Please recommend a specific MST 3000 for my nephew

[Suzanne]

To be frank, I haven't seen Mysetry Science Theater in a long time. Did it actually not have the 3000 in its title at any point??

Anyway, I would really love to watch it with my nephew, but with the plethora of options, I don't have the slightest clue where to start getting back in to the show.

A few years back, I shared an episode of Stargate SG-1, which is my all time favorite sci-fi show, with my nephew who was then 15. He loved it and became addicted. I own that whole series so he started spending weekends with me watching marathons. He turned me on to Star Wars as I have always prefered Star Trek. He also introduced me to Family Guy.

Anyway that background was just to get a feel for the type of kid I want to get into MST. He is now 18. He has become a very troubled kid. He needs someplace safe, and that is my house. I will only have one shot at MST so to get back to my original question....

Which DVD would you recommend I rent to watch with my nephew? It obviously has to be one I can get from Netflix.

Thanks

[Evil Herbivore]

Hi suzanne - wow, what i great idea.
Out of what NF has I would recommend:
phantom planet
the killer shrews
horrors of spider island
tormented
mr b's lost shorts - a bunch of the shorts
teenagers from outer space

[Baff]

It is so hard to pick just one. Evil Herb suggested some real good ones. I would suggest Manos: Hands of Fate because I seem to remember reading somewhere (don't remember where) that it was often chosen as a fan favorite.

Eegah! was one of my favorites. It starred Richard Kiel (who played Jaws in Moonraker & The Spy Who Loved Me).

Opinions on which is the best vary across the landscape as it all depends on how many of their one-liners you find funny. I often laughed at things my wife didn't and she laughed at references to actors and movies that I didn't recognize by name.

[Baff]

As for the 3000, I think that was in there from day 1. You can read a bit about it and some other oddball things in this interview with Joel.

A lot of people refer to the show as just Mystery Science Theater or MST, rather than MST3K or MST 3000. I remember wondering if it had gone through a title change at some point too.

[Suzanne]

Thank you very much for the input. My nephew comes home from his Freshman year tomorrow so we'll probably have a DVD weekend relatively soon. We did already agree to Alien Nation though

I'll let you know how it goes and which DVD I end up with.

[Robert]

My recommendations:

Prince of Space
Secret Agent, Super Dragon
Boggy Creek II

[Evil Herbivore]

LET US KNOW HOW IT WORKS OUT!

[Greyrobe]

Wow what a great idea... I'm looking forward to being able to share my love of MST3k with my nephew. He's still a little too young to get most of the jokes, but here's some of my favorite episodes:

Cave Dwellers
Space Mutiny
Eegah
And of course MST3K: The Movie in which they slaughtered "This Island Earth"

[Evil Herbivore]

ah...the movie is good. kinda forgot about that.

[Robert R.]

I don't know if you're still open to suggestions, but the two MST3K episodes I suggest are Big Giant Spider Invasion and I Accuse My Parents. The latter begins with a short film about truck farming called "The Truck Farmer." That film was made in the 1950s, so it does glorify agricultural concepts that modern Americans frown upon. Such concepts are industrial strength insecticides/herbicides, tree removal, and Third World labor. The praising of these concepts sends the trio into a wisecracking binge.

[Suzanne]

Ok, I finally have my nephew again this weekend so it is time to try out an MST 3000. The only problem is I have absolutely no idea which one to pick. I have been sitting here for hours reading up on every single episode that was suggested!!

The short "Truck Farmer" sounded particularly funny to me, but I don't think it would be smart to show him the main movie about taking your parents to court! Does anyone know if it is the type of thing that would give a kid a line of complaints? In other words, he is too old to actually sue for anything, but I still don't want to give him any ideas.

I feel badly about only choosing one because I'm sure you all put time into coming up with these lists. I was going to just put them all in a hat and choose randomly, but in the end I decided to go with "Manos: Hards of Fate." Hopefully Kevin and I will be able to work out way through all the titles suggested, but if it doesn't work for him, I'll just go through the list myself. I was going to start listing the ones I was particularly excited to see, but it is half of the ones suggested!

Thank you very much. If I hadn't at least had a shorter list to start with, I would be sitting here for several more hours checking out a lot more titles.

I will let you all know how it works out.

[Suzanne]

Hooray!!! It was a hit. I was pretty sure hit sense of humor would be perfect for MST3000, and it definitely is. We will now start working our way through all the suggestions in this post. Thank you so, so much. Depending on how much time I get to spend with him, we might even end up waiting for more to come out on DVD! For now we have tons of choices.

It is really nice to know that I can ask a question - which in this case was very important to me - and you all took time to answer.

Baff, we definitely knew pretty quickly what you were referring to as the actor/title names vs smart ass remarks. He didn't get very many of the name references, and there were some that I didn't get either. We both like the one liners with dry, sarcastic wit.

[Baff]

Glad to hear he enjoyed it.

They have been releasing a new set of 4 every 9-12 months. No telling how long that will last though. I think I heard recently that a new publisher got the rights for distribution, not sure what effect that will have on future releases. In the meantime, Netflix has about 40 titles for you two to work through. Some are better than others, but I enjoyed most of them. Some of the extras are great. There are a couple discs with juke box extras on them, be sure to watch those.