A time for all of us to find our inner Lumpy. And kill it with fire.
8 Likes
[Unintelligible Growling]
1 Like
The Rifftrax Twitch channel is showing the Riffed version all day long.
3 Likes
This is very, very good to know.
Although Twitch’s ad system is hot garbage when you’re watching it.
“RiffTrax is taking an ad break!”
NO, THEY’RE NOT, THEY’RE WATCHING AN OLD FRUIT OF THE LOOM COMMERCIAL
2 Likes
I saw the original premiere when I was 11. At the time, it didn’t seem any more bizarre than any other variety show of the era. To be honest, it still doesn’t.
2 Likes
The Jonestown Massacre happened the day after the Star Wars Holiday Special was broadcast.
I’m not saying that it was definitely that show which pushed Reverend Jim over the edge, but…
7 Likes
Like @CLANG_Potroast, I saw it went if first came out. I was just one year older. However, even at the tender age of 12, I found it bizarre.
I tried to tell people about this thing for years, but they just looked at me with a blank expression that suggested that they thought I might be insane. What was even weirder was when George Lucas tried to gaslight the world (and me by extension,) claiming it never happened; making me doubt my own sanity. The only thing that held me in place was that I had friends who also had seen it, assuring me that, yes, a Star Wars Holiday Special with Bea Arthur, Art Carney, and Chewbacca’s disturbing family really did happen.
Now of course, Star Wars Holiday Special has emerged from the bowels of the internet and is now part of the Pop Commons. At first I was happy to be able to point to it to show I wasn’t crazy or lying. Soon, I admit it made me a little sad. It was like I had some secret and perhaps dangerous and disturbing knowledge - Lovecraftian glimpse into madness - that was now as ordinary as a half-remembered celebrity appearance on Mannix.
Moreover, now people - including Disney itself (!!!) no less - want to treat it like it this thing is a worthwhile addition to the Star Wars canon. For my part, I say no. You can pretend that this wasn’t strange and twisted, but that doesn’t make it so. Leave the Star Wars Holiday Special like the Necronomicon and the forbidden lore of the Old Ones. Look at that pic that @FlyingSquid posted. Does that look sane to you?
“The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far."
- H.P Lovecraft
8 Likes
We don’t know if he watched it, though. It’s entirely possible that what pushed him over the edge was that someone else switched to PBS without his permission. 
2 Likes
Gotta love how the RedLetterMedia boys had to spend two sessions on Best of the Worst just to get through talkin’ about the SWHS.
(for those who just want a review, you want that second episode)
They can sometimes derail, even on things they do like, but they really, really didn’t wanna talk about this one. And it shows.
2 Likes
It’s time for the mandatory Life Day musical interlude.
Oh the pain! The pain of it all!
2 Likes
3 Likes
Yeah, I’m watching this right now on Twitch, and the Twitch ads over the show serve as a reminder as to why I’ll be relying on YouTube for the MST3K Turkey Day Marathon.
2 Likes
For those of you watching in The Super-Secret, Pseudo-Private, Regular Lounge, please remember the restrictions on holiday decor and celebrations imposed by Rule #55, particularly Rule #55.9 regarding the use of lightsabers as luminaries.
Thank you.
I learned something in this year’s viewing: not only did David Winters direct Space Mutiny, not only was he A-Rab in West Side Story, but he also was the choreographer on the Holiday Special.
Weird career you had there, Dave.
7 Likes
I watched the Rifftrax of this and felt hungover the next day.
3 Likes