Oh, sorry. I must be mis-remembering and it was someone else in this movie who was amused about it geting on the show. :o
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Or you’re being haunted by Doug McClure! 
Wow, that would be a dull haunting.
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Eh, I’ll leave out some coffee and sandwich fixings for him before I go to bed each night. Hopefully the cat doesn’t get them.
Mostly what I’m going to be haunted by now is trying to remember which mainstay action-adventure type guy I had him confused with all this time.
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I might purchase one of those for myself. Never know when it might be useful.
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You really think that Joel had already chosen the movies and had the rights before the Kickstarter ended?
I really don’t think he would have put in the hours and hours of work in until he knew he was going to have a show.
He’s the showrunner. He had a general clue and overall basis of what his optimal ones were. He hinted he had a really great Christmas movie picked as well during the Kickstarter. Joel wanted the show to return and stay back and having a definitive idea of a direction is much of it.
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So many moving gears apply. First an admission. At The Earth’s Core (1976) is such an ideal MST3K subject if it had slipped out of Season 11 the likelihood of it reappearing in Season 12 or 13 is high. Joel’s tastes match it so well. This making it was never in question. Only when. Hopping into it again, it is surprisingly stronger than I remember. I retract much of my misgivings. The riffs really sing, the Host Segments move, and the parts click into place. I stand corrected and I’m man enough to say so.
Where my problems were dealt with the Season arc of Kinga’s love life culmanating in an ending extending well past the movie and taking focus off the experiment. For years that bothered me. Less so now. MST is a variety show based on bad movies. The modern twist then of ongoing storylines felt foreign and hijacked priority off the episode. Further the movie seemed an afterthought having withstood Cry Wilderness (1987), Avalanche (1978), and Starcrash (1978) days earlier. The wrapping of loose ends and formally finishing the story shifted the enjoyment and the exposition wrestled the appeal to the ground. Reseeing it today, those misgivings vanished.
To Joel and his legwork? MST3K is his baby and enduring legacy. Him pouring days, weeks, or months into the right mix of suitable candidates and curating choice picks alongside Matt McGinnis factored into 2021’s Kickstarter. Robot Wars (1993), Demon Squad (2019), Gamera vs. Jiger (1970), The Mask 3D (1961), The Bubble (1966), and The Christmas Dragon (2014) were either named or alluded to during or right after the Kickstarter. Those were definite directions and he choose them specifically. Obviously some aims won’t always come together such as Munchie (1992) substituting another they sought and lost. Even so Joel places his everything into the program’s future and preparation ahead of selling it is absolutely visible between the lines.
The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t (1966) Joel had in his backpocket in the waning days of 2015’s Kickstarter. He declared the perfect Christmas flick for the Holiday Special and appealed to people to back to see it. That was “hours and hours of work” before any money was raised. Joel is a visionary and to be an effective one much research and energy must be poured to capitalize on those intentions. At The Earth’s Core in 2017 fell flat to me and now I change that assertion. A 14th Episode flew in under the wire and the quirks of 1114 I associated to the unexpectedness of doing it. Maybe I was right, maybe I was wrong, regardless a blueprint was forming and the Christmas Special went from finale to penultimate show. This is what I spoke to even if my objections are no more.
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Nothing is ever EXACT. Artistry in its expression inhabits a myriad of incarnations. Joel Hodgson and Matt McGinnis wade into the marrow of a season far in advance of it emerging into a possibility. The jump-off, what experiment transitions into the next, various links and pivots between shows, what larger plotting goes where, and now which host does what figure into the larger calculus of how a season rises out of a sea of thoughts. Without fail, nothing goes entirely as expected but the labor and foresight behind the scenes is sensed in the layout, interaction, and satisfaction obtained by digesting Seasons 11, 12, and 13 and in order.
1114 behaved out of place in the internal rhyme and reason of The Return and it might be nothing more than Core (1976) was going elsewhere in the season and ended up as the close. Joel opts on a given outcome (topping a season with a holiday special) and we MSTies give him another piece of the puzzle so things jostle and move around. Added to that, as the blueprint lives and evolves some pieces shuffle and alter though the design stays constant. Or does to someone like Joel. Again trying to explain my thoughts.
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So you’re saying he got to this episode and said, “I’m tired, I’m going to half-ass it.”
No. Not at all. Far from that. It surfaced seeming ajar, oft-kilter, or in the wrong order perhaps compared to the rest. Out of its element following the Christmas Special maybe but not what you’re saying. I have called it less. Yes. Seeing it again after a few years yesterday, quality isn’t so much the issue as distinction and perhaps anticlimax were. No putdown was implied nor intended. Endings are the most difficult thing especially for something not normally inclined to deal with them. The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t (1966) is where Joel would have stopped prior to gaining a 14th episode. What we may be looking at is a bit of the next season added to the previous one and a movie that has a slightly different vibe to the others as well. That’s all I was saying. Almost like another brick that leaves the pattern off somehow. Again an impression NOT a putdown. “All in all… just another brick in the wall…”
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My reasoning is complicated to put it mildly. If I lost you along the journey, it’s my fault. I aim for the profound and universal and consequently a wrong turn or trajectory based on varying perspectives is more likely. This entire detour began agreeing with Clang that a touch of McClure “does go a long, long way.” I added. “Word. The Land Time Forgot (1974) fit the bill. No more was needed. “But to each their own.”” This touched on one McClure clicking a box or scratching an itch and not having to return so quickly. Again her mileage but I immediately saw it and agreed. I then bounced from that to the 14th Episode and its history suggesting maybe that wasn’t designed initially but due to providence it got tossed in sooner rather than later. We’ll never know and it doesn’t matter outside the sense it possesses a read off from the others and yet it is a strong showing diving into it again so as I said at the top “To each their own…” And haknudsen if I rubbed you the wrong way. Apologies.
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I think it has more to do with the fact that the episode diminishes the movie by having so much going on that has nothing to do with the movie. Like the Laser Blast episode. I find the ending of that episode boring and usually skip the stupid 2001 "tribute’ at the end. Mostly because 2001 is the most overrated movie ever made but also because the whole sequence just falls flat.
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That’s much of it. Yes. Which is in my longer explanation. You’re not wrong. This is why I had issues with how the MST architecture was reworked.
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The first half of this is a banger for riffs. Once they get deep into the core the whole thing, movie and riffing, becomes a slog for me.
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Yeah. That and the ceremony and unusual credits sequence post-movie threw me. Specially when binging the season and watching it last at the time.
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I like the idea of Kinga getting married almost exclusively as a ratings stunt, but I didn’t like the reveal that Max had feelings for her and the subsequent pivot into a sort of love triangle. I’m glad they dropped that as soon as S11 was over, and I much prefer the Kinga / Max relationship the way it’s been since.
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Not a big fan of this one. I agree with Bruce, my least favorite of season 11. The movie just drags it down. But at least it has Caroline Munro. That gives it something going for it!
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Who’d have thought that Peter Cushing could just as easily have been cast as C-3PO? Seeing him in this is more likely to evoke images of everyone’s favorite mincing protocol droid than of a cold-blooded military governor.
Having read the source novel, I can say that the movie sticks closer to the original narrative than The Land That Time Forgot, though it does gloss over some bits in the manner of most film adaptations. The biggest flaw is how it botches describing the physical structure of Pellucidar. As I recall, it’s something akin to the interior surface of a Dyson shell, with a constant light source radiating from the center. This results in there being no objective method of measuring time, making temporal perceptions highly subjective (a concept only briefly touched on in the movie). Otherwise, it’s a reasonably faithful adaptation that’s enjoyable in its own right. Mind you, most of the effects have not aged well and Dia is probably a bit too damsel-like for modern tastes. Also, Doug McClure is still not fully convincing as an action hero.
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I liked At The Earth’s Core, both the original movie (saw it on cable) and the MST3K episode.
Granted the movie isn’t Oscar material but it’s more watchable than Manos, Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, etc.
Peter Cushing was quite an actor. I’d like to see more MST3K episodes with Cushing movies such as Dr. Who & the Daleks or the later Hammer films entries.
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