As we know, MST3k will always be encapsulated in a certain moment in time, mainly due to all the pop culture references. One of the most frequent manifestations of this are the in-movie riffing of celebrity/public figure look-a-likes.
Now, whenever I see “Teen-Age Strangler” I can’t help but think that in a different time, the “Yipes Stripes” singer would have been riffed as some sort of Amy Winehouse look-a-like. (RIP)
Being 15 years from the final episode, are there any actors in MST3k treated movies you think look like more recent celebrities/public figures? Or we can expand it, asking: is there any you feel that they completely missed at the time? Or were completely off the mark? Which ones were totally dead on?
Have at it!
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Ooooo! Nice topic!
I supposed Mike’s disdain for the “Twilight” saga would have been VERY on-display with a movie like “Samson V. Vampire Women”.
If they would have done Werewolf today, I don’t think they would have failed to notice that the grizzled survivalist is a dead ringer for the grandfather on Duck Dynasty. I watched the episode recently and was expecting them to start with the DD jokes, then I realized that that would have been impossible fifteen years ago.
Can’t help but think how they’d allude to Woody Harrelson’s character
in Zombieland, and his efficiency taking out zombies, versus the bad
guys incompetence dealing with the same in Zombie Apocalypse.
I alwasy thought Troy from “Final Sacrifice” looked like a Elijah Wood/Crispin Glover hybrid.
Jim from “Zombie Nighmare” looks like Jack Blades from Night Ranger (when he runs over John Mikl Thor, I always belt out “Motoring/what’s your price for flight.”)
Speaking of Woody Harrelson (and this has been mentioned previously,) I always thought he looked like Gus (I think that who it was) from “Alien From L.A.” (the guy who helps her and rides up to her at the final scene.)
I may be off on this one but Daphne from HOBGOBLINS reminds me of trailer park Paris Hilton.
I would imagine that if Justin Bieber was not famous, no tats, no talent he would be as douchey as Kyle also of HG fame.
Troy from THE FINAL SACRIFICE reminds me of skater/commentator/fashion maven Johnny Weir.
Great topic! It might be a reach but I could see Mike and the ‘bots making some kind of Kardashian reference (or two or ten) to the lead character of “Girl in Gold Boots.”
Also, the dancing scene in the on-ship night club in “Space Mutiny” is just dying for a Miley Cyrus/twerking riff. (“She’s presenting like a mandrill !!”)
I think Natalie from Werewolf looks like Trisha from Napoleon Dynamite, so if it were done today I think that ought to be the riff.
I started thinking of how Timoteo (Salvatore Furnari) from Hercules and the Captive Women reminded me of Tyrion Lannister (Peter Dinklage) from Game of Thrones. In fact, if GoT had been around 20 years ago, I imagine there’d be a lot of references in all the Hercules movies, in The Magic Sword, The Day the Earth Froze, Outlaw, Colossus and the Headhunters, etc. Just think of all the opportunities for Red Wedding riffs!
Hi, new here. HAD to say something.
I always thought the old guy from ATTACK OF THE EYE CREATURES looked like the late Art “Mr. Food” Ginsburg while the cute-as-a-button but bubble-haired bubble-head, Susan (same movie) looked like Rachel Ray. The General with the weird forehead should’ve been compared to a Klingon.
That unnamed blond bridge lady from SPACE MUTINY (‘Captain, the generators have been sabotaged’) is a dead-ringer for Courtney Love and I’m stunned that M&TBs didn’t mention it (see was famous then, too). Lt. Lamont (the ‘resurrecting-as-an-extra-because-the-filmakers-are-idiots’ lady) deserved a “Marc Bolan” riff just for her hair, alone. If you squint, she could be the late T-Rex frontman.
Daphne from HOBGOBLINS looked like an ugly Elizabeth Berkley (Jesse from ‘Saved By The Bell’ & Nomi from ‘Showgirls’) and Kyle was very vaguely like character actor, Jim Fyfe (Stuart from ‘The Frighteners’, did ‘The Lone Gunmen’ & HBO shows like ‘Encyclopedia’ & ‘Buy Me That’ 1, 2 & 3).
I always thought Troy from “Final Sacrifice” looked a lot like a young Gilligan (and the outfit didn’t help either)…
I think The Wild, Wild World of Batwoman had a lot of Kardashian-riff potential.
Also, as Reb Brown from Space Mutiny portrayed Captain America in an earlier, cheesier film iteration, I would have to think now Buff Drinklots would have some more Agents of Shield nicknames attached to his resume.
I’m a little surprised they didn’t note that the grizzled-old-prospector-archaeologist from “Final Sacrifice” looked like a bearded Tom Baker. You’d think that’d inspire at least one jelly baby riff.
@Haunted Hill
I agree. He also looks like a Ferengi.
A prominent woman character in Space Mutiny (the Santa doppelganger’s daughter? I forget) is the spitting image of Mary-Edith Burrell from “Fridays” (1980-82).
Henry Czerny on “Revenge” is a dead ringer for John Terrence, the snide newspaper reviewer in Merlin.
This is an obscure one, but I just watched it today and was thinking this so I had to throw in:
If you watch The Skydivers, there’s a scene where one (female) character has on a hood, curly hair and sunglasses and looks exactly like the sketch of the Unabomber. I had to look back and see why they didn’t mention it, but I guess the episode was ’94 and the Unabomber thing happened in ’95-’96.
The white-haired bad guy from “Operation Double 007”, and “Danger: Diabolik” looks like an overweight John Mahoney from “Frasier”.
Funny this has come up as I was just watching First Spaceship on Venus this morning and noticed how one of the crew members looks like Rob Corddry while another has a hair part exactly like Mike Ditka’s. Have not watched the whole movie yet, so maybe there is a Ditka quip in there somewhere. I know a Corddry reference wouldn’t work back then, but I do recall Rifftrax having some fun with him in reference to the jerk in Night of the Living Dead.
I always thought that guy playing the song (“Nazi Party!”) on the boat of Catalina Caper looked like Little Richard.
Oh. Wait. . . . . .
. . . :silly:
I’ve long wished that, “Ah, so Drew Carey’s nemesis Mimi survived the apocalypse,” from Time Chasers could somehow be transplanted back to Warrior of the Lost World and applied to the woman they said looked like Divine.
Rewatching that scene for the line, I just realized the first guy they encounter in dystopian Vermont (who rubbed an old oil filter on his shirt) looks a lot like Frankie Muniz, but his weird mannerisms combined with Muniz’s recent strokes might add up to something unintentionally offensive.
I’ve already mentioned these two, sorry for repeating myself…
Hamlet: Starring Jeremy Renner as Laertes! (Yay! *applause*)
Gorgo: Starring Jason Bateman as Joe! (Yay! *applause*)
I thought the guy who teaches the kids in Are You Ready For Marriage? about “boing” looked so much like Clancy Brown (who I most associate with being Sargent Zim in Starship Troopers) that I had to do the time math to confirm it wasn’t him.
On the subject of then-topical riffs, in one of the season 9/10 episodes, someone dials a phone and one of them comments, “what is it now, 10-10-10-10-220-10??” I remember the ads for 10-10-220 but honestly that was like a three month long ad campaign, clever at the moment but I suspect utterly lost on people as of 10 months later.
On the other hand, every reference they make to someone looking like Gandalf, Frodo et al is probably far MORE accessible 10 years after the fact than when they first made them.
There’s a character on some Alaskan gold prospecting show that is a dead ringer for Rowsdower.
@slowermo (#22)
I agree with this one. You’d figure today they’d throw in a Mr. Krabs reference, or chime in with, “Oh, by the way, WHERE’S THE HIGHLANDER!!”
In Puma Man, one of those heads was the spitting image of Al Gore, yet they made no mention of it. There was no excuse for that, as Gore was well known at the time.
I recently rewatched “The Dead Talk Back”, and all I could think while watching the skinny, frizzy-haired scientist guy putter around in his lab was “Wayne Coyne on any given Tuesday….”
@ #22: I’m not familiar with Clancy Brown. Personally, I thought Mr. Hall bore a resemblance to H.P. Lovecraft.
Michelle from ‘Girl in Gold Boots’ is almost a spitting image of Angelina Jolie, and Bud does look like a young Regis Philbin.
Watching the MST3K movie.
1. Seeing the Metalluna Mutant: “Lady Gaga!”
2. Cave-In at one of the halls: “The Metrodome!”
I cannot believe nobody brought up the fact that the Girl in Gold Boots’s main female protagonist looks like Angelina Jolie.
Looks like #29 beat me too it lol
I mentioned this in the episode guide, but the big-nosed henchman from “Danger!! Death Ray” whom the guys liken to Tommy Lee Jones? To me, he looks a lot more like Ryan Stiles. If the episode had aired a few years later, after The Drew Carey Show or Whose Line Is It Anyway had premiered, I bet we would have heard a lot of microbrewery and Hoedown jokes.
From the same episode, the main bad guy (whatever his name is) looks a lot like William Petersen, who played Grissom on CSI for years. Probably would have given us a lot of entomology jokes and quips to black.
You all look alike to me…
Anyway, the riff that popped into my head watching ‘Century 21 Calling’ was “Shelly Fabares and Devon Sawa, together at last!”
And has no one noticed the spooky similarity between the evil king from GAME OF THRONES and Mister B Natural?
In “Terror From the Year 5000”, Jimmy Carter has Disco Fever was dead on!
@34 / Rose from NJ -agreed — He was dead-on Jimmy Carter.
Not a lookalike thing, but an updated reference. Now that we know who Shawn Levy from “Zombie Nightmare” is, there’s a whole host of jokes that could be made at his expense: “That’s the kind of psychosis that cast Steve Martin as Inspector Clouseau,” or trying to pitch “Night at the Museum” to the ice cream waitress.
I can’t remember her name now but I’ve always thought that the blonde in “The Beatniks” looks EXACTLY like the original Barbie doll.