Oh, sweet MST3K. How you whisk me away from the confines of an otherwise ordinary office and into a world filled with love, laughter, and robots. Volume XXIV of everyone’s favorite movie-trashing television series brings us a quartet of fairly strong episodes, and a couple of great shorts, to boot. We’re back to the comfortable balance of two Joel, two Mike episodes on this set also, though Sci-Fi-era offerings are sadly absent.
Here’s what’s for dinner! Turn down your LCD brightness (where applicable).
617 – The Sword and the Dragon
The way Jack Frost made me bust a gut, I was as ready as can be for this episode (which happens to be another offering of Russo-Finnish descent). It’s silly for sure, and certainly watchable, but it’s considerably more boring and not as sharp as ol’ Frost. Maybe it’s the general lack of hideous witches, little hallucinogenic mushroom men, and anthropomorphic houses, but something about this episode wasn’t as exciting as I had originally hoped.
Having said that, it’s still filled with tons of unexpected production value, featuring the oft-cited thousands of extras and colorful special effects and environments. It’s a pretty film with good commentary from Mike and the Bots that never actually crosses over into great territory.
310 – Fugitive Alien
This is an MST3K classic, thanks in part to its status as a Sandy Frank production (meaning, of course, that it hails from the Land of the Rising Sun). It’s in color and is certainly pretty watchable in comparison to a lot of the films on the show. The budget is obviously quite low, however, with the requisite awful special effects and some pretty hilarious dubbed dialogue; after all, as with the rest of these productions, it’s nothing more than a Japanese television series strung together into a faux-feature film.
The story goes something like this: a man named Ken, who is a member of the Wolf Raiders interstellar organization, is on a mission where he’s ordered to kill a child. He refuses and is punitively ousted from the group, who he later fights against while working alongside Earthlings on the spaceship Bacchus III. Exciting moments include Captain Joe’s puffy cheeks and penchant for untimely alcohol consumption, guns made of electrical tape, and The whole affair is dreadfully incoherent and quite humorous thanks to our SOL buddies.
318 – Star Force: Fugitive Alien II
“Star Force times two: Two times the action, two times the confusion!”
Get your tenperature rising with this encore of awful dubbed entertainment. This one’s just as good as the first (maybe better), featuring more Ken, more Wolf Raiders, and lots of drunken-looking Captain Joe moments. There’s also close encounters with a black hole and a self-destructing star.
I’m not even really honestly sure what happens after that, as it’s just so hard to follow the plot. Something about a visit to a planet and then a woman who looks identical to Ken’s mom… seriously. But it ultimately doesn’t matter, as it’s yet another sharply-written slam-fest for Joel and the bots. The host segments in this episode are also surprisingly good (specifically, the action figure commercial and a musical interlude). They pertain heavily to the film, which, in my opinion, generally makes for a better host segment.
624 – Samson vs. the Vampire Women
(Samson walks into the room wearing his costume) “I feel kind of silly… did I overdress?”
This movie is about a bunch of—surprise!—vampire women whose evil deeds are suppressed by none other than famed Mexican wrestler El Santo (translated Samson). There’s a bunch of movies that star this guy, but he’s inarguably one of the most ludicrous-looking protagonists in film memory. Equally stupid is the hilariously rigid dubbing, which, while an easy target, is tactfully ridiculed by the bots. Overall, it’s a very funny episode, though you have to enjoy less referential humor and more observational ridicule for it to appeal to you (some people don’t love it for that reason).
This episode also stands as Frank Conniff’s final episode with the show, a bittersweet farewell to another staple of the series. As such, the host segments aren’t exactly hilarious material, but rather they’re all means to that end (though Dr. F’s emotional song “Who Will I Kill?” is pretty classy stuff).
Special Parts
This release includes the usual array of short interviews and Ballyhoo-produced featurettes that we all appreciate, but it also features two full shorts as well, which is a nice bonus (even though one of them has already been available on home video via Rhino’s Shorts! Volume 1 collection). The bad news is, typically speaking, this insinuates that the episodes from which the shorts were derived will not be eligible for future release (likely due to rights issues), but nevertheless, it’s good to have the shorts.
Here’s what all you get with Volume XXIV in terms of extras:
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Two full-length shorts:
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Snow Thrills – This marks the first time I’ve seen this particular short, and it’s no disappointment. In it, we get to witness dozens of poor souls careening through perilous snowy sporting events as the Joel and the bots focus on the obvious risks of the activities on display. It’s more quick-hit humor than anything, but it’s still very entertaining.
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A Date With Your Family – This is a classic short that you’ve probably seen on a previous release. It’s hilarious, plain and simple—one of the best in my opinion. We’re treated to a formally-narrated walkthrough of a “typical” family’s dinner routine, with each character amicably referred to by their generic family role (i.e. “Sister” and “Father”) and a hysterically rigid set of recommendations regarding what should and should not take place during such a family event.
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Life After MST3K: Frank Conniff (11:33) – Fittingly, as this set includes Frank’s final episode, it also features his installment of Life After MST3K. Frank explains his time with such shows as Sabrina the Teenage Witch and Invader Zim, and how much he enjoyed being a part of them. He also expresses his longtime desire of finally getting a show of his creation to television. Ultimately, he reflects upon MST3K as a bright spot in his past and certainly the defining moment thus far of his career—and he’s okay with that.
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You Asked For It: Sandy Frank Speaks! (25:31) – Sandy Frank talks about his achievements as a salesman and how he from a simple bookkeeping job at a small Paramount distributor to an independent TV series producer and distributor. He also briefly touches on MST3K’s relationship with his work in a somewhat uncomfortable brush-off of the topic.
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Introduction by August Ragone – A mainstay of MST3K featurettes, August is back for yet another gushy but amazingly detailed traversal of the history behind Fugitive Alien.
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Lucha Gringo: K. Gordon Murray Meets Santo – This is an interesting exploration of the history of Santo, the famous Mexican wrestler who starred in the related film, Samson vs. the Vampire Women (Santo translated to Samson, of course). He apparently always wore his mask so as not to break character, and his son even took up the part later on.
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MST Hour Wraps (Fugitive Alien)
Four new hand-drawn lobby cards by artist Steve Vance
