Thoughts on cinematic titanic

[BEERxTaco]

It's hilarious, if you're a fan of riffing you'll enjoy it.

BTW, I'm loving these Rifftrax shorts... keep em coming!

[headlesschocolatebunny]

I think RiffTrax and CT fill two different niches.

Growing up watching MST3K, I always thought it woudl be neat to do newer more modern movies.  Unfortunately, it would be highly expensive to do so since the rights would have to be purchased.  So RiffTrax fulfills that dream since they have figured out a way to riff movies without having to gain rights to whatever movie they riff.

The CT project fulfills my one wish with RiffTrax - that the sillouetes could be seen during the movie so tha thte sight gags could make a return.  Unfortunately, the only way to do sillouetes would be to do it digitally or chroma-keyed, and distribute it on a DVD.  It's unfortunate because again, they have to purchase the rights to the movie in order to distribute it.

Could sillouetes be done with modern movies?  I can think of only two ways.  One would be with a special software program that super-imposes the sillouetes.  The other would be to provide some sort of video processing hardware that would insert the sillouete into the video image.  Both have their drawbacks.  Software would only allow a sillouete Rifftrax to be viewed on a PC, or on a home theater setup where the media player is a home theater PC.  The hardware problem would be that it would probably be a bit pricey.

So, because of these technical and legal difficulties, I see CT and RiffTrax as filling two different niches which both have to do with making fun of movies.

However, I really do hope that they will get together and do crossover projects.  Both with Mike, Kevin and Bill doing a CT and Joel, Frank, Josh, Trace, and Mary coming over to do some Rifftrax projects.  Ideally they would just merge the two products and release both Rifftrax and CT releases.  Honestly, now that I think about it, I think Rifftrax is moving in the CT direction with their experaments with the Rifftrax on Demand.  The next logical step would be to offer a digital download of a full length movie (albeit public domain) complete with sillouetes.  I wish they could just combine their talents and do both.

As for which host was better, I was sad to see Joel leave.  But I did like Mike also.  They both have their own styles, and for me, they both worked very well.  Comparing Joel and Mike is like comparing Drama and Sci-Fi.  Is one better than the other?  No, they are different styles.  Some people prefer one, some the other.  As for me, I like them both.

On one final note, it will never truly be a MST3K reincarnation without THE BOTS!  I mean, I can't see a human actor pulling off the type of comedy and jokes that the bots were able to pull off.  It just doesn't work as well.  Unfortunately, even if bots are brought back, I doubt it would be possible to bring back THE bots in the form of Crow, Tom and Gypsy, since their likenesses are probably owned by Best Brains aka Jim Mallon.  Too bad.  Perhaps Best Brains will bring back MST3K as a digital download product.  But if the rumors are even slightly true, it seems that the original cast wouldn't be on board.

Well, enough rambling.

Did I post again under a different name?!?! Dan- you said what I say exactly! I guess great minds think a like huh?!?!?