MST3K (423)
423 - Bride of the Monster (w/ Hired! Part I) - I can't think of anything really off with this episode, but I just didn't find myself laughing much. This may not be the episode's fault. I had to stop the show in the middle due to a bad DVD-R. Tip: never, ever buy Fujifilm DVD-Rs (so far, I've never had trouble with Taiyo Yuden discs). This disc was so bad, the new dual layer burners in both my PC and my Mac couldn't rip it. I had to crack out Old Faithful -- the original DVD-R drive that came with my Mac -- to extract the data. This hour and half detour of frustration probably didn't help my experience of this episode.
This is the first Ed Wood movie I've ever seen. It wasn't that bad. The stock footage, the rubber snake, the bad stand-ins, and the beanbag chair octopus were fun. I'm thinking the "Worst Director Ever" tag is more of a loving nickname rather than a criticism. People enjoy his movies in an ironic way because of the unintentional bad acting and poor production values, but they do enjoy them. That's something that can never be said for Bill Rebane's monstrosity.
This movie is a MST3K reunion show of sorts. We've got Tor Johnson from The Unearthly, Bela Lugosi from The Corpse Vanishes and The Phantom Creeps, George Becwar from War of the Colossal Beast, and the nine-fingered Harvey B. Dunn from Teenagers from Outer Space. I bet this is a record, discounting sequels and Master Ninjas, of course.
Speaking of things we've seen before, Willie the Waffle, the wonderful, whimsical, wisecracking waffle springs into action to describe the horror of a world without ads. A Case of Spring Fever is still six years in the future for the guys, much as this apparently bothers them. Servo helpfully points out that this costume is from episode 317. What no one mentioned is that the device to see into Crow's mind during the dream host segment was seen way, way back in episode K19. In that show, Joel uses a device to watch Crow's first memory. We haven't had a KTMA repeat in a really long time. I think this one was probably accidental, though.
"You know, I thought being killed by an octopus was supposed to be peaceful." (6/10)
film d. Edward D. Wood Jr. (1955)
short p. Jamison Handy (1940)
mst d. Kevin Murphy (23 Jan 1993)
