Between the cancellation of the original show in 1999 and the Kickstarter for its revival in 2015, there have been three major attempts to revive the format of “Mystery Science Theater 3000” for a new generation, all by people who worked on the original program. Two of them, one successful and one unsuccessful, feature the team of Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, and Bill Corbett (arguably the “second generation” cast, even though Murphy voiced Servo in all of the “official” episodes of the original series). The successful iteration is Rifftrax, which uses .mp3 files to allow the team to direct their zingers at big studio blockbusters without paying any licensing fees, and the failure was The Film Crew, a series of direct-to-DVD programs where they mocked the usual public domain schlock. The other major effort, Cinematic Titanic, came from the creator of “MST3K” himself, Joel Hodgson, who is joined by …Read the entire review
