Movie: "MST3K XXXII"
Year: 2015
Rated: Unrated
Genre: Comedy
Directed by: Various
Writing credits: Michael Nelson, Bill Corbett, Kevin Murphy, et al

Reviewer: Dr. Boogie
Posted: 4/21/2015

Plot: Radar Secret Service

The US government uses radar technology to track down a gang of uranium thieves.

Hercules

Mythical strongman Hercules must help Jason recover the Golden Fleece and claim the throne of Iolcus.

San Francisco International

A pilot (no pun intended) for a TV series features an airport security chief dealing with several issues, including a child stealing an airplane, a hippie accused of stealing gum, and a heist of newly-printed currency.

Space Travelers

A trio of astronauts are trapped aboard a damaged space capsule as NASA works to rescue them.

Review: The latest MST3k collection features four episodes from the middle seasons of the show. Most of the episodes come from the Mike years (my personal preference, if anyone's curious), though Joel has the honor of riffing on "Hercules", the first in the staggering 19 different Hercules movies to come out in the 50s/60s, and ironically the last Hercules film to be shown on MST3k.

Space Travelers is definitely the oddball of the bunch here. An all-star cast featuring the likes of Gregory Peck, Gene Hackman, and Richard Crenna. It even holds the somewhat dubious distinction of being the only Academy Award-winning film ever to appear in the series. Granted, the award was for Visual Effects (there is most assuredly no award given for the screenplay), but that remains a much higher distinction than most of the other crap that gets fired out of a cannon at the SoL gang. This was largely thanks to the distribution company that picked up the film (originally entitled "Marooned") and recut it in such a way that the only way to view it is via the MST3k treatment.

Extras this time around include an introduction from Frank "TV's Frank" Conniff for Hercules and a brief history of Satellite News, as well as a mini-documentary covering the unfortunate journey that transformed Marooned into Space Travelers. I do enjoy seeing this little bits of background about the show and the movies, but the extras that really grabbed my attention in this collection were the new menu animations. In the past few collections, Shout Factory has been sampling dialog from each episode to create a short skit that plays out over the DVD menu. That tradition continues here, but now the entire skit is set to live action using some very nice recreations of the 'bots themselves! I know it doesn't seem like much to change up the style of a menu you'll likely breeze through on your way to the main attraction, but as one of the few people who enjoyed the skits in the original show, it was exciting to see what could have easily passed for one of those very skits.

It's the little things that make these collections so special. Well, that and getting to see proof that no star is too big to avoid a riffing by Joel, Mike, and the 'bots.

Overall rating:
(Scored on a 0.5 - 5 pickles rating: 0.5 being the worst and 5 being the best)