New Season of MST3k Crowdfunding has failed.

[Otrader]

My new favorite is the MADS monthly shows for $10 per live show.  With the exception of a couple good ones, most of the the new MST episodes were unwatchable.

[MATMAN]

[...] or the creeping political correctness. But for me it was the bad writing and the assumption that people would support anything, no matter how bad, with the MST3K logo attached.  

What political correctness caused people not to fund the new season?

Put a chick in it and make her lame and gay.

[AI Sharpton]

[...] or the creeping political correctness. But for me it was the bad writing and the assumption that people would support anything, no matter how bad, with the MST3K logo attached.  

What political correctness caused people not to fund the new season?

I'm pretty sure he's just doing a great meta commentary about how thin-skinned morons that call others snowflakes are actually the biggest snowflakes themselves since they can't tolerate anything not cast with 100% straight white dudes?!  Cuz thankfully Season 13 was no more PC than Joel's old fashioned Minnesotan sensibilities way back in Season 1.


Sorry, but what, exactly, is wrong with having a show with 100% straight white dudes?  

[jhs39]

I think they were on the right track with season 13 really pushing things forward with the writing. I'm really dying to get some new riffer blood in the mix so i have really appreciated Joel pushing forward the kids and giving them room to grow. I do agree with some of the sentiments of budgets being nuts, but i would imagine that Joel wants to secure these films permanently instead of perpetually fighting licensing issues and I think some of the movies had their first appearance in HD through MST so they might even be funding their own transfers as well. And i'm not sure the Gizmoplex was a great idea tbh

Regardless, this is sad to see because again i really want to see some new blood come to the forefront

I think Joel really needs to pick a host and bots and stick with them through the entire season instead of paying for two sets of test subjects and robot actors.  That would provide a much more consistent experience for the audience and also save money.  Joel also needs to return to the low-budget aesthetic of the original Comedy Central and Sci-Fi Channel iterations of MST3K.  

For those who don't remember--Season 11 of MST3K was also crowdfunded...then after far exceeding the original crowdfunding goal Joel sold Season 11 to Netflix where the fans who funded the episodes couldn't even watch them unless they also paid for a Netflix subscription or downloaded them illegally.  Netflix obviously didn't need any fan money and I always suspected that Joel just kept it.  If Joel used the crowdfunding money to produce Season 11 then those episodes should be on the Gizmoplex along with Seasons 1-10 but they aren't.

Hopefully, after the epic failure of the latest crowdfunding campaign, Joel will stop taking MST3K fans for granted and come up with a more modest and realistic business plan for the show.    

I'm not sure how many people saw the email Joel sent out to backers towards the end of the campaign about the specific sacrifices he was willing to make to bring the production costs per episode down in the hopes of reaching a slightly lower fundraising goal but it was so tone-deaf that the user comment section was locked very quickly.

[billythefist]

[...] or the creeping political correctness. But for me it was the bad writing and the assumption that people would support anything, no matter how bad, with the MST3K logo attached.  

What political correctness caused people not to fund the new season?

Put a chick in it and make her lame and gay.

What a sad existence

[Dtorrent87]

The issue is more oversaturation and too much leaning into the "geek" audience. It's a comedy show. It had a meaner edge to it at one point, where the writers and the characters liked good movies and were genuinely offended at bad ones. People confuse MST3K's "not a lot of R-rated jokes or things that look racist 30 years later" humor philosophy with "being nice and loving bad movies for so-called camp value." They're not the same thing at all. Paying the nerd tax by having totally untalented people like Wil Wheaton and Felicia Day parade through to pander to the wrong audience is just one more emblem of them forgetting that they need to appeal to people who primarily, like comedy, and secondarily, know something about good and bad movies. People who genuinely like crap movies are not the audience and aren't going to pay for this.

Can't say I fully agree with this. I actually have a deep appreciation for crap movies as well as great ones, and I still love MST3K. Some of my favorite RiffTrax are riffs on movies I like and even love as well. I think it's more about realizing the flaws or absurdity or poor character decisions in these films and being able to appreciate ribbing them for it.

I haven't been able to see TOO much of New MST3K, so I'm not sure how their approach to riffing these things has changed, or if they're doing things differently to avoid any sort of backlash like they used to get from some of the more thin-skinned directors and actors back in the day, but it does sound like they lost the plot on what made MST3K so great, and that's heartbreaking. And frankly, spending money on "star power" is plain silly.

[ageekyguy]

The issue is more oversaturation and too much leaning into the "geek" audience. It's a comedy show. It had a meaner edge to it at one point, where the writers and the characters liked good movies and were genuinely offended at bad ones. People confuse MST3K's "not a lot of R-rated jokes or things that look racist 30 years later" humor philosophy with "being nice and loving bad movies for so-called camp value." They're not the same thing at all. Paying the nerd tax by having totally untalented people like Wil Wheaton and Felicia Day parade through to pander to the wrong audience is just one more emblem of them forgetting that they need to appeal to people who primarily, like comedy, and secondarily, know something about good and bad movies. People who genuinely like crap movies are not the audience and aren't going to pay for this.

Can't say I fully agree with this. I actually have a deep appreciation for crap movies as well as great ones, and I still love MST3K. Some of my favorite RiffTrax are riffs on movies I like and even love as well. I think it's more about realizing the flaws or absurdity or poor character decisions in these films and being able to appreciate ribbing them for it.

I haven't been able to see TOO much of New MST3K, so I'm not sure how their approach to riffing these things has changed, or if they're doing things differently to avoid any sort of backlash like they used to get from some of the more thin-skinned directors and actors back in the day, but it does sound like they lost the plot on what made MST3K so great, and that's heartbreaking. And frankly, spending money on "star power" is plain silly.

I'm with you. I love "bad" movies in their own right, and I also really love MST.

I don't think new-MST is sucking up to the movies like some folks do, but I do agree that they're a bit softer on them than they used to be. Rifftrax can still be pretty antagonistic against the films, which works well. Although they too have softened up on attacking the actors themselves compared to even what they themselves did a few years ago.

[kkt]

I'm not sure how many people saw the email Joel sent out to backers towards the end of the campaign about the specific sacrifices he was willing to make to bring the production costs per episode down in the hopes of reaching a slightly lower fundraising goal but it was so tone-deaf that the user comment section was locked very quickly.

oh man, I am just dying to hear more about this. what did joel say? what were the comments like?

[I Want To Go Faster]

I'm not sure how many people saw the email Joel sent out to backers towards the end of the campaign about the specific sacrifices he was willing to make to bring the production costs per episode down in the hopes of reaching a slightly lower fundraising goal but it was so tone-deaf that the user comment section was locked very quickly.

oh man, I am just dying to hear more about this. what did joel say? what were the comments like?

I can feel my inner bitchy gossip coming out, and I'm also desperate for details.

[SuspiriaTrumpsItFollowsCrap]

I'm not sure how many people saw the email Joel sent out to backers towards the end of the campaign about the specific sacrifices he was willing to make to bring the production costs per episode down in the hopes of reaching a slightly lower fundraising goal but it was so tone-deaf that the user comment section was locked very quickly.

oh man, I am just dying to hear more about this. what did joel say? what were the comments like?

I can feel my inner bitchy gossip coming out, and I'm also desperate for details.

The problems here are manifold.

1: Part of the magic of classic MST3K came from a group of writers whom knew and appreciated the work of funny people whom came before them. They all knew about Don Rickles, Phyllis Diller, Lucille Ball, the sauciest Marx Bros films, etc. Plus, they knew old historical references (such as the “Because he’s a Calvinist, honey!” joke in The Amazing Colossal Man). Pseudo writers, bloggists, etc. whom never bother to make a jibe about anything pre MySpace, are never as funny. Joel - despite his experience - cannot make them funny; you can’t squeeze pomegranate juice from a tiny grape.

2: People whom grew up speaking face-to-face with others - for most of their day - will always be better at the natural rapport for character-to-character scenes, and the occasional improv stuff, than people whom have spent a third or more of their social interaction VIA screens/electronic devices. Bantering face-to-face, and being part of three people in a room, comedically improvising off each other, hones the ability to work with the timing of the other people in the performance, without appearing “forced” or “tubi-level”. Insta-Brats are incapable of this. Which leads to the third point ~

3: If you hire an unwarranted surplus of writers (especially blogtastic pseudo-writers), you can inflate the budget, as requested by Joel and as compared to original mst3k budgets. This means Joel can take a bigger payday for being the “Showrunner”, after hiring unnecessary/lacklustre “bloggists” for his writers-room. This meant hiring a lot of InstaScam-addicted people whom never watched any comedy material prior to “That 70s Show”, or any sci fi films before “Independence Day”, and sure as hell couldn’t tell you what AIP or Amicus meant to classic cheesy horror flicks. THAT is part of the joy of “Elder MST3K”: the in-jokes about things that were old by the time the original MST3K folks were in their 20s & 30s. This leads to “expectations”, which leads to ~

4: If someone wants to buy a proper Filet Mignon which costs more than $50 where I live (e.g. Mary Jo/Bridget/Trace/Frank/Bill/Mike/Kevin/Josh jokes) with all the fixin’s, and Joel promises that Filet Mignon to you, but has been serving veggie-based hamburger patties (e.g. Jonah jokes, bloggist jokes, hipsterwank jokes etc.) for the past several years, and asks people to fork up the Filet Mignon price, no-one can be surprised if many people decline and refuse to pay for something which is - comedically - the equivalent of Chibbie Wibbie Doctor Who, compared to the Tom Baker Era. And yes, some of us have been making the restaurant/food analogies decades before anyone on YouTube did; they go back to yahoo groups and user-reviews on imdb and message boards before any such YouTube channels existed. I’m a fossil; I was there.

5: When you have new teams with revolving talent (like Master Pancake), which are still continually funny, fresh, and smart enough to invite/include Mary Jo, Trace and Frank (THAT’S “inclusivity!”), yet keep-hold of Pancake’s “individual flavour”, while working on a shoestring budget, *that* is the model/schematic by which to work by. And if Joel can give-up on “chasing the dragon” of the heights MST3K achieved in terms of ratings and “TV power back in the day”, MST3K can make a proper comeback. But not with too many cooks in the kitchen, K-mart CGI, and hipsterwanks. Marvel already [provably] failed using this strategy. If it didn’t work for them, it won’t work for anyone else.