Guest: Bond, James Bond (closing thoughts)

So. I’ve decided that I like owning all of the Bond films. I get bragging rights, the information contained within feels like Miniature Film School, and even though I purchased the four volumes just after this neat-looking thing came out, I really like having them on my shelf, sandwiching the two Evil Dead Necronomicons with the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

I’m going through all of my reviews right now, in order to keep the byline consistent, and besides a bunch of typos, I’m noticing that this marathon turned me into a dick. I’m so angry. And it’s true, I give films a lot less leeway now. There’s shit I can no longer abide. For instance, I watched Garage Days recently and that film used to make me laugh a whole lot more. Now it seems… kinda lame. It’s saddening.

But back to Bond.

What I learned: formulating opinions is hard! I don’t know how critics do it. Sitting through film after film is one thing, but writing a clear article expressing an open-ended opinion is something quite different, and I for one am not clever enough to think of title-puns (ex. “Matchstick Men Flickers Faintly but Fails to Ignite,” or “Michael Clayton Should Be Disbarred for the Third Act”). Srsly.

I actually finished a long time ago. The lag came from ‘Oh Jesus I have to write something about it. Octopussy, hmmmm, it was so bland that I forget how I felt about it, what the hell?’

It got pretty grueling somewhere in the middle, not so much the movies but the special features. I had to watch Die Another Day a total of four times in a row, the fourth because I wasn’t aware of the trivia track option until I already watched the film with the commentary tracks; torture (blah blah edge of madness) for any 00 agent. And then I had to decipher my stupid notes and write down my stupid thoughts. I have a greater respect for the profession, and of course for ‘rex who also expressed this feeling during that whole MST3K thingy.

There is a fine line between criticism and bitching, and I still haven’t learned where it is drawn.

DVD Special Features:

After putting a disc in and watching the well-done trailer for the Bond Collectors Set, you’ll notice the cool menu designs. Well, design, they remain the same on each disc (except for Casino Royale). Every feature is nicely organized into different submenus that get their own blip of music from each specific film.

This bit of care actually got me a little excited after finishing the films and the commentary tracks, even though I was getting into what was basically information I could read on the IMDB trivia pages. There are some bits of gold in there, like this one thing in Live and Let Die's second disc showing Roger Moore playing Bond in a short SNL style skit, back when Connery had the official role. It’s hysterical.

Included on all second discs are “cliff notes” for Bond films, in the Mission Control submenu, illustrating best-of clips from each of the films. I hate Mission Control. Maybe if they had collected clips from all of the Bond films as a sort of illustrative montage, but no, “Here are scenes from the film you just watched three times.” Way to pad the DVD, fuckles.

Not that it matters, but You Only Live Twice’s photo gallery presentation is awful, matching the quality of the film, shrinking the images onto a badly designed sci-fi frame. YAY?

Where it starts to get a little weird is towards the end, at Die Another Day. The design remains consistent, but submenus are missing, which leads me to believe that none have been specially made for this set, but taken from the initial 2-Disc DVD release. That’s okay, I don’t need to hear the filmmakers endlessly convincing themselves and everyone around them that the hang-gliding sequence looks realistic. Because it doesn’t.

I’m disappointed that Casino Royale has no commentary track. I really wanted to hear what Martin Campbell had to say about this one. Though he remains largely quiet during GoldenEye’s track; his personality reminds me of David Fincher -- someone who doesn’t really like talking about why he does what he does, so unless somebody else is in the room with him and drawing him out of his shell, you ain’t gonna hear much outside of “I like how this part came out.”

Scene-It: James Bond 007 Edition: Mini-Mission

More like Extremely Mini-Mission. There are twenty sample questions from the full game, not enough to validate all of this time and effort, if I had needed it. I did get three wrong, however. The difficulty ranges from ‘that’s so easy’ to ‘how the fuck do they expect me to remember that bitch’s name?’ Yes, I know they’re all puns. And I hate them.

Cold Movie Stats:

Bond skis: 5 times (6 if you count the cello)
Bond shot out of a torpedo bay: 2 times
Bond invents snowboarding: 1 time
Endings over water: 10
Deadly fish usage: 7

The Next Film: Quantum (?) of Solace (??):

I like Marc Forster. His style seems to fit well with whatever film he does. The action genre is new for him, so this will be interesting to see. My biggest worry comes from Daniel Craig stating in an early interview that the film would be returning to the ‘tongue-and-cheek’ style of the Roger Moore era stuff. God. GOD. Why do they do this? Why do they refuse to keep with the serious style? That phrase now strikes fear in my heart. I want my genitals to be tied into bows and pulverized with a knotted rope, not lightly smacked with a carpet beater while being asked if it’s being done too hard. Man. Man.

Going with the pattern, the film will:
1) Not be as good as the previous entry
2) Possess the distinct possibility of being awkwardly shot and clashing with the Bond style set by the previous entry

If Craig sticks around for a third or more:
3) The third entry will be an improvement over the second, either a vast one or a miniscule one
4) tricks and rehashes will be pulled and used to nobody’s chagrin
5) diamond smuggling will be introduced OR Bond will go to Asia, thus ruining the spread
6) Craig will stick around one too many and live to regret it.

After that, the franchise will be reinvented once more for the new generation. By that time, they had better hope that Martin Campbell hasn’t been tossed into a smoke stack from a helicopter.


While plenty of people do it better, the Bond Series is a good franchise for its rare moments of brilliance. I guess.

Now when is Felix Leiter going to get his own?

MST3K (closing thoughts)

One year ago, I asked in my opening thoughts: "Does MST3K have legs? Will it be funny in the future? Or, when I try to show episodes to my future kids in 2018, will they force me to turn it off?" The answer: yes and no. What I suspected before beginning this project turned out to be true: MST3K was an uneven show. As I watched the episodes in production order, I noticed that it wasn't uncommon for one of the best to be followed by one of the worst. Before watching any of the episodes I hadn't seen before -- which was most of them -- I never knew if I was going to be laughing loudly or fighting sleepiness. A graph of my ratings for each episode shows the seismic-like peaks and valleys of my opinion of the show's run. The x-axis is the episode number (1-195, AKA K04-1013) and the y-axis is my rating.

As a general rule, the show improved over time. The black, angled line is the trend in my ratings. Starting around a rating of 6, the show ended somewhere north of 7. Still, later seasons were in no way immune to bad episodes, even if the later shows were less of a comedy crap-shoot.

But, will the show be funny in the future? It already is the future, as far as a show canceled nearly eight years ago that began life nearly two decades ago is concerned. As I found it funny more often than not, the short answer would be: yes, it's funny in the future.

The long answer: likely less humorous as more years go by. The show's reliance on pop cultural references will slowly make a portion of the jokes incomprehensible to future viewers. Any references lost to the viewer are essentially holes in the riffing. This can have a serious impact on how funny an entire episode seems to you. I found that the best MST3K episodes would get some comedy momentum going. The episode would build from belly laugh to belly laugh, never letting too much time pass before another good zinger arrived. If enough of those zingers were references to decades-old pop culture that merely whizzed over your head, you're going to lose that momentum of laughter. You'll end up spending as much time scratching your head in puzzlement as you will laughing. That's not generally what people crave when viewing comedy.

I'm not saying that the show should've been created reference-free. It would've never had gained its cult following without its references. Obscure references that fans caught made them feel special. "Wow, they know about that? They're like me!" This was an important part of the show's early popularity, as seen in the interviews with fans in the This is MST3K special.

At any rate, my sense is that the show became less dependent on references as it went on. Many of Joel's episodes would upset me by harping on unrelated-to-the-movie famous people, or toys from the 1960s I can't possibly have fond memories of, or riffs about seldom-rerun TV shows canceled long before I was born. Mike's episodes didn't have this problem as often. In the interview with Mike and Kevin found on the 1003 disc in Rhino's Volume 5 set, Mike states that they really tried to keep the comedy as timeless as possible. I'm guessing his influence in this matter increased significantly after Joel's departure. My feeling is that the Sci-Fi era episodes will be more watchable to the crazy kids of 2018 than the Comedy Central ones.

Then again, I could just be sensitive to things "not of my time." This graph shows my average rating for each season in yellow, and the average year for the movies used in each season in purple. Outside of the KTMA shows, there's a disturbing correspondence between the average newness of a season's movies and the average highness of my ratings.

In my defense, before discovering MST3K, the bad movies of the 1970s and 1980s were always my favorite. I watched countless Troma and Full Moon movies in my youth and would often rent (or buy) movies purely because they had a stupid title. Perhaps like Boomers, who revel in the rubber-suited, visible-zipper monsters movies of their '50s youths, bad movies from the '70s and '80s are nostalgic comfort food for me.


Below is a graph showing how many episodes I watched per week. My schedule was relatively simple: I needed to watch 4 episodes per week for three weeks and then watch 3 episodes in the fourth week. Repeat that thirteen times and add one last episode to complete the series. In reality, I only managed to do this for first four weeks and the last five. Other than that, I was either trying to get ahead in time for a specific event, or slacking off.

Keeping at this thing until the very end wasn't as easy as it may sound. Watching 3.75 episodes per week doesn't sound like much, but, added up, the entire process ate into my free time quite a bit. Each episode was a little more than 1.5 hours long. After the episode, I would read its entry in the ACEG and then start writing my blog post. As pathetic as it sounds, it would often take me close to an hour to get one of these bits of fluff written and formatted. On a typical day in which I would watch an episode after getting home from work, I'd find it to be 8pm (and dark out, in the winter) by the time I was done... if I was lucky enough not to run into a dead DVD-R. Towards the end, I began watching episodes during lunch "hour" at work. This was probably the only way I was able to finish; I was plain sick of donating 2.5 hours of my free time to this thing every other day.

Undoubtedly, the slow but inevitable slide this project made from "play" to "work" affected my enjoyment of certain episodes. Some that I gave low ratings to I'll certainly give another shot; I haven't closed the book on too many of them, despite what I may have said here. But not for a while.


I was going to follow this project up with a more relaxed "MST4K Chronocinethon." In that, I was going to watch Mike's Legend Films commentaries, Star Wait, Cheap Seats, and all of the RiffTrax and Film Crew releases. That ain't gonna happen anymore. I'm all riffed out at the moment. As well, Mike's RiffTrax releases are coming out way too damned often. I just don't have the energy to buy the track, buy/rent the DVD, rip the DVD, convert the track and the audio from the DVD to WAV, carefully merge the track with the audio from the DVD, render the resulting audio file, convert it to AC3, throw it all in DVD Studio and burn a DVD-R -- all once a week. I can't be dedicating that much time to such a thing at this point in my life.

Also, I hate to admit, I don't think I'm really behind the idea of "more riffing from the MST3K guys!" anymore. Even before I read this interview with Trace Beaulieu by Quick Stop Entertainment, I'd come to a similar conclusion about the idea:

QS: How do you view things like Mike’s RiffTrax project, or The Film Crew? Have you ever felt the urge to do something like that again?

BEAULIEU: Not riffing. Not movie mocking or anything like that. Joel and Josh and I did a little thing… what was it… Star Wait… And we were riffing on footage that a guy had shot of these Star Wars fans waiting for the movie to open. At first it was kind of weird being back with Joel and Josh and mocking something. That had its own strangeness to it. But I realized that without that character, I really didn’t have a reason to mock anything. I actually kinda like stuff. People have talked about, “Oh, you know you should do that again.” It’s like, “Well we did it.” I mean, that’s kind of why I left, was like, “I got it. I did that thing already.” And I haven’t seen what Mike and those guys have done.

Again, I hate to say it, but a part of me kind of feels bad for Mike. I feel like this talented comedian has gotten himself stuck on the SOL all over again. He's already done that. He's already been there. The ending of 1013 was supposed to be funny, not a curse. I feel like Mike's been typecast as "that movie riffer guy" and this is the only creative avenue open to him. I dunno. Maybe I'm way off and riffing movies again is like going home for him. I guess I'd just rather see the guy working on new and different projects with that creative noggin' of his, is all.


And, finally, what of my answer to the eternally controversial question: which host was better? Easy. It's Joel.

This may seem like an odd choice, given all the praise I've heaped on the Sci-Fi era and Mr. Nelson above. Before starting this project, I was much more familiar with the Sci-Fi episodes. Those, I had been taping from the reruns and watching randomly. That's the era I was most comfortable with going into this thing. Looking back, my ratings for the Mike seasons were generally higher than those for Joel years. Of the 7 episodes I rated a nine (my highest MST3K rating), I gave 5 of those Mike shows. Mike's clearly a better actor, too, with a confident screen presence and impeccable comedic timing.

But, none of that really matters when picking a favorite. I just liked Joel's personality better. His credo says it all: "I'm weird and that results in creativity." Joel was bursting at the seams with ideas. He was the invention exchange man from the Gizmonic Institute. He gave us rainy day ipecacs and mixed drink recipes. He showed us what the bridge would look like underwater. He brought props into the theater and interacted with the screen. Who can ever forget "Joey the Lemur"?

I also like the less-than-polished aspect of Joel's show. In Joel's MST3K, Crow's net would randomly fall off and they'd roll with it. People could sneeze and balloons could pop and it wouldn't matter. The camera was simply pointed straight at the SOL's brightly lit bridge. No neon colors or fancy Dutch angles. It was what it was: a low-budget puppet show with bad movies and goofy sketches.

It was Joel, I'm sure, who was responsible for early MST3K's down-home feel. The KTMA episodes had the entertaining and intimate voicemails from fans. No host segment in the cable era could ever beat the one from K06 when a kid called to invite Joel and the bots to his birthday party and Joel responded by putting up a happy birthday banner on the SOL. The voicemail was eventually converted into fanmail, but those had their own charm. Joel would show drawings and photos people would send in, read their letters, answer their questions and hold contests to name a character from a movie or think of other ways to kill a giant monster. The show wasn't just this thing created in a vacuum by ascetic monks; it was just a couple of states away in Minnesota and you could write 'em a letter if you wanted.

Plainly put, Joel was MST3K's spirit. In the years that followed his departure, the show became more polished and the writing of the riffing improved, but it also lost some of its warmth.


My favorite episode for each season:

KTMA: The Legend of the Dinosaurs

The guys were at the top of their unscripted game by the time this episode aired, their final show for TV-23. It's funnier and easier to watch than nearly every season one episode to follow it.

One: Robot Holocaust

Having one fewer episodes of a crappy serial to bog it down, this ep just edges out 107 as my pick for the first cable season. A mush-mouthed villainess and a robot lobster were great grist for Joel and the bots' riff mill.

Two: Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster

The only giant monster movie I really liked, perhaps due to its lack of annoying children. Joel's "Space Madness" host segment is one of the best of the series.

Three: Pod People

The near-perfect marriage of a ridiculous movie with spot-on riffing and a bucket full of hilarious host segments. Joel's best.

Four: Manos: The Hands of Fate

Not a terribly original pick, but this episode is an example of MST3K at its best: it has the power to make an unwatchable movie watchable (something they tried and failed with during the Coleman Francis flicks). Also, Torgo is Mike's all-time best character (even counting Mike Nelson).

Five: Outlaw

An award-winning episode for a reason. I think the "Tubular Boobular" song may be my favorite from the show.

Six: The Creeping Terror

MST3K was made for this movie: an alien piece of carpet stalks and eats teenagers while occasionally having carnal relations with an auto. One of those great-bad movies that MST3K brought to my attention.

Seven: Laserblast

My kind of movie: a low-budget, '80s sci-fi/horror flick involving Charles Band. It also made for a great (almost) final episode for the show.

Eight: Space Mutiny

Hijinks aboard a spaceship/boiler room involving a multi-named, muscle-bound fraidy cat and a guy trying to push his face out of its skin. Mike's best.

Nine: Werewolf

It's real hard to go wrong with a Joe Estevez vehicle. Count the different werewolf makes for added fun.

Ten: Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders

Ernest Borgnine scaring his grandson with tales of murdered pets, abusive husbands and an old man in dire need of a shave and a haircut.

The Final Numbers

Total Length

13 days, 1 hour, 33 minutes, 30 seconds
(94 min average for 195 episodes)
(29 min average for 18 specials)
(3.6% of a year)

Years Spanned

1942-1995
(1966 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1936-1973
(1951 average)

Time to Watch

365 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

3941 days

Speed

10.8x

Total Episodes with Joel's Goatee

207, 208, 209, 307, 410, 1001 (3.1%)

Crow and Tom's Dead Brothers

XT-5000, Minsky, Destroyer

Contests

Name the Vegetable Guy
Name that Cool Thing We Never Showed Flying Outside of the SOL
Other Ways to Snuff Gaos
Kenny, What Gives?
Other Kinds of Nunchucks
What's a Sampo?

Black and White to Color Ratio

84:111

Joel vs. Mike

1795 days (4 years, 11 months) vs. 2109 days (5 years, 9 months, 10 days)
107 movies (98 unique), 36 shorts vs. 91 movies, 23 shorts

KTMA vs. The Comedy Channel / Comedy Central vs. Sci-Fi Channel

1 season vs. 7 seasons vs. 3 seasons
21 movies, 0 shorts vs. 128 movies, 56 shorts vs. 48 movies, 3 shorts
21 movies/year vs. 18 movies/year vs. 16 movies/year
1973 average vs. 1963 average vs. 1971 average
none vs. 5 Turkey Days vs. 1 pseudo-Turkey Day
none vs. 1 awards special vs. 3 awards specials

S'long, MST3K! Thanks for the year of laughs.

MST3K (season ten closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season ten.

Jason in a comment said that he thinks the crew found out about their cancellation during 1004. I can see it. The first three episodes of the season were very strong. I was hoping to see the show go out at a full gallop. When 1004 hit: averageville for the rest of the year. It was a bit disappointing, but understandable all the same.

I think this season's host segments were probably the worst of the entire series. Though, even to the very end I still looked forward to the break from the movie they provided, next to none of them ever got me to laugh. Also throughout the season, they kept throwing out implications that Brain Guy was secretly gay. I guess that -- given his prissy accent -- I can see how that idea came about. Still, this doesn't seem like MST3Kish humor to me (especially the host segment with the rest stop condoms from 1011). Then again, that tack worked pretty well for two entire characters on Arrested Development.

I really liked the movie selection for this year, though. Cheezy, 1950s-style horror movies were kept to a bare minimum of one. There was a return to the late-1960s troubled youth genre, which we hadn't seen in years. One episode was a daring experiment, which I appreciated. All but four movies were horror/sci-fi films from the '70s, '80s and '90s: my very favorite decades for bad movies. It was the season of MST3K riffing on the type of crap the Sci-Fi Channel normally plays late at night, anyway. In a strange way, that brings the show full circle to its roots at KTMA where they did exactly the same thing.

Next: closing thoughts for the whole series. But, first, I need a few days of distance. Luckily, camping this weekend will provide that.


The Numbers

Total Length

21 hours, 9 minutes, 55 seconds
(92 min average for 13 episodes)
(77 min average for 1 special)

Years Spanned

1960-1995
(1977 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1940

Time to Watch

24 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

161 days

Speed

6.7x

Attack of the Giant Chin

1001, 1004 (15%)

Attack of the Were-

-fish 1005, -mooninite 1007, -bat 1010, -spider 1011, -worm 1012 (38%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

2:11

MST3K (season nine closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season nine.

Similar to my feelings on season four, the guys are now humming along like a well-oiled machine on their new network. Instead of a pointless storyline, there's good variety in the host segments. The riffing feels like it's more than second nature to the trio in the theater (one-and-a-half nature, nearly). I'm enjoying their creativity in dealing with some of the over-long, unriffable credits. Pearl testing for pain leakage, Servo singing a song to himself, and abusing a cardboard cutout of Rick Sloane were all three thousand times funnier than making fun of a list of names.

It's getting harder to keep myself on schedule. In the early months of this project, my attitude was generally "I need a laugh, let's watch an episode." Lately, I approach most episodes with a sigh and a "let's get this out of the way." Watching MST3K has become a job, which wasn't unexpected but still isn't very fun. Once I get an episode started, things are fine. I fall easily into the groove of the show and approach it open to laughter. Werewolf demonstrated to me that I haven't lost the ability to really enjoy the show when en episode calls for it.

Luckily, having seen many of the episodes already, I know season ten is solid stuff. I'm looking forward to Joel, Frank and Mitchell all coming back, Ernest Borgnine scaring the shit out of a little kid and Gypsy starting her own company. Mostly, though, I'm looking forward to being done. Freedom!


The Numbers

Total Length

20 hours, 45 minutes, 35 seconds
(92 min average for 13 episodes)
(18 min average for 3 specials)

Years Spanned

1958-1995
(1975 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1957-1962
(1960 average)

Time to Watch

22 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

197 days

Speed

9.0x

British Invasion

901, 905, 909 (23%)

Attack of the Mutant Animals

904, 905, 907, 909, 911 (38%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

3:10

MST3K (season eight closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season eight.

It was a rough transition at the start. Was it the Sci-Fi Channel that mandated nine 1950s horror movies in a row to kick off the new version of the show? Or did BBI suffer from some poor planning or unlucky rights acquisitions and didn't have much of a choice in the matter? Whatever the reason, I wonder if put off some potential new fans? People who might've tuned in to check out this weird puppet show that SFC saved from oblivion could've gotten worn out quickly from the repetitive movie selection. Then again, I wondered the same thing after the KTMA season did a five-episode Gamera marathon. That didn't really hurt the show's future at all. Then again, the show wasn't canceled just two short years after that.

What's wrong with horror movies from the 1950s? Personally, I dislike them quite a bit. I might go so far as to dub the 1950s as the worst decade for cinematic horror. The transgressive nature of horror just doesn't mesh well with the most repressive decade in our recent history. Sure, sometimes it's interesting to see how filmmakers managed to sneak images and ideas past the censors, but that's not usually enough to survive the sea of "he tampered in God's domain" garbage.

As far as the show is concerned, I think '50s horror movies can work just fine. By their nature, they're goofy and very easy for the guys to riff on. The lack of variety was the only problem with the early part of this season. Had the nine movies been spread out more evenly in the season, I wouldn't have even noticed.

Luckily, the show made up for this poor start in the latter half of the season. Space Mutiny is may end up being my all-time favorite episode. The Giant Spider Invasion was one of those nice, very funny surprises the show unleashes. I'm still not a fan of the '60s Japanese movies, though, same as I felt during season 3.

Having a storyline thread through all of the host segments for every episode was an interesting idea. It could've been a nice change of pace from the regular host segments. However, it just doesn't make any sense given the fact that the show was always rerun out of order. In reruns, this season just seems to be a random mishmash of ancient Rome, a monkey planet, a camping planet and Pearl driving the Widowmaker. These story-bound segments also turned out to be, in general, not quite as good as the free-form host segments from years past. I miss Joel singing "Joey the Lemur" while bouncing a puppet off of the robots' heads, though the Wisconsin cheese factory segment almost makes me forget that.

I'm looking forward to a number of episodes in season 9. I've never seen the infamous Pumaman, Werewolf or The Final Sacrifice before, all of which seem to be fan favorites.

Just seven more weeks and 26 episodes to go. The year is going by fast.


The Numbers

Total Length

34 hours, 50 minutes, 33 seconds
(92 min average for 22 episodes)
(24 min average for 3 specials)

Years Spanned

1955-1993
(1966 average)

Time to Watch

29 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

309 days

Speed

10.7x

Turkey Day Episodes

7 (32%)
801, 807, 808, 809, 810, 811, 812 (27 Nov 1997)

Horror Movies from the 1950s

801, 802, 803, 804, 805, 806, 807, 808, 809 (41%)

Movies Exploring the Evils of Hypnosis

805, 806, 808, 809, 812, 818 (27%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

13:9

MST3K (season seven closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season seven.

You packed a strong punch. There wasn't an episode in the entire season that I didn't like, a feat I don't see repeating in the future. It helped, of course, that there were only six episodes; there wasn't a lot of room for things to go bad. It might have also helped, for me, that all but two of the movie selections were from "my era." Movies -- especially bad ones -- from the 1970s and 1980s are my favorites and I enjoyed watching the guys take them on. I think that had this actually been the final season of the show, this would've been an excellent send off.

With the close of the final episode of this season, every single original cast member from the KTMA days has left. It's odd to think that so many of the creative forces that shaped the show are gone. The fact that MST3K went on to survive for years after so many losses suggests that the concept, if handled intelligently and with care, will work no matter how badly the show gets shaken up.

Before I started this project, I'd most recently taped from reruns, converted to DVD and watched Sci-Fi era episodes. I've seen a great deal of seasons 9 and 10 and most of the last third of season 8. That, however, was three years ago. Now, I can't remember the sound of Bill Corbett's Crow or what the new set looks like. This huge transition is going to be interesting. I wonder how much they'll reference the Comedy Central era? Will Pearl mention what happened to her brand new star baby Clayton? Will the riffing still reference previous movies from the other network and previous riffs said about those movies? Will Sci-Fi's mandated host segment storyline ruin that part of the show, or shake it up and make it more interesting? I'll find out soon.


The Numbers

Total Length

10 hours, 23 minutes, 19 seconds
(92 min average for 6 episodes)
(24 min average for 3 specials)

Years Spanned

1946-1988
(1972 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1948-1956
(1952 average)

Time to Watch

13 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

106 days

Speed

8.2x

Turkey Day Episodes

1 (17%)
701 (23 Nov 1995)

Number of "CLAYDIN!"s said

∞

Black and White to Color Ratio

2:4

MST3K (season six closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season six.

I have to be honest: this project started to really wear on me during this season. Part of the problem was that I fell behind schedule during the holidays. For most of this season, I've been struggling to catch up. I felt obligated to watch an episode every single day in order to do so, which is not something I'd recommend and not something I was able to stick to all of the time. I'm still 4 episodes behind. Watching episodes began to feel like a job after I got home from my real job; something to suck 2-2.5 hours of my free time everyday. Add in the constant issue of failing DVD-Rs, and I wasn't going into many of these episode in the best of moods.

I think the other part of the problem is that show has started to falter at this point. Things are starting to feel stale. The riffing seems to be filled with variants of jokes we've already heard multiple times. The host segments are often lacking that spark of zany creativity often seen in the Joel era (the Poopie! video reminded me of this). The first 2/3rds of the season were pretty good, but these problems became apparent to me during the last 8 or so episodes. I wonder if Frank felt the same way and that's a reason he felt a need to take off? It seems likely Comedy Central felt this way, given their semi-insulting quarter-season episode order for the following year.

Despite all of this, the BBI crew seemed to be putting even more work into the show than ever before. The end of season 6 marked the beginning of an explosion of non-episode MST3K content. They published an episode guide -- a real, live MST3K book -- covering the first six years of the show. They created their first stand-alone TV special, poking fun at the Oscars. The Info Club released it's first non-episode video tapes. They began working on a movie -- a real, live theatrical film -- with Gramercy Pictures. They also began working on a CD-ROM for PCs, which was to include never-before-seen riffing on two never-before-seen shorts. Earlier in the year, they held their first fan convention, the ConventioCon ExpoFest-A-Rama, and even performed a live show there. The guys from BBI were quite busy during 1994 and 1995. Did this impact the amount of energy they could focus on the actual episodes? I don't know. That might be the most logical explanation for the dip in quality I detected.

I've never seen any of the season 7 episodes, so those should be a treat. It looks like they have some interesting movie picks. Melting Man looks right up my alley. I'm not terribly excited to see Dr. F interact with his mother. From the glimpses I've seen of those host segments, their relationship appears to be a tired TV cliché. But, before that: The Movie. As soon as the delivery guys drop off my new toy and I get it hooked up and running, I'll be ready to take on the MST3K cinema experience.


The Numbers

Total Length

39 hours, 32 minutes, 44 seconds
(92 min average for 24 episodes)
(41 min average for 4 specials)

Years Spanned

1948-1986
(1962 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1947-1973
(1954 average)

Time to Watch

51 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

253 days

Speed

5.0x

Turkey Day Episodes

5 (21%)
601, 604, 615 (24 Nov 1994)
609, 612 (23 Nov 1995)

Total Coleman Francis Movies

609, 619, 621 (13%)

Total Bodybuilders Beating the Crap Out of People Movies

604, 605, 615, 616, 617, 624 (25%)

Total Episodes with Mike's Goatee

611 (4%)

Total Episodes with Frank's Goatee

620 (4%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

16:8

MST3K (season five closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season five.

After 5 years of steady improvement, the show falters just a bit. According to the average of all of my ratings, I liked this season less than the previous two. This feels correct. There were a more than a few episodes this year that I will more than likely never watch again. Yet, season five is the only season with two 9-rated episodes in it so far, including the only episode to win a TV award. Interesting year, this was.

The slight decrease in average episode quality is understandable. The year saw the hugest, biggest cast change possible for the show. I'm very impressed that the guys made it through this major mid-year transition with such ease. Mike effortlessly steps into the role as master of MSTie ceremonies. He's so good at this job that I can say I wasn't missing Joel all that much by the time 524 came to town.

Other than the Joel-Mike switchover, this season marked a few milestones for me. It contains both the temporal and episode midpoints in this marathon of mine. Watching 3 or 4 of these things per week and blogging about it is quite a time-eater. It felt great to survive to the halfway point. It was also the first time that I ever managed to watch an entire episode on the MST3K high-holiday of Turkey Day. That wasn't easy at all.

Season six will be interesting. I think I've only seen two of the (Rhino-released) episodes from that year, so it'll be all new to me. I'm really looking forward to 604. After watching Rock 'n' Roll Nightmare, I'm a confirmed Thor fan. I also can't wait to see 611, which I gather is the "parallel universe" episode. That should be fun. I'll also find out whether Frank's last episode is as great as Joel's? From today until February, season six it is.


The Numbers

Total Length

36 hours, 57 minutes, 51 seconds
(92 min average for 24 episodes)
(13 min average for 1 special)

Years Spanned

1944-1988
(1963 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1947-1959
(1954 average)

Time to Watch

44 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

204 days

Speed

4.6x

Turkey Day Episodes

9 (38%)
505, 507, 512, 513, 514, 517 (25 Nov 1993)
503, 511, 512 (24 Nov 1994)
512, 519 (23 Nov 1995)

MST Hour Episodes

3 (13%)
504, 505, 507

Teens Gone Wild

507, 509, 514, 522, 523 (21%)

Total Episodes with Joel's Goatee

--- (0%) [Joel, what happened this year?]

Crappy Italian Movies Purporting to Take Place Partially in My Home State

504 (4%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

9:15

MST3K (season four closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season four.

I know I say this every year, but season four is the best year the show has had so far. What stood out this time around was the consistency. There were very few episodes that I didn't care for. The vast majority of them were what I think of as MST-standard: well-written riffing surrounding a bad-but-fun movie peppered with creative host segments. Standout episodes for me were Being from Another Planet, Attack of the Giant Leeches, Hercules Against the Moon Men, The Beatniks and Manos: The Hands of Fate. Manos, unsurprisingly, is my pick for best of the season.

Season four was not without its trip-ups. It took seventeen episodes before BBI finally figured out that serials and soaps were not a substitute for a good short. Sometimes -- and this is a complaint only someone watching these things in order can have -- the repeated riffs the guys get hooked on get a little annoying. I was about to tear out clumps of hair every time they used the "Jim Henson's --- Babies" joke. A problem that will never go away is the occasional poor movie choice. I'm still scarred from Monster A-Go Go.

The Mystery Science Machine seems to be operating so well right now, I'm actually a little nervous about the fact that the show is due to be scrambled next season. I'm very curious to see if I can detect any of Joel's discontent in the next twelve episodes. Does he look like he doesn't want to be there? When he shares a scene with Gypsy, is he less animated working with his nemesis Jim Mallon? Gunslinger is the last episode that Joel directs. Will he keep certain takes in the final product that reveal all is not well? And, after he leaves, how long is it going to take to get up to the level of quality seen in season 4? Is the last half of season 5 a lost cause? I'll soon know the answer to all of these questions and more as "A Year on the Satellite of Love" continues.


The Numbers

Total Length

37 hours, 24 minutes, 10 seconds
(92 min average for 24 episodes)
(18 min average for 2 specials)

Years Spanned

1953-1984
(1962 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1936-1963
(1949 average)

Time to Watch

45 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

239 days

Speed

5.3x

Turkey Day Episodes

16 (67%)
401, 402, 403, 404, 408, 411, 415, 416, TIM (26 Nov 1992)
412, 417, 420, 422, 423, 424 (25 Nov 1993)
402, 407, 422 (24 Nov 1994)
424 (23 Nov 1995)

MST Hour Episodes

13 (54%)
401, 402, 404, 408, 410, 411, 414, 415, 417, 418, 420, 422, 424

Fantasies of Days Long Past

408, 410, 411, 412, 422 (21%)

Total Episodes with Joel's Goatee

410 (4%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

13:11

MST3K (season three closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season three.

Season three was the best so far. That's encouraging. On an episode by episode basis, there isn't a steady incline of improvement, but the guys are getting better year by year. Though not a huge leap over season two, s3 sports better movie selections, generally funnier riffing and some classic host segments. It could've used more Pod Peoples and less Gameras, however.

I didn't like the Sandy Frank episodes as much as I was hoping to. I was expecting the Frank episodes, using the full power of the ComCen-era MST team, to obliterate the memories of the KTMA versions. That didn't really happen. There is no doubt that the host segments in the s3 version blew those from the KTMA episodes completely away. The "Tibby" song, "T.G.I.Tokyo," the not-for-kids "Arts and Crafts" segment, the "Gamera" song and the Gamera schematic are all indispensably classic bits. The riffing on the Frank episodes, however, wasn't the best of the season. It was nice to have all three of the guys consistently in the theater this time, but I felt like they didn't have as much to say about the Frank films as they did with other episodes this year. I still wish the utterly bizarre Frank movie Humanoid Woman would've made it to this season. I'd've gladly traded that one for the utterly boring Mighty Jack.

On the other hand, I discovered that I'm a dedicated Film Ventures International fan. Cave Dwellers, Pod People, Stranded in Space and the Master Ninjas (along with non-FV movies Daddy-O and War of the Colossal Beast) were my favorite episodes of the year. FV's randomized credit sequences are so cheezy and cheap, you've got to love them. Pod People is the first episode I've encountered that I can't wait to re-watch once my "Year on the Satellite" is over with.

What happened to the hexfield viewscreen? It was installed last season and was constantly visited by Mike. There were only a handful of visitors this year; the thing's probably rusted shut from disuse, now. Mike's visits were such a highlight for season two, it was disappointing to lose them. Hopefully he'll return more often in the next season and half, before he gets commandeered as the new host.

I've only seen one season 4 episode (that I remember), which was Rhino's release of Manos. It'll be all new to me. S4 also coincides with my Six Weeks of Halloween celebration. It looks like there are plenty of '50s horror movies in season four that will fit right in.


The Numbers

Total Length

38 hours, 55 minutes, 58 seconds
(97 min average for 24 episodes)
(26 min average for 1 special)

Years Spanned

1956-1984
(1968 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1938-1957
(1950 average)

Time to Watch

43 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

239 days

Speed

5.6x

Turkey Day Episodes

18 (75%)
301, 303, 306, 307, 309, 310, 311 (28 Nov 1991)
312, 317, 320, 321, 322 (26 Nov 1992)
308, 313, 318, 319 (25 Nov 1993)
306, 311, 315, 316, 321 (24 Nov 1994)

MST Hour Episodes

14 (58%)
301, 302, 303, 306, 307, 309, 310, 311, 312, 313, 317, 319, 320, 321

Total Film Ventures Films

301, 303, 305, 322, 324 (21%)

Total Sandy Frank Films

302, 304, 306, 308, 310, 312, 314, 316, 318 (38%)

Total Sequels

301, 304, 308, 312, 316, 318, 319, 323, 324 (38%)

Total Movies That Are Really TV Episodes

306, 310, 314, 318, 322, 324 (25%)

Total Episodes with Joel's Goatee

307 (4%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

9:15

Fincher (closing thoughts)

David Fincher's one of my favorite directors. Even when he stumbles, his technical skills manage to create a visually interesting film.

Every-other Fincher film is a masterpiece, so I'm expecting great things from Zodiac. I have to admit, I'm not thrilled that this is his long-awaited next project. Fincher's pretty much tackled, slaughtered and mounted on his mantle the serial killer genre with Se7en. I don't know if there's any reason at all for him to revisit it. If he was interested in true-story-based filmmaking, I wish he'd stuck with The Black Dahlia. That unsolved crime story would've been perfect for Fincher's sensibility.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button sounds more interesting. A man begins aging backwards and falls in love with a woman. How can they last if she continues to grow older and he gets younger? The plot has the potential for sappiness, but I trust Fincher to infuse enough of his own darkness into it to make it worth while. Fincher is directing Brad Pitt again in this one, which has always worked out well in the past.

At any rate, I'm glad the man has settled onto some projects. It's been too long since the silver screen was darkened by his vision.

MST3K (season two closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season two.

The highlight of the season for me was the introduction of Frank. Dopey and good-natured, he's the perfect foil for the pessimistically evil Dr. F. My only complaint is that he doesn't get enough screen time. I never cared much for the Mads' section of the host segments, but Frank makes them fun.

Just as welcome were Mike's guest appearances as various visiting movie characters. The hexfield viewscreen was a brilliant addition to the SOL, allowing for greater variety in the host segments. Already, it's pretty clear that Mike was the only choice to don the jumpsuit in 513. He's the best actor of the crew, able to mimic an evil TV dad and a mush-mouthed villainess with equal aplomb.

Gerry and Sylvia are plain scary.

Gone is the ADHD Joel, unable to sit in his seat in the theater. Sure, he gets up a few times to play with a handful of things onscreen, but Joel is much more chair-bound than he was in season one. I liked the dancing, prop-using Joel in season one's theater segments. I wonder what made him change?

I've seen some bad movies in my day, but some of season two's selections wowed me with their ineptitude. Rocket Attack U.S.A. and Ring of Terror, in particular, were on a level of badness that I'm just not used to. These are the kinds of films that fool other bad filmmakers into thinking they can easily make something for the big screen. This may actually explain Manos.

Though I didn't like any single season two episode as much as I liked season one's Robot Holocaust, overall things are getting better. Except for the lack of invention exchange ideas, the host segments are funnier in season two. Joel's lemur and space madness sketches are my favorites of the entire show so far.

I'm looking forward to season three, coming up next. From how people talk about it, it is seems to be the quintessential Joel season, packed with classic episodes.


The Numbers

Total Length

21 hours, 5 minutes, 58 seconds
(97 min average for 13 episodes)

Years Spanned

1948-1973
(1961 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1939-1944
(1940 average)

Time to Watch

22 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

134 days

Speed

6.1x

Turkey Day Episodes

10 (77%)
201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 213 (28 Nov 1991)
208, 210 (26 Nov 1992)

Total Robert L. Lippert Films

201, 203, 208, 210 (31%)

Total Giant Lizard Films

208, 210, 212, 213 (31%)

Total "Biker" Films

202, 207, 209 (23%)

Total Episodes with Joel's Goatee

207, 208, 209 (23%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

6:7

MST3K (season one closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season one.

Joel's energy in the theater is great this season. No longer relegated to a tiny strip on the bottom, his giant silhouette can reach most of the screen. This gives him the power to fiddle with computer knobs, give ladies pecks on the cheek, and dance, dance, dance. I loved his props, too. Brushes for cleaning on-screen characters' clothes, hot dogs for roasting in lava, and POW-BIFF-BAM signs for extra action in fight scenes.

Commando Cody quickly went from being "neat, I've never seen a serial before" to "not this again." I suppose filling up twelve weeks' worth of one-reel, low-budget action is harder than it sounds. The flying effects were good for the time. They just needed a better-focused plot and perhaps some other type of cliffhanger rather than Cody seeming to die each and every time. I can't wait until we get some real shorts.

Poor Gypsy didn't have much to do this season. After the unexpected success of the Richard Basehart non sequitur in 101, she became limited to mostly that topic. She was allowed a brief moment to shine during 113. As if to take revenge for Servo's condescension, she slowly transforms into a giant scorpion and eats the bot. Of course, her tail immediately falls off during the last transformation, but it was the thought that counted.

In line with common MiSTie convention, I did find that there were a number of not-great episodes this season. My absolute favorites, however, aren't even the ones released by Rhino. The two later robot movies, 107 and 110 had me laughing the most. A close third was 112.

Overall, there were some bumps in road in the first national season. Given the major changes coming up, I'd expect we're in for some more bumps in season 2 before we settle into the four long seasons.


The Numbers

Total Length

20 hours, 49 minutes, 24 seconds
(96 min average for 13 episodes)

Years Spanned

1942-1986
(1959 average)

Shorts Years Spanned

1952
(1952 average)

Time to Watch

24 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

99 days

Speed

4.1x

Turkey Day Episodes

1 (8%)
106 (23 Nov 1995)

Episodes with the Words "Robot" or "Monster" (or Both) in the Title

102, 103, 107, 110 (31%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

10:3

Marx (closing thoughts)

Their career in cinema only spanned 20 years, but the Marx Bros. packed some mighty durable comedy into it. For me, their films fell neatly into three groupings:

Excellent Bros.

• The Cocoanuts
• Horse Feathers
• Duck Soup
• A Day at the Races
• At the Circus
• A Night in Casablanca

Still Funny Bros.

• Animal Crackers
• Monkey Business
• A Night at the Opera
• Go West
• The Big Store

The Bros. Fail

• Room Service
• Love Happy

I think the movie I will probably re-watch first will be At the Circus. In it, you've got your Margaret Dumont, you've got your circus freaks, and you've got a stuffy orchestra being set adrift in the ocean. There ain't much not to love there.

MST3K (season KTMA closing thoughts)

Goodbye, season KTMA. I will miss your down-home flavor. Wishing a young fan a happy birthday in response to his voicemail is a host segment that will never be topped. I will miss the flubs, from the sneezing and falling over to Joel accidentally saying something that sounds worse than what he meant. I won't miss the lack of a script so much. I think the improvisation leads to more bad puns, comment loops and dead spots than should really be there.

My favorite episode for this season was K21. The riffing is the most consistent out of this set of shows. It also has solid host segments that were reminiscent of those that come later. The movie was not so great, but that's what the riffing was there for. I was glad to see JatB leave on a strong note. Humor-wise, they are definitely ready to make the jump to a national audience. All they need are some bot upgrades, a spiffier set and some slightly better theme song lyrics. K06, K10, K12, K18 and K20 were also in my top tier of KTMA episodes.

My favorite movie, however, was SST- Death Flight. I dunno, I just liked it. I'd happily watch it unMSTed in a year or so. I also liked Gamera vs Gaos, Gamera vs Zigra, Humanoid Woman, Fugitive Alien, and The Last Chase. After Humanoid Woman, in particular, I feel like a stronger person. That foam, man.

My least favorite episodes were K05 (Servo and Crow missing), K14 (bad movie + bad riffing), K15 (bad movie + really bad riffing), K17 (Joel missing). As you can tell from the spread of these episodes, the season was pretty uneven. The guys didn't just make an ascent into comedic greatest as they got more practice in. I can almost understand why they refuse to release any of these on home video. Still, I think a couple of them could hold their own as the bonus disc in a 4-disc Rhino set. I'd really like to see, at least, the host segments for K01. I'm curious as to how Joel introduced everything.

I wonder how many disappointed fans there were when the show never returned to KTMA-23? Everyone thought that MST3K was just on a hiatus and would be back in the fall. Even the final newsletter of the season pleads for people to write KTMA about bringing the show back. Suddenly, they switched gears and began making shows for a small cable channel. I know we didn't have the Comedy Channel, or even cable, back in 1989. I'd assume a lot of MST Info Club members were in the same boat. That must have been disappointing. I bet there are even some old codger MST3K fans who say the show jumped the shark between seasons 0 and 1! "Bah, things were better in my day. You'd always know the time it was and how cold the Twin Cities were when MST was good."

Me, I'm happy. I know it only gets better from here.

The Numbers

Total Length

1 day, 5 hours, 57 minutes, 49 seconds
(100 min average for 18 episodes)

Years Spanned

1965-1981
(1974 average)

Time to Watch

33 days

Time to Broadcast Originally

176 days

Speed

5.3x

Total Sandy Frank Films

10 (56%)

Total TV Episodes/TV Movies

6 (33%)

Episodes with Missing Riffers

K05, K06, K12, K17, 1/2-K18 (31%)

Black and White to Color Ratio

1:17

Coen (closing thoughts)

And with The Ladykillers, that brings me up-to-date in my Coen Bros. Chronocinethon. If forced, I'd probably rank their films in three groups:

Excellent Bros.

• Blood Simple.
• Raising Arizona
• Fargo
• The Big Lebowski
• O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Still Good Stuff Bros.

• Miller's Crossing
• Barton Fink
• The Man Who Wasn't There
• The Ladykillers

What the? Bros.

• The Hudsucker Proxy
• Intolerable Cruelty

Two misses out of eleven ain't bad at all. Also interesting: seven out of eleven were period pieces. It looks like the Bros. next major movie, Hail Caesar, will be another period film. I'm looking forward to their take on 1920s theater. Not doubt it'll have some interesting characters speaking in amusing dialects. Good enough for me already.

Yuzna (closing thoughts)

Like Wes Craven, Brian Yuzna is a pretty uneven director: he has his good films and his bad films and it's hard to predict which type will come next. However, he still produces interesting movies consistently enough that he's definitely worth keeping up with. Here's what he's good at:

Ignoring previous movies and forging his own, unique path with sequels (Initiation: Silent Night, Deadly Night 4 and Return of the Living Dead III).

Horror-romance. Maybe I'm alone, but anytime Yuzna takes a romance in one of his movies seriously, it lifts the entire film up a level (Return of the Living Dead III's Julie and Curt, Rottweiler's Dante and Ula, and, to some extent, Progeny's Sherry and Craig).

"Kicking it up a notch." Especially when he's got Screaming Mad George on board, Yuzna can be counted on to push things a little bit further than your average horror director. From the fleshy ending of Society, to the grotesquely beautiful Bride, to a Wolverine clone that actually, for once, chops people up with his claws onscreen, Yuzna delivers great visuals.

Beneath Still Waters, I'm looking forward to. I actually own a signed copy of the novel, though I've never read it. I think I will, in preparation for the movie.

(comment in the main post)

Gordon (closing thoughts)

That takes me up to the present. I'm finished with Stuart Gordon for a small amount of time, until Edmond arrives in theatres and "Dreams in the Witch-House" arrives on DVD (sorry, Showtime, I don't plan to subscribe just for one series). I have to admit, I am not looking forward to Edmond. I've already described how I am not a fan of plays. I'm also not a fan of David Mamet. After a bunch of recommendations, I rented Glengarry Glen Ross recently and was not impressed (talk, talk, talk). The clip of Edmond that I saw online looks to be similar. "Witch-House", I'm nervous about... only because it has to stand in Dagon's shadow. Other than that, I am geeked that Gordon is doing more Lovecraft-inspired work.

Gordon's one of the great, unappreciated directors in horror. I'd bet most every non-horror-nut-regular-Joe would have an inkling of who Wes Craven or John Carpenter is. Those same folks would never be able to come up with the answer to "who directed Re-Animator"? Which is a shame, as Gordon has barely ever struck out at bat. Of his twelve films, I would peg only Daughter of Darkness and Space Truckers as strikes. Most everything else have been solid base hits, with Dagon and Re-Animator being homeruns. Apologies for the extended metaphor (in honor of the one Gordon film I couldn't find).

(comment in the main post)

Coscarelli (closing thoughts)

That's it! That's everything Mr. Coscarelli has directed so far. I may just be subscribing to expensive Showtime, just so I can see his newest effort in the Masters of Horror. Waiting for the DVD sets for that would be hard.

The Phantasm quadrilogy is probably my all-time favorite horror movie series. I love the fact that Coscarelli wrote and directed each and every installment. I love that -- except for fake-Mike and no-show Jody in P2 -- the four main characters stick around for the entire series. I love Reg's everyman hero. I love the surreal aspects of P1 and P4. I love the "road trip through a post-apocalypse" theme of P2-P3. It's truly a unique series. I'm saddened that it seems -- like every other horror series -- we will be getting a remake instead of P5. Worse yet, Coscarelli will not be directing the new trilogy. Because of this, I doubt very much that these new films will have a fraction of the magic of the originals. Ah well. We're lucky to have the four that we do.

(comment in the main post)

Barker (closing thoughts)

And that's the extent of Clive Barker's directorial endeavors. I'm not sure what the current status of Tortured Souls is, but I'd heard Universal had dumped it. What I'd wish, in general, is that Barker'd forget about major studios for his next film. I'd love to see him approach his next with the amount of wild freedom seen in The Forbidden. A story like Tortured Souls could really use that.

(comment in the main post)