Netflix Is Bringing Back Mystery Science Theater 3000 With A New Host In April
YouTube/Netflix – [The] Anticipated Reboot of Fan Favorite Series Mystery Science Theater 3000 will be Available on Netflix in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, UK and Ireland in the “Not-Too-Distant Future.” Original creator Joel Hodgson will be joined by comedian Jonah Ray (“Jonah Heston”) as the new host and Felicia Day (Geek & Sundry) as “Kinga Forrester.”
A Kickstarter starter campaign, spearheaded by Hodgson and Shout! Factory, surpassed the goal of funding the production of 14 new episodes and set the world record as the highest-funded film and TV crowdfunding campaign in history.
Mystery Science Theater 3000 is one of those shows that if you know it (as anyone who watched Comedy Central in the 90s might), you probably love it, and if you haven’t it’s one of the weirdest things to explain. You talk about a cult classic show and this is about as cult as it gets, getting low ratings throughout its time on air but a loyal following to the point that it raised $5.8 million in the Kickstrarter to bring it back that Netflix mentioned above. The premise: A guy stuck in space is forced into experiments where he watches really REALLY shitty movies with his sassy robot friends. There are some storyline elements but it’s basically just them riffing over movies with shitty costumes, bad acting and plots, and everything you want out of awful films. If you like a podcast like How Did This Get Made?, it’s similar but ratcheted up 1000 points on the absurdity meter. Losing the original host Joel is going to be an adjustment but the new guy Jonah Ray has been funny in some of his work with Kumail Nanjiani and Joel is still involved with the production so, combined with Netflix’s steady hand, there’s some real hope.
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If you’re not familiar with the original because you’re a college kid but you also like drugs or shows like Rick and Morty, this is for you. It’s a real deep rabbit hole to go down but here’s a decent best of:
My personal favorite full episode on the movie Manos Hands of Fate is on YouTube (along with a bunch of other of people’s favorites here) if you’re looking for a good first episode to try out:
The show comes back April 14th. Don’t screw it up, Netflix.