My inclusion is “Kitten With a Whip.”
I’m sure I’ve personally mentioned it a few times over the years but my reason for not being able to sit through it is the utter stupidity of Forsythe’s character is just painful and as it is the lynchpin of the movie, makes it unwatchable. And by that I mean the fact that the moment he saw Jody on TV he should have been running to the cops. He did absolutely nothing wrong other than getting conned and had absolutely no reason to become panicked and keep the story to himself. I try to watch it every so often but always lose it when I get to the point where he goes back to his house to find Jody there and even as it becomes clear that she’s a complete bag of crazy, he still refuses to call the cops.
So, Luke has a problem with an infuriating plot. But that’s just be one reason you might not be able to sit through an episode. Me, I’m going to go with 209- THE HELLCATS. Bad visuals, bad audio and the story meanders around and ends up nowhere, and the segments are retreads. About 20 minutes in I’m lookin’ at my watch and wandering if the dishes need washing.
What’s your pick? (Oh, and I’m sure that Sampo’s Theorem will be on full display here.)
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Squirm ( I have invertebrate issues ).
Luke speaks for many of us on KWAW.
THE GIRL IN LOVER’S LANE, “Big Stoopid”, has a like effect on me. Specifically, BS and Danny decide to break a C Note in a seedy pool hall filled with thugs. He’s not even discreet and makes a big deal how he wants his change. Do they leave, NOOOOOO, they play a nickel game of pin ball!? I thought BS was suppose to be showing Danny how to stay out of trouble?
There are quite a few early episodes and even some late-era Mike eps that are impenetrable for me. I suppose I’ll just say Hamlet because at that late in the show’s history I can’t blame the polish of the program for why I can’t sit through it. After ten years and several great episodes the Brains hit a brick wall with Hamlet and they can’t save it.
There is only one- The Castle of Fu Manchu.
With me it’s “I ACCUSE MT PARENTS.” I can sit through Manos or Monster-a-go-go without missing a beat, but this movie seems to actively kill brain cells every time I watch it. I find it hard to stay interested in it or more than 10 minutes at a time, even with the running commentary. Oh well, you can’t win them all…
Sidehackers, because of the rape scene.
It’s an eternal tie between “Devil Doll” and “The Girl in Lover’s Lane”. One is too damn creepy for me (even if it does pick up near the end), the other is depressing in the extreme. No amount of riffing, even one I quote regularly*, can keep these from triggering the “Turn it off – NOW” response in my brain.
*”I wonder how many hours rotary phones have added to movies over the years.”
trickymutha took the words out of my mouth.
I realized the other night that I have never made it through “Secret Agent Super Dragon,” so I decided to watch. Fifteen minutes into the episode and I was already distracting myself with my phone. I remember some Holland jokes but that’s about it. This was probably the fourth time I tried watching the episode since Rhino released the set.
As always, there’s no consensus about MST eps. I Accuse My Parents is one of my all-time favorites, and I really enjoy Secret Agent Super Dragon; ditto Hamlet. But I do agree with the choice of Castle of Fu Manchu; I have no idea what it was about, no matter how many times I try to watch it.
Stranded in Space is my pick: a snore-fest, totally forgettable. Oh, and The Indestructible Man is pretty hard for me to get through.
Two Words: Coleman Francis. Sky Divers and Red Zone Cuba were a trial to go through, even with the quality riffing. I’m not sure I want to try making it through Beast of Yucca Flats.
Sidehackers, Hellcats, Wild Rebels (I just don’t like biker movies), Squirm, King Dinosaur, Moon Zero 2(that theme song is like fingernails on the chalkboard to me), Devil Fish(Hated it completely),Gamera vs. Barugon was depressing and the villian was a really annoying jack-ass, Stranded in Space was pretty boring, Teenage caveman was pretty bad, The Beatnicks I’m half and half on, Painted Hills…meh, Last of the Wild Horses EXCELLENT host segments but a forgettable movie. Did anybody else hate Escape 2000 except for me? AND FINALLY……Girl in the Gold Boots, bleh.
I am going with #409 Indestructible Man. I’m not sure why, but eveytime I try to watch this one I just pass out cold. Of course maybe I’m not being fair to the episode. I can’t judge whether it’s unwatchable if I keep falling asleep.
Trickymutha nailed my number one, too.
There have been a few it took me repeated watchings to get through – just for the dreariness of the film.
Tormented
The afore-mentioned Stranded in Space
The afore-mentioned Sidehackers
Attack of the (the) Eye Creatures
Starfighters
even (gasp,) Manos.
There are some episodes in which the movie is so bad and dreary, the riffing can’t save it. In these I would include The Crawling Hand, Manos: the Hands of Fate, and Boggy Creek II: The Legend Continues.
There are others which are pretty good, but really drag in spots (again, because of the awful dreariness of the movie). In this category I would include First Spaceship on Venus, Manhunt in Space, Crash of Moons and Invasion of the Neptune Men.
Looks like we’re heading for a consensus on Castle of Fu Manchu. I’m not sure what’s so repellent about that movie… because I’ve never made it past the opening scene!
I can’t stand the biker films. Also, I never get more than 15 minutes into Mighty Jack.
I notice several of my all time faves are making others lists. Oh well, I am sure Mighty Jack is someone’s all time favorite episode.
@11: The Beast of Yucca Flats is truly a beast. If you didn’t like the other two Coleman Francis movies, you probably shouldn’t bother with the third. It’s the worst of the bunch. Again, the riffing struggles to make it watchable…
Aw shucks, Kitten with a Whip is my fave Mike episode. :/
Ah well. I remember I couldn’t really watch Bloodlust that much at first, but then I gave it another chance. I’m not too much a big fan of Castle of Fu Manchu (mainly just cause of the host segments; I could give the riffing another shot though). Robot Vs the Aztec Mummy is also kinda lame, for my opinion.
But the one episode I CANNOT sit through the most (and it will remain this way)…..
K05 – Gamera. With only Joel sitting in the theater, no effect on the black and white so it almost looks like you’re watching the film on its own, and most of the host segments practically being voice messages, it’s not really much of a fun episode.
That’s my opinion.
Sidehackers gets yet another vote. It just made me so uncomfortable.
Overdrawn from the Memory Bank – I hate the video quality of the film
Colossus & the Headhunters because I wasnt into the segments
Angels Revenge
Parts the Clonus Horror
Moon Zero Two
Nightmare set for me for sure
I’ll have to say “Tormented”. It’s funny, but just really drags in my opinion, and I usually move on to something else. I also have a lot of trouble with the KTMA episodes as I think Josh is a funny guy, but something about his Servo just doesn’t mesh with me.
Gunslinger and Last of the Wild Horses. I just don’t like Westerns.
Hobgoblins. It’s just stupid, plus any time Misties get together everyone wants to watch it, so I’ve seen it way too many times.
I too, loved The Sidehackers and in honor of it, bought a Tee shirt last Thanksgiving at a bar called “Sidehack” in Sturgis, S.D. They give away free Thanksgiving dinner every year to anyone who wants to come. We just happened to be out there at that time.
And I really like MST3K’s riffing of Hamlet. Like, like, like.
Add another vote to the “biker films” pile – Sidehackers, Wild Rebels, and especially Hellcats just make my skin crawl. Sidehackers at least features the novelty of sidehacking – never portrayed on screen before or after I imagine – and Ross Hagen is a decent poor-man’s Steve McQueen. And there are some golden riffs in Wild Rebels that stand out in my mind, despite watching it very infrequently (Operation Weasel Snitch, the Turd Museum), but Hellcats drags in every way for me
First it’s just so icky and filthy and grimy and sticky and yuck. Eloquent, ain’t I? The protagonists are bland, bordering on unlikable. Ross Hagen’s hat, and the things that must be living in it. *shudder* Then there’s the lackluster riffing, due to a writers shortage, I believe, and the host segments that basically amount to a clip show of not particularly memorable clips. And in the second season, no less. But I will give it to the Brains – the “Joel and the Bots all have bad colds” intro does make the weak episode feel almost natural.
Dishonorable mentions: The first 20 minutes or so of Manos. I’ll admit that endless driving footage set to light jazz is very difficult to riff, but just saying “Manos! The Hands of Fate” over and over… Really? I also don’t get much out of the Beatniks, but I can’t really say why. Just dullsville I guess, Daddy-o.
One last thing. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I love the Hamlet episode. I find it very well riffed, especially given the material to work with. It’s one of my very favorite experiments. Once again Sampo’s Theorem applies.
First Spaceship on Venus and Monster A-Go-Go. The first is just not that great and the second the riffing doesn’t over take the boring badness of the movie like Manos does. I can watch both eps the entire way thru, but the brain will shut down and I have to fight to stay awake.
Put me down for “Monster A-Go-Go” and “Red Zone Cuba”. Somehow I can always think of something I’d rather be doing, like re-grouting, the dishes, the litter box…..
I simply cannot sit through Hamlet. I really dislike the excessively flowery language found in
Shakespeare’s work, and the incomprehensible speeches take the sting out of the riffs. Give me
Coleman Francis any day!
– Final Sacrifice is a tough one for me. Even though I have the nice Shout! Factory DVD of it, I’ve never made it all the way through that DVD without falling asleep. Dull movie, not the best writing on the show, just not that appealing.
– Hobgoblins. I don’t go to my DVD of that one too often either. Dreadful movie with some of the worst attempts at humor in a movie ever. It’s painful to watch.
– I’ll agree with the Kitten With A Whip suggestion in the original topic above. Aggravating movie. So are some of the other similar films like Teenage Crimewave. Not much fun, frustrating stories, not great comedy fodder or the badness of the film overpowers the comedy from MST3K.
– Girl In Lovers Lane. Great comedy from MST3K, but the movie is just good enough to make that ending a massive downer. Not really a good comedy pick-me-up, is it? I’m still not sure how BBI decided to use that film for the show. Even the last host segment acknowledges the problem and it’s a big one.
– Sidehackers. The film is just so bad, violent and horrible. The jokes are great during the film, but you have to make an effort to avoid paying too much attention to the film to enjoy them. I only watch this one very infrequently.
I’ll have to totally disagree with the inclusion of some of the other “biker films” on the lists of others above. Wild Rebels and Hellcats are just so dumb I find myself really enjoying the plentiful jokes during those films and the ridiculous situations in the movies. With no emotional involvement int he films at all they are light viewing and the comedy from MST3K really shines through. Wild Rebels was the first MST3K we ever saw and we still really enjoy it. I also watch Hellcats quite a bit because the party scene in the shack, the “drag” challenge, bad acting and other idiocy really make that one fun.
I can’t sit through Devil Doll (evil doll movies creep me out too much), Manos (molestation movies creep me out too), The Girl in Lovers Lane (just WAY too depressing), the biker movies (boring), and Tormented (actually a lot of fun until the scene where he might kill the little girl). (I guess Tormented isn’t too horrible of a movie, in that I care about the little girl.) I’ve never seen Castle of Fu Manchu or KWaW, so I can’t pass judgment on them.
Regarding other comments above, I love Hamlet; it’s not their best episode, but I think they made a good effort and it’s a fun change of pace. I also really enjoy Beast of Yucca Flats – the bizarre narration, incompetent movie making, and the fact that I’ve actually been through Yucca Flats a few dozen times make it a lot of fun for me. Bizarre, incompetent, non-creepy, with pseudo sci-fi elements – that’s a good combination for me any day!
Mad Monster – I had really just discovered MST, this was about the 20th episode I’d watched, and to my chagrin, I made the sad discovery that some episodes just weren’t going to be funny to me. I
watched about half and realized that I hated the movie, and wasn’t even smiling at the riffs. I never finished it.
Also on a side note, ones like Manos I enjoyed once, but really don’t have any desire to watch again. Part of what keeps me going in episodes like these is the facsination of how much weirder is this going to get? Once I watched it and know, I really don’t feel like plodding through it again.
P.S. I’ve never seen any of the biker ones, are they really not recommended?
>11
Of the three Coleman Francis movies, I think you could stomach Beast of Yucca flats the most. Why? Its short. There are two good shorts before it and the movie itself takes up only an hour of the show. It also has very little dialogue so Mike and the ‘bots get to riff a fair amount more than usual. To me its the Manos of the Coleman Francis films. Sure its bad, but the riffing (and the brevity of it) makes it a breeze to sit through.
Skydivers was Coleman’s worst. Now that one is tough for me to sit through.
Ooh, love this topic.
I’m right there on Hamlet (I think I’ve made it all the way once). Kitten With a Whip is one annoyingly stupid movie and the riffing is lackluster.
But the one episode that puts me to sleep like Benadryl every time is Human Duplicators. I have no idea why — Richard Kiel’s drone of a voice? The glacial pace? I dunno but I’m not sure I’ve ever seen the end of this one.
But scarily, a lot of the eps mentioned by others are some of my favorites. Not only do I love the Coleman Francis episodes, I even watch his movies unMST’d (though I still need to get a ‘pristine’ copy of Red Zone Cuba). And my wife has a ‘thing’ for Manos — she’s as likely to pull out the original film as the MST episode.
Yeah, we’re weird that way — good thing we found each other, huh?
Castle of Fu Manchu has become, not a favorite exactly, but an episode I don’t mind watching now and again. The movie is just as dreary and nonsensical as anything ever featured on the show but I honestly like the riffing and the host segments, particularly Crow’s teary essay on the “Miss Saigon Syndrome” and Joel’s “We’re Robinsons, roughly,” little speech at the end.
I think, to be unwatchable, an MST3K episode has to feature a movie that isn’t just dreary or boring but actively vile. There has to be nobody in the movie to side with even a little, neither hero nor villain. Sidehackers hardly needs explanation. The Leech Woman is up (or rather down) there with it. Devil Doll is pretty bad as well, particularly because its villain is so monochromatic–would it have killed Bryant Haliday to change the tone or cadence of his voice from time to time? Even Fu Manchu exhibits more energy. The Coleman Francis movies are almost that bad but there’s something that saves these episodes from being unbearable. Maybe it’s because you really do get the sense that Francis had a vision or passion (albeit a “dark, muddy” one.)
ETA: Add Devil Doll to the list. Ugh.
For newcomers, Sampo’s Theorem states: “For every MSTie who believes that a given episode is the worst thing they’ve ever done, there is another who considers it their finest hour.”
I meant to mention it in the post…
Also, keep those discussion ideas coming to msampo at a-o-l dot com!
>31
>P.S. I’ve never seen any of the biker ones, are they really not recommended?
I liked all three season two biker movies. They’re a breath of fresh air from the dreariness of the much of the first season. Sure the content of Sidehackers may be a little dark for an episode of MST3K, but Manos was just as dark if not darker. A little girl was forced to become the wife of some strange cult leader in Manos. That may take the cake for how dark a movie gets in MST3K.
I would go have to go with The Wild World of Batwoman. I just can’t sit through more then 30 minutes of this movie. It’s so boring and my mind starts to wander very quickly.
Honorable mention would have to be The Castle of Fu Manchu. I pretty much despise Jess Franco because if anyone is a hack director it’s him, and this movie shows his full abilities at “directing”.
Anything in black n white
Devil Doll keeps popping up but it’s one of my faves! “Ham, I want some ham!” Kitten With A Whip wins as most annoying.
Anything from the first season, especially Robot Monster.
There are several:
1) The Starfighters. WHEN WILL SOMETHING HAPPEN!
2) Squirm- the worms are just icky (of course, so is much of the acting).
3) Their last movie- Diabalik (Not just amoral, but an immoral “hero” makes
this (as a movie-not the host segments) ickier then Squirm.
Noting Hamlet cited above. The first time it was almost unwatchable, but
repeat viewings are better then movies like The Starfigghters and Diabolik.
Sidehackers.
I just can’t do it.
On a personal note: I’m fascinated by the ones mentioned… Some of them are my favorites. But I like westerns AND Coleman Francis…
I’ve never gotten through Hamlet. It’s just no fun, and MST3K is supposed to be fun. I don’t even play this movie anymore.
Also, Gorgo. The actor’s accents are so strong, I can’t understand what they are saying. Then again, I AM from Georgia.
Films that make my brain hurt:
Castle of Fu Manchu, an utter mess.
Slime people, what a drearily filmed turd – did they goop vasiline on the lens?
Kitten with a whip, horrible script, stupid premise.
I absolutely love ‘Devil Doll’. I can watch it 3 times in one night and every night.
I watch ‘Kitten with a Whip’ frequently and enjoy it, and ‘Wild Rebels’ has for many years been one of my top 5 all-time joel episodes.
The Coleman Francis trilogy is awesome and I can watch any of them over and over. Same goes for ‘Manos’, and I especially love the first 20 minutes.
Others mentioned such as – Squirm, Girl In Gold Boots, Angels’ Revenge, Boggy Creek 2, I Accuse My Parents, and Last of the Wild Horses are all some of my super all-time favorites. I can watch them daily, no problem, still laughing like the first time I saw them.
I also enjoy ‘Castle of Fu Manchu’. I even like ‘Mighty Jack’.
But, I will agree that ‘Hellcats’ is just a rotten snorefest, with poor riffing to boot.
I also have trouble with ‘Colossus & the Headhunters’ (lousy host segments don’t help, and the movie is boring and the riffing is sub-par).
I hate all the ‘Hercules’ episodes. I just am bored to misery by that genre.
Season 1 episodes are not good enough for me. I can make it through maybe 4 or 5 of them at best.
Another I can’t deal with is ‘City Limits’- Dark, boring and a genre that I hate…I also can’t get through ‘Daddy-O’.
And I still can’t get through ‘The Indestructible Man’ either (Too many recycled riffs, just nothing new here).
And while I like the riffing in Hamlet, it is just so dark and lifeless that I prefer to just listen to it from another room while I do other things. They could have done that one on the radio and it would have made no difference.
I for some reason have trouble with ‘It Lives by Night’ too. Otherwise, I have come to find season 10 to be loaded with many of my all-time favorites.
HAMLET. That Shakespeare guy sucks.
Wild World of Batwoman is like chewing gum with the tinfoil left on.
screaming skull and hamlet. hamlet just because of the pace. screaming skull because the movie is so dry and irritating, it actually turned me away from the show for a short time thinking the charm had worn off :(
“Hamlet”. That episode just bores me into a coma. Ditto for “The Atomic Brain”.