MST3K (603)
603 - The Dead Talk Back (w/ The Selling Wizard) - A dull short and movie combined with only occasionally funny riffing and host segments. This is one of those episodes that I won't be able to remember anything about in two weeks. I'm not surprised to read that this film was never released when it was made and didn't see the light of day until 1993.
Yeah, some bands do have really long guitar solos at their live shows, don't they? I'm sure the Grateful Dead was even worse in this regard. It's kind of a one-note joke to occupy three entire host segments. Crow's Dead-ish solo lasts for an impossibly long time, just like a concert. Yep, that's amusing and true-to-life... can we move onto something else? I will offer my compliments to Andy LaCasse for the actual guitar composition. He really nailed that goofy-meandering-waa-waa Dead sound.
During the fake séance, a stool floats handily into Krasker's hands. Crow: "So, big deal! My stools float." When all else fails, go for a poop joke. I'll give 'em credit for this one: it took me a beat to catch it. Most of the rest of the riffing didn't do too much for me. I don't know if I'm out of practice at watching these things or if the guys were just off this show. I think they were just off. The poor source material didn't help.
Not a great choice for a short, either. It's just a really long ad for Budweiser freezers. Once you get past the amusing idea that these macrobrewers used to dabble in ice creamer freezers, there's just pitch after pitch for the wonders of '50s grocery technology. Plus, I'm still disturbed by that enormous scab on the saleslady's knee. Yeesh, thanks for the close-up.
This is also the infamous Rhino release marred by constant glitches. It wasn't quite as bad as I was expecting. There are probably hundreds of video glitches during the episode. Luckily, the vast majority of them only last for one frame. These are noticeable, but honestly not too distracting. There were only three major areas of bad video, found at 0:24:41, 1:04:08 and 1:23:19. Other than those bits, this ep is watchable; no worse than the dozens of fuzzy/hissy taped-from-cable episodes I've seen.
"The pizza dominatrix!" (6/10)
film d. Merle S. Gould (1957)
short p. Jamison Handy (1954)
mst d. Jim Mallon (30 Jul 1994)
[Real life managed to knock me off of my MST schedule for the last two weeks. An Xbox 360, three family Christmas parties and a funeral were the main contributors. It didn't help that I knew my next episode was both poorly regarded by fans and had a flawed transfer from Rhino. As soon as the opening theme started, though, it felt good to be back. I don't think I'll be able to get back on track within season 6, but I'll definitely recover by season 8.]
