The Gizmoplex
The original run of Mystery Science Theater 3000 ended just before the new millennium, seemingly confining the show’s trademark rapid-fire movie riffing to the 20th century. To classify this as something that depressed me for many years would be underselling it just a little bit. YouTube arrives, and plenty of people tried their hand at riffing on pop culture, both long-form and short-form, and all of them came up short compared to MST3K – many were simply too snarky, too sweary, too mean-spirited, and just missed the point, often by light years. There was only one Mystery Science Theater, and it was gone. And then even a lumpen attempt in the early aughts to revive Mystery Science Theater by its own rightsholders, in a manner that seemed weirdly derivative of Homestar Runner among other things, came and went. Was no one going to do the Satellite of Love justice? Or was the 21st century just too Dark & Gritty (TM, pat. pend.) for the gently-snarky-but-generally-sunny humor of one of my favorite television shows ever? … Read more