Mystery Science Theater 3000

TV Series. 1988-Some point later. Joel Hodgeson et. al.

Some puppets tell jokes over a movie with easy-to-acquire broadcast rights.

Mystery Science Theater 3000 is the perfect show for the postmodern moment of cable television. Cable invited deconstruction, part of the joke of Mystery Science Theater 3000 is that movies like The Pod People or Manos the Hands of Fate actually got made at at all. What world had to exist to create them?

Mystery Science Theater took the postmodern zeitgeist and rotated it a quarter turn - it is deconstructive, but it is also kind. The frame story setting (a man imprisoned and forced to watch movies against his will) was chosen because otherwise it seemed too mean to be making fun of the movies they were watching. When possible (and it is often possible) the movies are treated with some love: tiny bits of them are recreated in skits or impressions, there are callbacks to other movies, there is a sense that it is all in fun.

If you haven’t seen it already, I recommend starting with Space Mutiny or The Cave Dwellers.