All too often, the films shown on MST3K rely quite a bit on padding to get up to feature length. Frequently the padding has no perceivable relevance to the plot. So which occasions of non sequitur padding do you find particularly egregious? My top pick is the scene with Ike the Security Guard in The Wild, Wild World of Batwoman. A very close second would be the Fish Argument Theater from Gamera Vs. Zigra.
Gonna have to go with The endless traveling scenes in King Dinosaur. Completely useless to the plot.
What’s your pick?
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‘Fire maidens of outer space’ come on, what WAS the point of the poison wine?
2 words:
rock climbing
kind of off topic but i was watching ‘city on fire’ and noticed the hate for Shelly Winters. so it got me to wondering what other actors/actresses the brains had no love for. MIGHT be an interesting WDT sometime…
Take out all the stock footage from Deadly Mantis and you would have a fairly decent episode of Twilight Zone.
Yes Rock Climbing, but consider Sandstorm or the boat chase in Final Justice.
Technically you could say that nothing is more blatant padding to reach movie length than sticking two episodes of a show together and pretending it’s a movie like Riding with Death or San Fransisco International Airport
Invasion Of The Neptune Men. The movie ended with what seemed like 30 minutes of stock footage.
the love scene in Mitchell.
I would have said the wrestling scenes in Racket Girls, but the more I watch it, the more I consider them like the interstitial chapters in Moby Dick, far more metaphorical intending to further the theme more than the plot. I really must stop watching that episode.
I vote for Monster a Go-Go. The entire film was padding!
To follow up what scarecrow pointed out, I’d nominate Red Zone Cuba – also an entire movie made up of padding.
But remember: only love pads the film.
In Starfighters, the practical-joke-at-the-bar scenes, with the pilots calling each other to the phone for fake calls, were entirely pointless padding. I know Starfighters itself is entirely pointless padding, but the phone call business was extreme.
It was a bit worse than that, even. Neptune Men started using its own footage to pad itself out. So not only did it have like 30 minutes of stock footage, a good chunk of that was stock footage of itself. That’s just… dirty, in a way.
Ultimate padding sequences has to be Torgo stumbling from one point to another whether in the movie or in SOL and Deep 13. He even has his own theme music to go with it.
The good ones have already been taken (Fire Maidens, Lost Continent, Moon Men, Starfighters, etc.), as I knew would be the case. One that counts for me, however, is the machine-gun scene at the end of Danger! Death Ray! — It is INTERMINABLE, and thinking about it will sometimes keep me from watching the episode. More obviously, though, there’s the ENTIRE SECOND HALF of Prince of Space (in spite of the fact that it’s one of my favorite episodes).
Commando Cody –
Every episode begins with five minutes of what happened in the last episode, not to mention the Interminably repeated taking off with the rocket pack shot. BTW – How does a rocket control work that has two settings – Up and Down?
The first 93 minutes of Manos.
Another one I’d like to add. In Ring of Terror, when we go looking for Puma.
Ooh, ooh! The repeated stock footage of WWII type fighting in Beginning
of the End. Somehow I can’t help but feel Peter Graves was partially
responsible for them.
Obvious point: Since nature abhors a vacuum, MST3K is on the side of nature; they fill the vacuum created by bad filmmakers (who are not a part of the natural order), filling the interminable dead-spaces of their creations with golden riffs.
On a more practical note (but it’s another obvious point), I meant to say that the machine-gun scene at the end of Danger! Death Ray! isn’t actually THAT long, but it FEELS like an eternity.
Horrors of Spider Island is my “Film de Jour”, so pretty much everything from after they find the island to when Joe and Bob arrive, then then from just after Joe and Bob arrive to when Gary shows up again.
Crow: “Taaaaking-of-clothes music!”
I think about 1/3rd of Horror of Party Beach was the Del-Aires playing. It was also the best part of the movie (and the band was actually pretty good and fun to watch), so maybe this is reverse-padding?
Runner up is the endless Traveling to get Sodium scenes in the same film, which were much less fun.
Two words: Ro-Man. Bubbles.
My thoughts exactly. One of my all-time favorite MST3K sequences.
I’m going to go with “Invasion of the Neptune Men”. Near the end, the basically took the footage of one overlong dogfight, then ran it again, and again. Saaaaaandstoooooorm and Rock Climbing were also overlong, but they didn’t show the same footage over and over.
Lotsa padding in Wild World of Batwoman. The band on the beach, dancing Rat Finks, mole men, Heathcliffe in general…
But dammit! Not enough backstory on the horseshoe!
Or we could take this in the wrong direction and discuss the wardrobe folks who came up with Torgo’s pants?
Track of the Moonbeast:
Going to the concert and seeing “The Band That Played California Lady” play “California Lady”
I always love the opening shot in ‘Beginning of the End’ where the car is approaching… and approaching… and approaching… And Crow finally loses it and screams, ‘Is something gonna HAPPEN?!!’
What about the “officer third wheel” scene from The Creeping Terror? Is this a case of excessive movie padding or just the mad ranting of a renegade narrator on the loose? You make the call!
10- Commando Cody shorts (back story every time???)
9-EEGAH dune buggy scenes (rather have more Arch Hall Jr. songs- pretty bad)
8- Sand Storm (nuff said)
7- Rock Climbing (nuff said)
6- The Entire Home Economics Story
5- All Roger Corman movies with walking
4- Servo’s Star is Born host segment in Episode 610
3- Opening scene in Soultaker
2- Longest credits in history at beginning of Future War
1- The last 30 minutes of Neptune Men
Bubbles Ro-Man? Didn’t she open for Michelle Wilson on the Shine Your Love tour?
All of the really good ones have been mentioned.. That being said.
I’ll add the mind numbing “Seance Scene” from The Wild Wild World of Batwoman.
Tom: You know.. That may really not be Chinese!
THE BLACK SCORPION. Such a low budget producers couldn`t afford the animation for the monster footage. So same scenes used over and over and over.
All of the “acts” in The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies.
The Incredible Melting Man seemed to feature a lot of padding, especially with the repetitious flashbacks that kept reminding us that you’ve never seen anything until you’ve seen the sun through the rings of Saturn.
In general, a lot of that film could have been edited way the hell down with no great loss.
And then there’s all the stock footage and the “all the countries are rallying together to save Santa Claus” scenes in Santa Claus Conquers the Martians that never really seem to matter or have any relevance later.
You know, I think you’re right. Plus for silly padding, let’s shineshineshine and add the “Shine Your Love” number to the list.
One word: SANDSTORM!!!!
Any of the Coleman Francis troika of films were just exercises in padding.
The make out teens in Manos.
Bride of The Monster. The endless argument between parakeet man and the does she or doesn’t she have a pencil behind the ear lady.
the end of The Wild, Wild World of Batwoman.
END END.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-onWNxvSLVk
there was no padding.
but that really happens in the USAF.
Bert I Gordon films have a lot of padding to begin with anyway.
In Space Mutiny, every scene with the space witches (Ballerians?) felt like filler. Some of the crew in those scenes seemed like they were only in those scenes as well.
That’s not padding, that’s TORTCHA!
All the good ones from MST3K have already been taken, but my favorites are the opening credits for Future War (not only do they have nothing to do with the rest of the movie, but they’re a bad ripoff of Alien3) and almost the entirety of “Fire Maidens of Outer Space” (that movie would boil down to a short and boring Outer Limits episode).
If I may expand out to Cinematic Titanic, my favorite is “The Alien Factor.” So much walking in the woods!
Bobo making a brain sandwich at the end of The Undead… heh.