The good news is that Jonah would return as the host of the series, not to mention Patton and Felicia coming back as the mad scientists. Good to see the familiar faces in front of the camera.
But other changes were in the works. Season 12 would be shorter, with six films riffed. But in an attempt to make the series more "binge-able", Jonah and the bots had to riff all six movies in a row. Kinga (Felicia Day) declares it "The Gauntlet" and laughs madly... because she is a mad scientist after all.
What this means for the series, well, I'm sure I'll have something to say about it. But let's also take a look at the this line up of movies. The bad movie gods were smiling, because we have some great fodder here. Let's see how Jonah and the bots handle them.
- 1201 - Mac and Me
- 1202 - Atlantic Rim
- 1203 - Lords of the Deep
- 1204 - The Day Time Ended
- 1205 - Killer Fish
- 1206 - Ator: The Fighting Eagle
Surströmming smells like lavender compared to these. Do the bots have noses? It doesn't matter. They'll smell them anyway and I'm sure they and Jonah will have much to say.
ReplyDeleteCrow in particular is offended by these films and shouts "Kill me now!" in the trailer and tries to run away when "Ator" is revealed. That crazy bot. I'm especially looking forward to the bookend films. 80s cheese at its finest.
DeleteMac & Me was a clear ripoff of E.T. but it's one I'd like to see MST3K rip on. Ator: The Fighting Eagle has the sheer stink of a MST3K winner as do the rest of the bunch. Of course, the jokes from the boys are what heightens the experience. Here's hoping there's some classics.
ReplyDeleteWatched the first three on Thanksgiving. First impressions were good. "Mac & Me" was my favorite of the three. But "Lords of the Deep" was surprisingly awful in a wonderful way. "Atlantic Rim" was... wow, just a bad movie all the way around. Jonah and the bots do a good job, but the movie doesn't give them all that much to work with. Looking forward to the next three!
DeleteA common theme of the movies selected is that they all attempted to cash in either on the success of a prior movie or the publicity of a concurrent movie, with varying degrees of brazenness. We all know about Mac and Me ripping off E.T. and how Atlantic Rim was slipping out ahead of Pacific Rim. Max points out how Lords of the Deep was one of a string of science fiction and horror movies with an underwater setting that came out in 1989. The Day Time Ended can be seen as an incoherent version of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Killer Fish is another attempt to capture the Jaws magic. And Ator is one of the many Conan wannabees of the Eighties.
ReplyDeleteNice catch! You are absolutely right. All told this was a fun season. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed "Killer Fish". And "Ator" was as dull a movie as I remember it being from when I was a kid. It had more in common with "Cave Dwellers" style wise than I also remembered - especially those slow halting speeches.
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