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I'm okay with my tax dollars paying for this
The website fatherhood.gov maintains a database of Dad Jokes.
Infinity Train: Book 1
Infinity Train was a short-lived Cartoon Network series, who for its second two Books was moved to HBO Max, then unceremoniously delisted from there, because WARNER BROS IS TERRIBLE. That's right: current Infinity Train right now can only be legally seen on DVD or from tapes of on-air recordings. This is what you missed. Contains minor spoilers.
Zelda Day 2023
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, like Breath of the Wild, has a secret experience system that doesn't make your character stronger, it makes the enemies harder. Here's 102 ways to kill a bokoblin in that game. If you got it for the holidays and want some tips, here's 10. How to send Link waaaaay up into the sky with just a fan and a plank, using Oriented Carryable Objects (OCOs). And here's TerminalMontage's speedrun cartoon, featuring Cucuí Ganon.
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: SANTA CLAUS CONQUERS THE MARTIANS
When we went through Cinematic Titanic, we passed over one episode to save it for the Holiday Marathon: their re-riff of Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. A weird conceit (the lives of Martian children are too regimented so they need Santa to break them out of it), the actors give it their all but the low production values have given it a reputation of one of the worst movies ever made. Among the actors in this are a young Pia Zadora as Girmar the Girl Martian, and Bill McCutcheon, who later appeared on Sesame Street and in Steel Magnolias, as the childlike Martian Dropo.
10th Annual MST Club Xmas Marathon!
This year we are holding our tenth annual (yikes) Christmas Video Marathon, at https://cytu.be/r/Metafilter_MST3KClub. The enormity of that number is not lost of us. From the noon (Eastern time) of December 22nd, and all through December 23, 24 and 25, that's 84 straight hours of irreverent Christmas comedy and specials, along with other fun things, all produced with the intent of giving you something to unwind to during stressful times. More information inside....
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Elon Musk
This week, Rudy Giuliani sued for defamation of two Georgia election workers, dinged for $148 megadollars, and went right back to repeating the claims that got him successfully sued outside the courtroom. The main story: Elon Musk, the good and bad. A bit of good (getting the big automakers to care about EVs), but a whole lot of bad. On Youtube (31 minutes). And Now: People On TV Do Not Understand This Holiday Dessert (fruitcake). And finally, this is the end of Season 10 of Last Week Tonight. There is a look back at some episodes, and talk about some stories that didn't happen because of the (necessary!) writer's strike. Thanks for watching along, see you when Season 11 starts.
That poor reindeer
Putting 31 volts through various holiday toys. (Youtube, 10 minutes)
He thought a good meal was one he could shape into a smiley face
Here is Uncle (6 minutes), a stop-motion short from 1996 by Adam Elliot. Elliot makes "clayographies," bittersweet and quietly funny stories about lives. Uncle had two direct successors, Cousin (1998, 4m) and Brother (1999, 8m). Here is an interview with Elliot about Uncle. Later on he made Harvie Krumpet (2003, 22m), Mary and Max (2009, clips + trailer: 11m; full movie [buy or rent] 1h32m), and Ernie Biscuit (2015, 20m). These are mostly all viewable, in much sharper detail, on Elliot's website, but they're harder to directly link to.
Special Event: Mystery Fandom Theater 3000: INVASION OF THE ANIMAL PEOPLE
Second of five fan-made episodes that seek to recreate a Comedy Central-era Mystery Science Theater 3000 experience. The movie is hard to explain... aliens in a round spaceship come to Earth and use a remote-controlled monster to kill reindeer and tear apart houses. There's also a lady they're harassing. Rifftrax covered this movie some 17 years later.
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Freight Trains
This week... a BBC anchorperson is caught flipping a bird to the camera for a brief moment as her broadcast begins. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson announces that the security camera footage of the House from Jan 6 he plans on releasing will have faces blurred to help protect them from prosecution for trying to overthrow the US Government. And Now: Everyone on CBS Mornings Wants To Fuck Meteorologist Jim Cantore. The main story is on freight trains, which were massively deregulated in the 80s so they could compete with trucking, but now it seems only a matter of time until another accident occurs like the one that happened earlier this year in East Palestine, Ohio. As John Oliver puts it, "Industry + Deregulation - Government Oversight = Episode of Last Week Tonight. And guess what guys: here we are." And it concludes with a new adventure on the island of Sodor, narrated by Matt Barry: fun! And the giant explosion it ends with is fun too. On Youtube (28 minutes)
Let's get ready to goo it again
Hello! It's been awhile
15 years in fact!
I hope you've been well
Me? I don't like talking about myself
Not directly anyway
The goo balls are doing fine
Better than that, they have a new game
Coming in 2024
WORLD OF GOO 2
I hope you'll enjoy it, I'll see you soon
Signed, the Sign Painter
15 years in fact!
I hope you've been well
Me? I don't like talking about myself
Not directly anyway
The goo balls are doing fine
Better than that, they have a new game
Coming in 2024
WORLD OF GOO 2
I hope you'll enjoy it, I'll see you soon
Signed, the Sign Painter
Special Event: Mystery Fandom Theater 3000: LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD
Mystery Fandom Theater 3000 was put together by some friends who loved the show and wanted to do something along those lines themselves. They hewed pretty closely to the original, in that they remade the Mike-era Comedy Central opening, complete with its audio and a few clips taken directly from it, but with different people playing the roles. The movie is extremely bad: it turns out that those Santa's Enchanted Village shorts with Stinky the Skunk and The Ferocious Wolf, that Rifftrax riffed in Santa's Village of Madness, have a secret backstory with those two characters! Come see the foundation of the K. Gordon Murray Cinematic Universe!
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Organ and Body Donations
This week... Henry Kissinger died at age 100. George Santos was expelled from the US House of Representatives for ethics violations. And Now: People On TV Talk About AI The Only Way They Know How (in terms of the Terminator movies). Main story: on organ and body donations, organs for medical use, and bodies for scientific use. Organ donations are wildly popular, with 42,000 yearly transplants, but with a waiting list of over 100,000 people, and with 17 people dying every day waiting for a transplant. Are there problems with the systems set up to handle organ and body donations and where they go? And could there be ways in which rich people manage to jump the line for a transplant? Hint: yes. On Youtube (32 minutes).
Special Event: Film Crew: GIANT OF MARATHON
We conclude our review of the four Film Crew episodes with another peplum, directed by Mario Bava and starring Steve Reeves as the hard-to-say Phillipides. This one's focus is more historical than the usual, with the events shown dating to the Medic Wars instead of the general mish-mash of places and people these movies usually give us. Wikipedia informs us that Bava was forced to reshoot some scenes when extra were spotted on camera smoking cigarettes, proving he's a cut above our usual grade of director. Also, this movie was actually considered to be pretty successful at the time!
Enjoy some humorous existential dread
The Amazing Digital Circus (Youtube, 26 minutes) is a computer-animated Youtube cartoon about a group of whimsical characters stuck in a whimsical VR world. They're all hugely dismayed by this fact and want to leave it please. In that way it feels a bit like social media. In a month it has gotten 147 million views. Meet the characters (1 minute). It was made by the talented Gooseworx, who also made Little Runmo (16 minutes, previously), a cartoon about a video game character who learns a little too much about the world they live in. CW: general disquietingness.
Turkey Leftovers
Mystery Science Theater 3000 is going a bit overboard for Turkey Day 2023, with 48 straight hours of episodes from both the classic era and recently-concluded Season 13! Starting November 23 at 9 AM Eastern time, and watchable for free on the show's official Youtube channel, on their official Pluto TV channel, on their Twitch channel, and on their bespoke streaming solution the Gizmoplex. Two full days of cheesy movies and humorous commentary from a human test subject and their automated mocking contraptions.
The popcorn preparation primer on every package of popcorn
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Dollar Stores
This week.... Fox Business asks Fabio for opinions on the Israel-Hamas war. The House passes a bill to prevent a government shutdown before the end of the year, but was also marked by multiple congresspeople insulting and even threatening each other. And Now: You'll Never Guess Where Fox's Pete Hegseth Went To College. (Princeton) Main story: Dollar stores, specifically Dollar General and Dollar Tree (which also owns Family Dollar), and how terribly they treat their employees. Dollar General has been called the worst retail job in America. Often a single employee runs the entire store at a given moment. The median Dollar General employee makes $18,352 a year. The piece finishes up with a trademark fake promo for a store called "Dollar Bucket." On Youtube. (22 minutes) Finally, an update on the New Zealand Bird of the Century poll, their sponsored bird, the pūteketeke, won the poll with over 22 times the votes that the second-place finisher, the kiwi, got. The organization that ran the poll was Forest & Bird, who are selling metal sculptures of the winning bird (with a removable John Oliver that can ride on its back) at the site metalbird.com. Last Week Tonight is off next week.
Special Event: Film Crew: THE WILD WOMEN OF WONGO
Possibly the most awkward of the four movies Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy riffed as The Film Crew, it's 1959's version of a crazy sex comedy. Mother Nature and Father Time muse on the situation of the island of Wongo, where the menu are ugly and the women are beautiful, and of Goona, where the reverse is true. In the end those of matching levels of comeliness are paired up, and 1959 societal expectations are upheld.
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: The Israel-Hamas War
This week... the main story is about the Israel-Hamas war, specifically about their leaders, "how they came to power, whose interests they do and don't represent, and what role they played in bringing us to this current conflict." Hamas undermined the efforts of the previous poltical party Fatah, which had been pursuing peace; and Netanhayu is currently widely reviled within Israel by those who blame him for the security lapses that allowed Hamas to attack, but has long had other very troubling issues, and currently presides over the most right-wing government in Israel's history. (On Youtube, 32 minutes) And Now: Rachel Campos-Duffy Really, Really Needs You To Know That Her Husband Was Once In Congress. Concluding the episode is an update over the New Zealand Bird of the Century election.
If the customer wants wheat toast, we simply flip the jelly pack over
Welcome, new grill trainee, to the Waffle House family! Today in this training video, recorded by Area Vice President Greg Hall, you will be introduced to the "Magic Marker System," the only approved method of "marking" orders at Waffle House, and is absolutely used in all of its restaurants really honest. It isn't at all what those heathens at Huddle House and IHOP would call "batshit insane." Ready? Let's begin!
Special Event: Film Crew: KILLERS FROM SPACE
We're in the final weeks of MST Club's ten-year mostly-weekly run, although we'll probably do other shows from time to time. Tonight's episode is the second Film Crew production (R.I.P. Mike Dodge), about a guy who's killed in a crash, kidnapped by aliens, then forced to aid them in their plans for world domination... which involves irradiated giant lizards. It's like the backstory to a kaiju movie.
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Abortion Rights
This week... Ron DeSantis claims he doesn't wear lifts in his shoes. Main story: the fight to preserve abortion access in US states. "[...A] truly horrible thing to have to add to the list of things that pregnant women are not safe to do. So it's now officially: ride a roller coaster, eat sushi, dye your roots, and simply exist in the State of Texas." It's on Youtube (23 minutes). And Now: It Was Halloween, And Local TV Hosts Did What They Always Do. And finally, New Zealand is having a poll to decide their "Bird of the Century," and Last Week Tonight is waging an "alarmingly aggressive" campaign on behalf of the Pūteketeke, a.k.a. the Australasian crested grebe. The website of their campaign is here.
Special Event: The Film Crew: HOLLYWOOD AFTER DARK
After Mystery Science Theater 3000, some of the performers/writers/crew (a lot of them filled multiple roles) moved on to other things. One of these projects was a series of riffing-related projects they called The Film Crew, with Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy. They did a few different things, and of them all the one that has best survived is a series of four direct-to-DVD movie riffs, done with a framing story and a sketch at a mid-movie break. This is the first, Hollywood After Dark, a.k.a. Walk The Angry Beach, starring later Golden Girl Rue McClanahan as Sandy, "stripper who aspires to become an actress but ends up being taken advantage of by the industry," sez Wikipedia. My how times haven't changed. While originally made for Rhino Video in 2006, the Film Crew disks weren't released by Shout Factory until 2007, and the character of "Bob Rhino," voice played by late MST3K writer Mike Dodge, had to be renamed to Bob Honcho. It's another MST-related project from MST Club.
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Chocolate
This week, on Not-Bill-Maher.... Republicans choose Mike Johnson to be Speaker of the House. Argentina failed to elect a President last week, with one of the two front-runners being Javier Milei, a self-described "anarcho-capitalist," but described as John Oliver as "a lot," and "a politician who workshops his ideas with his four dog." (not a typo) And Now: Dagen McDowell Seems Like She Was A Fun Kid. Main story: Chocolate. And the show is up front: "Are you going to make this weird for me?" Yep. Because the great majority of farmers who grow cocoa do not share in the profits of this $140 billion dollar industry. 60% of cocoa comes from Ivory Coast and Ghana, where most farmers live in extreme poverty. (On Youtube, 23 minutes) And Now: Local Law Enforcement Agencies Go All Out With Their Halloween Safety PSAs.
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: THE RATTLERS
It's the last of the 12 episodes of Cinematic Titanic (we have skipped one to save for Christmas). The movie: rattlesnakes in a mineshaft are affected by abandoned military nerve gas that causes them to start attacking people. I don't know, seems like a negative quality of a military nerve gas, to make its targets attack people, but then I'm not a military nerve gas contractor. Next week we'll start in on the four episodes of The Film Crew!
How was it possible for a group of trained people to put on such a flop
The evening of JFK's inauguration also marked the first (and last) episode of a new CBS panel game show, "You're In The Picture," hosted by the inimitable Jackie Gleason, with panelists Jan Sterling, Arthur Treacher, Patricia Carroll and Pat Harrington, Jr. The following week Jackie appeared in that time slot again, but without sets or a panel. He spent the entire time before a studio audience giving a improvised monologue about how resoundingly the show had flopped, as well as a story from his early career, while drinking booze-laden coffee. Both episodes are up at the Internet Archive. Thanks to StarkRoads for finding these! CW: guest misgendering for humor, cultural insensitivity typical of 1961 pop culture, and commercials.
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: McKinsey
This week... things that continue: the hostage situation in Gaza, the US House continues failing to elect a new Speaker, and New Jersey Senator Robert Menendez facing corruption charges. And Now: Some Things That Turn Stuart Varney On. The main story is management consultants McKinsey & Company, a gigantic organization that advises huge corporations and government agencies alike. They have a pretty high opinion of themselves, while keeping a low profile. "They are, without question, the go-to consultants for managers seeking justification for savage cost cutting[...]as well as a convenient scapegoat on which to blame it." (Duff McDonald, The Firm: The Story of McKinsey and Its Secret Influence) The episode finishes with a LWT-made "commercial" for McKinsey, who are "capable of anything, and culpable for nothing." The McKinsey segment is on Youtube. (27 minutes)
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: WAR OF THE INSECTS
a.k.a. "Genocide." In this Japanese-made horror movie, the bugs hate people. The bugs attack people. There's an atomic bomb involved too, that can't be good. Released on DVD in 2011.
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Food Safety and the FDA
This week... a cold open about the situation in Gaza. The US House voted out Speaker Kevin McCarthy, and replacing him won't be easy. And Now: Jim Cramer Is Totally Untroubled By His Haters. The main story (Youtube, 20 minutes) involves food safety and the failings of the Food & Drug Administration in ensuring it. And Now: Check Out The Sexual Tension Between Fox Business' Liz Claman And Charlie Gasparino.
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: DANGER ON TIKI ISLAND
Renamed for the Cinematic Titanic release from its original title, "Brides of Blood." The movie's plot is pretty crazy, involving radiation, a monster that requires sacrifices, dismemberments, and butterflies and banana trees turning into monsters. Released on DVD in 2010.
Those skeletons should unionize
Underlevel (itch.io, free but Windows only for now) is a game made in 48 hours. It's got silly and charming graphics, and it's a lot of Halloween-themed fun! You're the skeleton lord in charge of a five-level dungeon, but a knight has invaded your domain and means to destroy you! Rally your lollygagging skeleton minions, to both lead them to the safety of the downstairs and destroy as many of the gem-laden pots on each level as you can, before the knight gets to them first and smashes them to raise its experience level! If you can't play it (that Windows thing, argh), here's a playthrough on Youtube. (9 minutes)
Another Poll of Episodes
Does anyone still read these? We're doing another poll of favorite Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes! I'm not sure how we're going to use it this time, but it'll help pick out episodes rather than go through the entire show again, heh.
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Homeschooling
This week.... Kevin McCarthy is dumped as US Speaker of the House, and there are a number of troubling things about Franklin, Tennessee mayoral candidate and MAGA supporter Gabrielle Hanson. And Now: People On TV Share Increasingly Unhinged Conspiracy Theories About Taylor Swift. The main story has to do with homeschooling, which is rarely regulated due in large part to the efforts of the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDS), the "NRA of homeschooling." (On Youtube, 25 minutes) And Now: The Surprising Importance of Emojis on 'Divorce Court.'💦🍆🥒🍑
Giving to food banks effectively
Rick Beetham on Mastodon asked a local food bank for the best items to donate to them, and came up with a list of 20 tips. The comments also has useful info, including that it's better to donate directly to the food bank instead of through the grocery store (and that way you might even get a receipt for writing it off on your taxes), and that giving money is usually best, because food banks often can get discounts that are unavailable to donators.
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: THE ALIEN FACTOR
MST Club's quick jaunt through Cinematic Titanic continues. The movie's about aliens landing and attacking the residents of a small town. In the world of cinema, this appears to be a statistically significant problem.
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Prison Health Care
This week... the writer's strike is over, and it was successful! The show's been off for five months, and a number of things happened during that time (see inside). And Now: Local News Is Very Excited About What Week It Is (Fat Bear Week). Main story is about the woeful health care in US prisons, a shameful condition often belittled by the media. Yep, Last Week Tonight is back! (On Youtube, 19 minutes) And Now: Fall Is Here, And So Is Something Else (Pumpkin Spice Lattes).
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: EAST MEETS WATTS
a.k.a. Dynamite Brothers. MST Club keeps rolling with a martial arts blaxploitation movie. It's the first Cinematic Titanic DVD that was filmed before a live audience.
Let's get down to pigness!
Fact: if you open a pen of pigs with expected food at the end of a run, the pigs will dash down it to the food at high speed. Some pigkeepers in England decided to take advantage of this essential trait of pigness, and so they bring us LEAGUE OF PIGS, a series of charmingly over-produced pig racing videos, now beginning its epic tenth season! A few selections: the oval track, the most recent video, and a trickier idea to accomplish than you might at first think; racing through water; the most recently completed season and the first season, from two years back. hippybear made a post about the 9th season finals last month, but it turns out there's more fun to be had there!
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: BLOOD OF THE VAMPIRES
"Dad, where's mom?" Dad: (refuses to tell kids she's locked in the basement and is now a vampire) This is the last Cinematic Titanic with the original premise of being locked in a bunker and being forced to watch bad movies. The remaining episodes were all recorded live before an audience.
NES Strider was not programmed well
When people mention Strider, they tend to think of Capcom's flashy classic arcade platformer, with Strider Hiryu slashing apart fur cap-wearing robots with his plasma sword. Hardcore Gaming 101 has its history. The arcade game was a classic; the NES game, somewhat less so. It was extremely badly implemented, and not even released in Japan. Displaced Gamers' Behind The Code series currently has two videos about it, about why it displays garbage sprites (15m) and its awful physics (19m), which let you wall jump, but only with frame-perfect timing, and not even the right frame. It's rather technical, but I trust that you can fast-forward through the bits you're not interested in.
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: FRANKENSTEIN'S CASTLE OF FREAKS
Frankenstein's trying to set up shop again but it doesn't go too well. The Doctor is a bit hornier here than the typical Frankenstein movie; this episode has the "Breast Blimp," as a way to cover up some in-movie nudity.
The working name for Croönchy Stars cereal was "Stoopid Flakes"
The wonderfully-named Muptown Funk makes a couple of fairly new video series: The Muppets Deep Dive and Muppet History Lesson. They offer comforting and entertaining information on Rowlf, Lew Zealand, the Muppets' Lipton Tea Ads, Thog, Walter, Croönchy Stars cereal, Danny Trejo(?), and Fully Operational Automated Tony Bennett. (Avg length 10 minutes)
Red is beautiful. But red is difficult. PURE RED
Neil Cicierega edited a bunch of George Lucas and Panasonic-related Japanese things together into THE GEORGE LUCAS EGGSPERIENCE. (4 minutes)
No waka waka to be heard
Atari Archive, an excellent game-by-game video retrospective of the library of the Atari VCS (aka the Atari 2600) covers its infamous port of Pac-Man. (38 minutes)
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: LEGACY OF BLOOD
a.k.a. Blood Legacy or Will to Die. John Carradine, as shown in a video will, has left a mountain of cash to his descendants, but his servants will get it if they all croak. As you can probably guess, the rest of the movie resembles the sound of a marsh at sunset. Sadly a dog is among the first to go. This is Cinematic Titanic #4; #5, Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, we're holding off on until the holiday season.
"[T]he transformation of the internet into this shitty mall."
Ryan Broderick on The Verge writes on the possible end of the Googleverse. Mentioned: Usenet, Altavista, All Your Base Are Belong To Us, Myspace, AI, the sameness of recipe sites, Blogger, Google Reader, Perez Hilton and Anil Dash. Not mentioned: Google Plus.
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: THE WASP WOMAN
Roger Corman produced and directed this movie about a woman who's given wasp jelly to make her young, but also turns her into a violent bug person. Movies are products of their times, and this one certainly is so. Third in the series of Cinematic Titanic direct-to-DVD features starring many of the original cast of Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: THE DOOMSDAY MACHINE
China's working on a machine to destroy all life on Earth, for some reason. The military gets involved in a space mission to Venus to replace half of its crew with women. It turns out to be because when the machine activates, the probe can preserve human life on Venus. Implying that people will have to boink a lot for noble reasons is a prevailing theme of science fiction from the time. This was the second episode of Cinematic Titanic, released in 2007.
Special Event: Cinematic Titanic: THE OOZING SKULL
MST Club, or whatever you want to call it now, rolls on, with showings and descriptions of the 12 episodes they made of Cinematic Titanic! A short-lived riffing project with Joel, Frank, Trace, Mary Jo and J. Elvis Weinstein, in his long-awaited return to riffing! Their website has been taken over by scammers and their store no longer functions or exists, but it seems you might be able to watch some of them at certain free streaming channels, like maybe Tubi or PlutoTV? The Oozing Skull, like many Cinematic Titanic riffs, is renamed from the original title, which was Brain of Blood.
Mystery Science Theater 3000: THE CHRISTMAS DRAGON
"A Magical Journey to Save Christmas." This supposed kids movie opens with a kid's parents getting killed by a dragon. Merry Christmas! But wait, this is a fantasy world, with magic and dragons, do they have their own version of Jesus? In theme it can't decide if it wants to be Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings, but whatever it is it went straight to DVD. Joel, Jonah and Emily hatch a daring plan to escape from Kinga's captivity, but they'll need a little help from an unlikely source. We're at the end of Season 13, and with it we're once again at the end of our trip through all of MST3K. Please see inside.