Mystery Science Theater 3000: 12 TO THE MOON
October 5, 2016 5:05 AM - Season 5, Episode 24 - Subscribe
"Land on the moon with the intrepid first astronauts!" An international team of smarties haul themselves and cats up to the moon, where Gidney and Cloyd make ridiculous demands of them (they want the cats) before freezing North America. With short Design for Dreaming: One of the more bizarre things ever screened on the Satellite of Love. An annoying musical lady goes with her masked suitor to see GM cars on display, pausing in the middle to engage in Jane Jetson domesticity. If the premise to the movie sounds a bit familiar, it's got the same general idea (for the first half anyway) as 211 FIRST SPACESHIP ON VENUS. BTW, if you like the "many names of David Ryder" from 820 SPACE MUTINY, this episode has a good number of toughguy lunkhead names too! It also seems it shares some production elements with the movie in 902 THE PHANTOM PLANET. The short is a highlight of MST's entire run, and is a great introduction point. Also, this is the final episode of Season Five. YouTube (1h35m) Premiered February 5, 1994.
Episode 524 12 TO THE MOON
Satellite News - Mighty Jack's MST3K Review - MST3K Wikia - War of the Colossal Fan Guide
Movie:
Daddy-O's Drive-In Dirt - Wikipedia - Rotten Tomatoes (Critics N/A, Viewers 12%)
IMDB (1960, 2.8 stars)
"An international team embarks on an expedition to the moon in an uncommonly spacious rocketship. There they encounter a faceless alien intelligence who conclude that the human race is too immature and dangerous and must be destroyed."
Directed by David Bradley. Written by Fred Gebhardt and DeWitt Bodeen. Starring, according to the poster, "AN INTERNATIONAL CAST." That means Ken Clark, Michi Kobi and Tom Conway.
Short, "Design for Dreaming"
Daddy-O's Drive-In Dirt - Wikipedia
IMDB (1956, 3.6 stars)
"A dancing woman of the future wants her hubbie to buy every car she sees."
Directed by William Beaudine. Starring Tad Tadlock, Marc Breaux and Thurl "Tony the Tiger" Ravenscroft.
The short has much greater cultural impact than the movie did. Daddy-O informs us that the "Kitchen of Tomorrow" was built by Frigidare, and appeared in two later shorts: Frigidare Finale (1957) and American Look (1958).
Wikipedia mentions that clips from Design For Dreaming itself appeared in the BBC documentary series Pandora's Box, Michael Moore's "Capitalism: A Love Story," a number of music videos, on stage during some performances by Nine Inch Nails, in an episode of Pen and Teller: Bullshit, and even a commercial for Super Mario Land. That combination of old-timey dated notions of future life and being in the public domain make it popular material for reuse. It can be downloaded from the Internet Archive.
This is the 98th episode of MST3K. Including KTMAs, there are 197 episodes of MST in all. If we include them, we are about halfway through the entire run of MST3K. If we don't (and there are good reasons to exclude them, believe me) we're actually a bit past halfway.
This is also the last episode of the 5th (cable) season of Mystery Science Theater. We have reached the end of the third of the "long" seasons, which are each 24 episodes long.
Unfortunately, this is about the time when Best Brains' relationship with Comedy Central began to deteriorate. Season 6 would be the last of the long seasons, and Season 7 would have a scant six episodes in it, culminating with the end of their CC run. "TV's" Frank Conniff leaves at the end of season 6 (Mary Jo Pehl joins the cast as Pearl Forrester to replace him), and Trace Beaulieu, Dr. Clayton Forrester himself, leaves after Season 7.
Of course the story of Mystery Science Theater doesn't stop there; they went to have a pretty darn good three season run on the Sci-Fi Channel after that! And of course Joel Hodgson is hard at work reviving the show for Netflix as I type this!
Episode 524 12 TO THE MOON
Satellite News - Mighty Jack's MST3K Review - MST3K Wikia - War of the Colossal Fan Guide
Movie:
Daddy-O's Drive-In Dirt - Wikipedia - Rotten Tomatoes (Critics N/A, Viewers 12%)
IMDB (1960, 2.8 stars)
"An international team embarks on an expedition to the moon in an uncommonly spacious rocketship. There they encounter a faceless alien intelligence who conclude that the human race is too immature and dangerous and must be destroyed."
Directed by David Bradley. Written by Fred Gebhardt and DeWitt Bodeen. Starring, according to the poster, "AN INTERNATIONAL CAST." That means Ken Clark, Michi Kobi and Tom Conway.
Short, "Design for Dreaming"
Daddy-O's Drive-In Dirt - Wikipedia
IMDB (1956, 3.6 stars)
"A dancing woman of the future wants her hubbie to buy every car she sees."
Directed by William Beaudine. Starring Tad Tadlock, Marc Breaux and Thurl "Tony the Tiger" Ravenscroft.
The short has much greater cultural impact than the movie did. Daddy-O informs us that the "Kitchen of Tomorrow" was built by Frigidare, and appeared in two later shorts: Frigidare Finale (1957) and American Look (1958).
Wikipedia mentions that clips from Design For Dreaming itself appeared in the BBC documentary series Pandora's Box, Michael Moore's "Capitalism: A Love Story," a number of music videos, on stage during some performances by Nine Inch Nails, in an episode of Pen and Teller: Bullshit, and even a commercial for Super Mario Land. That combination of old-timey dated notions of future life and being in the public domain make it popular material for reuse. It can be downloaded from the Internet Archive.
This is the 98th episode of MST3K. Including KTMAs, there are 197 episodes of MST in all. If we include them, we are about halfway through the entire run of MST3K. If we don't (and there are good reasons to exclude them, believe me) we're actually a bit past halfway.
This is also the last episode of the 5th (cable) season of Mystery Science Theater. We have reached the end of the third of the "long" seasons, which are each 24 episodes long.
Unfortunately, this is about the time when Best Brains' relationship with Comedy Central began to deteriorate. Season 6 would be the last of the long seasons, and Season 7 would have a scant six episodes in it, culminating with the end of their CC run. "TV's" Frank Conniff leaves at the end of season 6 (Mary Jo Pehl joins the cast as Pearl Forrester to replace him), and Trace Beaulieu, Dr. Clayton Forrester himself, leaves after Season 7.
Of course the story of Mystery Science Theater doesn't stop there; they went to have a pretty darn good three season run on the Sci-Fi Channel after that! And of course Joel Hodgson is hard at work reviving the show for Netflix as I type this!
This is my favorite episode!
I've always wondered if the thing about the moon people liking cats was some sort of allusion to Lovecraft's "Cat's of Ulthar". While incompetently done, if you think about the actual storyline it has a very Lovecraftian feel to it, more than the usual Weird Tales vibe of the time.
posted by charred husk at 8:15 AM on October 5, 2016 [1 favorite]
I've always wondered if the thing about the moon people liking cats was some sort of allusion to Lovecraft's "Cat's of Ulthar". While incompetently done, if you think about the actual storyline it has a very Lovecraftian feel to it, more than the usual Weird Tales vibe of the time.
posted by charred husk at 8:15 AM on October 5, 2016 [1 favorite]
Kitchen of Tomorrow? Tex Avery did it much better (4:00-5:55)
As for the feature, is one of the "12 To The Moon" Alice Kramden? (It would be time-period-accurate)
posted by oneswellfoop at 6:48 PM on October 5, 2016 [1 favorite]
As for the feature, is one of the "12 To The Moon" Alice Kramden? (It would be time-period-accurate)
posted by oneswellfoop at 6:48 PM on October 5, 2016 [1 favorite]
Notice:
I am around the area that Hurricane Matthew is scheduled to hit tomorrow. I *may* not be able to run a show tomorrow, depending on what the weather is like and where the storm actually hits. I've yet to find notice of an evacuation for my area of coastal Georgia, but there are possible evacs planned for both Flordia and South Carolina, so I assume I might need to bug out myself.
My own plan, if evacuation becomes essential, is possibly to retreat to a friend's place in Statesboro, which is a good ways inland. More news as it breaks.
posted by JHarris at 7:57 PM on October 5, 2016
I am around the area that Hurricane Matthew is scheduled to hit tomorrow. I *may* not be able to run a show tomorrow, depending on what the weather is like and where the storm actually hits. I've yet to find notice of an evacuation for my area of coastal Georgia, but there are possible evacs planned for both Flordia and South Carolina, so I assume I might need to bug out myself.
My own plan, if evacuation becomes essential, is possibly to retreat to a friend's place in Statesboro, which is a good ways inland. More news as it breaks.
posted by JHarris at 7:57 PM on October 5, 2016
Just be safe, JH. Don't let Hurricane Matthew conk you on the noggin and shoot you into space.
posted by oneswellfoop at 8:04 PM on October 5, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by oneswellfoop at 8:04 PM on October 5, 2016 [3 favorites]
I also think this is not such a bad movie, even without the riffing. I'm a sucker for the German guy plot - don't want to say more in case some people have never actually seen this one before.
posted by wittgenstein at 7:58 AM on October 6, 2016
posted by wittgenstein at 7:58 AM on October 6, 2016
Ah, it's REALLY short notice, but we're having a show after all! Usual place, usual time, c'mon in everyone!
posted by JHarris at 5:59 PM on October 6, 2016
posted by JHarris at 5:59 PM on October 6, 2016
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posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 6:06 AM on October 5, 2016 [1 favorite]