COMEDY CENTRAL AND KTMA BASICS
Q: Who played what on the show?
A: In alphabetical order:
- Trace Beaulieu played Dr. Clayton Forrester and supplied the voice and puppetry for Crow T. Robot from the earliest KTMA days through the end of season seven
- Frank Conniff played TV's Frank
- Joel Hodgson played Joel Robinson
- Jim Mallon supplied the voice and puppetry for Gypsy beginning in episode 101
- Kevin Murphy provided the voice and puppetry for Tom Servo since the beginning of season two
- Michael J. Nelson played Mike Nelson
- Mary Jo Pehl played Mrs. Pearl Forrester
- Josh Weinstein played Dr. Laurence Erhardt and provided the voice and puppetry for Tom Servo in the KTMA episodes and during the first season, and supplied the voice and puppetry for Gypsy during the KTMA episodes
Q: What happened in the last Comedy Central episode?
A: In its final episode for Comedy Central, Best Brains tossed
the entire premise of the series up in the air: The evil Dr. F. was
forced to close his secret underground lair (known as Deep 13)
for lack of funding. He disconnected the Satellite of Love from its
tether and informed M&TB they would soon burn up in the Earth's
atmosphere. But Tom and Gypsy found a way to increase the SOL's power
and they managed to escape the Earth's atmosphere. They were hurled
into deep space, where a series of "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "Star
Trek" parodies took place (including a riotous segment in which Mike
was transformed into Captain Janeway from "ST: Voyager"). In the
final segment, the SOL reached the edge of the universe, and all its
inhabitants were transformed into pure spirit and happily floated
away. Meanwhile in Deep 13, Dr. F., in a take-off of the ending to
"2001," watched himself grow old, and, on his death bed, saw before
him not a monolith but a giant videotape, the label of which read
"The Worst Movie Ever Made." Dr. F. was then transformed into a star
baby, to the delight of Pearl Forrester. With that, the episode
ended, leaving all of the series' major characters (except Pearl)
utterly transformed, and permitting practically anything to happen
when the 8th season began.
Q: What was Gizmonic Institute?
A: It was the top-secret research lab where Dr. F. worked as a
scientist and where Joel Robinson worked as a janitor. The corporate
culture of Gizmonic revolved around inventing. Everyone who worked
there, including the janitors, were inventors. In fact, one of the
reasons Dr. F. chose Joel Robinson to send into space was because Dr.
F. resented the fact that Joel was a better inventor. During the KTMA
episodes, Dr. F. spoke to Joel from what was apparently a lab in
Gizmonic. But the inside of Gizmonic has never been shown on the
regular series (and has seldom even been mentioned -- except in the
theme song -- since early in season one).
Q: What was Deep 13?
A: It's a cavernous underground lair, located deep in the
sub-basement of Gizmonic Institute (it may be 13 levels below ground
level, hence the name, but that was never explicitly said), near the
Institute's atomic pile. "Deep 13" is not a phrase that is a
reference to anything, as far as we know.
Q: Why was Dr. F. living in Deep 13?
A: In episode 101- The Crawling Eye, Joel speculated
that Dr. F., fearing his rogue experiment would be discovered by the
management of Gizmonic Institute, fled from Gizmonic to Deep 13 in
order to continue his work. Dr. F. denied Joel's suppositions, but in
the same episode Dr. F. was overheard telling his then-partner Larry,
"No one can know we're down here doing this!" So we tend to believe
Joel's theory.
Q: Who were "The Mads"?
A: The Mads was a collective term for the inhabitants of Deep
13, short for the mad scientists (although Frank was really neither
mad nor a scientist).
