Forrest’s Personal History with MST3K

                 
I saw my first episode of MST3K was in 1992 I believe.  That episode was Pod People and I thought it was incredibly funny; in fact, I laughed harder than ever before at a television show.  So I decided to start watching more of them.  I was still a casual fan and I watched about six or seven episodes of Season Three, then got bored and moved on.  It wasn’t until Season Five, when I saw The Brain That Wouldn’t Die, that I got back into the show.  I watched about ten Mike episodes of Seasons Five and Six, and then again lost interest in the show. 

Then a long time later on a rare rainy day in Las Vegas, I went to Blockbuster because I wanted to rent a comedy video.  On the shelves were five MST3K Rhino episodes: Pod People, The Brain That Wouldn’t Die, Manos: The Hands of Fate, Gunslinger, and MST3K: The Movie.  Suddenly I remembered how much fun that show was, and so I rented The Brain That Wouldn’t Die, Pod People, and MST3K: The Movie.  I had a ton of fun that night, laughing my butt off, I had finally found something that could make me laugh hard without vulgar comments, like Beavis and Butt-Head and South Park both have (don’t get me wrong - behind MST3K, South Park and Beavis and Butt-Head are my favorite shows but it was the first show to make me laugh hard without having your mind in the gutter). Watching this show required intelligence, and my intellect did get much better from watching MST3K.

Soon I was watching the Sci-Fi Channel, and I found them to be hilarious, from the hilarious The Final Sacrifice to the incredibly daft Puma Man, I had finally found my newest and most favorite hobby.  I raided Amazon.com and bought every Rhino VHS I could, and I ended up owning every episode Rhino release over a few weeks.  I was soon a MiSTie. I then downloaded every Comedy Central episode I could from Kazaa (so sue me) but I didn’t really like it because I found watching them on the computer was nowhere near as fun as on TV.  Then I found out about tape trading.  I love tape trading, it’s very fun, and less expensive than buying from the Rhino selection.  But after a long time of tape trading I decided to get DVDs, and I’d have to hand it to Gary and David at www.mst3kvideos.com and www.castleforrester.com, they can provide you with the VERY best quality ever.

I have recommended MST3K to dozens of friends. Some now love the show, some hate it, but the ones who hated it seemed to be much lower in intelligence than the ones who enjoyed it. It also has a lot to do with whether or not you take an interest in pop culture. If you love pop culture, MST3K is going to be your favorite thing, if you can care less, you’ll probably care less about MST3K.

What do I think about MST3K?  Simple. I love it.  My personal favorite episodes are The Final Sacrifice and Pod People.  I like Joel and Mike on pretty much an equal level, but I will say that I prefer Mike over Joel.  It’s his pop culture edge.  Joel is great too, but if I were to be entirely honest, Mike would have to be my favorite.  And I’ve also concluded Mike Nelson to be the funniest man who ever lived.  He’s extremely smart, witty, and very, very funny.  What makes him so funny?  In today’s world, vulgar is funny among most people.  Admit it, cursing, society failure, and pretty much anything South Parkish is funny.  However, Mike, as well as everyone else from BBI do not rely on vulgarity.  They are able to make us laugh just as hard without relying on things that Chris Rocks does.  Not to say anything bad about Chris Rock, he, in my humble opinion, is one of the funniest guys ever, and to be perfectly honest, he’s made me laugh as hard as some of the best work that BBI has done.  However, after viewing an excellent MST episode (which is pretty much all of them), there’s this sort of satisfaction that you get out of it other than watching something like Beavis and Butthead.  We all know that we love that show, you’d be a liar to deny you don’t think Beavis and Butthead are funny.  But after watching Beavis and Butthead, well, it’s just a very above average show, and very funny.  But MST3K has a certain quality to it that simply does not exist elsewhere, it leaves you with this good feeling about it, that you’ve survived the cheesy movie, and got a hilarious commentary as well.

As for the bots’, I love em all. Gypsy, Crow, Tom Servo.  The show simply could not be complete without them. Josh Weinstein’s Servo was good, but in all honesty, Kevin Murphy’s was superior.  But you also must understand that Weinstein was only with the show for KTMA and Season One. had he stayed until Season Five or so, my tune would probably change.  As for Crow, picking whether Trace or Bill were better is simply impossible.  Sometimes I like Trace’s Crow more, sometimes I like Bill’s Crow more, so given that, I’d have to say that I love them both.  Dr. Forrester and Frank, does anyone not like them?  Whether or not you thought they added little or a lot to the show, I think we can all agree that they were funny.  I loved Dr. F and Frank, and it was sad to see them go.  As for Pearl.  Well, bite me, but I like Pearl and I think Mary Jo added tremendously to the Sci-Fi era of MST3K.  Same for Observer and Bobo.  However, I will say that I liked Frank and Dr. Forrester best as the Mads.  As for Larry Erhardt, well, he wasn’t around long enough for me to attach to.  And remember, I have NOTHING against Josh Weinstein, but he simply wasn’t around long enough for me to truly attach to his Servo and Mad characters.  However, I still think he’s a funny guy, and he’s very successful, arguably the MOST successful former Best Brains member.

Then one day, I decided, hey, wouldn’t that be neat if we could interview Mike Nelson?  Don and I had our doubts, but Mike agreed to it!  It just shows what a great guys he is.  That opened the portal to our numerous interviews with BBI, and I’d like to thank Mike yet again for doing that with us.

So, because the success of Don’s MST3K Site had grown, we decided to call it The MST3K Review.  Don, in my opinion, did an excellent job at putting the site together and when we added in my custom-made graphics (behold the power of Adobe Photoshop), the site looked a lot nicer and not so cluttered.

Now that I’ve seen every episode, I now get to re-watch them. And review them. I love reviewing MST3K episodes. That Greg Eichelberger guy, who had one of the first MST3K review sites, well, his was a no-nonsense, flunk or pass MST3K site. As well as many other MST3K review sites that simply did not enthuse me.  It seems that the fans that wrote the reviews had a hate/love relationship with MST3K.  Pass or fail.  That was until I met Don.  I loved his review site for one main reason: He clearly loved MST3K.  Although he was a bit bias when it came to the Sci-Fi Era, it was clear that he was a true MiSTie.  So I asked if I could help with the site.  Then Josh came along, and now we’re one of the best Review Sites there are.  There’s only one other MST3K review site that I will recommend highly: Mighty Jack’s MST3K Reviews.  I could also tell he was a true MiSTie as well, which is what makes the MST3K Review and Mighty Jack’s MST3K Reviews so great because we all love the show!  And it’s a way to express our love to MST3K, as well as I hoped we have given a few veteran MiSTies a ting of nostalgia, as well as helped newcomers better understand the show, and recommend them episodes.

But before I stop, I’d like to thank a few MiSTies, Don for letting me add in my dumb little opinions to his already great site, Josh for being a good friend and a good reviewer who has added tremendously to the site, Shawn for his non-gloomy MST3K Reviews and kindness, Gary for being one of the most generous people I’ve ever met, David for providing me with some of the best possible MST3K episodes, Zann for helping me get started in the tape trading world of MST3K, and Craig for just being a great guy, and a very generous MST3K trader.

Also, thanks to Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett, Josh Weinstein, Joel Hodgson, Jim Mallon, Beez, Bridget Jones, Mary Jo Pehl, Trace Beaulieu, Patrick Brantseg, Paul Chaplin, and everyone else who brought this show to us.  We thank you all for providing us something other than Home Improvement and other trash on TV, as well as providing us with an endless joy.