I’m happy to see that the Bring Back Mystery Science Theater 3000 Kickstarter has hit $3.3 million, meaning they’ll produce at least six episodes.
At $4.4 million they’ll make nine episodes, but at this point $5.5 million (twelve episodes) is looking like it might be a stretch.
Also Patton Oswalt is joining the cast as TV’s Son of TV’s Frank, a move I’m pretty “meh” on (though I can see the physical resemblance between Frank Conniff and Oswalt).
I was worried that the MST3K Kickstarter might not make it to the full 12 episode total.
Felicia Day is going to play Kinga Forrester, the next evil mad scientist overlord on the new MST3K.
My first thought on reading that was an extremely inappropriate Krieger quote from Archer.
My second was that they’re going to blow past that $5.5 million barrier.
Dunno how they’re going to top this short of announcing they’ve signed up George R. R. Martin and Neil Gaiman as staff writers….
The Bring Back Mystery Science Theater 3000 Kickstarter has hit their $2 million goal, which means it’s funded and they’ll do at least three new episodes.
Everybody Smile!
And they still have 25 days to go! Now let’s hope they make it all they way to their 12 episode $5.5 million stretch goal…
Joel Hodgson just launched a kickstarter to produce new episodes of Mystery Science Theatre 3000.
Let me get the obligatory meme out of the way:
But fans have been calling out for an MST3K reboot for years. Why only now?
Simple: Jim Mallon sold his share of the rights to Shout Factory:
Shout! Factory has acquired cult comedy series “Mystery Science Theater 3000,” Variety has learned.
The news of the acquisition comes the same day Joel Hodgson, the creator and writer of “Mystery Science Theater 3000,” launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund a new season of the show.
With the new deal, negotiated by Shout’s David McIntosh, Shout! Factory now has the proprietary rights the “Mystery Science Theater 3000” from Best Brains, Inc., including all brand assets and global intellectual property. The media company is partnering with Hodgson and his company Alternaversal, LLC on future endeavors surrounding the “MST3K” brand, including plans for new content development, digital media initiatives, live events, merchandise licensing programs and content syndication to international territories.
The one caveat I have is evidently there will be a “new cast” for the show. I think the consensus is that the MST3K faithful would love to have Hodgson, Trace Beaulieu and Frank Conniff back in their old roles (and possibly J. Elvis Weinstein back as the original Tom Servo; given his attachment to RiffTracks, Kevin Murphy seems unlikely to reprise the Tom Servo voice role). But I’m certainly willing to give the new cast a chance.
So, yeah, I signed up.
Here’s the pitch video:
In 2001, Fox premiered the live-action version of The Tick. I thought they did a pretty credible effort capturing the comic book’s goofy, off-kilter charm, despite an incredibly modest budget for a live action network show (they couldn’t even hire someone who looked like Jimmy Carter for the pilot).
So naturally, it being on Fox, they cancelled it after nine episodes
Now comes word that Amazon is resurrecting the show with Patrick Warburton back in the title role.
If it gets picked up, I may have to finally break down and subscribe to Amazon Prime…
(Hat tip: Bill Crider on Facebook.)
Super brief because I need to be back at work, but I wanted to note the passing of Leonard Nimoy at age 83. He was great as Spock, perhaps the best actor in a very fine ensemble cast, and also extremely good in several other roles. A good actor and, by all accounts, a classy, stand-up guy.
Someone’s been having fun imaging Samuel Beckett as the star of his own Quinn Martin private detective show:
The mention of Andre the Giant may seem random, but in fact Beckett used to drive the young Andre to school every morning because he was too big to fit on the bus.
(Hat tip: Don Webb.)
There are two forthcoming TV show DVD sets that hearken back to the days of my youth:
Recommended without qualification is the complete WKRP in Cincinnati with the original music restored. If it wasn’t the greatest sitcom of the late 1970s/early 1980s, it was certainly in the top 5.
A bit more qualified recommendation for the complete 1960s Batman. Every significant dark, gritty Batman of the last 30 years (from Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight to the Christopher Nolan trilogy, and even the Tim Burton movie) has been largely in reaction to this show’s campy tone. The show is very much a product of its time, but retains a certain charm for just that reason. Plus the cast of villains (Burgess Meredith, Vincent Price, Julie Numar, Frank Gorshin, etc.) draws from some of the very best character actors of the time.
I’m sure either might make swell Christmas presents for someone you know…
Longtime Saturday Night Live announcer Don Pardo has died. I think he was the last person who worked on the inaugural season of SNL who stayed on with the show for it’s entire run. (Lorne Michaels went away for five years before coming back to the show.)
He was a great announcer, and he did a lot of work in radio and on TV game shows like Jeopardy.
Here he is on why script writers should use short words:
Don Pardo passed away yesterday. But he will receive some lovely parting gifts.
— John Walters (@jdubs88) August 19, 2014
Robin Williams dead of an apparent suicide at age 63.
Williams, along with Richard Pryor, was one of the true authentic comic geniuses of my lifetime. As a stand-up comic, his mind was so quick and his work was so manically innovative that his basic appeal actually survived transition to the straitjacket confines of a prime-time sitcom. He was a solid dramatic supporting actor, but it’s a shame that (unlike Pryor) he never found a movie that served the true essence of his comic genius.