Coming November 1:"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows pt 1"!

[Darth Geek]

They choose and pump out the money-making VOD's all year for the casual fans because they make a shitload of money, but don't have any interest in taking a little time to quickly knock out a movie that their biggest fans are asking for.  Seems rather dismissive to me.

Which is why in a few short years I've gone from an obsessive fan surfing this website every day and counting down the minutes until the next release ... to somebody who swings by a couple times a year to see if they have anything I want.

As a small business owner myself, I don't begrudge them one bit for chasing the money. You HAVE to in order to stay in business.  So good for them.  But money matters to me too so as a consumer I'm not going to spend money here if they don't offer what I want.

And, money aside, the dismissive attitude towards hard core fans doesn't help either.

I agree with you about the money. And I too don't purchase every riff they release anymore, unlike when they did blockbusters.

I don't see it as dismissive of the hardcore fans, though. Heck, the most hardcore of their fans would be the MST3K junkies that keep clamoring them for the show to be back again. Which is essetially what we get with the VODs.

[Edward J Grug III]

They choose and pump out the money-making VOD's all year for the casual fans because they make a shitload of money, but don't have any interest in taking a little time to quickly knock out a movie that their biggest fans are asking for.  Seems rather dismissive to me.

Which is why in a few short years I've gone from an obsessive fan surfing this website every day and counting down the minutes until the next release ... to somebody who swings by a couple times a year to see if they have anything I want.

As a small business owner myself, I don't begrudge them one bit for chasing the money. You HAVE to in order to stay in business.  So good for them.  But money matters to me too so as a consumer I'm not going to spend money here if they don't offer what I want.

And, money aside, the dismissive attitude towards hard core fans doesn't help either.

I agree with you about the money. And I too don't purchase every riff they release anymore, unlike when they did blockbusters.

I don't see it as dismissive of the hardcore fans, though. Heck, the most hardcore of their fans would be the MST3K junkies that keep clamoring them for the show to be back again. Which is essetially what we get with the VODs.

Yeah, I don't understand how a fan of the MP3s is more hardcore than the fans of the VODs?

[RoninFox]

They choose and pump out the money-making VOD's all year for the casual fans because they make a shitload of money, but don't have any interest in taking a little time to quickly knock out a movie that their biggest fans are asking for.  Seems rather dismissive to me.

Which is why in a few short years I've gone from an obsessive fan surfing this website every day and counting down the minutes until the next release ... to somebody who swings by a couple times a year to see if they have anything I want.

As a small business owner myself, I don't begrudge them one bit for chasing the money. You HAVE to in order to stay in business.  So good for them.  But money matters to me too so as a consumer I'm not going to spend money here if they don't offer what I want.

And, money aside, the dismissive attitude towards hard core fans doesn't help either.

I agree with you about the money. And I too don't purchase every riff they release anymore, unlike when they did blockbusters.

I don't see it as dismissive of the hardcore fans, though. Heck, the most hardcore of their fans would be the MST3K junkies that keep clamoring them for the show to be back again. Which is essetially what we get with the VODs.

Yeah, I don't understand how a fan of the MP3s is more hardcore than the fans of the VODs?

The only way I can trace that logic is that MP3s came first in terms of Rifftrax (as long as you don't count the Legend DVD commentary tracks, but that was before the Rifftrax name).

[Pak-Man]

Well the MP3s do require a bit more commitment, so there's the trace of logic that those who are willing to do the sync thing are more devoted. Really, though, anyone who's willing to sit through Fun in Balloonland is hardcore enough for me.

[ScottotD]

Eh, the VODs are just funnier to me.  If the MP3s were as well written I'd like them as much but they're just not

[Miku Fan]

I watched Robot Monster at 6:30 am today. THAT'S hard core.

[Pak-Man]

Eh, the VODs are just funnier to me.  If the MP3s were as well written I'd like them as much but they're just not

See, that's an interesting nit to pick at. The writing for MP3s and VODs would, I imagine, be exactly the same. They hammer out a script, read it while watching the movie, their voice gets isolated and either tossed onto an MP3 or spliced with the video. The only difference between the two would (potentially) be the quality of the subject matter being riffed.

Even then, in the MP3 world there are movies like Karate Kid 3, which was an MP3 that didn't sell as well (I'm inferring from statements they've made and advertising they've done) as the Super Mario Bros. riff, which was a VoD and is now considered "essential." Both of those movies are pretty close in terms of chronology, quality, target audience and probably budget.

Just some food for thought...

[RoninFox]

Eh, the VODs are just funnier to me.  If the MP3s were as well written I'd like them as much but they're just not

See, that's an interesting nit to pick at. The writing for MP3s and VODs would, I imagine, be exactly the same. They hammer out a script, read it while watching the movie, their voice gets isolated and either tossed onto an MP3 or spliced with the video. The only difference between the two would (potentially) be the quality of the subject matter being riffed.

Even then, in the MP3 world there are movies like Karate Kid 3, which was an MP3 that didn't sell as well (I'm inferring from statements they've made and advertising they've done) as the Super Mario Bros. riff, which was a VoD and is now considered "essential." Both of those movies are pretty close in terms of chronology, quality, target audience and probably budget.

Just some food for thought...

The subject matter I think changes a lot, quality or not.  When so many of the blockbusters follow the same story structure and have similar characters and action scenes that flow the same basic ways, the riffing tends to find the same patterns too, getting more varied movies forces them to change things up. 

Also, I love the Karate Kid 3 riff, and I'd call it just as essential as Super Mario Bros as far as the quality of the jokes, but if they found it didn't sell nearly as well I guess that's speaking to something.  When you get away from the blockbusters that everyone has it's a lot harder to sell an mp3.  Not everyone would have tracked down a DVD copy of Super Mario Bros (unlike me, who's had one for years) but offer it to them in one package and you have a sale.

[TheUnabeefer]

Karate Kid 3's riff is far far superior to Mario Bros IMO. It's stronger, funnier, and just more enjoyable to me.

I used to sit on the MP3 side of the debate, but the VOD's have been much more consistently entertaining than the last regularly-released slew of MP3's they did. I think that has more to do with subject matter though than quality of movie or era or whatever.... which is still most of my personal argument.  If they did a broader variety of movies in MP3 format (as opposed to just comic book films, and Twilight) the consistency of quality and standard would be about the same (as it was in the early days of Rifftrax)

Which again brings the balance of scale back to MONEY. VOD's bring more money. That about does it.

I'm fine with it, as long as the VOD's continue being the same standard of funny as they have been!!  I can only think of one or two times they didn't really resonate with me so far.  Good track record.

[Darth Geek]

Karate Kid 3's riff is far far superior to Mario Bros IMO. It's stronger, funnier, and just more enjoyable to me.

That's pretty high praise. I do need to check out the Karate Kid 3 riff sometime.

[BathTub]

Yeah I haven't watched that one yet.

[Edward J Grug III]

I hope you two both bought it and aren't outing yourselves as the reason we don't get that style of riff any more! ;P

[BathTub]

I would bet money that MrTorso is about the only person who owns more RiffTrax than me.

[Miku Fan]

I have 416 rifftrax listed in my purchase library. 

[d00hickey]

I would bet money that MrTorso is about the only person who owns more RiffTrax than me.

I have every one except some of the shorts, and also that weird clip shows they released about a year ago.