Ed Wood Caulfield 0 Report post Posted August 10, 2003 Hey all MST3K fans. I was searching through a MST3K website when I found this interesting tidbit about the future of Mystery Science Theater 3000. The reason I put (Late) in the topic title is because this news first came out in April, but no other progress has been made yet. Anyway here's the news. "Basically the Viacom/Time-Warner thing has no effect on a possible aquisition of the old episodes. However, Satellite News has also learned that Viacom is looking to buy Universal(or some specific part of Universal.) BBI owns the rights to all the episodes, unfortunately they don't own any of the movies from those episodes. Basically the main concern of both BBI and Sat News was the fact that the rights to most of those movies are costly. Sat News claimed that no other network would take MST because they felt it wasn't profitable since ratings were so bad(Sampo notes that the Turkey Day marathons on CC were the worst ever.) However the fact that Viacom bought out Time-Warner's 50% of Comedy Central, is looking to buy what appears to be all of Universal, and is even going as far as to change the name of TNN to Spike TV. It appears as though they have well enough money. On top of that, as i've mentioned so many times before, they're losing about 30 hours a programming per week once Saturday Night Live reruns entirely go to E! They're gonna need a few shows to fill those spots, MST of course can't do it alone. As for ratings wise... I don't think Viacom is really worried... their TNN(soon to be Spike TV) airs World Wrestling Entertainment programming, and despite WWE Raw being their #1 show, its ratings aren't all wine and roses. If Viacom does indeed buy Universal, then things may rapidly change, perhaps for the better. Like Sampo said: If not television, then video/DVD. Either way it's a win/win situation for MST." Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MDH257 0 Report post Posted August 10, 2003 It's not happening. It would cost millions which no one (with the money) is willing to spend. And Comedy Central got the reruns of Mad TV away from TNN/Spike to replace the SNL reruns in January. I hate to rain on the parade, but the fact is that when Sci-Fi stops showing the episodes they have, MST3K is leaving television forever. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AndrewTS 0 Report post Posted August 10, 2003 Unlikely...but stranger things have happened. Until then, "keep circulating the tapes..." Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
LaParkaYourCar 0 Report post Posted August 10, 2003 Sci-Fi stops showing episodes in January I think. I'm collecting every episode that they show on tape now and I hope to get every episode they have the rights to before it's over. I know that the Sci-Fi channel MST3K website has all the episodes of seasons 8-10 listed so does that mean they can show all of those episodes? If so why haven't they shown certain ones in awhile? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ed Wood Caulfield 0 Report post Posted August 10, 2003 They can't show every single episode from Seasons 8-10 because the rights for the movies have expired and won't come back. Personally, I never got why the creators or distrubtors of these horrific, terrible movies would want to get paid before sending their horrible movies. In the shows early days, the producers,directors, etc. gave their films for free. Why the sudden change? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
LaParkaYourCar 0 Report post Posted August 10, 2003 They saw the popularity of the show and wanted to cash in probably. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
KingPK 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 Or, in the case of Sandy Frank, hate that they totally rip on the movies and declare he would never give them another movie for as long as he lived. I really wouldn't bet on seeing MST return to the air after Sci-Fi's contract expires. Rhino will probably release some more episodes on video, but unless you trade tapes, most of the episodes are history. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Smues Report post Posted August 11, 2003 (listens to The Sandy Frank song) Gee I wonder why Sandy Frank would hate them and not let them have anymore movies. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, he's the source of all our pain. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, gads about the house all day. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, thinks that people come from trees. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, gets horrid movies from Japan. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, films are always poorly dubbed. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, Speilberg won't return his calls. And of course my favorite, although not from the Sandy Frank song: Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, likes to crap in his hand. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
{''({o..o})''} 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 I've put some episodes on Kazaa as part of the Digital Archive Project. But as has been said, the show ain't coming back. The only problem I get is not being able to compress the avi's enough to fit on a single cd-r. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AndrewTS 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 (listens to The Sandy Frank song) Gee I wonder why Sandy Frank would hate them and not let them have anymore movies. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, he's the source of all our pain. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, gads about the house all day. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, thinks that people come from trees. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, gets horrid movies from Japan. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, films are always poorly dubbed. Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, Speilberg won't return his calls. And of course my favorite, although not from the Sandy Frank song: Sandy Frank, Sandy Frank, likes to crap in his hand. ....from the Time of the Apes episode, show 306. In many cases selling the rights to show a movie wasn't a problem since many of the movies were such bombs that dumping them on MST3K often was the only way to make a little scratch off it. Not that they don't try sometimes--I swear I saw a DVD for Future War--yes, the one riffed on MST3K--at my local Saturday Matinee. At least Sandy couldn't complain that MST3K editing ruined his movies, since Fugitive Alien and TotA were just hacked up and pasted together Japanese TV shows. The original Gamera wasn't that bad, though...well, at least compared to the movies that followed it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
KingPK 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 I was at my local discount crap retail store (Building 19), and guess what I saw in the DVD rack? Go ahead, guess. Joe Don Baker IS Mitchell! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AndrewTS 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 I was at my local discount crap retail store (Building 19), and guess what I saw in the DVD rack? Go ahead, guess. Joe Don Baker IS Mitchell! Yeah, that doesn't even scratch the surface of crap I saw when I went to Century III mall's Suncoast. It seems since DVD got big there's a belief that there's a huge market for extremely bad b-movies on DVD. Although sometimes you get a good deal that way--The Terror, House on Haunted Hill, and Night of the Living Dead all on DVD. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
PsychoDriver 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 Sadly, it appears pretty impossible for MST3k to ever get shown on TV again (to many rights issues and red tape) which is a damn shame.. that show was great I just wish RHINO would be better with releasing new eps on DVD and maybe get a Special Edition of "MST3k:The Movie" out Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
River City Rocker 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 I just wish RHINO would be better with releasing new eps on DVD and maybe get a Special Edition of "MST3k:The Movie" out Rhino is promising an "exciting" DVD release for the fourth quarter of 2003, according to Satellite News. Details are still up in the air, but this could mean that there could be some new episodes being released, or, even MST3K: The Movie. -Ben Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AndrewTS 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 MST3K: The Movie is already out on DVD, but it's very rare. However, it's bare bones. There's no scene selection or anything, so either you watch it all the way through or FFWD to the point you want. If they re-released it with a swank menu, scene selection, DELETED SCENES (the original ending for it that was cut by the studio), and maybe even the original version of This Island Earth or maybe the entire movie riffed (there wasn't really any need to cut the movie since they didn't have to squeeze it into an 2 hour block with host segments), then I'd simply have to pick it up. Unless it was eps I don't already have, I wouldn't be too excited about them released many of the TV eps on DVD, although some of the tapes I have are poor quality so I'd like to see some of them. Ever notice at times it seems they select movies at random to make video releases of? The Crawling Hand was a very bland episode. Since it was before the show really starting to kick ass, and there's nothing really noteworthy about the episode, I wonder why they picked it. If they wanted a season 1 ep, Robot Holocaust would have been an infinitely better choice, or Robot Monster even. And I think the "random choice" about what to release can be shown by Bloodlust and Hellcats being released on video. Those episodes are almost unwatchable besides the host segments and the short prior to Bloodlust. I suppose that licensing rights may prevent some of the episodes from being released, though--for example, some of the best episodes were the Godzilla/Gamera movies but those are still watched for the cheese and camp factors so people buy them un-MSTied. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ed Wood Caulfield 0 Report post Posted August 11, 2003 There's a new online petiton out planned to be sent out to Comedy Central in hopes of getting the Comedy Central episodes back on the air. So far, the petition has 2,097 signatures. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
LaParkaYourCar 0 Report post Posted August 12, 2003 I just downloaded Santa Claus Conquers the Martians and the picture is moving so slow that it can't keep up with the sound!!! This is freakin annoying!!! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
