In his interview on the Riding with Death DVD, Steven de Souza touches on the issue of, when writing a story, getting the capabilities of those opposing the protagonists just right.
Or in D&D parlance, the Challenge Rating (CR). Too low, and the story becomes a stakes-free cakewalk. Too high, and the protagonist comes across as incompetent, with the resolution often appearing as a deus ex machina.
Many MST3K films struggle to get their CRs in that Goldilocks zone. So which films do you think the CR was either too low or too high?
For too low, I’d go with Danger Death Ray. The goons practically walked right into Bart Fargo’s fists. For too high, I’d go with Devil Doll. English was just so hapless and he needed Vorelli and Hugo’s falling out to resolve the situation for him.
Too high: The evil night club owner in “Daddy-O.” How in the world was Pete Plum supposed to be victorious? Too low: “Batwoman.” She just walks all over Rat Fink.”
Your picks?
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Too High – BOGGY CREEK II: Tanya’s expectation of getting a viable college degree in Monsterology.
Too Low – FINAL SACRIFICE: Rowsdower’s battle against Canada’s most incompetent cult thugs. Tanks tops and ski masks? Sheesh!
Too High: Rocket Attack USA and Invasion USA No joke; just despair…
Too Low: The Starfighters Anything close to dramatic conflict was handled quickly, competently, and by the book.
Too High: Incredible Melting Man. The monster was unstoppable, untouchable and unreasonable (well maybe a little bit at the end).
Too Low: Prince of Space. When all weapons are useless against you, there’s really no challenge. As Crow put it, “And the tension is… thwarted.”
Too High – MANOS: Although the family, especially the dad, are so incompetent (seriously – spend the night THERE?!), the Master didn’t even have to be impervious to bullets to have then firmly in his clutches of fate.
Too Low – ANGELS’ REVENGE: Specifically, the militia extremists as antagonists. That bunch is so goofy and farcical that it would be enough for the Angels to just keep their derisive laughter from flowing outward on sight. At least the main villains are far more of a challenge.
Too high : The Touch of Satan, because Satan.
Too low : Monster A-Go Go. There was no monster.
Too high: ‘Robot Monster’. The odds are so stacked against the humans that it has to be revealed as “All just a dream” to get them out of it.
Too low: ‘Prince Of Space.’Title character easily beats the Phantom and his men every time they meet.
Too High: Radar Secret Service. How could the villains possibly think they’d triumph over RADAR? It was clearly no contest.
Too Low: The Hobgoblins. Since they were easily defeated by prune-colored-muscle-car owner Kevin and his Band of Smarmy Pranksters, I can’t say I’m impressed by their powers, even if they did manage to travel the galaxy in a form-fitting spaceship.
Interesting WDT — thanks, Sitting Duck!
Too High: “Teenagers from Outer Space,” despite the weak-sounding title. I mean, really. How are mere humans supposed to fight skeletonizing ray guns and giant lobsters? The ending is truly a deus ex machina.
Too Low: If I may pick a Rifftrax outing, “The Guy from Harlem.” The CR was so low as to be nonexistent. You get a hint of this when our protagonist is informed that the Bad Guy is so elusive that no one’s ever seen him, yet then is given an exact description of him. He’s as easy to find as lint on a black dress.
too high:’Village of the Giants’
-tommy kirk
-giant beau bridges
-giant beau bridges buffalo shot
-tommy kirk
with these disadvantages for the heroes, not even the presence of jim begg could prevent the giant teeners from ruling the…town. anyway, hope for humanity…of the town…was only found in the dark and twisted basement lab of ronnie howard.
too low:
‘Diabolik’ i mean really…the clowns in that movie could make my grandmother look like a super secret super thief. and she’s not…
Too Low:Critter Jones, because these are drug dealers and Buzz is a child that kills.
Too High:Critter Jones, because Leo, his evil doppelgänger, and Buzz the Child are no match against a guy with a bucket of hard water suds.
Too high: Blood Waters of Dr. Z. Running board guy was no match for Leopold, let alone his own clumsiness and incompetence.
Too low: Squirm. Sherriff Pink. Need I say more?
Too high: Red Zone Cuba: The entire Cuban military vs. six or seven down-and-out morons!
Too low: Eegah: One lumbering, club wielding caveman vs. the shoot-first-ask-questions-later desert cops.
A couple more that came to mind.
Too low: Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. In spite of his impressive mustache, Voldar was never a serious threat. The low point was when he and his goons mistook Dropo for Santa.
Too high: Bloodlust! Robert Reed et al were constantly at a disadvantage against Knock Off Vincent Price Wannabee. It was only the intersession of the Vengeful Lackey that kept them from becoming stuffed and mounted.
Too low: Pitch, the effete little demon man of delicate digestion. His prancing was no match for the simple virtues of good little Lupita.
Too high: I was going to put St. Nicholas the all-knowing here, but he got trapped in a tree by virtue of a not-notably large dog. Instead, I will go with the other red man with a big S. Who knows what other lactose-related tortures he subjected Pitch to once he returned to hell? That and the whole “the embodiment of death, destruction and disease” ordeal.
maybe…but i still believe that if the assault force had stuck to marching up Castro’s driveway they could have hung out at his place dining on coffee and beans while the army was looking for them. THEN when Castro comes home for the night they lock him out and agree to only let him in if he surrenders. then, in case he double crosses them, Coleman backs up Castro’s crapper.
Hmmm…
Too High: “Phase IV”. On humanity’s side, we have one competent scientist, one deranged scientist and one traumatized young woman. On the other side, tiny, highly intelligent creatures that can foul up the humans’ technology, outnumber humanity, and have near-incomprehensible plans. Result: insect overlords.
Too Low: “Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster”. One rather small secret army and a second-string kaiju vs. Godzilla. It’s Godzilla, all the way.
Too High: “Creeping Terror”. A slow-moving, ungainly, easily-avoidable alien device against people who are truly too stupid to live.
Too Low: “Cry Wilderness”. If you consider the escaped tiger the villain, he’s captured pretty easily. If you consider the brutal hunter Hicks the villain, he does almost nothing bad then he gets his eyes clawed out. If you consider young Paul to be the villain…well, he’s actually pretty destructive, on reflection.
Too Low: THE THING THAT COULDN’T . . . WHOOPS, HE DIED
Too High: GORGO, THE GIGANTIC INVULNERABLE KAIJU WHOSE MOM IS EVEN MORE GIGANTIC AND INVULNERABLE, PLUS SHE IS NOT INTERESTED IN TAKING ORDERS FROM ANY SIX-YEAR-OLD KID IN STUPID SHORTS
Too High: Kitten With A Whip.
John Forsythe, one-on-one vs. Ann-Margret, exactly half his age? You’ve GOT to be KIDDING me, Pyle.
Also Too High: The Space Blob in “Space Children.” That thing could have taken over the whole beach, subdivided it into lots, and put up beach cottages. Maybe Peggy Webber could have kicked its fat lngblflongrt, if they’d turned her loose. Also, the Space Blob looked way too much like this year’s World Cup trophy.
Too Low: Gary Lockwood in the “Magic Sword.” Did anyone watching this ever think for one second that Sir George, from the first moment he appeared on screen, wasn’t going to get the babe, the sword, the cash, all his dead buddies wouldn’t count to fifteen and become new guys, and wouldn’t defeat each and every assemblage of styrofoam and papier mache that they threw at him? To quote “Big,” “Where’s the fun in THAT?”
Jackie Coogan’s shorts kept the almighty blob in check. probably would have actually gotten Ann out of town too. just sayin’.
I’ll give the topic a whirl, out of respect to the writer/director of “Street Fighter: the Movie”: :)
Hoo-boy, gotta side with this one:
What makes the movie such a slog to get through is that the “challenge” level is so high, the filmmakers likely didn’t even intend Forsythe to win out in the end, but just exploit 50’s-60’s generation-gap delinquency fear-buttons, as a sort of prolonged torture-porn “Fatal Attraction Meets Bye Bye Birdie”.
Like walking into Harlem at night, armed only with a Mantovani record.
(Technically, Hanks’ quote about Skyscraper Transformers wasn’t about “Lack of challenge”, it was about “What about this adult boardroom-created marketing idea would have any remote appeal or entertainment for kids?”
And I only bring that up because A) I hate to see a good iconic movie-quote misquoted into culture, and B), that was the exact same movie scene, verbatim, that was going through my mind watching the first Fantastic Beasts movie–Yeah, that’s right, Warner, we don’t want Harry Potter or Hogwarts, let’s spend two hours in grimy 30’s New York offices with Doctor Who chasing a CGI platypus…)
—
As for Low Challenge, even despite Weapons of No Use, Phantom of Krankor at least looks the part of a good Villain Meanie (or at least like that bad guy from the old Rainbow Brite cartoon), but what exactly did Batwoman’s Ratfink do that was supposed to be “threatening”? Dress up as Mr. Sluggo, hire some low-loyalty goons to kidnap girls and then drug them with hot soup?
No wonder Batwoman seemed to look bored as a superheroine for most of the movie, and treats defeating the villain like a receptionist asking a complaining customer to leave the office.
If it were possible, I’d give this comment a million “likes”.
Low CR: It doesn’t take much of a hero to defeat Cleolanta’s henchmen in “Crash of the Moons”. They’re not only bumbling in immediate action, they do dumb stuff like installing ladders right next to the front door to provide hiding places for anyone wanting to ambush the guards.
As for too high, I’d have to agree with “Teenagers from Outer Space.” Derek doesn’t get a tingle in his trousers and southern California is one giant lobster ranch. I guess it’s not the only time raging teenage hormones screwed up a good situation.
Too low: The Beast of Yucca Flats. Despite the name, he’s just a very large, very slow man, and gets taken out almost immediately once actually confronted.
Too high: Gamera vs. pretty much everybody. Gamera’s powers seem to include flight, fire breath, and getting his ass handed to him repeatedly until it’s time for him to win. As Joel said about the fire breath in Gamera vs. Zigra, “did he forget he could do that?”
Too high: all those Japanese movies where it’s Gamera or Godzilla vs. some other monster; the humans don’t have any chance against the latter, and are saved only by a “Monstrom ex Machina”.
Too low: The Brain That Wouldn’t Die; I know Dr. Bill is supposed to be deranged and all, but come on: he’s got Jan’s head in a pan, the rest of her is in a smoking wreck within walking distance of his family’s summer place, he’s trolling down the street in a convertible ogling every woman on the sidewalk, he’s gotten up close and personal with at least five other women in front of dozens of witnesses, and he’s just gone on a wacko rant about transplants in front of others. Plus he’s got a vicious home-made monster with a soggy butt in his inadequately secure closet in the basement. There’s no way it would not just be a matter of time before he’s toast. At the very least, in real life, the cops would’ve been at his door within a couple hours after finding Jan’s headless torso. After all, he forgot to get her purse . . .
Too Low: Because PRINCE OF SPACE is already hammered, let’s go with INVASION OF THE NEPTUNE MEN. Sure, the Neptunians run an impressive bombing campaign, but they lower their CR to naught by stopping to engage in hand-to-hand combat (at which they openly suck) and sending weird propaganda messages to children that require extensive deciphering. They’re so bad that Space Chef gets to sit out most of the movie.
Too High: THE TOUCH OF SATAN. Not even a Deus Ex Machina here. Satan wins effortlessly, the story (such as it is) is just luring another sucker into his pyramid scheme of damnation.
Too high: All the annoying kids in those Japanese monster/space movies. They have unlimited freedom to come and go as they please, even in highly restricted military, political, or scientific headquarters and in the most dangerous areas of battle. And no matter how much they screw up or how many people they endanger, the kids always come out on top.
One word:
[ . . . dramatic pause . . . ]
KEN!!!!!
Too high: All of the kaiju movies have been mentioned, so how about Starfighters? Regular pilots vs. the incredible flaws of the F-104 Starfighter. The mechanical failures of the notorious “Widowmaker”/”Flying Coffin” provide the only drama and the pilots prove little match for it.
Too low: Any number of movies, but the first one I thought of was Mighty Jack. The villains are made to be super terrorists who are unstoppable, but put up very little resistance to Mighty Jack, other than fooling their members with a couple of spies who are relatively quickly exposed and killed.
Too low: Wall-mounted guns. There’s no way to aim, so they could only work if the intended victim is standing in the right spot. And they are easily disabled — simply shooting at them causes them to burst in a pyrotechnic display of flame and sparks.
Too high: Paul vs. The Moon Beast. According to Longbone’s slide show (which eats), this has happened before, and you simply can’t fight your fate in becoming a Demon Lizard Monster (which I personally think is one adjective too many). So, it’s Johnny and his magical moon-rock arrowhead vs. Demon Lizard Paul, the end result of course being a psychedelic lizard dance and then an explosion.
Too low: C’mon.. nobody is gonna mention PumaMan? I mean, all he has to do is defeat Donald Pleasence, and he um… he..
…huh.
I meant – Vadinho! The bar is very low because Vadinho takes care of bidness.
Gare
Too High: Mr. B Natural, a shrill peculiar succubus against who’s spirit of music no child is safe.
Too Low: The Posture Pals, who thwart evildoers by standing straighter.