Customer Reviews

Mystery Science Theater 3000: Vol. XIX [Limited Edition]

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This set features two shows with Joel Hodgson as host from the Comedy Central era and two with Mike Nelson from the Sci-Fi Channel era. MST3K always worked especially well when the films used were in the sci-fi/horror genre and this set is packed with four such episodes.

Episode 107- ROBOT MONSTER (with shorts: COMMANDO CODY Parts 4 and 5)

This 1953 black and white film is extremely low budget, so much so that the eponymous "robot monster" costume consists of a cheap gorilla suit topped off with an even cheaper deep-sea diving style helmet. It is one of those movies that is so incompetent it is fun all on its own and it's perfect fodder for MST3K. A family survives the destruction of most of humanity by the evil Ro-Man, who hunts them mercilessly yet has trouble finding them though he is living nearly next door! The family has managed to elude Ro-Man through the scientific genius of the older parents and their attractive adult daughter, Alice, and here fiance. Even their young, pre-adolescent children are mental giant compared to the incompetent Ro-Man. As if he didn't have enough difficulties, Ro-Man has a "thing" for Alice, which causes him problems with completing his murderous mission. The movie at times is incomprehensible in its editing, with inexplicable shots of lizards impersonating dinosaurs and other weirdness inserted to pad out the film. There's also lots of shots of George Barrows as Ro-Man stalking about Bronson Canyon. This is a strong Season One MST3K episode and the inclusion of the Commando Cody Radar Men From The Moon shorts just adds to the low budget fun. This one has been a favorite of mine for years and I'm quite pleased to see it in commercial release.

Episode 423- BRIDE OF THE MONSTER (with short: HIRED!, Part 1)

This 1955 Ed Wood film stars Bela Lugosi and Tor Johnson, two of Wood's favorite actors. The pairing is great fun and the movie is everything fans have come to expect from Ed Wood, with cheap monsters, continuity issues, and Lugosi playing a mad scientist assisted by his lumbering, hulking side-kick, Lobo, played by Johnson. Johnson played essentially the same character with the same name in The Unearthly, a movie also used on MST3K. Bride Of The Monster is a quintessential Ed Wood film and belongs right up there next to Plan 9 From Outer Space. The jokes from the MST3K crew come fast and furious and it seems obvious that they had a great, almost too easy time writing jokes for this one. This movie also features Harvey B. Dunn who played "Grampa" in Teenagers From Outer Space. The short, Hired! Part One is also fun and inspires a whole host segment, "Hired, The Musical". Another episode highlight is the host segment where Joel and the 'Bots play out the end of the film with the help of Cambot.

Episode 818- DEVIL DOLL

A 1964 black and white film about a ventroliquist/hypnotist with an evil dummy named, Hugo. The ventroliquist is after the fortune of an heiress, which creates a love triangle since he already has a mistress. Tragedy of course, ensues, but it's all comedy for the viewers of this MST3K version. The movie is atmospheric to a degree, but is also slow and ponderous at times and the slowly pulsating soundtrack delivers as much monotony as it does tension. Nevertheless, there are some good highlights in this episode, most notably Mike Nelson impersonating Hugo and there are plenty of good "riffs" during the movie.

Episode 911- DEVIL FISH

Italy produces many "psychotronic" movies and this 1984 color production keeps that tradition alive. Directed by Lamberto Bava, son of the great Mario Bava, this is silly and fun B-grade monster movie stuff all the way. Years before the upcoming Roger Corman movie, "Sharktopus", this film features a marine biologist, a dolphin trainer, a research scientist, and a local sheriff attempting to hunt down a hybrid monster comprising shark and octopus traits. Filmed on location in Florida, it's another bad "don't go in the water" type follow on to the success of Jaws in 1976. Silly monster movies always worked well on MST3K and this one is no exception. Not one of the best episodes ever, but fairly consistent and enjoyable fun throughout.

Extra features include:

* This Limited Edition version of the set comes with a collectible Gypsy figurine similar to the Tom Servo and Crow figurines sold in earlier Shout! Factory sets.

* A new introduction to the film Robot Monster by J. Elvis Weinstein

* Joel Hodgson's Inventing the "Invention Exchange"

* The Puppet Master: Richard Gordon on Devil Doll

* MST3K: Origins and Beyond at CONvergence 2009

* Exclusive Mini-posters by artist Steve Vance

* Cult Filmmaker Larry Blamire Geeks Out on Robot Monster

* Citizen Wood: Making `The Bride,' Unmaking `The Legend'

* Original Theatrical Trailers

It's anybody's guess why they're being so slow about releasing various snarky episodes of "Mystery Science Theater 3000," in which Joel, Mike, Tom Servo and Crow make fun of baaaaaaad badbadbad movies. "Mystery Science Theater 3000: Vol. XIX" brings together four delicious episodes of this series involving alien robots, sea monsters and an evil dummy.

First there's "Robot Monster", the seventh episode of season one (the roughest of them, but you won't notice here). Joel and the bots are subjected to a horrifically cheesy sci-fi movie in which civilization is destroyed and all of humanity is killed by... a gorilla with a deep-sea helmet, aka Ro-man. Ro-man is trying to hunt the one remaining nuclear family and exterminate them, despite the fact that he literally lives next to their house. Insert random lizard attacks.

Then there's Ed Wood's "Bride of the Monster," in which Joel and the bots are subjected to Wood's B-movie horror: Bela Lugosi is a mad scientist, living in a swamp filled with inappropriate reptiles and a giant octopus that inexplicably eats people. People wander in and get eaten, and eventually a pretty girl becomes the newest victim of Lugosi's attempts to make a master race.... yeah, okay.

After that, we jump forward to the Era Of Mike with "Devil Doll." Mike and the bots decide to have a crazy "Friiiiidaaaaaay" dorm party which is hampered by a lack of beer and music, even as Pearl hobnobs with the gods. Then it's off to the movies, about a sinister ventriloquist and his surprisingly sentient dummy... it's actually rather good by MST3K standards, but still rather dull.

And finally, Mike's wallet woes get sidelined while Pearl, Bobo and Brain Guy pretend to be a cruise ship. The new movie: "Devil Fish," a horrible cash-in on "Jaws" in which many wooden Italians pretending to be Americans deal with a sort of... warty shark-octopus thing that magically appears to eat anyone who hits the high seas. Also: lots of soap opera stuff.

Any "Mystery Science Theater 3000" collection with an Ed Wood Jr. episode is bound to be an absolute delight, but this one is especially good because it has three absolutely ghastly movies and one that is only fairly bad. The movies are pretty funny even on their own merits, and having Mike, Joel and the bots mocking them is the icing on the cake ("The director's vision: lots of shots of things!").

And it's got the usual stuff: Mike, Joel and the bots have lots of silly adventures (seeing what Crow dreams about) and skits (getting turned into broad Italian stereotypes). And their mockery of the movies is just delicious ("Oh, great! The nutty bird man in Apartment 4-B is gonna give us a religious insight"), especially when they pretend to speak as the characters ("There's bird poopy on my paper!").

"Mystery Science Theater 3000 Volume XIX" is... well, three truly abysmal movies and one that is merely bad. Add in Joel, Mike and the bots, and you have loads of classic laughs.

At the San Diego Comic Con Shout Factory announced the latest Volume

which is # 19 much to the delight of many MST3K fans.

First off as you can see by the photo it will contain a Gypsy Figurine which is slightly bigger than Crow and Tom Servo

Now for the episodes in this set

# 107 ROBOT MONSTER - This movie is about a group of survivors being stalked by Ro-Man - a man in an ape costume and fish tank helmet.

One of the all time most well known iconic B movies - ultra cheap, lousy acting and pointless. See stock footage of dinosaurs ( lizards with glued on fins) from One Million BC. See Roman chase George Nader around. See Roman chase women, children all over the place. See Roman attack kids, see him try to satisfy his urges with the ladies..see it in utter disbelief.

This is one of what most Season 1 fans would call a better Season 1 episode. It is well done. This is another title owned by Wade Williams which Shout has licensed which is why we've seen Beast of Yucca Flats, Lost Continent and others.

This has a riff at the end that I really like " Is this the End of the Film Joel" watch for it. And listen to Tom Servo sneeze during the Commando Cody serial..You get 2 chapters of Radar Men from the Moon in this because Robot Monster is a short film

J. Elvis Weinstein gets to do the intro to Robot Monster & was pretty insightful and fun to hear what he had to say ..

# 423 BRIDE OF THE MONSTER - An Ed Wood classic. Bela once again plays a mad doctor trying to create a race of atomic supermen to take over the world. Along with his assistant Lobo - Tor Johnson - who was Lobo in the Unearthly as well as the Beast of Yucca of Flats

Another incompetent mess with super poor effects / editing and a very low budget. All sorts of bad editing including a rubber Octopus (leftover from a John Wayne film) blended with stock footage of a real Octopus swimming in a tank. Bela has a stunt double in this one - Eddie Parker - watch for this. You cant miss it.

This contains the short Hired ! Part One (Part 2 of Hired is the short on Manos the Hands of Fate) About a car salesman needing advice from his pop on how to get his salesmen to sell cars. And Joel & the Bots do a nice musical about it.

Another Wade Williams title & long over due for release - the transfer of this is just fantastic and should blow away any VHS copies..very well done

# 818 - DEVIL DOLL We jump to Mike during the sci-fi era in this film which in my opinion is not that bad. Bryant Haliday (the Projected Man) as a hypnotist/ventriloquist The Great Varelli - with his dummy Hugo performing acts on stage. Haliday uses his powers to control people, the dummy puppet to get what he wants.

Also in this is the lovely Yvonne Romain from Curse of the Werewolf.

This has some atmosphere and is for me a fun one to watch.

I own the Image DVD of this which has the uncut version - with some nudity.

This film is a feature length movie based on one of the short stories from the original 1945 classic Dead of Night (check this one out)

As an MST3K episode it is a lot of fun of course with segments that have to do with the movie. Mike Nelson as Hugo - Watch and see it to believe it. This is a solid episode during the scifi era.

# 911 - DEVIL FISH (aka Monster Shark) This monster/horror film has a Shark Octopus eating Italians who decide to swim where the monster is. This one is directed by Lamberto Bava (son of Mario) Lots of killing and what to do about the monster. There is a subplot in this film as well to keep things moving along between the monster attacks. This is your basic standard MST3K episode during the scifi era with Pearl, Bobo and Brain Guy torturing Mike, Crow and Servo from Castle Forester. It to me was a the surprise of this set.The riffs when the monster swims underwater are especially funny.

BONUS FEATURES :

* New introduction to Robot Monster by J. Elvis Weinstein

* Cult Filmmaker Larry Blamire Geeks Out on Robot Monster

* Citizen Wood: Making `The Bride,' Unmaking `The Legend'

* Inventing the "Invention Exchange" with Joel Hodgson

* The Puppet Master: Richard Gordon on Devil Doll

* MST3K: Origins and Beyond at CONvergence 2009

* Original Theatrical Trailers

* Exclusive Mini-posters by artist Steve Vance

* Collectible Gypsy figurine

Overall Shout has done great things for the releases of these episodes, and once again they are to be commended for their efforts. Good stuff and cant wait for more volumes

Usually with the MST3k volumes, there's always one lesser episode included with the two or three good ones, but with Vol XIX, ALL FOUR EPISODES are very very good! Here's the breakdown:

ROBOT MONSTER: From the first season, this movie is highly regarded among fans of awful, inept films, usually ranking right up there with Ed Wood's PLAN 9. I had never seen ROBOT MONSTER (MST version or otherwise) til I bought this set and I must say it's definitely deserving of its fame as one of the worst movies of all time. The monster is a guy in a Gorilla suit wearing a divers helmet. He's Ro-Man, one of the Ro-Men from the planet Ro-Man (yes, the movie specifies exactly that). His mission is to kill the last remaining human family on Earth so his race can inhabit the planet Earth. Ro-Man sets up shop (which includes a bubble machine on a wooden desk and a wood framed viewing screen which he uses to communicate with his superior Ro-Man) in a cave, then wanders around trying to find the family even though the hole in the ground that they live in is RIGHT NEXT TO HIS CAVE!!! All this is exceptionally silly stuff, though the film does get dark in places when Ro-Man kills a little girl, then captures and attempts to rape the older daughter of the family. Even though its barely an hour long, the movie is still massively padded; you'll see "dinosaurs" fight endlessly at the beginning and end of the movie, as well as countless scenes of Ro-Man walking around the desert scrub, looking rather like Yogi Bear as he waddles about. I've seen the worst movies MST has ever took on (MANOS, MONSTER A-GO-GO, THE CREEPING TERROR, WILD WILD WORLD OF BATWOMAN, the Coleman Francis Trilogy, etc.), and ROBOT MONSTER is about as bewildering as they come. The first time I watched it I just turned off the DVD player while scratching my head, wondering what the heck it was that I just saw. Being a first season episode, this one has slow riffing, and two COMMANDER CODY shorts to compensate for the brief runtime of the movie, but honestly those things don't matter one bit this time around. You'll watch this one just for the insanity of the film itself. Its seriously that odd of a movie.

BRIDE OF THE MONSTER: Its an Ed Wood movie. Its an Ed Wood movie that features an aged Bela Legousi, Tor Johnson, and that fat guy that's missing a finger from TEENAGERS FROM OUTER SPACE. If you've seen PLAN 9 you'll find a similar, lovably inept approach to BRIDE OF THE MONSTER. You get people rolling around on a motionless rubber octopus as its "attacking" them, tons of stock footage of animals, a guy stuck in "quicksand" that he just hops right out of, a deeply inaccurate stand-in for Bela (featuring platform shoes!), and a nuclear explosion where the surviving characters muse philisophically while standing mere feet away from the blast. Its almost too easy for Joel and the bots. Really, a stellar episode, though with all that the movie has going for it, how could it not be? It also has the first part of the HIRED short, which is quite fun, though I felt the 2nd half was slightly funnier.

DEVIL DOLL: This Sci Fi era episode features a movie thats actually not that bad for what it is. Its set in England (or, as Servo puts it, the "land of jug-eared, chinless, stomach-eaters.") and is about a ventriloquist named the Great Vorelli and Hugo, his evil, sentient dummy. The movie is atmospheric to a degree and the story is competently told. That said, the movie IS paced a little slow, but there's still plenty to make fun of, from all the potshots directed at the British to the dour, serious tone Vorelli has throughout all his performances (he's hired to ENTERTAIN, isn't he?!). The back and forth riffing Mike and the Bots provide for Vorelli and Hugo is awesome, starts at the movie's very first scene, and never lets up from there. This is also the episode where Servo transfers his soul into a Toaster Strudel, so the last quarter of the film has a rectangular shadow bobbing around next to Mike in the theater. It all makes for a truly excellent episode.

DEVIL FISH: Another good Sci Fi episode. Its kinda a Jaws rip-off about a proto-shark, which is a gravely skinned shark with octopus tentacles, apparently. The movie itself reminds me of WEREWOLF in that its very very 80's, stars many obviously European people despite being set in America, and attempts a serious tone while having way too many goofy characters to actually be taken seriously. DEVIL FISH also has some soap-opera antics going on which fuel the riffing fires as well. Like BRIDE OF THE MONSTER, this movie just has too much weird stuff going for it to be a bad episode, and Mike and the gang really do a great job with it. Another great episode.

So you get 3 excellent episodes, and a fascinating season 1 ep with this set. All 4 dvds don't have any glitches or tape hits either, so its clear, easy veiwing the whole time. A very good box set, one any fan shouldn't be without.

Episode 107: Robot Monster with shorts Commando Cody Parts 4 & 5.

A robot costume that consists of a gorilla suit and an old diving helmet, if that isn't an example of great riffing material for Joel and the Bots I don't know what is. The robot, the infamous Ro-Man is charged with wiping out the one remaining family in the world, but somehow can't just go out his cave entrance and shoot at them cause he lives right by them. The movie is horrible, but the guys do a great job with it. The Commando Cody shorts are funny as well, as they always are. Favorite Line: Not really a line, just the sequence at the end where the film repeats itself, thats hilarious.

Episode 423: Bride of the Monster with short Hired Part 1

Bela Lugosi, Tor Johnson and Ed Wood, sounds like a recipe for disaster and it is but an entertaining one. Bela plays a mad scientist who has a place in the swamp complete with an octopus and an oversized dumb oaf played by Tor Johnson. Its the usual mess of an Ed Wood movie and the octopus attacks are just laughable. Joel and his bots do a great job making it more than passible. Also the Hired short is quite entertaining. Favorite Line: "A big bald deranged kitten that can snap your neck like celery"

Episode 818: Devil Doll

Here's a ventriloquist who has a dummy named Hugo that has a mind of its own. Also there's a guy investigating if this ventriloquist is involved in any of the murders that keep happening and there's a woman who has a lot of money and guess whose after it? Its actually decent by MST3K standards with some good tension but its very plodding and dull mainly from the acting. Thank god for the crew as they riff away with no mercy. Favorite Line: "I'm sweaty cause I was choking the puppet..... no wait"

Episode 911: Devil Fish

This schlock is a horrible boring piece of crap that has many Italians pretending to be Americans and doing the worst job of anyone I've seen in film. We also have a half octopus/half shark thing that is devouring locals in Florida. There's a lot of bad accents, pool sequences where the creature attacks and a thin lady that looks like a human skeleton oh and Cortez a powerlifting deputy. Mike and the bots do such a great job with this, its so funny throughout. Favorite Line: "You know just because you can edit doesn't mean you should"

Extras

An intro by Josh Weinstein for "Robot Monster"

Joel Hodgson on the how the Invention Exchange was created

Interview with Richard Gordon, the puppet master for Devil Doll

and many more

Its a great, funny set one of the best they've released. Well worth having.

My family and I have only watched half of the boxed set but we have thoroughly enjoyed what we have watched! So far, it has been a blast laughing at the comments from all of the cast and watching these horrendous movies. I would recommend this box set for only the true MST3K fans, otherwise the humor will be lost on those that don't appreciate it!

Introduction

Again, Shout! Factory has given us a nice cross section from the history of Mystery Science Theater 3000. We have two Joel-hosted episodes (including one from the first season) and two Mike-hosted episodes (both from the show's Sci-Fi Channel days).

ROBOT MONSTER (1953)

This episode contains two episodes of the Commando Cody serial, and one of the strangest feature films I've ever seen. ROBOT MONSTER stars one of the goofiest monsters ever committed to celluloid: a creature with an ape's body, an astronaut's helmet and a face made out of clay. Helping him in his plan of genocide is a machine that makes a billion bubbles (so claims the opening credits). The film is almost worth watching on its own; it's that peculiar and odd.

This episode comes from the program's first season at Comedy Central (or Comedy Channel as it was known in the day) and it still has that early, unpolished feel to it. Some of the jokes are good (especially during the two shorts), but overall it's still relatively flat and lacks the liveliness that would be the standard in later years (Josh Weinstein's sneeze while operating the Tom Servo puppet is one of the more notable moments). This is one of the few occasions when the bizarreness of film itself overwhelms everything around it, including the riffing.

BRIDE OF THE MONSTER (1955)

This episode comes with the first part of the "Hired!" short. The second part of that short is featured in a much more famous episode, "MANOS": THE HANDS OF FATE. The riffing of this portion of the Chevy sales film is just as good as they would do the following week.

The feature film feels a lot like at least half of the Bela Lugosi films I've seen. Here, director Ed Wood, Jr. pairs Lugosi with Tor Johnson. This time the mad scientist and his henchman are attempting to create a race of super-humans to take over the world. They also have a giant octopus living nearby, although to be honest I've no idea what (if anything) it has to do with the rest of the story. At the end, the octopus explodes in a giant atomic mushroom cloud of an explosion, while the heroes safely stand several feet away and watch the blast.

We're now in the fourth season of MST3k and the cast, crew and writers are really firing on all cylinders. Of course, the inherent silliness of an Ed Wood production makes their task a little easier than usual. Still, there are some killer jokes and gags to be had at the expense of three of Best Brains' favorite targets.

DEVIL DOLL (1964)

This is not one of the worst movies that MST3k ever did. In fact, it's a relatively decent little B-movie, horror/fantasy film about a ventriloquist who loses control of his sentient dummy. It's a slow and incredibly predictable movie, but the atmosphere isn't bad and its heart is in the right place. It's a British movie from the mid-1960s, so if you're fan of films or TV from that location and era, you'll probably recognize a lot of the character actors present. William Sylvester of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY fame stars.

I hadn't watched this one since reruns were still airing on the Sci-Fi Channel, and I had completely forgotten how funny the riffing was. There are several instances where one great joke leads to another and another, creating several minutes of non-stop laughter. This is one of my favorite experiences with MST3k, when a series of jokes goes on for so long that even the lesser gags don't break the spell. It doesn't happen with every episode, but - for me - it did here.

DEVIL FISH (1984)

This film concerns a giant artificially-created monster fish roaming around the ocean and eating people. The eponymous devil fish is part octopus, part shark and part whatever-a-particular-piece-of-stock-footage-currently-shows. It's a fairly typical film of this genre, owing a great deal to JAWS and other, better monster movies.

The riffing again is strong with this one. Personally, I got a little tired of the repetitive jokes based on the fact that the Italian producers attempt to make Italy look like Florida. Still, the rest of the jokes more than make up for that.

Stinger

Once again, another solid, entertaining MST3k box set from Shout! Factory. This set includes several extras, including mini-documentaries on a few of the films and filmmakers included in this collection. I am increasingly impressed by the effort that Shout! Factory puts into these extras and they are great fun for fans (like me) who like MST3k but also like hearing and learning about how these awful and strange movies ever got produced.

I L-O-V-E MST3K. Even the bad movies are good when the crew gets hold of them. I really cannot add to what has already been said - I am now waiting for the next boxed set to be put out!

Bride of the Monster, Devil Doll and J. Elvis... what's not to love? The included Gypsy figure is a great collectible and I'm glad the ol' gal was included in a box set. Robot Monster is hilariously bad, slightly cringe-inducing and lovable all at the same time.

For anyone who's a MSTie like me, you'll definitely want this collection: for the Gypsy toy. The movies are good too, of course!