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Weekend Discussion Thread: Your Favorite Christmas RiffMST3K, RiffTrax and Cinematic Titanic have given us so much Christmas hilarity. THREE different riffs of “Santa Claus Conquers the Martians,” TWO different riffs of “Santa Claus” and many many RiffTrax features and shorts. For me, it’s a tie between Cinematic Titanic’s riff of “SCCTM” and RiffTrax’s “Fun in Balloonland.” Both are gaspingly funny. So, what’s your favorite? And what kind of Christmastime tradition do you have around watching any of these? 82 Replies to “Weekend Discussion Thread: Your Favorite Christmas Riff”Commenting at Satellite News
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Oh, I don’t know about that.
MST SCCTM: What’s in the pipe Santa?
From Rifftrax animated Rudloph:Kevin’s reaction to “I need you tonight”
And at night, you became Agent Jay…
I like Santa flying a bit too low in RT’s “Plan 9”.
For an actual Christmas Riff almost nothing can beat the MST3K Santa Claus.
In terms of hilarity, though, the Balloonland thingee is absolutely the funniest (not really very Christmas, though — could be seen at any time of the year with the same crazy impact). Probably the last funny thing Rifftrax did.
Thanx for the heads up. Actually called “Yahoo View.”
From Rifftrax: Nestor paraphrashing: While she protected Nestor with her body, she allowed the storm to take her. Mike: “Wow, Merry Christmas kids, Mom’s a donkeycicle” Rather dark of the children’s movie, I’d say.
And I opened the heck out of channel D!
Not sure if this counts. From Playstation Underground Promo CD back in 1997.
Agent Jankins: We found them playing it inside the ship.
Tom: GOOD GOD! It’s a Marilyn Manson Christmas album!
I’ve been watching a Christmas riff every night of December this year. I love the Christmas stuff more than anything else MST, RiffTrax, or CT does because it fits my personal aesthetic of Happy Endings (usually) and little or no violence and/or sex. I think my favorite overall show has to be the RiffTrax Live Santa Claus; for sheer WTF hilarity it can’t be beat and the uncut version means the movie makes a little more sense and is therefore more enjoyable to see as a movie than the MST riff.
My favorite individual riff is the part in the RiffTrax short “Christmas Rhapsody” where the small, no-account tree is being chopped down by the family and Kevin goes from worried to alarmed to screaming in agony. It’s stupid and silly and just the perfect counterpart to the overly serious and reverent tone of the short.
Now, let’s a raise a glass in toast to Happy Days’ Donny Most, if that’s OK.
“I didn’t know David Lynch made a Christmas movie.”
Why is it so hard to film Santa without him being insane?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058548/
IMDb lists the character name as Dropo, one “p”
Oh, the Hellcats in Whoville, they spanked the denfanklers, they blew the fantoozlers and cranked the grauflanklers.
They wizzed their gizfunklers and shanked their wizbanklers, they toozled and woozled and peanuted kertanklers
Even little Wendy Lou Hellcat.
The entirety of the Christmas shorts show had me on the floor, but the poor little tree who gets cut down… holy cow, I laughed until I cried.
“I’ve abandoned my child! I’ve abandoned my boy!”
Gare
What, no love for Zlateh, the grim, miserable Chanukah goat?! That one’s a holiday tradition ’round these parts.
“That was enough to buy Chanukah candles, potatoes and oil for pancakes, gifts for the children, and other holiday necessaries for the house.”
“Son, you are to get none of those. Only booze.”
My wife and I frequently give each other a tender “Headbutt…” exchange.
huh?
Jay:
Jay – My name. J is the tenth letter of the English alphabet. It is not used in the Hawaiian alphabet, but it is the first letter in Joel’s name even if you are in Hawaii. To the best of my knowledge Leonard Maltin has not published a guide book on Hawaii.
Wishing you, Johnny’s Nonchalance (Hey! Guess what letter that starts with!) and all MSTies everywhere wonderful Patrick Swayze Christmas!
– – Just Being Silly And Relaxing About Science Facts Jay.
When the martians burst in. “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!”
For the record, how many Christmas-related Rifftrax shorts are there?
Our “foundational” Christmas movies are the MST3K classics, ‘Santa Claus Conquers the Martians’ and ‘Santa Claus’. It’s very nice that Joel and Mike (Joike?) each got one, and they’re not just Christmas movies but episodes that capture the feel of Christmas quite nicely.
Beyond that, we’ll sprinkle in any of the others. The Christmas shorts and the Star Wars Holiday Special have already made an appearance this year, along with “I Believe In Santa Claus” (does anyone else feel like the back half of that is just the kids’ hallucinations as they freeze to death in the middle of nowhere?) and we’ve done both the Bridget and Mary Jo specials. We’ll almost certainly try to take in the CT and RT versions of the MST3K classics mentioned above at some point in the next few days. And Santa’s Village of Madness, of course. And any shorts that we notice in the catalog.
Christmas movies are nicer when they’re riffed. It cuts nicely through the schmaltz that can get a little thick otherwise.
Here’s what’s a search at the Rifftrax site turned up:
http://www.rifftrax.com/search/catalog/Christmas
Not sure how Rise of the Planet of the Apes got in there.
Y’know, the fact that IBISC has been neglected so far in the thread, even among the core RT fans, only proves that they should have waited to give it to Joel & Josh?
The riffs in creepy Mexican Santa Claus are all pretty good, but my special favorite is the quip about the enigmatic
“Pleasure Mouth” jolly Saint Nick inexplicably has in his floating castle.
What -was- that thing?!?
No, it just proves that it’s a relatively recent Rifftrax release and not everyone who comes here keeps up with that. I think they did a fine job with it; the film has an utterly batshirt surreality that they work with well.
Also, who’s Josh?
Yup. That one.
Last year the Cinematic Titanic “Santa Claud vs the Martians” was available on Hulu, but alas all CT is now off and out of stock. It really was fresh and funny! I can only hope it and the others resurface and are available again soon.
Oh golly … RT is just now releasing one called CHRISTMAS CIRCUS WITH WHIZZO THE CLOWN …
Oh golly ….
Having just seen the unriffed version on Amazon (if it’s PD, you’ll find it on Prime!), I WONDERED when they’d get around to that one…
(Basically, think “What kind of local TV show was Chuckles the Clown doing before the elephant stepped on him?”)
Sorry I’m late, everybody.
All of my favorite Christmas riffs have been noted by others.
As far as Christmas episode viewing, I divide my choices between the Original Stuff (the actual series) and the Outside Stuff (RT, CT, other outside projects). For the former, I alternate between the KTMA version of “Gamera” (hey, it has Christmas references), SCCtM and “Santa Claus”. For the latter, I have a lot of choices, including the RT and CT versions of SCCtM, both specials with Bridget & Mary Jo, both RT versions of “Santa & the Ice Cream Bunny”, the RT version of “Santa Claus” and the Christmas Shorts show. And they just added another one today. I’ll have to work out some sort of schedule by next year.
Of course, by then, the revival may have its own Christmas episode, too.
Sorry about being late y’all, I thought I posted before but I didn’t. My favorite Christmas/Holiday riff is The Magic Christmas Tree, The movie is just so bizarre, with the clown horn yard. Ichabod the turtle, and the giant. Also, the movie covers the time from Halloween to Christmas, which is one of my favorite times of the year.