Product Details

• Actors: Peter Breck, Kent Taylor, Rod Lauren, Alan Hale Jr., Allison Hayes
• Directors: Herbert L. Strock
• Format: Black & White, Full Screen, NTSC
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo)
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: Unrated
• Studio: Rhino Theatrical
• DVD Release Date: June 11, 2002
• Run Time: 89 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000067J09
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #86,715 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "Mystery Science Theater 3000 - The Crawling Hand" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

It's Mystery Science Theater 3000, America's only show that makes fun of really bad B movies from the comfort of a spaceship floating above Earth. Mike Nelson, along with his mechanical companions, wisecracking Crow and well-read chick magnet Tom Servo, make suffering through Hollywood's worst films a breeze. Adding their own dialogue, barrage of witty remarks, and an occasional colorful skit, they next hour and a half will fly by like it were only 90 minutes. There's no ushers with flashlights, crying babies, or women with big hair to spoil the fun.

This is such an early Mystery Science Theater 3000 that Larry, not Frank, is Dr. Forrester's bumbling assistant. It's sorta like Curly replacing Shemp. Anyway, in The Crawling Hand an astronaut becomes unglued and blows his ship to smithereens. Some of the wreckage makes its way to Earth, and among the charred remains is the poor clod's hand. While frolicking on the beach, a wild-eyed med student, Pual, finds and becomes possessed by the lacerated limb and takes it home--Tom: "Thank goodness he brought a handbag." For a while the two are happy, but eventually things get out of hand (hah, hah). They start to fight, and as Crow says, "It's hand-to-hand combat." Alan Hale Jr. costars as an overweight sheriff whose brawn surpasses his brain capacity. Gee, now that's a stretch for him. Show #106, original airdate December 1989.

Product Description

MST3K: THE CRAWLING HAND - DVD Movie

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars More spontaneous April 23, 2003

By Martin Andrade

Format:DVD

Joel Hodgson has always been embarrassed by his early work. After a few seasons on Comedy Central MST and CO asked that their first year work not be rerun or used for all day marathons. They are the best judges of their work, and if you're not a huge MST3K fan I'd recommend taking their advice.

However, I personally enjoy the early years of MST3K. My personal collection includes taped episodes of the original KTMA channel 23 episodes where Joel and Co got their start.

The jokes are spontaneous, by not having a heavily scripted show one can almost relax a little bit, and see for themselves the .... in all its glory. "The Crawling Hand" is also one of my favorites from the first season due to the epic amount of word play and puns. There are several solid groups of bellyaching laughter when one pun after another after another are delivered by Servo and Crow. I also like the more homey feeling of the visual aspects of the film. I grew up watching MST3K on television with poorer picture quality and I get a bit nostalgic. But like I said earlier, Joel is the best judge of his own work, and if he is unhappy with the earlier episodes, I recommend you take his advice

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars MST3K: The Crawling Hand(1963) May 29, 2011

By Jorge A. Zarco

Format:DVD

The Crawling Hand(1963) is dated, sci-fi/horror trash at its best. An astronaut runs out of oxygen and is killed when his spaceship blows up! Debris from the ship lands on a beach and a teenage kid keeps parts of it. The astronaut's severed hand and the teenage kid are infected by a space virus that motivates people to kill! A sheriff(Alan Hale Jr.) and two FBI agents try to control the situation. The FBI agents may have been prototypes for Mulder and Scully on The X-Files. Sirry Steffen plays the teenage kid's sexy, Nordic girlfriend. The teenage kid looks like a raccoon or Sid Vicious with black make up around his eyes!
The Crawling Hand is cheesy, but it's more fun than some of today's CGI-driven, boom fiestas from Hollywood. During the first season of Mystery Science Theater 3000, they were still struggling to refine the show, but their hearts were in the right place. Josh Weinstein was the voice of Tom Servo and he played Dr. Forrester's lackey, Dr. Erhardt. Weinstein left the show; Kevin Murphy played Tom Servo for the rest of the show and Frank Conniff played TV's Frank. Dr. Forrester also dropped his fake British accent by season two. The out of print Rhino DVD had the MST-ied version of The Crawling Hand and the original, uncut version.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Rough around the edges, but still quite enjoyable July 10, 2002

By Jonathan Tavaris

Format:DVD

It's true that this episode from Season 1 of MST3K is rough around the edges, but that doesn't mean that it's not enjoyable. The biggest flaws are long silences, some unfunny riffs ("Sure, next you'll tell me there's a ring around Uranus!"), and a couple awkward host segments (especially the intro). However, the novelty of seeing a first season episode is enough to make this episode worth purchasing, and it's actually quite entertaining. There are some really memorable riffs in this episode ("It's the Crawling Bladder!"), and at times they keep coming steadily, like in later seasons. The episode does get off to a shaky start (the intro segment is sloppy, and most of the bad riffing seems to be concentrated within the first 30 minutes), but thankfully gets much better as it goes on. I wouldn't recommend this to someone new to MST3K (get Manos: the Hands of Fate and I Accuse My Parents first), but it's a real treat for MSTies.