You sank my battleship!” a few seconds before Servo did.
• In between segments one and two, in a jump cut between two scenes in the movie, it looks like they stopped tape and then restarted it. Servo is suddenly off his chair and Joel says “Whoa! Turbulence!”
• That’s make-up lady Faye Burkholder doing the sexy Gypsy voice and some puppetry in segment 2.
• Wow, can I just say that John DeLancie really does a good job of being a jerk. I met him once. He seemed really nice.
• Firsts: Crow mentions ram chips,” the Mads mention “pushing the button, “we get the very first reading of letters to the show and the first mention of Cambot’s “stillstore” function, which, at this point, appears to be a piece of cardboard and some masking tape.
• My DVD contains what is apparently a commercial for the show in which J&TB perform the “SST Death Flight Theme Song.”
• Cast and crew roundup: Cinematographer Joseph Biroc also worked on “The Amazing Colossal Man” and “Kitten With A Whip.” Score composer John Cacavas also worked on “Superdome” and “Hangar 18.” In front of the camera: Peter Graves was also in “It Conquered the World,” “Beginning of the End,” “Parts: The Clonus Horror” and did some narration in “Attack of the the Eye Creatures.” Burgess Meredith was also in “The Last Chase.” Robert Reed was also in “Bloodlust.” Robert Ito was also in “Women of the Prehistoric Planet.” Tom Stewart was also in “Space Travelers.” Walter Maslow was also in “Human Duplicators.” Lorne Green was the narrator for the short “Johnny at the Fair.”
• CreditsWatch: We now begin an ongoing feature in which we note changes in the closing credits. In all the previopus episodes (as far as we know) Vince Rodriguez is listed as director and Todd Ziegler is credited with handling the audio. For some reason, in this episode and the next one, both their credits have vanished.
• Fave riff: “If I could do that I wouldn’t leave the house!” Honorable mention: “Put the masks on the important stars first!”
Pete Hammond at deadline.com reports that the 2015 edition of Leonard Maltin’s Movie Guide, due out in a couple of weeks, will be the final print version update.
Maltin and his guide were mentioned several times on MST3K, most notably a closing credits conversation in episode 706- LASERBLAST. Of course, Maltin himself appeared on the show — and held up a copy of the book — in episode 909- GORGO (and also appeared in a DVD extra when that episode came to DVD).
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