In case you’ve noticed, I haven’t been posting much. This is due to a volatile mix of health issues, the fact that I’m moving in a couple of weeks, and too many video games. I’m trying my best to remedy this. Until then, here’s some stuff I missed.

Mystery Science Theater 3000

• Entertainment Weekly placed Tom and Crow at number 12, on their list of “Hotshot Movie Robots.” I’m sure this is relevant to someone, somewhere.
• Former MST3K tech guy Brad Keely won a freaking Emmy for his camera editing work on PBS kids show DragonflyTV.
• Satellite News is going to Comic-Con. Find ‘em and buy ‘em a sammich.
• The A.V. Club pits Manos and Troll 2 against one other. Oh, the horror.
• io9 determines where Crow T. Robot sits in the great spectrum of robotkind. Somewhere between Robocop and Marvin The Paranoid Android, it seems.

Rifftrax

• Bill extended an invitation to the Cinematic Titanic crew.
• Jawbone Radio interviewed Bill.
• Bill was on TV. Is there anything Bill hasn’t done, of late? Busy bee.

Cinematic Titanic

• Satellite News has photos from CT’s June live show.
• Joel appeared on the Water and Power web series. (Auto-play, beware.)
• Josh was the answer to a Jeopardy question.
• Frank wonders if Doomsday Machine is worthy of a Manos Award.
• Autographed 8×10s have hit the CT store.
• Mary Jo blogged for the MN Film & TV Board again, here and here.

Satellite News has an interesting new interview with (arguably) the chief Brain, former MST3K producer and current rights-holder Jim Mallon. They describe it as being “no-topic-off-limits,” and I appreciate the gesture, but it’s not quite as hard-hitting as I would’ve liked. Nonetheless, it’s a much better interview than what we’re used to.

While there’s nothing too controversial, there are a few noteworthy responses. Jim possesses the missing KTMA episodes, for one. (He seems willing to release the host segments.) And Jim doesn’t contradict any of Joel’s recent claims about the past, which is nice. He does, however, carefully maneuver around the question about Josh’s departure, and he says that the animated shorts were discontinued due to cost, ignoring the fact that 80% of the fans despised them.

Good read, though. Check it out.

TVShowsOnDVD has posted a list of the extras for the upcoming 20th Anniversary release of MST3K episodes. Their first MST3K set will, of course, have the standard, irrelevant inclusion of movie trailers for the enclosed episodes, but there will also be some worthwhile material.

First, there will be something called “The History of MST3K,” presumably a short (new?) documentary on the series. Perhaps more importantly, Shout Factory will be recording the upcoming Comic-Con reunion, and it will be included in this box set. Nice. Perhaps not quite as robust as I was expecting, but the Comic-Con footage will make this set more than worthwhile.

See the above video, the one in between the frustrating and inexplicable empty spaces? That’s an entire episode of The Film Crew.

It seems that Shout Factory has branched out and made The Film Crew available on video site Hulu.com. Granted, it’s only one episode — Hollywood After Dark — but if you haven’t tried out any of their DVDs, this is a great way to give The Film Crew a try. You’ll have to sit through the occasional ad, as with all Hulu videos, but still — free!

Came across this fantastic picture of Vampira recently, presumably mugging it up for some young fans. I just felt like sharing it. And I feel like this sort of post should have a title. Like “Deep Photos” or “Apetography,” or… Okay, I’ll stop.

Also, I know I’m really behind in posting. I’ll try to catch up!

This post originally had a much filthier title. Yes, it’s that good.

In a move that should have every single Rhino employee hanging their heads in shame, Shout Factory has posted a picture of the awesome packaging for their first MST3K episode collection, on the set’s Amazon page. Though this isn’t confirmed, it looks to me like it could be a tin. And hey! It doesn’t have a lot of random, only vaguely related imagery on it! Incredible!

We still don’t know which episodes or extras will be in the set, but recent promo material stated that Werewolf and Laserblast would be on there. Though Shout Factory has said that this was a mistake, I wouldn’t be surprised to see one or both of these in either this, or the next, collection. The official lineup should be revealed at the San Diego Comic-Con, in a few weeks’ time.

The “20th Anniversary Collection” should be out on October 28th, and can be found on Amazon for a hefty but probably worthwhile $48.99.

Resurfaces? Well, okay, it never really went away. Today, however, I received another comment on this blog by someone impersonating Joel Hodgson, claiming once again that it’s okay to torrent Cinematic Titanic episodes. This is, of course, NOT TRUE. The really good part came in the middle of the comment:

What with gas prices soaring, food prices making you sick to your stomach, and job losses at an all time high, we thought it was only right to release ALL future releases of Cinematic Titanic FREE-OF-CHARGE.

“And then we will give you all free Ferraris and supermodels, before riding off to Bad Movie Heaven on our unicorns made of dreams!” Joel is a kind, smart man, but I’m pretty sure he has not yet acquired the ability to print money with his mind. Future releases of Cinematic Titanic depend on your buying them. We fund the project when we buy CT episodes. So keep buying. Stop torrenting.

His extremely long comment closes saying that, in order to support Cinematic Titanic, we should buy from the MST3K.com store. Now, there’s some crazy moonlogic for you. Is it possible that there are so-called MSTies who don’t support, even hate, Cinematic Titanic? Maddening, if unsurprising.

Sadly, this guy (who may well be the same person as the Jim Mallon impersonator) was smart and used Anonymouse to cover his tracks. Otherwise, I’d love to rat out his information and have Joel put his filthy, thieving ass in jail. But Joel’s probably too nice for that. I’m not, though. Let me at ‘em.

A couple of days ago, Cinematic Titanic’s second episode finally saw the light of day, in both DVD and download forms. How is it? Any good? It’s not high enough on the financial priority list for me at the moment, so I’ll have to rely on hearsay, for now.

If you head to the CT website right now, you can grab it from the new Store page. (Am I the only one who thinks the Store link’s placing on the site is a little… er, awkward?) The DVD (properly packaged like an actual DVD, finally) will run you $14.99, while a download is $9.99. The servers crashed during the initial sales rush, so downloads may be slow, if they’re working at all.

It also looks like they’re selling Oozing Skull in DVD cases, so if you’ve been holding off on getting that one, you might want to… not… hold off… anymore. Or buy it again. Joel would probably appreciate that.

As you might have heard, a demo for upcoming PC game Spore was recently released. Spore is a long-awaited “evolution sim,” I suppose you’d call it. You create your own species from the ground up, then guide them as they evolve and advance, going from a single cell to a spacefaring race.  At the moment, you can pick up the trial version of the “Creature Creator” for free here.

Why do I mention this? Well, as you can see above, I am one fabulous nerd. Yes, I made Tom Servo and Crow T. Robot in Spore. Or, rather, I tried and ended up producing freakish, ghastly creatures inspired by them. Needless to say, the possibilities are endless and quite disturbing, especially if you shell out $10 for the full version of Creature Creator, which unlocks many more parts to use. I probably could’ve done better with the full selection.

I’m not alone in my madness, either. YouTube user Connigit made his own Trumpy creature. You can also see sad, disturbing footage of my own Crow T. Robot here. Can you do better? Most likely. Download the Spore Creature Creator and give it a shot. My next Spore project? Nummy Muffin Coocol Butter. Or something shaped like genitals. I haven’t decided yet. Either way, you can keep track of them here.

UPDATE: See? I knew I sucked. A reader named Insert Coin(s) to Continue made his own, more accurate Tom and Crow. I love that Tom, particularly.

Mike Nelson lives again, as the next Rifftrax release will be a regular, run-of-the-mill commentary — no Rifftrax Presents shenanigans. Along with Bill and Kevin, Mike will be diving head-first into the astoundingly overrated world of M. Night Shyamalan, riffing on his breakthrough film, The Sixth Sense. On June 25th, you’ll have more Bruce Willis and Haley Joel Osmont than you could ever want. Which should be none.

The above video is some Sixth Sense-related mischief from yon Rifftrax Blog.