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Weekend Discussion Thread: Best and Worst of Season 11Well, we are at last done with season 11 … or ARE we??
I want to kind of wrap up the Netflix season and I will, perhaps over several weeks. However, once again, if YOU have topic ideas for threads (about season 11 or otherwise), I am once again accepting them at msampo at aol dot com. This week’s topic: Your most favorite episode of season 11, and your least favorite, and why. And as a bonus: SHOULD Netflix greenlight season 12? This is pass/fail here: yes or no. Have at it! 105 Replies to “Weekend Discussion Thread: Best and Worst of Season 11”Commenting at Satellite News
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By all means Netflix should give the go ahead for season 12. I suspect it would bring many surprises for us MSTies.
Favorite from season 11? Yongary. The Macarena dance put it over the top.
Least favorite? Beast of Hollow Mountain. Bad Mexican stereotypes. Alcoholic dad and hyperactive kid. I kept expecting the Frito-Lay Bandito to show up.
First, season 12 should be approved. Aside from what happened to Jonah, let’s have Synthia get a bit too close to Max, making Kinga mad because she’s afraid they’ll overthrow her.
Best movie is Avalanche. Great riffing, and nice song from Kinga and Neville, although she should pay him back.
Least favorite was Wizards of the Lost Kingdom…both of them.
Bonus: what was the riff that sold you on MST3K: “Wonderful, wonderful Super Dragon”…Reptilicus.
Yes, by all means Netflix should give season 12 a green light! So far, my favorite of the season is The Land that Time Forgot. I immediately loved the feel of it (they were really on it during the opening credits, and I was sold by the time “The world’s worst paperboy” came along). I wish I could say for sure what my least favorite episode was, but I actually haven’t made it through the entire season. The Wizards movies burned me out (so maybe they are my least favorite), and I haven’t had the courage to watch Carnival Magic yet (I love animals, and I don’t even like thinking about a chimpanzee who contemplates suicide [and I have tried to blot out the racoon scene in Cry Wilderness, an otherwise hilarious episode for me]). I don’t like Christmas movies in July (even bad ones), and I just haven’t gotten around to watching the finale yet.
First – an emphatic no. It was a waste of talent and time and Netflix can (and has) done far better with its money. Only the Netflix Gods can decide what they will do, but their history hasn’t shown any sort of propensity for a show like this (my hunch was that only because it was already financed did they give it a shot). If I had to bet I’d say a renewal won’t happen.
“Avalanche” was the best episode by a long shot — worst was “Carnival Magic”, which would have been a tough slough even without the practiced hand of Joel or Mike.
Best of season 11: Avalanche. Honorable mention: Yongary
Most Underrated: Time Travelers
Worst of Season 11: Wizards of the Lost Kingdom 1&2.
Overrated: The Christmas that Almost Wasnt.
Season 12? Most definitely! Please oh please Netflix!
Best: Cry Wilderness
Worst: Carnival Magic
Honestly, I could go either way. I found Season 11 to be alright, but I absolutely hated 90% of the host segments. Too much reliance on songs, guest stars, and I don’t know why after the Sci-Fi era, they’re still trying to maintain a PLOT.
Best: Starcrash
Honorable mention(s): Wizards of Lost Kingdom 1 & 2
Worst: The Christmas that Almost wasn’t
Overrated: Yongary
Underrated: Carnival Magic
I have learned almost too late I need to watch each episode at least 20 times like the “classic” series before I can judge. I’ll say with each viewing, I have learned to appreciate just now good the new season is.
I will be very sad if there isn’t at least a Season 12- I am hoping for at least two more seasons!
I don’t think anyone but the usual contrarians will say no to a Season 12. And if you say “no” to Season 12, consider this: did you enjoy even one episode of Season 11? Do you think the performers improved as the season went on? If so, why not let them continue to improve, and give you more laughs? None of the talent involved is being forced* to do this, so “waste of talent and money” arguments are specious at best.
As for the best of Season 11, it’s very hard to choose between some very good episodes. Reptilicus will always have a spot in my heart due to the premiere and “Every Country Has Its Monster”, which I think wins hands down for the best new song. Avalanche and Time Travelers both hit the right mark for riffing on a movie which actually tried. Cry Wilderness and Carnival Magic bring the “WTF Movie” moments. The two Wizards of the Lost Kingdom episodes have some great moments, and they’re the kind of movie I can watch and laugh at even without riffers, and Yongary adds the required Kaiju quotient. Finally, StarCrash gets high marks for many reasons. Top 3: 1. I’ve been waiting for years to see this movie riffed by professionals, and they nail this one, 2. It has my favorite nerd joke of the season: “Jonah: A glow-in-the-dark star? Crow: Yeah, they ALL do.”, 3. Christopher Plummer’s performance.
I wasn’t so impressed with the two Doug McClure movies. They’re good but not great.The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t is one of those “good riffing over a too-boring movie” episodes — par for the course for Christmas riffs, in fact (only Santa Claus Conquers the Martians works well as a Christmas riff so far, and we’ve already got three of those.) The Loves of Hercules, while a good episode, is tainted by the fact that the movie just leaves me feeling sad for Jayne Mansfield.
Finally, I can say that the worst episode in my book is The Beast of Hollow Mountain. No amount of riffing can cover over the vast array of artistic, technical and ethical violations in this movie. All of the other episodes, even the mediocre ones, I will watch again. I have no inclination to see this episode ever again.
* No, not even Jonah. Not really.
Best: Cry Wilderness. Hands down. I liked Reptilicus too.
Worst: Sorry, but the two Doug McClure movies didn’t really work for me.
Weirdest: Carnival Magic
Biggest Disappointment: Unfortunately, Starcrash. But only because I was so looking forward to it, and discovered that they were still cutting the films to fit the timeslot. Wasn’t sure why that was necessary since it’s on Netflix and all. Some moments I was expecting to see riffed weren’t. And guys, no comment on the “Halt the flow of time!” moment? No, “Where’d THAT power come from? Out of Roger Corman’s a$$?” type of riff? (Okay, I said “Coleman Francis” when I first saw the scene because it was THAT stupid, but seriously, guys, WTF?)
Moment That Sold Me on the New Series: Every Country Has a Monster. Best. MST. Song. Ever.
What the hey?: Kinga and Jonah’s wedding. Sorry, did nothing at all for me. Like the Brains discovered for Season 8, there really is no reason for a continuing storyline on MST. Get the guys in the theater, start riffing. That’s what it’s all about, people.
Should There Be a Season 12: Yes! They still have to do Dracula vs Frankenstein and get that John Agar Film Festival started that Pearl always wanted!
Besides, we have a ready-made crappy film in The Emoji Movie! Seriously, who wanted that piece of crappy sh–cinema, and what was it made for?
Best: Carnival Magic
Worst: The Land That Time Forgot
Season 12: Absolutely!
Best: Cry Wilderness
Worst: Yongary
Should it get another season? Why yes. I think it should.
Thoughts overall?
Good:
The cast. The new characters were fun, bringing back classic characters were fun. There’s only one sore spot on this list but I’ll get to that later.
Widescreen. Yes! Movies riffed in widescreen at last!
Joel playing the “Movie in the hole!” guy. Sorry I forgot his name.
BB Servo was a great sight gag.
Gypsy’s expanded role was EXCELLENT! I’m so happy that she’s no longer a one-note character who’s always on the receiving end. And I loved it every time she comes into the theater to riff even for just a few seconds.
Guest Stars: Wow. Seinfeld AND Mark Hamill?
No MST3K Joel appearance. While Joel does appear as different characters, I appreciated how he didn’t come back as Joel from the series since Mike Nelson didn’t appear in this new season in any capacity.
The Jazz(?) robot at the end. I liked him. Hope he sticks around.
Bad:
Jonah. I’m not entirely sure, but there’s just something about him that I don’t like. I guess it’s his overall passive attitude towards everything that bugs me a bit. Joel and Mike knew the circumstances that they were stuck in a place against their will and when given the opportunity, would try to fight it. Joel would refuse to enter the theater and Mike would try many times to actually escape the SOL. Jonah just didn’t seem to care one way or another. And it gets worse when we get to….
The opening titles. I’m just going to say it. I HATE the opening titles. I don’t like the idea that Jonah is forced to redo the entire opening segment every time the series comes on. And having the sequence play out with dialogue really drowns out the vocals of the song.
The fast paced riffing. This is problematic for several reasons. First, it doesn’t give viewers any time to process or enjoy a good riff when they hear it. it totally drowns the characters who are actually talking in the movie. Let the movie breath! And Third, it robs the movie of being funny on it’s own. If every second has to have a riff, how can the movie show itself as being genuinely bad?
The Sets. With the exception of the Mads’ Lair, the sets on the show were not good at all. The SOL host segment set felt a lot more cramped than the previous SOL sets and the way it is shot just feels like there’s a lot of dead space on the screen. Oh, and what is going on with the sets that the guest spots are using? They look like they’re standing in a dark room just looking into a camera. It’s so off putting. Watching guest spots from the Hex Screen felt more involved than this.
Video Effects. What’s going on? At random points during the host segments, a purple bubbly water effect would wash over the entire screen and vanish without so much as a mention. I thought it was some kind of SOL malfunction or something that Kinga was doing behind the scenes that would be brought up later, but no. It’s just a random effect. Were the show’s editors trying to blend two takes together or what?
The Satellite of Love. We only see the Satellite from one angle throughout the entire show, and that’s underneath it with all several cables attached to it. There is no good money shot of the SOL and no effort during the host segments to that take advantage of it. We see only one new shot of the SOL during the last episode’s closing credits, but that’s it. I remember during the Kickstarter updates that they were going to do all kinds of goofy stuff with the SOL, like having one end rotate to accommodate widescreen movies and all kinds of neat stuff. What we get is an underside shot of the Satellite in the opening segment and that’s it.
I’d probably say Avalanche for best and The Land That Time Forgot for worst. The latter somewhat pains me, since it’s the episode with my name in the credits,
Of course for season 12.
Best: Cry Wilderness
2nd: Hercules
Honorable: Avalanche and Wizard 2
Most WTF: Carnival Magic
Worst: Earth’s Core
Disappointing: Xmas
Favorite cameo: Mark Hamil
Yes to Season 12.
S11 was a mixed bag. The good news was that Jonah was a capable host. Hampton is a worthy Crow. Baron seemed to be trying really hard with Servo at times, too much “ironic radio voice”. The jokes as everyone has said ad nauseum came a little too fast.
Patton was pretty good, Felicia unfortunately I think was miscast. I was almost shocked at the number of flubbed lines that made it in the show. So those were the best takes they had. Yikes
Almost no chemistry with Patton whatsoever.
The cameos were almost uniformly dreadful.
Still, some pretty good riffing at times and it gets a lot of leeway for nostalgia. I really wanted to like Baron and Felicia but I get the feeling that they are holding the show back a little like Josh was during S1.
Absolutely no to Season 12. Season 11 didn’t resemble the previous eras at all!
The balance of professionalism versus ameteurs is totally off. What I really wanted was folks who were totally green butchering line deliveries, struggling to find their comedic voices, and minute-long dead silences. Instead, I got folks with varying degrees of experience butchering line deliveries, struggling to find their comedic voices, and sometimes moving too fast! If Joel had just hired people we’ve never heard of, like he used to, this never would’ve happened.
Never before have we had a Mad so pathetic, unscary, and desperate for approval. I mean, singing duets? Getting agitated by insensitive family members? Shamelessly stealing ideas? Showing emotions? These are lows Clayton and Pearl would never have sunk to! Those two were serious villains who were constantly so terrifying that every time they showed up I pissed myself, and I’m not afraid to admit it. Trace Beauleau was literally the world’s scariest man and no one could ever top him. To this day I still shudder when I see someone dressed in flourecent green.
And the robot voices! Tom Servo’s voice used to be deep, man. Every time he spoke my very soul would vibrate. It was like listening to an abyss. Baron Vaughn’s voice, however, is only kinda deep. I can barely tell him apart from Jonah half the time! That’s right, I said it. Jonah Ray and Baron Vaughn sound almost exactly alike.
The host segments are terrible too. Every episode has a host segment that hints at an ongoing plot. This is exactly like the Sci-Fi era, which had the majority of host segments consumed by an ongoing plot! And we all agreed, unanimously, that this was bad and should never have happened. Mystery Science Theater 3000 isn’t about growing and expanding its wheelhouse as the expectations we have of comedy series grow and expand. It’s about uncritically recreating the 1990s, excpet the bits of it we didn’t like! And if it can’t even get that right, I don’t know why we bothered bringing it back in the first place.
Favorite episode: Caroline Munro! OK, actually it was Avalanche, for a zillion reasons. I really enjoyed Time Travelers too – 50s-era sci-fi in color, just the right amount of dopeyness, and great riffing. Nearly all of them were good, with just a couple of exceptions….
Most disliked episode: Carnival Magic – too slow, too creepy, too boring, hard to save even for the old pros. Both the Wizard movies were more abominable overall, and it was a chore to get through them, but I have a feeling they will age better on a second viewing. (I am reworking my way through the season now.)
Season 12: Yes! Jonah and the new bots are not quite up to Joel and Mike levels yet, but they are rookies. Their first year was great, and still better than almost anything else out there in Bad TV Land. Patton was a pleasant surprise too! Felicia needs to be, well, “madder”. And bring on more NPH and Mark Hamill – they were fun! Also, I agree that movie cuts for time aren’t so important as they were for network TV.
I’m for a season 12, but they need to retool the show. Slow down the jokes. Better writing for the host segments.
I’m for a season 12, but they need to retool the show. Slow down the jokes. Better writing for the host segments.
Yes to Season 12. It sounds like Joel is listening to the fans about fast riffing and a few other issues. It takes time to create a great show esp. one as complex as MST.
Favorite ep: Avalanche. The riffs were well-timed and the movie was fun. Hercules is my runner-up.
Least favorite: Cry Wilderness. This movie was so perfect for riffing and should have been great but it was during this one that I nearly teared out my hair, thinking, they’ve blown it! They don’t know how to riff anymore. Luckily not every ep had as poorly timed riffing as this one.
Sampo, how about a thread focusing on the positive aspects of Season 11? And you still have an aol.com email? Wow.
I loved Season 11, to me it feels, looks, and sounds like MST3k, watching the first episode Reptilicus brought me warm and fuzzies. Not every moment, episode or decision worked (not so sure about the ending or the whole wedding thing..), but their success rate was remarkably high. Season 12? BRING IT! We need more Jonah and the bots!
Fave episodes: Cry Wilderness and Avalanche, also shout out to Carnival Magic for being so dang weird!!
Least Faves: Beast of Hollow Mountain (kinda boring) and The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t is PUNISHING! Only watched it once so far. . .it is a tough one, that movie has defeated me. . .but I will try again.. :)
No one seems to like Christmas that Almost Wasn’t. I want to throw in a kind word for its euro-weirdness. One of the better ones of the season.
I give season 11 a big fat “eh it was ok”. I don’t think it stacked up to the “classic era”, but it’s still nice to have new MST3K, and I can see myself revisiting at least a couple of episodes every now and then. It was reasonably funny but flawed which means it can’t compare to the well-oiled machine that was the old series. I guess if I had to rate it, I’d give it a 6.5/10.
Best episode: Avalanche or Cry Wilderness. Both insane movies, perfect for the show.
Worst episode: The Time Travelers or The Beast of Hollow Mountain. Both boring as sin and the riffs weren’t that great.
S12?: Sure. I would say I was moderately disappointed by S11 so I certainly do think that the show could use another season to iron out its newfound kinks.
Things I’d like to see improve in s12 (probably not going to be super original here):
– yadda yadda the riffing is too fast paced everyone has said this and it doesn’t really bear repeating but i’m including it anyway!!
– The new intro is pretty choppy and I don’t like the “Jonah has to redo it every episode!” gimmick.
– More interesting camera work. Every host segment is uniformly flat. Definitely makes them feel a bit sterile.
– The celeb guest stars were horrendous. They didn’t fit the show, none of them were funny or entertaining, and the fact that they just stood in some disconnected room was very bizarre and offputting. I’m definitely not going to get my way here, but I would be very glad if they were axed.
– I never really found the theater gimmicks (Servo flying especially) funny. It just seemed like they were trying to change things up just because they could, and like I just said, I don’t really think they ever added to anything, they just got distracting. They were definitely more rampant in the first half of the season, so I think they knew by the end they were overdoing it.
As much as I remember gluing my lil’ Friday-night/Saturday-morning self to the new miracle of cable to watch S1, I look back at the episodes on disk and realize only two or three of them were actually funny–J. Elvis was a bored-sounding Servo,, Dr. Erhardt looked like something off local TV, there were long spaces between the ad-libbed riffs, and the tries to get a running gag going (like making up a Commando Cody theme song) were funny if they worked, desperate if they didn’t. And then S2 brought in scripted riffs, and a classic was born. :)
S11 isn’t bad, it’s better than the Mike years but not up to the Joel years, in that they know HOW to riff the right way, but don’t have the ammo or the verve–The spirit is willing, but the riffing is weak.
So yes, I’d go for a S12, if producer Joel could wake up and realize his attempt to “fix” his ain’t-broke series for the Netflix era caused the main problems: We don’t need season-arc plots, because we’re not “binging” it like Game of Thrones even though it’s on Netflix, and yes, touring is hard, but the comedy is better when the comics spend a little more time together on or behind the set working on the material. Oh, and it’s okay, you can show square vintage B/W films on a widescreen HDTV, it won’t confuse our lil’ brains, and if there’s no broadcast constraint on running time, there’s no reason NOT to show shorts.
– Best: Cry Wilderness, a movie of enough wrong decisions to ask “why” in a hundred ways, but only because it was slightly more fun to sit through than Carnival Magic
– Worst: At the Earth’s Core, a movie that felt like it was riffed at 4:30 on Friday, with a mad, easy, SciFi-like running-gagged rush for the end credits, thanks, g’night folks, we’re outta here! (Beast of Hollow Mountain, or “How to stall time for a movie that arrives an hour late”, still gets points for the movie-related host segs.)
Just like educational shorts in S2 were funnier than Commando Cody serials in S1, think the new show can learn a few things getting over their training wheels, and make S12 the S2 of S11.
Uh, which he literally was…?
Okay I was really close to not telling if this was sarcasm until the part about fluorescent green. Well done, sir or madam!
Season 12?: Oh good heavens, yes. S11 is probably in my top five, maybe top 3, of seasons overall. S3 has still not been topped and this doesn’t end as strong as S8 but I absolutely loved it after waiting until the last day to even back this season on Kickstarter.
Best Episode: Cry Wilderness was an instant classic for me, on par with any of the previous iterations’ greats. I also loved Carnival Magic because I am weird.
Worst Episode: I thought Christmas That Almost Wasn’t and At the Earth’s Core were the least of the lot, which makes for a downer of an ending but they are still okay. Not bad, per se.
I was just so happy to have something that was brand new but still felt like MST3K. I want more, damn you, more!
Season 12 on Netflix? Yes, but only if there is no alternative that would allow them to take their time over each episode. Take their time, release a new episode every week or two. No binge watching, no binge creating.
Oh, and NO CELEBRITY CAMEOS. Save those for the “Mystery Science Theater Holiday Special”.
Sony. Poor Sony…Every studio has a franchise-iconic cartoon character except them. :(
Every time they go to Target and see Universal’s Minions all over everything, or see Wal-Mart still trying to sell Dreamworks’ Trollz, they realize that all they’ve got is the Smurfs, the Angry Birds and Adam Sandler’s Dracula, and nobody wanted the Smurfs last summer.
That’s also why Warner is giving us the Lego Ninjago Movie, even though Batman isn’t in it.
The Seinfeld and Mark Hamill cameos seemed like they’d heard of the Kickstarter, were fans enough to say “Me! Mememe, can I be in it too? :) ” and Joel let them because he was first afraid he wouldn’t raise enough Kickstarter money if it had people we hadn’t heard of in it.
Neil Patrick Harris, OTOH, was more of an in-tribute of “Look, folks, remember how much you liked Neil and Felicia in their last comic cult-phenomenon?”, which, since I’d never seen it in my life, didn’t really mean that much in and of itself.
And worked for a local Minnesota station’s Saturday monster movie, but…guys, you’re on cable now!
When TV’s Frank came on, the whole dynamic of the show changed instantly, from Saturday-afternoon KTMA, to silly and rebelliously annoying comics being silly and rebelliously annoying. :)
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One of my complaints about S11 dates back to a joke that used to crack me up when I was a kid:
“They say TV has killed the art of conversation—That’s what they also used to say about movies, and two hundred years ago, that’s what they said about books. But then, before there were TV or movies or books…what did people have to talk about? ‘My big toe is bigger than YOUR big toe!’?”
It’s good that Jonah & co. seem to be raised on the classics, and producer/director Joel is keeping things back on the old-school philosophy of heckling the movies with embarrassing shared pop-refs, but that brings up the question of just what pop-culture a new generation actually HAS in Grandma’s attic trunk.
We’ve got almost an entire generation now that’s never lived to see a 60’s rerun on TV, a cartoon on Saturday morning, or the Million Dollar Movie on local statations (badda-dadda-dum-dum, dum-dum!), and fast-forwarded over commercials if they got to see them at all, so…what do they have to embarrassingly joke about? For the Mike era, that was pointing out that they knew the actor from a TV series or movie they had heard of, or finding the fat, drunk or foreign character and making jokes about his big toe.
Two questions about the riffing seemed to tip me off about this:
1) Used to be, every time there was a riff about a gag sounding too borscht-belt standup-comic, they’d make a joke about how stand-up comic the punchline sounded (“Ba-BING!”) Usually, it might be by doing it in a Rodney Dangerfield voice—huh-huh, tell ya—or, once in a while for Trace’s Crow, in a Jerry Seinfeld voice. (“What is he expecting, a big on-off switch?”)
For some incredibly bizarre reason throughout the whole episodes, to Jn&tB’s generation, “Outdated stand-up comic” = “Andrew Dice Clay imitation”. (“Hickory dickory dock, oww!!”) Er, the freakin’ HELL?—Nobody remembers Clay, those who do don’t want to, and the last time we saw him, he was losing to Pauly Shore on “Celebrity Apprentice”, but didn’t seem quite as much of a real-life a-hole offscreen as Tom Green still was.
Okay, if not Clay, who DO The Kids Today associate with “Bad outdated comic”, in the Henny Youngman or Jackie Mason sense?—Know any kids who quote Gallegher? Does anyone still know who Carrot Top is (and no, he’s not the president), and did anyone learn who Rip Taylor was only after MST3K jokes? Yes, “Comics hate other comics”, especially bad ones, but Clay’s outdated, y’know, ‘cause he’s so 90’s.
2) Yes…the Muppets thing.
If you look back at the Joel & Mike eras, they each have their different subconscious comic reaction to working on a Cowtown Puppet Show: In the CC Joel years, we might get the “Charlie McCarthy Hearings” sketch mentioning Farfel and Lambchop, or the scene where Joel’s singing the Sidehackers love theme to Gypsy and ad-libs, “I feel sorta like Mac Davis on the Muppet Show”…While M&tB seemed almost personally outraged that King Friday XIII and the Mister Rogers puppets were in the same profession that they were. (Just listen to RiffTrax’s “Attack of the Puppet People”, or can anyone explain where that riff came out of nowhere in “The Starfighters”??)
But for Jn&tB, puppets aren’ t just The Muppets…The Muppets were beloved 70’s pop culture. It’s practically the ONLY 70’s pop-culture their generation still has any affection for (the rest turns up mocked as Avalanche riffs), which is why everyone flocked to that first Disney movie, even though the actual Muppet performers loathed the smarmy-retro script.
Jokes about “carrying on the TV-puppet tradition” might result in the Rowlf jokes about Growler, but when the most enthusiastically pop-culture-specific riffs in the episodes this season were about Skekses, David Bowie and Fraggle Rock, you start to ask just how many Psychic Lawn Darts the new writers DO have in their subconscious to throw.
Should there be a season 12? Why not. I’ve got nothing against anybody, and it’s always nice to see people get work. My hope is that, like the original series, things would gradually improve with every subsequent season.
Least favorite episode: The Beast of Hollow Mountain. It’s going to be a long time before I try to watch that one again. One bad running gag sunk the whole episode for me.
Favorite episode: I dunno. The season left me pretty cold. Yongary will probably be the first one I return to at some point down the road — I remember that being kind of fun. Although the fact that I can’t remember much about it to encourage me to revisit it isn’t a great sign.
I see that this thread is sort of turning into a good thing/bad thing analysis of season 11. I wonder whether that should be its own discussion thread down the road: Things to improve on if season 12 happens. Even though season 11 didn’t do much for me, I certainly want to see the series get better. Or maybe it would be better to wait until season 12 is/isn’t confirmed before starting that thread.
Ramchip!
Most favorite was Starcrash. Goofy half-baked space operas are tailor-made for MST3K. Plus the first time I watched the ship launching scene, the litany of names they rattled off had me laughing so hard I was hyperventilating.
Least favorite was Carnival Magic. As I noted in the original discussion, it bears the strongest resemblance this season to the Sordid Crime films of the original series that were among my least favorite episodes. Not even Mark Hamill as a singing interstellar carnie or the pitch perfect stinger could save it for me.
Here’s my complete ranking of the season.
Starcrash
Wizards of the Lost Kingdom 2
Wizards of the Lost Kingdom 1
At the Earth’s Core
The Land That Time Forgot
The Time Travellers
The Beast of Hollow Mountain
The Loves of Hercules
Reptilicus
The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t
Avalanche
Yongary
Cry Wilderness
Carnival Magic
Finally, there absolutely should be a Season 12. I’ve mentioned this previously, but I’d like to see them do the live action adaptation of The Guyver with Mark Hamill and Jimmie Walker in supporting roles. Plus it could cross promote with the Netflix Original Death Note movie in the category of manga/anime properties where the setting is transplanted from Japan to the States. The first Ator movie would also be a favorite. That way, they could play with my sister’s crippling fear of spiders the way Cave Dwellers played with my crippling fear of snakes. Perhaps they could also do Arena, which is sort of a science fiction version of Bloodsport.
Seeing the flak some of the guest stars are receiving, let me say that I thought most of them were just fine. The only true dud was Neil Patrick Harris. The fact that I think Dr. Horrible is terrible may be coloring my judgment, but probably not.
It’s Ardy.
Good: Avalanche, Hercules, Starcrash, Carnival Magic, Wizards 2, Reptilicus
‘Meh’ or worse: Cry Wilderness, Time Travelers, Wizards 1, Beast of Hollow Mountain
Movie selection: great
Host segments: all over the map
Celebrity cameos: weak
Riffing: ok, delivery needs a little work
Season 12: Hell yes!
Favorite has to go to Yongary. They found one goofy little kaiju movie, and boy did they run with it. CAPSULE!
Honorable mention to Reptilicus, as that gave them a really strong open to the new season and new crew.
Least favorite has to be the two Wizards of the Lost Kingdom films. Take your pick, I won’t mind. Those were episodes where the riffing was okay and all, but it wasn’t overcoming the truly cringe-worthy stories, settings, and performances up on screen for me. Pity shame, too, as one of them is where they got to my name in the Kickstarter thanks… :-)
As for a Season 12, I say yes (though without a Kickstarter, that might necessitate me finally getting a Netflix account…). I think they’ve really got something with the new crew, and with more cultivation and development, Season 12 would be awesome. Still a few rough edges (pretty well all of which have been mentioned, the bit about lull destruction with riffs too jam-packed at points being the biggest of my complaints), but all in all, Season 11 was great, Season 12 would be greater.
You just had to get a rip in on the Sci-fi era. I think I speak for many here when I say , you are a dull, pretentious bore.
Should there be a Season 12? Meh, not in my opinion.
Overall, Season 11 had some decent moments, but overall I didn’t like it.
The entire formula and structure of the original episodes was better. Why does Jonah have to reenact the opening every episode? Who’s idea was that? Also, the new host segments are mediocre.
There were a few fun and interesting movies, but overall I would’ve chosen different movies.
The Neil Patrick Harris cameo was AWFUL.
I wouldn’t jump for a Season 12, but I’d probably contribute if they needed it.
You literally find every excuse you can to set up a way to bash Mike. It’s almost surreal. People just skim your posts till they find the Mike slam and then say “ah, there it is”.If you lived anywhere in the Minnesota area I’d seriously consider somehow getting word to the Nelson family to get a restraining order slapped on your fat ass.
Oh, nobody does that, do they? ;)
Besides, I passed both halves of the SAT–Other people’s reading comprehension is not my problem.
How any MSTie could dislike Cry Wilderness, Carnival Magic or Avalanche is beyond me. To me, they are all clearly fantastic MST3K episodes.
I have to say, I’m a little surprised that so many people are complaining about Jonah having to reenact the intro every week. Technically, the only change here is that he gets sucked up through a tube at the end of each opening segment. I thought the idea was kind of funny, myself.
Best: I have to choose Starcrash, although it may have something to do with the fact I was already familiar with the movie.
Worst: The Wizard movies. Its been a long time since the guys have gotten hold of a film that was too much for them, but that happened here.
Season 12? Yes, please.
I still haven’t seen any of the new episodes, but my vote is YES for season 12. Even IF Season 11 was as bad as a few people think it was, there’s no reason to think they won’t improve.
Besides, IMHO any MST3K is better than none.
Good: Movie selection, most riffs.
Bad: Felicia Day’s mouth, Jonah the unshaven mindless drone, the Skeleton Band.
Season 12: No one cares, so I will have to say No, don’t bother.
No question, I think there should definitely be a season 12.
While 11 had plenty of problems, here’s hoping they learned from some of them, and 12 will be when the new series really takes off.
As for favorite episodes, Carnival Magic is the clear winner, though Avalanche and Time Travelers both came pretty close to classic MST3K episode status.
Worst… I hate to say that it’s hard to pick just one since so many of the episodes this season fell flat with sub-par riffing and non-funny host segments. Reptilicus, Cry Wilderness, and The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t all failed on the riffing front, but I suppose Cry Wilderness ends up at the bottom of the heap, for being an overwhelmingly awful movie that also had poor quality riffing and seemingly phoned in uninspired host segments. Even the return of Pearl, Brain Guy, and Bobo couldn’t save that one. Reptilicus may have actually had worse riffing, but at least it had the Monster song, and the host segments were (comparatively) better.
Sampo’s law is definitely true here. My favorite of the season is Cry Wilderness, and I loved Beast of Hollow Mountain. I still haven’t watched the last episode, so I can’t comment on it.
Every Country Has a Monster was such an outstanding song, and something that was so well written.
I would love to see the full movies riffed. I completely get that Joel is most likely thinking of TV syndication, but I’d love to have the full movies on Netflix.
I do miss the Hexfield and definitely the occasional pop ups of people who visit Deep 13 or the SOL, which we don’t quite get with the guest stars. It’s probably an actor scheduling thing, making it easier to film them separately, but I hope some can be on-set in s12.
I echo the riff pacing others have noted.
The interstitials with Patton have been insightful to know more about the series and to hear the really, really well done reworkings of MST3K: Original Recipe songs, but I hope they go back to rotating Spaghetti Ball brief clips. The interstitials definitely give the show a Svengoolie feel, but that’s actually the one thing about Svengoolie I’m not into, and it would give us a little more time with the movies.
I’m all for a Season 12, regardless. The movies Joel picked were great. They’ve generally been reasonably well produced and funded, which is always a positive, and I can’t wait to see the future.
Yes, we need Season 12 and beyond. MST3K should continue endlessly and rotate performers every 100 episodes.
Favorite of Season 11:
Currently a 3-way tie between Beast of Hollow Mountain, The Land That Time Forgot and Wizards of the Lost Kingdom II. I enjoy them each for different reasons; Beast and Time Forgot because they remind me of a snoozy Season 3 or 4 episode, and Wizards because it’s just hilarious. Runners up are Avalanche and Wizards 1, but I really enjoyed every episode of this season. Even the Christmas one had it’s moments, and for when I’m feeling particularly weird, there’s always Carnival Magic.
Yes, we need more, please. They’re just warming up.
But, of course, if Season 11 is not your cup of tea, perhaps this may suffice?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=id1UuLOcU7A I’m digging what I’ve seen so far.
Yes, and the regular commenters who said no were predictable. Only reason I got Netflix was to see the show and I have now canceled my account.
I’m glad season 11 was the opposite of S0 and S1. S0 was so horrible that the only way they got to comedy channel was they only show ed them a 12 minute ‘best bits’ promo and they were hurting for content. When they go so long between riffs that you forget someone is riffing that is bad.
Anyway,
Best: Avalanche and Wizards 2
Worst: Hercules and Carnival Magic: Probably not the fault of the jokes, as both movies are so depressing I can’t get with the comedy.
Seeing how Beast of Hollow Mountain is so unpopular, let me explain why I ranked it so high. Quite simply, I love weird westerns. Whether it’s aliens, prehistoric critters, supernatural tomfoolery, or the remnants of the civilization of Mu living in a cave system under Gene Autry’s ranch, I can’t get enough of them. Having said that, I can understand why this one didn’t go over well. It’s clearly a fairly conventional western with the dinosaur bit sloppily tacked on the end. Certainly it no Valley of the Gwangi. It’s not even Valley of the Dolls. It’s not even Guys and Dolls, etc., etc.
Lighten up a bit. I find his Mike bashing as tiresome as anyone else here. But it’s not like that’s all he offers. Just keep in mind it can always be worse. In fact, it has. Remember JediPeaceFrog? Now that was a poster who failed to have any redeeming traits.
I’ve already detailed why I’m not fond of Carnival Magic. My dislike of Cry Wilderness primarily has to do with how batch-whackable Paul is. Even Kenny of Gamera is tolerable and well-adjusted in comparison. As for Avalanche, Seventies disaster movies just leave me cold. It also had what I considered the only truly dud celebrity appearance.
I would love to have another season! Overall, for me, the positive aspects of this iteration far outweighed the negative, especially the riffing, which typically had me frequently laughing out loud.
The best and the worst? That’s like asking me who my favorite electric guitar player of all time is, or what pop song is the most annoying of all time. I have no clear best of the best for S11. I really liked Cry Wilderness, Avalanche, Starcrash and The Land That Time Forgot. Episodes that were not so great for me were The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t and The Loves of Hercules. Carnival Magic has it’s own special place: I liked the riffing, but it’s a movie that is just so weird and creepy, like Manos, Eegah, Giant Spider Invasion, or Red Zone Cuba; just, ugh!
So, assuming there will be another season, what movies do you all think would be good choices for riffing? Off the top of my head, Three-Headed Shark Attack, Zoombies, Empire of the Ants, Frogs…
Season 11 was vintage MST3K. It was a worthy variation on a beloved theme. As with Seasons 1-10, you have to rewatch each episode several times before you can get a true appreciation of it. I watched every Season 11 ep twice, and each was funnier the second time around.
BEST: literally every movie was MST3K-worthy; they all feel like classic MST3K, and I’ll probably return to each from time to time. My favorites were the two Doug McClure films, and Yongery. Reptilicus was fun, too. Hollow Mountain was so WTF that I actually enjoyed that one a lot. Generally, I like the cast a lot, too. Jonah is great. “Every Country Has a Monster” was an instant classic. The thing about MST3K is that you have to re-watch every episode in order to catch all that is going on: it is hard to judge after only one viewing. The fact that each episode was funnier the second time through is enough for me to consider Season 11 a rousing success.
WORST: as I’ve mentioned before, though, some of these films were 1,000 times worse than even the worst of Seasons 1-10. Carnival Magic, The Christmas . . . , and Star Crash are literally the worst movies I have ever watched all the way through; Wizards 1 & 2 and Cry Wilderness are close to making that list, too. The riffing is generally funny and I laugh, but through gritted teeth. Still, I will gladly re-watch these episodes along with all the others. Yes, riffing is too fast at times, and, yes, it is still too hard to tell who’s talking. Host segments involving Kinga and Max were ‘way too static: give them more to do, different sets, more chemistry in the relationship, etc. It’s a waste of Patton’s and Felicia’s talents to have them just stand there, side-by-side, talking at the camera. Almost every time they were given more to do, the fun energy on screen just increased exponentially. (The dino restaurant business in Time Forgot, for instance.) The wedding plot was irritating, far, far more irritating than any of the story arcs in the SciFi seasons. (I actually really like most of those.) Except for Mark Hamill, who seemed to be having the time of his life, the guest stars added nothing and just ground what pace they had going to a halt. That being said, there are host segments in Seasons 1-10 I will skip with extreme prejudice: Crow’s Celebrity Match Game, Mike as Carol Channing, “Love American Style”, any of Joel’s more fey pop-culture bore-fests. So, I think scattershot might just come with the territory . . .
COMMENTS: giving Gypsy a real female woman’s voice was a great idea, as was making her more mobile and descending from the ceiling; loved giving her two riffs a movie, too. Servo’s greater mobility was off-putting at first, but I got used to it. I actually liked the randomness of making Jonah reenact the opening every episode! Love the giant tube sucking him off the set and depositing him in his space ship. Love Joel as Ardy and his other cameos, and “Movie in the hole” has joined “We got movie sign!” as a favorite catch phrase. Liked the running gag of Jonah trying to add new robots to the cast and Crow and Servo destroying them. The upscale production values are interesting, but the SOL bridge is too sterile; bring back the hexfield! Except for “Country/Monster”, none of the songs is up to the standards of the classic show. Don’t know about the skeleton crew–not bad, but wouldn’t be sorry to have them dropped.
Yes, yes, for God’s sake yes: give us Season 12, with some of the kinks ironed out! And let us remember that Season 1 is universally regarded as inferior to Seasons 2-10: a show should never be judged by it’s first season alone!
Hither Season Twelve? Sure, go ahead. Things did improve over the course of this season and hopefully they’d be on more solid ground next time.
Best: Avalanche, Yongary, Carnival Magic.
Worst: The Loves of Hercules, both WOTLK.
And am I the only one who found Starcrash a chore to get through? Caroline Munro’s space bikini and Christopher Plummer struggling to maintain his dignity were the only things that made it watchable at all for me…
I agree with you on many of your criticisms. Yes, it would be nice if they did the opening theme clean with no additional elements, and I did not understand why it was necessary to repeat the actions from the beginning. That, and the bubbly special effects were addressed — these were flaws in the “Kingachrome” process — but it shouldn’t have been necessary at all. MST always did do a good job of mocking its own, shall we say, inadequacies. But at least the producers were smart to avoid trying to “fix” them with CGI.
And, yes, Servo flying always seemed to be a case of, hey, we can do this now, so why don’t we? Crow’s new long legs did allow him to take more of a part in the on-screen action (Crow’s “elevator talk” in Starcrash got a chuckle from me). But in the end, all I could think of was, dang, the puppets in the theater must weigh a lot less than they did originally!
Special guests: Okay, I’m on the fence here. On the whole, most worked, but for the most part, it was a case of, let’s pay off our celebrity fans and friends who stepped in when we needed them. The appearances weren’t particularly arbitrary, and it didn’t especially look like a payback moment. Yes, the visitors were clearly filmed when they were available on a black screen and had little real connection with the regulars (at least Neil Patrick Harris was on set, but I never understood his appeal as an actor), but, I had no problem with them for the most part.
I did think that, particularly, Jerry Seinfeld and Mark Hamill looked like they were reading from a script in an empty room: neither one really interacted with the cast very well, but if you liked them, their appearances were fun. But it reminded me more like Alexi Sayle hijacking an episode of The Young Ones for his own shtick, stopping the show cold, then the episode having to get back on track. How’s THAT for an obscure reference!
And I actually had no problem with Jonah’s passivity in the theater. Joel really didn’t play off the “hey these guys are holding me against my will” a lot, certainly not to the degree Mike did later. If there is a Season 12, they should address that (especially with the idea that the Mads effectively killed Jonah in the last episode).
Which brings up a big problem: the continuing plot. At first, the idea that Kinga and Max were stealing ideas from previous experiments was a good one (until Jonah finally recognized what was happening), but as the “wedding” got into high gear, it started to get annoying. Going for a ratings boost is fine, but when the network you are airing on doesn’t get a rat’s fig about ratings, it served no purpose, especially with no chemistry being allowed to develop between Kinga and Jonah, except in the sense of “I control you, do what I say!” that always permeated the series.
Then, the biggest criticism of the new series: the riffing itself. I think it was mentioned a couple of times in the forums that the riffing was recorded when the stars were available and dubbed in after filming. That, and the fact that the movies are still being cut to fit the two-hour time slot, created a real disconnect between the riffers and the setup. It only emphasizes MST’s main issue that the stories are written by committee, and when the stars do a block of recordings all at once, it’s more obvious than ever. The riffs don’t match the body language, and the riffers don’t interact with themselves.
And this resulted in the fast riffing that many posters have already complained about. Essentially, the riffs are finetuned, worked out, rehearsed, then recorded when the riffers were available. But there is no sense of “hey, this is a romp, let’s have fun with it.” Sure, CT was also written by committee, but at least it was a committee of the performers themselves (the new MST isn’t), and, with the live shows, they could go off the cuff depending on the reactions of the audience. In Season 11, there is no sense of going off, no adlibbing — or, perhaps I should say, apparent adlibbing — and, the most criminal of all, no real interaction between the riffers. They do their jokes, but rarely do the riffers play on the others, as they did in the original series. This is especially jarring with Gypsy: she comes into the theater twice, does a quick riff, and quickly departs. Very rarely do the guys take any notice of this, no compliment or recognition of Gypsy’s line, nothing. In the end, it’s as if the cast clocked in, walked into the theater with their script, and started reciting lines.
As has been said before, what always made the show work was to take a script written by committee, and avoid showing on screen that it is a script written by committee. It should sound as if the riffers are coming up with the joke for the first time when something happens on screen. Joel and the Bots did this very well; Mike and the Bots did NOT. And Jonah and the Bots aren’t even trying. If the vocal recordings are done separately, as I understand they were, that’s not surprising — but it is disappointing.
Now, don’t get me wrong. The show is still fantastic; once set, the frame works fine; and the riffs are funny for the most part. And if the series became simply joke-joke-joke, moving away from Joel’s assertion that “the right people will get it,” the jokes were funny. I’m not getting into a Joel vs. Mike vs. Jonah situation here, but if there is going to be a Season 12, I think Joel and his people should take another look at the Joel-era episodes and remember why the original show worked as well as it did. Don’t go for the joke-joke-joke, try to slip in a few really obscure gags into the rhythm, and make the viewers think about the riff long after the experiment ends. (A joke about Hildegarde von Bingen Unplugged will go over most people’s heads, but at least it got fans wondering what the heck THAT was about, and this is the Age of Wikipedia, after all.) Pop culture riffs are fine as far as they go, but add something unique and non-obvious as well. Put in a few more “I thought YOU were Dale!” type-gags. Make the show work for its laughs. Build up the interaction between the cast members.
And bring Frank Conniff back as a regular writer. If it was weird and obscure during the Joel era, I always assumed that was at Frank’s hand, and the absence of the weird and obscure in the Mike and Jonah eras might be testament to that.
And I didn’t see MY name in the credits, even though I was sure I contributed above that threshold. Sigh….