Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5419 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-11-18
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Box set, Black & White, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 4
• Running time: 380 minutes

Customer Reviews

just what we need

-- another review at this late date. Like the other sets, some of these are more desirable to own than others. I tend to better enjoy episodes where the underlying movie is silly or campy-bad (Santa Claus / Squirm / Final Sacrifice), but not unwatchable like 'Manos.'

Having said that, Space Mutiny is one of my all-time favorites. I hadn't seen all the others, but bought the box set just for that one. A truly cheezy movie that was made for no better reason than to swindle the movie-going public out of its hard-earned dollars, gets the kicking it so richly deserves. Classic line: at a meeting of the rebels, a dissenter is knocked down and murdered. Crow says, 'It's a rare meeting where something actually gets done!'

Overdrawn at the Memory Bank: Early Raoul Julia in cheap made-for-public-TV tripe, shot on videotape. Not a top-10 episode, but maybe top-25. Girl in the Gold Boots: A solid, but also not-top-10 episode, on a par with Secret Agent Super Dragon, or Touch of Satan (secondary inclusions in other box-sets). Hamlet: The awful underlying black-&-white (mostly black) movie ruined this one for me. Looks like it was shot in an abandoned bunker. Not many memorable lines.

But don't let words like 'secondary' fool you - mst3k was better than most stuff of TV, then and now. They can't all be gold. I wish they'd box up the most-requested episodes a few at a time, and the less-requested episodes 8 or 10 at a time. Nobody listens.

Arguably one of the finest - er ... funniest - in the series
All MST3K fans have their personal favorites, those with riffs on movies that just tickle your funny bone a little more than some of the others, for whatever reason lurking in one's Freudian, Jungian past upbringing (or whatever). This set contains two of my favorites and a third that ranks close, so that even with the (relative) dud of the Girl in Gold Boots, this set gets five stars. The two that get me every time are Hamlet, which is a poorly shot, poorly dubbed German rendition that only vaguely resembles a Shakespearian play, and Space Mutiny, a Canadian travesty shot in a warehouse equipped with lots of padding for "railing diving" and other action sequences that substitute for actual acting and a plot. Close in the mix is Overdrawn at the Memory Bank, starring the late great Raul Julia, who does a lot of confusing things using cheap computer graphics and a bunch of community theater actors, resulting in a stultifying excuse of a science fiction movie. I don't know, there's just something about Hamlet's step father being made to shout "We're out of ear poison" that gets me, along with the turgid golf cart chase in Space Mutiny where Mike goes, "I could walk on my hands faster that that." In short, three out of four of these movies are good for repeated, often repeated, laughs, and even the Gold Boots clunker has enough shiny moments that I wouldn't consider it out of its league here. Nobody who calls themselves a "fan of MST3K" should be without this set, and I think it makes a wonderful entry set for those new to the hijinks of the Satellite of Love crew.

Big McLargeHuge
Okay I'll admit it. I've only watched Overdrawn at the Memory Bank and Space Mutiny on this set. But the two alone are MORE than enough reason to have it. I've just never felt the need to watch anything else. Space Mutiny is by far one of the best MST3Ks ever made. The movie is beyond horrible which makes for excellent humor. The names that Mike and the bots call the so-called "hero" makes it worthwhile all by itself. I have never once regretted having this set. Someday I'll watch the rest but for now Space Mutiny and Overdrawn are good enough for me. I could sit and watch them all day. Now if only they would release Girls Town on an MST3K set my life would be complete.