Hey, MiSTies! Heard about the Kickstarter, yet?
The only time where I went to a Kickstarter project and actually saw the numbers update in front of me.
Hmm. I'd be interested to know who "we" are. Who exactly of the original crew are involved with this? I recognised Trace and Kevin's voices on the video but what about the others? I notice under some of the pledge rewards it mentions "the new host," which suggests that Mike may not be involved. I think I'd like to know more about who will actually be writing the scripts before I can get totally excited.
And who is the new host? It sounds like Joel won't be doing it, which kind of makes sense when he was always a bag of nerves in front of the camera, plus I imagine he'll be too busy producing the show, but again no mention of Mike.
Also, how much of the money donated by the fans is going to be spent on the VIP premiere?!
I would guess, that they want a new host and new mad because if it's successful they want the show to run for a long time without recasting.
Do people want to see Mike hobbling around the Satellite of Love with a walker? Or Dr. Forrester in a wheelchair shaking his cane at the screen?
Well, of course the old fans would, it's the possible new fans who only want young and sexy people onscreen I'm thinking about. ;-)
And on a more positive note, I just visited the site and Yikes! Over $900,000 pledged in one day??? 8-o
How much do you want to bet they could get a lot of films from The Asylum?
It's definitely a good time for MST3K to come back, what with the current fad of making deliberate B-movies, like the Sharknado franchise. It'll be interesting to see whether modern movie producers will be happy to be MiSTed. Maybe it'll become the new in-thing, with producers clamouring to get their movies onto the show!
Well, you should probably create a folder for the new season as they passed the first goal and will make 3 episodes.
Will they make more? Good question. Donations seem to have dropped off considerably after day 1.
A lot of Kickstarters tend to have a decline in pledges after the initial flurry. There is often an eleventh hour surge from those on the fence, so I wouldn't be too worried.
you should probably create a folder for the new season
Maybe once it's definitely happening. I'm not savvy with how Kickstarter works, but presumably people who have pledged can still pull out if they change their mind?
Joel has done an interesting Q&A here where he explains that none of the original cast/writers has actually signed up yet, and also makes some interesting points to those complaining about the likelihood of a new cast.
Don't know if people who've pledged money can pull out or not.
he explains that none of the original cast/writers has actually signed up yet
Heck, when he introduced the new host he mentioned that Jonah hasn't actually been signed up yet. (I would assume they're waiting for the Kickstarter to end and actually have the money before doing that, but I'm not sure.)
Felicia Day (from The Guild and Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog) is set to become the new Mad, playing the daughter of Clayton Forrester. More info about that and the new voices for Tom and Crow here.
With only 17 days to go on the Kickstarter campaign, it does look like they might not make it to the full 12 episodes, though they might manage the target for six.
They passed the 6 episode mark.
Patton Oswald (who moderated the MST3K 20th Anniversary panel at San Diego Comic Con 08) will be the new Lackey.
He's supposed to be Frank's son.
I like his name: TV's Son of TV's Frank!
Looks like they'll probably make it to the nine episode stretch goal. But unless there's an amazing surge in pledges at the eleventh hour, a full twelve episodes isn't in the cards.
The nine episode threshold has been passed. At this point, getting to twelve episodes is doable. However, it's going to require a surge of epic proportions. So if you've been on the fence until this point, open up your hearts and your wallets. At the time I write this, they have forty-one hours left.
Apparently Rifftrax are now linking to the campaign, which might encourage a few fence-sitters. However, they need over $1m pledged in less than 2 days to get the final 3 episodes, which seems unlikely. But still, 9 episodes is good!
Couldn't they just do the 9 episodes and then do a new Kickstarter for the last three if they get good ratings and good reviews?
I imagine the logistics may be a bit too complicated to do that. With eighteen hours to go, they've past the five million mark after factoring in the contributions from add-ons. It'll be a nail-biter for sure.
14 new episodes! 8-o :-)
Final total from the Kickstarter alone $5,764,229. Nice eleventh hour surge. So does this break the Veronica Mars record?
Walking through the mall I realized they missed an obvious money-making plan.
MST3K Calendars
Pay $2.00 for a 3 month calendar, $3.30 for 6 months, $4.40 for 9 months, $5.50 for 12 months, and for $5.90 they'll give you a calendar with 13 months in a year.
;-)
Thought I'd start a thread for random musings on the upcoming Season 11.
Officially, Joel is not going to announce the movies they'll be featuring ahead of time. That doesn't stop us from speculating. Since they're partnering with Shout Factory, it seems reasonable that Joel et. al. will use movies they currently hold. Some of the more likely titles available through that avenue include Battle Beyond the Stars (because what's MST3K without Roger Corman), Swamp Thing, Message from Space, and Starcrash.
Battlefiled: Earth
It will air on Netflix.
Mary Jo, Kevin, and Bill will be making guest appearances as Pearl, Bobo, and Brain Guy. I'm guessing that Pearl will be helping her granddaughter move into her new facilities.
http://www.mst3kinfo.com/?p=22976
B*gg*r. I don't use Netflix, so that news is no use to me at all, and I object to subscribing to something just because there's no other way of seeing it.
Hopefully they'll be released on DVD eventually. I'm assuming that Shout will want to get some extra cash from the series.
Since Shout Factory is involved, the odds of a physical media release are practically certain.
The big question is will Bill shave his beard when he does his role as Brain Guy, or will he do like Caesar Romero as the Joker?
Brian Kelly: How much do you want to bet they could get a lot of films from The Asylum?
Not this season. According to Joel, the movies they'll be using come mostly from the Sixties, Seventies, and Eighties, with one from the Nineties. The Asylum was founded in 1997 and only got out one film before the new millennium started (1999's Bellyfruit). From the description I've read, it's not really suitable MST3K fodder, so I doubt it'll be their Nineties film.
A rumoured list of the episodes/movies is circulating. How accurate it is remains to be seen.
Episode 1: Reptilicus
Episode 2: Cry Wilderness
Episode 3: Time Travelers
Episode 4: Avalanche
Episode 5: The Beast of Hollow Mountain
Episode 6: Starcrash
Episode 7: The Land That Time Forgot
Episode 8: Hercules
Episode 9: Yongary
Episode 10: Wizards 1
Episode 11: Wizards 2
Episode 12: Carnival Magic
Episode 13: The Christmas That Almost Wasn't
Episode 14: At the Earth's Core
The Hercules film is supposedly the Lou Ferrigno version. 'Wizards' parts 1 and 2 is supposedly 'Wizards of the Lost Kingdom,' some sort of off-shoot of the Deathstalker and Barbarian Queen movies.
Starcrash is currently held by Shout, so seems to be a good bet. I've seen it before and it's the sort of movie that's meant to be shown on MST3K. I've heard about At the Earth's Core, but have never gotten a chance to see it. IIRC in the original novel Pellicidar is a place where clothing doesn't exist. The producers simply ignored this little detail and went with standard Hollywood Cave People clothing. While I imagine a lot of folks were disappointed at not having Caroline Munro nude for the whole film, there the consolation on not having to see Peter Cushing nude.
Gordon, At The Earth's Core was based on... At The Earth's Core. IIRC one of the later books is called Pellucidar.
Been a long time since I've seen it, but IIRC the movie was... okay... if I'm bored and flipping through the channels, I'd probably watch it.
The Land That Time Forgot is a much better film (although I do oddly prefer the sequel, The People That Time Forgot.) Looking forward to what they riff to the line "What wine goes with plesiosaur?"
Reptilicus... I think I liked this as a kid, but haven't seen it since.
Time Travelers... is that the pilot for a time travel series that didn't sell? IIRC they go back in time by going down a flight of stairs.
At the Earth's Core was the first Pellucidar novel. The eponymous, Pellucidar was the second book of the series.
The new series premieres on Netflix on Friday 14 April.
A countdown clock has been set up.
Netflix are making 20 classic episodes available as a warm-up to the new season's premiere.
Netflix has put up a trailer on Youtube.
Looks like the episode list Callie posted above may be genuine, as the movie that gets sent is clearly Reptilicus.
If you're like me (and I know I am), you pledged at a certain level that gives you an early online screening of the first episode. That screening occurs today. For those who go to a church that follows the lectionary, it could be seen as a treat for going through the extra long audience participation Palm Sunday gospel reading.
I've set up a topic at the top of this page for "Reptilicus" on the assumption that it will be episode 1, and will add further pages as soon as I have confirmation of the titles.
Also - *sigh* - I have succumbed and started a free month's trial on Netflix. If the new MST3K turns out to be really good, doubtless I'll keep the membership and pay six quid a month for the rest of eternity!
Looks like that episode list is 100% accurate. Only Hercules is called The Loves of Hercules, while the two Wizards movies are listed as Wizards of the Lost Kingdom.
Thanks, Gordon. I've now set up the full set of sub-topics - although even I have to hit F5 umpteen times to make them show up!
I hadn't realised that all the episodes would be released at once,assuming they'd come out once a week. The temptation to overdose is great!
I managed to get through all 14 episodes before my free month on Netflix ended. I almost wish that the episodes had been released one at a time, even though I would have had to subscribe to see them all. Perhaps I’m just an old fogey (shut up) but having them available in one hit – while financially convenient – was a bit of an overload, especially because I then had to go back quickly to do a second run-through while jotting down my favourite lines.
There were four episodes where I simply didn’t want to go back to do that second run: Hercules, Yongary and the two Wizards. I don’t think I had a problem with the riffing itself but there’s the thing: I don’t remember the riffing because my only memory of those episodes is that the movies were so bad that they spoiled my enjoyment. Obviously all the movies chosen for MST3K are bad but these were more awful than usual and so I was distracted from the riffing, and certainly had no wish to watch them a second time.
However, overall it was a joy to have the series back. I thought Jonah was a great new host and settled in immediately, and the ‘new’ bots were equally good even though I still can’t tell the guys’ voices apart. The Mads were okay, too. Sometimes I felt that Felicia was either trying a bit too hard or alternatively was going through the motions, but generally Kinga and Max were entertaining. Not sure about the unrequited love story, mind you.
It was also a joy – and often a surprise – to see how many celebs were prepared to get involved with the comeback. I just hope that their fees didn’t prevent the option of a 15th episode!
I didn’t understand the point of the bumper segments, and they became more annoying as time went on. Maybe they were just meant as a convenient point for viewers to hit the pause button and go for a pee, but I found myself grinding my teeth and thinking that if they’d left them out they could have included more of the movies instead of having some awkward cuts where major plot points were left out and either had to be explained to us by the hosts or just left us a bit bewildered.
Anyway, it was lovely to have MST back for a while. Hopefully the episodes will eventually be released on DVD because I’d like to see them again in due course.
Binging is definitely not the best way to experience MST3K. I've been pacing myself at the rate of an episode every Sunday afternoon. Since I already subscribed to Netflix, I didn't have the incentive to binge everything within a free month trial period.
Though I haven't seen it yet, the word I've been hearing elsewhere is that Hercules is the low point of the new series.
Regarding the bumpers, IIRC some Netflix Original shows have aired on conventional TV networks. They would make for a convenient point to stick in commercials.
Since Shout Factory (who handles the original series DVD releases) has been involved in the new series, a DVD/Blu-ray released is all but guaranteed.
Gordon, did it give you a thrill to see your name on the list of donors? I'll admit that, instead of fast forwarding to the stinger, I squinted at the end credits of the episode when the 'G' names of the Kickstarter donors ran but my eyesight is bad and I couldn't see anything resembling your name. Then it occurred to me that you may not have used that name anyway!
With 14 episodes to play with, Shout might do what they've always done in the past and release them in three sets of four discs, and then perhaps do some extras for the fourth boxset. Or I wonder whether they might start mixing individual episodes into future boxset releases like they do with the Joel and Mike episodes.
I was listed in the end credits of Beast of Hollow Mountain as Gordon L. (it's in the third column).
IIRC the Kickstarter add-on store had an option for an $85 DVD set. So I imagine they're going for a complete 11th season set while they still have rights to all the movies.
Season 11 comes out on DVD and Blu-ray this April.
https://www.shoutfactory.com/product/mystery-science-theater-3000-season-eleven
Oh, that's nice! It's good of them to release all the episodes at once; they could have cashed in by releasing them 4 at a time, with the documentary on the 3rd box. Kudos to Shout.
The documentary was lengthy and interesting, and confirmed that the corridor sequence is a model and not CGI.
Because all the episodes were to be released simultaneously, they had to record them in a rush, frequently filming two episodes in a day. I noticed in some of the footage that the actors were reading their lines from autocues, which is hardly surprising.