If you’re attending Dragon*Con in Atlanta this month, you might want to be on the lookout for the following MST3K-related events:
Night of the Colossal Mystery Science Theater 3000 25th Anniversary Festival-A Go-Go!
This colossal riff-fest features 5 episodes personally selected and introduced (via video) by Joel Hodgson. During each intermission, our friend Daniel Griffith from Ballyhoo Motion Pictures will introduce rare footage from the show’s history and ‘sneak preview’ clips from his latest MST3K documentaries, as well as host various trivia games. There will also be an MST3K costume contest preceding the first episode, with a grand prize going to the best costume.
Saturday, August 31st at 11:30 pm
Bill Corbett will also be participating in several panels:
Bill Corbett, Unlicensed Life Coach
Live podcast recording as Bill tries to help with life problems, despite being frighteningly unqualified to do so.
Friday, August 30th at 10:00 am
Talking RiffTax with Bill Corbett
Bill will show some RiffTrax highlights, a RiffTrax short or two, and hold a Q&A session.
Friday, August 30th at 2:30 pm
FRED Entertainment Panel-PaloozaExtrava-Thingee-a-Doodle
A panel that really only exists for the sake of frolicking, bantering, and geeking about with special guests and an Irishman.
Friday, August 30th at 5:30 pm
How to Do Comedy Wrong the Right Way
Learn the dark arts of the funny in this panel about comedy theory with Bill, Joseph Scrimshaw, and other professional funny people.
Saturday, August 31st at 2:30
Gonzoroo II
An evening of music, geekery, comedic delights, and surprises galore!
Saturday, August 31st at 8:30 pm
Bill Corbett’s Super-Powered Revenge Christmas: A New Graphic Novel
Bill talks about the making of his new epic Christmas comic book and shows preview pages.
Sunday, September 1st at 4:00 pm
Gonzo Quiz Show IV: The Quest for Quiz
Teams of celebrity guests are led through a series of panel show games that you entertained.
Sunday, September 1st at 8:30 pm
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Drat, drat, and double drat!! I can’t make this con!
Well, maybe someone will bring a camera.
http://dragoncon.org/images/events/MST3K.png
generalist,
Thanks for the link! I’ve added the graphic to the post.
I’m attending. Flying from the UK too!!
So what are your guesses on the episodes? I’m thinking Pod People, Manos, Mitchell, Space Mutiny and The Final Sacrifice.
EDIT: I just re-read it and Joel is picking the episodes, which means that some of the Mike-era stuff might not make it. So my alternates would be Fugitive Alien and Teenagers from Outer Space.
Doug… your warm… but not quite there. And FYI, the night will feature TWO Mike episodes. :laugh:
Since I can’t be in attendance, I’ll guess the 5:
MANOS
I ACCUSE MY PARENTS
MITCHELL
FINAL SACRIFICE
WEREWOLF
hey, guessing the episodes is a pretty fun game! I’ll say:
The Crawling Eye
Rocketship XM
Gamera
Mitchell
Danger: Diabolik
Joel, at Riffing Myself recently, said if he had to pick, I accuse my parents is probably his favorite.
The following is not Bill Corbett related, but Silk Road: Asian Cinema and culture track at Dragoncon is doing Godzilla Theater 3000 (note the similarity to Mystery Science Theatre 3000).
Also, one of the bands at Dragoncon, the Gekkos, are described as high energy nerd rock band and perform songs about [blah blah blah], MST3K, [blah blah].
We are fans, and have been fans, of one of the greatest, longest lasting, phenomenons in the history of fun – MST3K.
Really wish I was able to attend. This looks like it’s going to be a lot of fun.
Okay, I’ve calmed down. I guess I’ll try to get there next year.
For the sixth year in a row, I won’t make it. Maybe next year. Getting to see the Titans live in Royal Oak, and, the Rifftrax live shows make not going to Atlanta a lot easier.
This is why Dragon*Con is awesome. Phoenix ComiCon, are you listening?
For those who have gone to these panels at Dragon Con in the past, how early do the lines fill up? Do you have to get in line absurdly early (like the night before), ridiculously early (3-4 hours), or not so bad (an hour or less)? I’ve always just gone for the autographs and stuff, but this year I was thinking it would be fun to see some of Bill’s panels.
Darkknight; anything listed as main programming will require lining up. gonzo quiz show was a lineup event last year but I don’t think it filled completely up and people leave after a while so you can always walk in later, it’s very long. I imagine the MST3K 25th anniversary a go-go will be lined up, but not completely full and only a few will be there throughout the night. Plus, it’s opposite Monty Python at 11:30 in the Brit-Track, which lined up, and filled up last year and they had to turn people away. I doubt Bill’s Super Powered Revenge Christmas reading will fill completely up, and if you come late, you can probably find a single seat close to the front. His reading last time did not fill the moderately large room.
Lots of times its according to what it is opposite. A few things don’t require lining up at all, but I cannot guess which of Bill’s this might be. Since RiffTrax sells out often, I imagine that panel would require lining up to get a seat. Hope this helps.
By the way, Daniel Griffith, can you tell what my costume will be by looking at my avatar? It’s Brain Guy from Riding With Death.
PorpOise, looks great! And I agree with you, the event will probably have a line, but I’m not sure people will be hanging out all night. At least, not most of them. However, I am doing trivia contests and games in between each episode ALL night. And the prizes I am giving away are pretty cool! Plus, the first 100 people attending will get a free ‘MST3K ALL-NITER SURVIVAL KIT’ with all kinds of EXCLUSIVE goodies. One per person, of course. :)
Hosted by podcasting’s answer to Alan Whicker, Ken Plume? This is one to make time for, friends.
Thanks for the info!
Manos
I Accuse My Parents
Mitchell
Werewolf
Final Sacrifice
Anyone know if that poster will be sold??
Speaking of cons, Kevin Murphy will be showing up at Salt Lake Comic-Con, the first in Utah, on September 5-7.
http://saltlakecomiccon.com/portfolio/kevin-murphy/
I was already going to this, but this just made me even more excited about going!
Shark… I will be giving away 12×18 EVENT posters as prizes during the festival. I may make them available online for purchase later.
Is it me, or…
Is the inclusion of the words COLOSSAL and A-GO-GO a thinly veiled hint at future releases from Shout?
I know, completely ridiculous…
Thanks Daniel – cant make the con, but I would spend $$$ on a poster for sure!
Anyone care to report back on how the MST3K themed festivities are going?
What were the five episodes shown?
My son came and enjoyed the festivities until almost the very end. Then my motherly paranoia skills kicked in and I told him to come back to the hotel because I worried. I feel terrible because he missed getting a poster by like an hour. Ugh! Please tell me I can buy one somewhere to make up to him. He’s the biggest 16-year old fan out there !
Got to see Bill’s Rifftrax panel it was great, He talked about the recent live shows and then they showed a short about choking.
pondoscp: Joel’s #5 movie was Manos, Hands of Fate.
#4 movie was The Final Sacrifice.
Then I had to “go to bed”.
I saw a glimpse of the program and I think #1 movie was Mitchell and #2 was Werewolf. Sorry, can’t remember #3.
In case you wonder, I did not win the MST3K contest. top three winners were Frank look-alike, Dr. Forrester look-alike and a Zap Rowsdower.
I attended most of the Bill Corbett panels. The Unlicensed Life Coach podcast was hilarious, and I hope he continues it! Straight out of the gate, Bill said he has no credentials or anything to properly Life Coach someone but will give it a good try. Joseph Scrimshaw did a good job picking out some very amusing questions from people, who were brought up to be coached by Bill. The first was from a woman who felt guilty about her happy life while her friends were dealing with crappy marriages. The second was from a guy who had trouble motivating himself to get enough exercise. This was my favorite portion. The third involved a guy who wanted a way to convince his parents that he didn’t have to contact them every day to let them know he loved them.
As covered before, the Rifftrax panel was awesome as well. I think it actually hit capacity, which says good things about how popular Rifftrax continues to be!
Gonzoroo II saw Bill Corbett giving a great monologue and finishing it off with a reading/riffing as a “monologist”, as he called himself, from the opening pages of the “Man of Steel” novelization.
The Gonzo Quiz Show was my favorite panel at the whole convention. Bill Corbett joined James Urbaniak and Mike Firman in a team called “Two and a Half Men” (which the mystery was which one was the Half) vs. Paul and Storm and Phil Lamarr (whose team name eludes me at the moment). The order of the early games allude me, but I remember Bill Corbett was called forward to provide vague general “basic noun” descriptions of popular Science Fiction/Fantasy movies and TV shows, which his team had to guess. The second game involved audience members throwing ping-pong balls into the nets placed on Mike Firman and Storm’s heads. I think this one could be left out, as it took up a lot of time. The third game involved each person being given a statment (true or false) and having to try to convince the other team the opposite of the statement’s truth. For example, Bill Corbett got the statement “I went to high school with Ralph Macchio.” This statement turned out to be false, but he had to convince them that it was true despite their questioning. The truth was that he went to high school with Scott Baio, detail from which he used to play the statement given to him as true.
The last round was my favorite, which involved giving the celebrities snippets of songs with which they started singing along with. At some point during the song, the sound died out, at which point the panelist had to continue singing. Once the song’s volume was raised back up, if they were still in sync with the song, they got a point for their team. Bill’s was “I feel pretty”, which they started in the middle of the song. Bill had to frantically find his way into the lyric sheet given to him to find the point in the song at which they started. While doing this, he was singing in tune with the song about how they started in the middle and about his difficulty in finding his place. The song died out while he was still finding his spot. Once he did, he moved seamlessly from rambling with the tune to singing the song. When the audio came back on, he was in perfect sync with the song. I’d never seen anyone do that before at this panel! He got an extremely well-earned point for his team and a huge standing ovation from the crowd.
Ultimately though, Bill’s team lost by a single point, but they put up a good fight!
After that, they went into the second section of the night, Thank God You’re Here, which had to be abbreviated because of the long wait loading the panel that drove them 30 minutes starting late. This involved Aaron Poole and Joseph Scrimshaw putting each panelist into a scene they know nothing about and letting them improvise their way through it. It would’ve been better if they really hadn’t known, but I think the shortness of the second round caused Joseph and Aaron to tell each panelist what their scene was. Bill’s scene saw him as a moody director telling Joseph and Aaron what to do. I forget the details of it, but it was quite hilarious.
I’ll go into the Super-Powered Revenge Christmas panel later, as time is now running short for me!
i attended the 25th anniversary marathon. i have some images of the goodie bag contents
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https://sphotos-a-atl.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/q71/s720x720/1234849_10151918671299225_1200749798_n.jpg
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last one is bill and i after the super powered revenge christmas panel
I won the first contest at the show! It was a Torgo-impersonation contest and I acted just like TORGO!! Wait a minute…God, I’m depressed. But I got a free MST3K box set so it all works out!! If they ever have something like this again, it would dearly benefit people to show up early, as there were many people turned away at the door for the event. The crowd was friendly as Hell & the more tired people got, the funnier the movies were. So, Super-Mega-multiple times thumbs-up for this & me & my friends (all 4 of them) are spreading the gospel on non-converts to the Mistie-religion. All hail the SOL (and the Forrester clans).
So what were the 5 episodes shown? I’ve got a semi-firm answer so far (thank you, porp0ise).
Uncle Jason, YOu WeRe GReAt aNd sO vErY fUNnY.
I attended the MST3K marathon event (for those who were there, I was dressed as the Master with my husband as Torgo, and you might have seen me around the con dressed as Tom Servo the day before). The five episodes were Manos, Final Sacrifice, Werewolf, Gamera vs Guiron, and Mitchell, but I’m pretty sure Daniel Griffith only ended up showing four of them, and I think Mitchell got the boot. Can’t say for certain though – we made it through Final Sacrifice, and there was a vote for the next episode (Werewolf just barely beating out Gamera), but my husband and I were too tired to power through, even though Werewolf is one of our all-time favorites (Paul, you is a woerwilf!). That said, it was a massively fun event, probably my favorite part of the con. We had a blast dressing up and nerding out with all the fellow MSTies. (Speaking of – porp0ise, you looked grand, and Uncle Jason, your Torgo walk was a vision.)
Okay, on with the show!
I had planned on attending the MST3k marathon, but I got there a little too late after the lane had well-formed due to my attending another panel that nudged right against it. This year, DragonCon had a huge turnout, bigger than ever before, and there were long lines and crowds everywhere. The line for the MST3k Marathon was extremely long, and when I got within 40 feet of the door, I heard the staff shouting that the panel had reached max capacity. I was disappointed with this, but like the Rifftrax panel, I felt that the fact that it hit max capacity said great things about how popular the show still was, so many years later. I took advantage of this and went back to my room to go to bed, as I was extremely tired anyway. I’d like to think I would’ve made it all the way through, but chances are I would’ve left at some point due to overwhelming exhaustion.
Bill Corbett’s Super-Powered Revenge Christmas Spectacular panel was just that. He and Joseph Scrimshaw talked about the origins of the comic book narrative. It started out as a play starring Joseph, and Neil Gaiman told Bill he should turn it into a comic book. After that, he sought out the help of Len Peralta to do the art, and Joseph helped him with the translation from play to comic book script. Some of the play got left out, but the overall story was there: A writer and his girlfriend make a bet regarding a comic book that he was wanting to make. If the bar patrons he was telling the story to like the story he had planned out, then he would pick up the tab for everyone in the bar. If they didn’t like it, his girlfriend would pick up the tab. He then proceeds to tell a story re-imagining the classic Christmas characters with modern comic book superhero stereotypes, complete with machismo and grandiose narratives. Santa Claus, Rudolph, Frosty, The Grinch, even It’s a Wonderful Life, you name it, it’s overhauled and reimagined, to become a big revenge story, with just enough change made to claim satire on copyrighted characters. Bill then pulled up three people from the audience, two women and a guy dressed as Superman, to each read a part of the script alongside Bill and Joseph. They read out almost the entire first act of the play, with Len Peralta turning the page on the comic book shown on the projector. It was a picture-perfect. The chosen audience members read their parts with great character and embellishment. I can’t wait for this to come out in a year and a half! Bill then opened it up to questions, of which I managed to ask at the last minute about what the plans were for the original play. He said he wanted the comic book to come out first, then depending upon the success of it, he would look into an audio adaptation or something along those lines. I’d give anything to see Joseph Scrimshaw perform it on stage. I’ve definitely become a huge fan of his after his showing at Dragon*Con last year!
I missed a couple of other Bill Corbett panels due to other stuff going on at the time, and just plain forgetting. (So much to do and see! So little time!) I know he had a section in the Walk of Fame he shared with James Urbaniak, who I briefly talked to and thanked him for his great work. I had just recently gotten into Venture Bros. in the past year, and since then have realized he’s been in a lot more other things that I have enjoyed as well.
Overall it was another successful year at DragonCon, and I plan on attending next year too! Hopefully we can get some more MST3k stuff going on, and have some more of the Brains attending! (Mike Nelson, I’m looking at you!)