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Mystery Science Theater 3000 is an American science fiction comedy film review television series created by Joel Hodgson. The show premiered on KTMA-TV in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on November 24, 1988. It then moved to nationwide broadcast, first on The Comedy Channel/Comedy Central for seven seasons until its cancellation in 1996. Thereafter, it was picked up by The Sci-Fi Channel and aired for three more seasons until another cancellation in August 1999. A 60-episode syndication package titled The Mystery Science Theater Hour was produced in 1993 and broadcast on Comedy Central and syndicated to TV stations in 1995. In 2015, Hodgson led a crowdfunded revival of the series with 14 episodes in its eleventh season, first released on Netflix on April 14, 2017, with another six-episode season following on November 22, 2018. A second successful crowdfunding effort in 2021 produced 13 additional episodes shown on the Gizmoplex, an online platform that Hodgson developed which launched in March 2022. As of 2023, 230 episodes and a feature film have been produced as well as three live tours.
Crow The Robot is a fictional character from the American science fiction comedy television series Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K). Crow is a robot, who, along with others, ridicules poor-quality B to Z movies.
Tom Servo is a fictional character from the American science fiction comedy television show Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K). Tom is one of two wise-cracking, robotic main characters of the show, built by Joel Robinson to act as a companion and help stave off madness as he was forced to watch low-quality films. At least during the Comedy Central era, he was somewhat more mature than his theatre companion, Crow T. Robot. Tom, more often than the others, signals the need to exit the theater to perform host segments.
Coleman Chambers Francis was an American actor, writer, producer and director. He was best known for his film trilogy consisting of The Beast of Yucca Flats (1961), The Skydivers (1963) and Red Zone Cuba (1966), all three of which were filmed in the general vicinity of Santa Clarita, California.
Extra Terrestrial Visitors is a 1983 science fiction film directed by Juan Piquer Simón. The film's original draft was meant to be a straightforward horror film about an evil alien on a murderous rampage, but the producers demanded script alterations in order to cash in on the success of Steven Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial by featuring a child and a cute, lovable alien.
Girls Town is a 1959 American drama film directed by Charles F. Haas and starring Mamie Van Doren, Mel Tormé, and Ray Anthony. Paul Anka also appears in his first acting role. Van Doren stars as a juvenile delinquent who is sent to a girls' school run by nuns, where she finds herself unable to help her sister. The film capitalizes on the 1950s rebellious-teen exploitation films, with catfights, car races, music from Anka and The Platters, and sexy outfits.
Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders is a 1996 American fantasy horror film written and directed by Kenneth J. Berton.
Henry Jamison "Jam" Handy was an American Olympic breaststroke swimmer, water polo player, and founder of the Jam Handy Organization (JHO), a producer of commercially sponsored motion pictures, slidefilms, trade shows, industrial theater and multimedia training aids. Credited as the first person to imagine distance learning, Handy made his first film in 1910 and presided over a company that produced an estimated 7,000 motion pictures and perhaps as many as 100,000 slidefilms before it was dissolved in 1983.
"Bart the Lover" is the fifteenth episode of the third season of the American animated television series The Simpsons. It first aired on Fox in the United States on February 13, 1992. In the episode, Bart, playing a prank on his teacher Edna Krabappel, responds to her personal ad as a man named Woodrow. In the subplot, Ned Flanders asks Homer to curtail his swearing, so Homer starts using a swear jar.
Mr. B Natural is a short sponsored film produced in 1956 by Kling Film Productions for the C.G. Conn Company, directed by Phil Patton. It is also the name of the film's main character, played by Betty Luster.
The Corpse Vanishes is a 1942 American mystery horror film starring Bela Lugosi, directed by Wallace Fox, and written by Harvey Gates. Lugosi portrays a mad scientist who injects his aging wife with fluids from virginal young brides in order to preserve her beauty. Luana Walters as a journalist and Tristram Coffin as a small-town doctor investigate and solve the disappearances of the brides. The film was produced and distributed by Monogram Pictures, and was reissued in 1949 by Favorite Films Corporation.
Progress Island U.S.A. is a 1973 short subject film directed by Jorge Delgado and made by the Puerto Rico Economic Development Administration to promote the burgeoning U.S. Commonwealth.
Santa Claus is a 1959 Mexican fantasy film directed by René Cardona and co-written with Adolfo Torres Portillo. In the film, Santa Claus works in outer space and battles with a demon named Pitch, sent to Earth by Lucifer to ruin Christmas by killing Santa and "making all the children of the Earth do evil".
Future War is a 1997 American direct-to-video science fiction film about an escaped human slave fleeing his cyborg masters and seeking refuge on Earth. It was lampooned in a 1999 episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000.
The Chicken of Tomorrow is a 1948 documentary short film about advances in chicken farming. This mini-documentary was narrated by Lowell Thomas and is in the public domain. The film was sponsored by Texaco.
For nearly 150 years, Gilbert and Sullivan have pervasively influenced popular culture in the English-speaking world. Lines and quotations from the Gilbert and Sullivan operas have become part of the English language, such as "short, sharp shock", "What never? Well, hardly ever!", "let the punishment fit the crime", and "A policeman's lot is not a happy one".
High School Big Shot is a 1959 film starring Tom Pittman, in his final film role, as Marv Grant, a smart high school student whose plans for getting a college scholarship are threatened by his alcoholic father played by Malcolm Atterbury, and his relationship with the most popular girl in school. Filmed in 1958 under the title Blood Money, it was released by executive producer Roger Corman as a double feature with T-Bird Gang in his first Filmgroup release.
Teen-Age Crime Wave is a 1955 American juvenile delinquency film noir crime film directed by Fred F. Sears and starring Tommy Cook and Molly McCart. It was released by Columbia Pictures. The plot concerns a pair of delinquent teens who go on a statewide shooting spree after escaping from reform school.
Assignment: Venezuela is a 1956 American short sponsored film. It is a fictional travelogue designed to promote working in the oil industry in Venezuela. It was directed by John H. "Jack" Tobin and is part of the Prelinger Archives, available in the public domain. It was made into a Mystery Science Theater 3000 spoof in the 1990s.
References
- 1 2 Oakes, Brian (2010). "Building films for business: Jamison Handy and the industrial animation of the Jam Handy Organization". Film History. 22 (1): 95–107. doi:10.2979/fil.2010.22.1.95. S2CID 192073563.
- 1 2 Levin, Donald (2006). "Reconstructing reality: The industrial film as faux documentary". In Rhodes, Gary D.; Parris Springer, John (eds.). Docufictions: Essays on the Intersection of Documentary and Fictional Filmmaking. McFarland. pp. 88–101.
- ↑ Morgan, Chris (2015). The Comic Galaxy of Mystery Science Theater 3000: Twelve Classic Episodes and the Movies They Lampoon. McFarland. pp. 157–8.