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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I love this thread, because it points out what is so great about MST3K. I cannot stand “Hamlet”, and “Devil Doll”. But I love “Indestructible Man”, and “City Limits”. I’s great to agree to disagree, especially in this day and age.
kitten with a whip is a drag of a story,so is ring of terror,the starfighters,&the unearthly. but i sit through them once in a while.i allways some funny bit i missed.
This thread leaves me a little bit…well…almost all the beefs here are with the movie itself (I guess that’s how the topic was stated). I love all the movies MST did. Probably the only one that really hits me where it counts is Overdrawn at the Memory Bank which I’m surprised has been mentioned so little. Ah, that awful video and that PBS I have to watch this for school feeling! But redeemed as all movies are by the riffing.
Which brings me to: the riffing. Eps with not so great riffing are hardest for me to get through. That would include most of Season 1 and a few later eps like Being from Another Planet, the Unearthly, and Quest of the Delta Knights. So LMD’s theorem is for some people the riffing overcomes the movie and for some people no amount of riffing can overcome the movie. I guess…
P.S. Kitten with a Whip is awesome. I’m guessing those that don’t “get it” also don’t dig Russ Meyer movies. Or Carnal Knowledge for that matter.
I didn’t know what to make of The Unearthly when I first saw it, aside from the great shorts that preceded it. The turning point was when I caught the scene where Carradine’s evil scientist and his girlfriend strap on the “Them” goggles and start counting down for whatever reason and J+tbots start interjecting in Carradines voice “Seven!” “1.8” “A Bajillion” “Booga Booga!” as if trying to screw up the count. Then I began noticing some of the more clever riffs and then what was so peculiar about the movie. I mean what a grim ending! “Let’s just forget what we saw down here. Think of the paperwork!” “Aqualung!” They have a lot of fun with Carradine and Tor and the movie itself is too short to wear out it’s welcome, at least to me. I like the Mousetrap host segment, it reminded me of playing board games as a kid when you didn’t want to sweat all the rules you just wanted to play.
I’ll add to the biker-films pile, and include Daddy-O and Girls Town. Something about the whole biker/hot rod 60s kitsch always rubbed me the wrong way. However, I gravitate toward these on rainy/snow days, so who knows?
I’ll differ with several of the other posters and claim Fu Manchu as a personal fave. It took years to warm up to Robot Holocaust, but the bizarreness of the movie itself mixed with some of the best season 1 riffing have won it over for me.
What’s so interesting about these threads is there is never a consensus. A lot of people love the Gamera episodes (isn’t there a whole set of them coming out?) but man, I just couldn’t get into them.
But, because I happily watch B through Z grade movies, I adore “Kitten With a Whip” and “Teenage Crime Wave”. What one person loves, another hates.
My husband and I fight over “Mitchell.” He hated it. HATED. IT. It’s one of my favorite episodes, and he will watch a few minutes of it with me but then quietly mosey out of the room and go do something else. I think he was upset that the dune buggy bit was cut out; we saw it on TNT or TBS back in the early 1990s and he always said that was the only good part of the film.
Also, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to sit through “The Castle of Fu Manchu” again. Absolutely unbearable to me.
Hamlet. Shakespeare. Dubbed. Better than NyQuil.
Lost Continent. Two words. Rock Climbing.
It took me four attempts to finally watch Final Sacrifice all the way through without falling asleep.
Track of the Moon Beast. Hearing Johnny Longbow go on and on about what’s in the stew set the pace.
Hamlet is nearly as exciting as watching clothes spin in a dryer… when all you’ve worn for the last week is grey sweat pants.
The intro is brilliant, and the ghost of Hamlet’s father is so bizarrely dressed, you begin to believe that they might actually pull this one off… but then at some point following the first host segment I always end up dropping off and waking up just in time for the final duel sequence.
The only one I started but never finished was Million Eyes of Su-Muru, because of the poor video quality (an old vhs tape copy digitized and put on youtube). Hamlet I can get through but it takes some serious effort; the dreary, hissy audio just puts me to sleep. Many of the first season episodes are a challenge but I do get through them.
#144, #146
Don’t forget Sparky the dog in Teenagers From Outer Space. Maybe he joined Derek in
a dog heaven in the sky.
Hamlet and squirm and the japanese monster movies are not my favorites, but for #1 unwatchable, for me its “overdrawn at the memory bank”, man I hate that movie.
Fu Man Chu and Hamlet are unbearable. I can enjoy just about any other episode. Except Gorgo. Only the british could make a boring Kaiji movie.
@161- what about the dog (and cat) in Merlin? Somebody call PETA? Rock and roll Martian indeed. (not to mention the poor dead beached whale in Borgnine’s chest. Marty- what happened?
Mmm, there’s a bunch of these I’d love to hate that are spoiled by imdb. Squirm–I fell desperately in love with Pat Pearcy in Goodbye Girl, then was amazed to see her show up in Squirm, then saw the un-MSTed version and discovered that she actually, uh, well… And then you find out that Don Scardino went on to have a career (actually had been in the bidness for 12 years when he did Squirm), and that Jean Sullivan and Peter McLean were playas.
Then there’s the back story on the production of things like Phase IV and Humanoid Woman. Whoa. Like, for a long time MST was the only place you could SEE Phase IV.
And you can never look at Devil Doll quite the same if you’ve seen the version that went to the European market.
So watching some of these is like riffling through an old high school yearbook.
“Unwatchable” is something special, like Merlin’s Shop of Mystical Wonders. Normally I’d be mildly interested in how a guy with no obvious credits (one Kenneth J. Berton) could get backing for a professionally cast, produced, lit, shot, and edited –in color!–with a crappy, nasty, totally mean-spirited movie with The Script From Freezing Hell, but I just don’t want to know. I just want to believe that everyone involved in getting this terd bought is now working second shift at an In-N-Out Burger.
I’ve never found a movie un-watchable as long as Joel/Mike and the bots were riffing on it. However, I’ve never made it through a Commando Cody short.
#165 – what is in the European version of Devil Doll? I just watched that and now I need to know!
I assume that the European version of Devil Doll has boobs?
I’ve always had a tough time getting through Pumaman, It Lives By Night, and Track of the Moonbeast. They all feel like the same movie to me.
#162
Sampo strikes again!
That’s one of my favorite mst3000 movie. I found the effort to incorporate
Casablanca interesting, and it did show creativity in concept of doppling
et. al. Btw, no anteaters were harmed in making OatMB, no matter how stupid or
repulsive they were.
I can’t sit through the Bela Lugosi movies, I just find them dull and the picture quality awful.
Others-
~Overdrawn at the Memory Bank
~Quest for the Delta Knights
~Horror of Spider Island
~Alien from L.A. (hated Kathey Ireland’s voice)
~many of the cheesy sci-fi/space films like first spaceship to venus-they should be perfect for riffing but their just dull.
It seems like this thread is about the movies themselves. To me, I have to take the episode as a whole thing. I hate The Beast of Yucca Flats, but the riffing and host segments are good. It’s why my only choices are in this discussion are episodes from season 1.
I actually watched “Delta Knights” unriffed from start to finish at least once. It was my brother’s favorite movie when he was around 10. It’s clearly not a *good* movie, but I wouldn’t say it’s exactly painful.
I’m with #23 on this one. I not a big fan of westerns so I wasn’t too happy with “Gunslinger” & “Last of the Wild Horses”. “Skydivers” & “Red Zone Cuba” (not westerns BTW) come to mind as well.
Funny you should mention Gunslinger because that episode is an oxymoron for me. It definitely fell into the “hated” category for me for a long time. I tried watching it about four times and always thought that the best moment was Servo bilocating in the host segment. Then one day I decided to give it another chance and found it completely hysterical all the way through. I don’t know what the difference was.
I have a hard time getting through most of the Japanese films. Out of all the ones they did I only like: Prince of Space, Time of the Apes, Godzilla vs Sea Monster, and the Godzilla one with Jet Jaguar.
I am one of those OCD freaks who likes to watch the show in order, so I always finish an episode, even if it takes a few sessions. Following along with the weekly Episode Guides over the past years has forced me to re-watch ones I didn’t particularly enjoy (or even finish) the first time (I’m looking at you KTMA Gamera‘s).
Taking notes and looking up references helps to stay me involved in what may be a boring movie. Plus, the first time through, I was trying to follow the story more than catch all the riffing. So I no longer trust the instinct that says “That’s a bad episode,” just because the movie was dull. And guess what, there’s usually stuff that I find to enjoy after a few viewings.
For instance, I was not looking forward to re-visiting the creaky B&W movies that open Season One, but surprise, they turned out to not be so painful this go around.
There are some others I don’t like very much, but that’s not really the question here. I really hate MST3K: The Movie for reasons already mentioned earlier, so I rarely watch it. Wild World of Batwoman still baffles me. Rocket Attack USA is dreadful, but I bet the next time I watch it, I’ll find some funny in it.
Until I got the complete series via DAP, my only source for MST was the Rhino box sets. But there were episodes from those volumes that got little play in my house, and would often get ejected from my DVD player after 15 minutes or so: Ring of Terror, Unearthly, Atomic Brain, Monster A-Go-Go. But now, the novelty of having all the shows allows me to enjoy them, especially when seen in context of the seasons in which they first appeared.
I’d probably have to pick the movie segments of Last of the Wild Horses. The entire thing feels to me like I’m watching and listening to the movie through a frosted glass door. I still don’t know what that movie’s about–horses? And of course, what little I can retain about the movie is shoved aside by the epic win that is the mirror-universe plot. Any time that the movie is really difficult to see and hear, though–that’s a serious obstacle to enjoyment for me.
I also need to give honorable mention to Fire Maidens from Outer Space, which again has awesome host segments and a one-note movie (pretty much just a ladder and some dancing scenes for 80 minutes.) That one’s probably the closest I’ve come to actually falling asleep in the middle of an episode.
Oh, Harriet, will I second “Kitten With a Whip”?–
Admit it, first time you heard the title, you thought it was going to be some Russ Meyer-ish Viva Las Vegas musical with Ann-Margrock, and not “Establishment deliquent-fear meets Fatal Attraction”, didn’t you?….Well, now we know.
And I’m not going to re-open old fan wounds, but the riffing on “Mitchell” was a war crime.
I have no more love for Joe Don Baker than the next man, but that was a Mike episode in Joel clothing, and it shamed the series.
The one I absolutely cannot get through is Hamlet. I feel like they might as well still be speaking German for all I can understand Shakespeare. The riffing even drags for me in that one. I finally just shut it off and put in another disc.
Robert vs. the Aztec Mummy is one I will likely never watch again. It’s so drawn out and boring and then when it finally gets to the title, it lasts all of one minute… What a let down.
Devil Doll was very difficult for me to get through beacuse I have a severe ventriloquist dummy phobia. Can’t even watch the episode of Buffy with one in it.
Wild, Wild World of Batwoman… um… yeah… I just think the title and my brain goes into WTF mode. I do believe I was in shock the whole time I watched that one.
And finally, one only mentioned once before: Santa Claus. I only pop that one in for the skits. Cannot watch the movie at all.
I don’t remember Castle of Fu Manchu (maybe that’s a good thing) but it’ll have to be one I try to watch soon.
I could live the rest of my life with hearing or reading that “blank” show that is no longer on the air is way better than any show that is on the air now. It’s just too elitest and makes me think how come someone that hates current TV would watch enough of it to have a proper opinion on it.
Getting back on topic: Hamlet. I love the source material, but the dull, lifeless black production just makes it hard to sit thru and listen to the many fine and funny riffs.
1. Castle of Fu Manchu. Just…so…hard…to…watch. Literally. I can’t see anything. I can’t hear anything. The things I DO see don’t make any sense. Its…painful. The host segments properly display just how terrible a movie this is to watch. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yT35SUbpKjE
2. Hellcats. Like Fu Manchu, I can’t understand any of the audio. However, I can see everything. And what I see is ugly and unpleasant. No plot, no action, just ugliness.
3. Red Zone Cuba. It just moves so…slow. Its like a violent Bergman film. You know, without the good visuals, plot, etc. Nothing happens. No one is worth caring about. Save a few great (albiet sporadic) riffs, its a total waste.
4. Kitten With a Whip. Crisp visuals. Clean audio. A great cast. An actual plot. Sharp dialogue. But I CANNOT sit through it. CANNOT. Why? This movie hates me. I hate this movie. John Forsythe is a spineless idiot and is somehow a shoe-in to be a Senator. Ann-Margret is an evil bitch. AN EVIL PSYCHO BITCH! Her cronies are annoying muggish thugs. The movie’s plot about John Forsythe’s character being held hostage is all his own fault (call the cops, you idiot!) yet the movie insists that he’s an innocent victim when all he’s the victim of is his own stupidity and libido. And he gets off without consequence in the end! I HATE IT! HATE IT, HATE IT, HATE IT!
Oh, and Hamlet, but that goes without explanation.
“but that was a Mike episode in Joel clothing, and it shamed the series.”
===============================================
Well I must be a horrible person, because I love it when they rip on the movies and(some of) the people in them. I hope they let me watch the Mike episodes in Hell.
I don’t want to offend anyone: and, remember, “one man’s poison … ” and all that. Now, that said …
I simply can NOT get through “Castle of Fu Manchu”, “Hamlet”, or “Overdrawn at the Memory Bank”. In fact, OATMB is my least favorite MST3K. I’m sorry, but it is SO bad, SO cheap, SUCH a waste of talent, I feel really uncomfortable trying to watch it.
We got some real weirdos here.
That’s easy the only episode I turn away in fear from is…”Alien from L.A.” Kathy Ireland’s voice is like nails across a chalkboard I have never been able to get very far in that episode. Ouch, I’m cringing just thinking about it.
@186 MikeK:
“Let your freak flag fly!”
Now I’m just going to be silly.
THE ATOMIC BRAIN IS DA BOMB!
I agree with a lot of the ones people keep mentioning (Hellcats, Fu Manchu, etc), but the first one that popped into my head was City Limits. I can never remember a thing about that episode, all the times I have seen it – except the Kim Cattrall song, of course.
Well, keeping in mind that Sampo’s Theorem is in full effect here, I can understand the mostly universal disdain for episodes such as Castle of Fu Manchu and Hamlet. What I am surprised by, however, is the number of mentions above of Overdrawn At The Memory Bank. Back when we discussed it in January 2010, it received a collective vote of 4.42 stars (out of five), so obviously it is a popular episode among this community. Heck, even Hamlet got a 3.05 star rating. I demand a recount!
@191 – Overdrawn isn’t BAD-bad (ie., not Monster-a-Go-Go bad), and it’s pretty clearly not good either–It’s just, well, bizarre, from those strange days of the late 70’s when PBS was just finding itself and didn’t know how to make original drama. (Qv. “The Lathe of Heaven”.)
Of course, that’s pretty much M&tB’s point, so we get a lot of third-party motif-inserted “PBS is Evil because they made this” jokes about pledge drives and Are You Being Served, but the movie itself is really more of a historical curiosity that don’t make one danged lick o’ sense.
Y’know, I dearly love the series, and every episode has its moments BUT… Fire Maidens from Outer Space and Mighty Jack just shut my brain off. I’ve tried and tried, but I can’t stay conscious when those eps are running. (I have them in an easily retrievable location, just in case insomnis strikes.)
The insufferables:
Kitten With A Whip
Sidehackers
A Touch Of Satan
Hobgoblins
Girl In Gold Boots
And Now For Something Completely Different:
I really can’t sit through Diabolik, but for reasons opposite to all the others — it’s such a great great movie, it bums me that they finished the series riffing on something so inappropriate.
After seeing it on MST, I couldn’t wait for it to come out on DVD in its original version, and it really is one of the great 1960s anti-hero/comic book/spy gadget films of all time.
Squirm, Daddy-o, Santa Clause Vs the Martians, Soul Taker. All movies that make me want to swallow a bottle of pain killers because I cant stand them.
Racket Girls, end of story.
All I remember about that episode was falling asleep to the sounds of the crowd during the endless women’s wrestling matches.
‘aah’ ‘aah’ [People sounding like they’re falling off cliffs]
Blood Waters of Dr Z. Emmis.
Wow. If I could only have a few episodes on a desert island I’d take Hellcats, Sidehackers, Wild Rebels and I Accuse My Parents. I don’t get it.
But my choice: Starfighters. Unwatchable and the skits are unfunny as well.
Agreed 197. I’ve tried to watch it 3 times and just tuned it out after a bit.
Coleman Francis almost does this but there’s just something so stupid and bad about it I can’t look away.