Movie Pain: Low - Slick direction on a slick 60's caper
Riffing: Chuckle-Fest
Skits: Chuckle-Fest with a brilliant closing bit
Pearl breaks the "stick of joy", and that means freedom for Mike and the bots: The final show ("sob") took aim at the adventures of a hip 60's super thief. Since I was fondly familiar with the character, I looked forward to hearing the guys quip away on this movie. The end results? Mixed.
While there were big laughs at the start - Such as Crow singing a lyrically bland version of the Diabolik theme song (as a matter of fact, Bill Corbett has some of the best lines through the first theater segment) it, unfortunately, tails off with mostly fair -and VERY bawdy- riffing the rest of the way.
Skits are okay (Servo blows himself up, several times). Great ending though, with the guys making it back to earth where, well, their lives don't change much. Not bad but not the bombastic classic I'd hoped for.
Final theater riff? "This has been the official biopic of Larry Fine" - Servo
Host Segments
Intro: The gang looks over the SOL employee handbook. Segment 1: Pearl breaks the controlling joystick so M&TB are free. Segment 2: Servo destroys his extra selves. Segment 3: New jobs for the Mads. Pearl will be dictator for life of Qatar, Bobo has a job at the zoo. But Brain Guy's future might not be as bright. Segment 4: Mike sings a song to soothe the scared Crow. End: The SOL crash lands on Earth and we learn that Gypsy's rich while M&TB are roommates who sit around watching bad movies. Stinger: "Is that stud coming?"
Notable Riffs
* "Just watching you film, don't mind me." - Crow as Ginko
* "Sophisticated, not gay." - Crow as Ginko
* "Each seagull has its own parking space." - Servo
* "Would somebody shut those howler monkeys up?" - Crow
* "Giant robotic Sea-Horses!" - Mike
* "Never start a movie in the middle of a spin cycle." - Mike
* "I must agree by the way, 'Dee - Dee - Da', absolutely." - Crow
* "Do something affirmative, Roger" - Crow
* "She's a GREAT Samaritan!" - Crow
* "I hurl my skinniness at you!" - Mike as Diabolik
* "I must remember to have my face re-sharpened." - Crow
* "I was cleaning the erasers." - Servo as Valmont
* "He's on the David Cassidy workout program." - Mike
* "The box of men got out" - Crow
* "I'll bulge my eyes at you!" - Servo
* "He's a golden Gumby." - Mike
* "Did she get stuck in a bear's behind?" - Crow on Eva
* "Invest me wisely."- Mike as Diabolik
* "Driving out to the store! Gonna pick up some bread! Maybe stop by the Post Office! Meet Deloris for lunch, hope they're serving that ham..." - Crow, singing the Diabolik theme
Crawling Eye on TV
* "The Crawling Eye: The Marty Feldman story!" - Servo
* "Oh Forrest Tucker, he's the guy who makes sure the tree's shirts are tucked in." - Mike
Riff Explained
"Oh my, the 2 Fat Ladies have their own motorcycle gang now." - Mike
A popular BBC cooking show. The 2 fat ladies were filmed traveling around on a motorcycle with a sidecar, preparing dishes across the land
"Woa, Dr. Phibes is drunk again" - Mike
In the strange 1971 film The Abominable Dr. Phibes, Vincent Price is the title character who often played a huge pipe organ.
"Reginald Perrin's on that train" - Crow
References yet another BBC TV show; which told the story of a man in the grip of a mid-life rut, who rode the same train to and from work 5 days a week.
Diabolik is a popular Italian comic book series, which was created by sisters Angela and Luciana Giussani in 1962. The women based their character's appearance on actor Robert Taylor, and the action on paper was more violent than that seen in the film (Diabolik has no qualms about killing criminals). There are some American adaptations available if you're interested in checking them out.
To date, I've been unable to find anything that makes me laugh as hard as this show did. I miss ya MST3K, It was a great run. Thanks for making life a lot of fun!
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Released on DVD: Volume 39 (XXXIX)
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