1 out of 5 - Would Recommend: A Turkey Day Tradition!

Welcome back to 1 out of 5 – Would Recommend, where this week we’re taking part in a holiday tradition: Turkey Day!

The Genesis

Imagine if you will being stuck across the state from your family on Thanksgiving, because you work retail and Thanksgiving’s becoming more about shopping than turkey. You need to find a way to make the best of it, so you decide to emulate mid-90’s Comedy Central and fill your day top to bottom with Mike Nelson & Pals making fun of bad movies. Here’s how you’d do it.

Free & Easy Methods

Also, he’s trying to bring MST3k back, which is cool.

MST3k creator Joel Hodgson hosts a Shout! Factory produced marathon of classic MST3k-eps every Thanksgiving, which is probably closest to the Comedy Central marathons of old. It doesn’t have any new episode content (yet – see the link to the right for details), though. If you’re into self-curating on a budget, you can always watch some combination of the 24 features/live shows and 38 shorts from RiffTrax or the ten episodes of Joel Hodgson’s Cinematic Titanic (like MST without the puppets) available on Hulu.

My Method & What You Need

1 Feature: Just one of their feature length video-on-demand riffs. Fun in Balloonland is particularly excellent choice here, as it is about a Thanksgiving Day parade, though the laughs don’t come fast & furious until near the end.
Sample Schedule 1. Excuse my handwriting.
2 Live Shows: Two of their live events, in video on demand form. I’d recommend some combination of Manos, Birdemic, Night of the Living Dead, and House on Haunted Hill.
3 “Specials”: I have loose definition of “special” here, being any RiffTrax programming between 30 and 60 minutes in length. This includes longer shorts like This is Hormel, their entire run of Batman and Robin serial episodes, two actual specials entitled Best of RiffTrax: Villains and RiffTrax Special: 90’s Cyber Thrillers, and six episodes of Total Riff Off. The actual specials are a nice change of pace (being clip shows) and the three Man V. Monster riffs from TRO (episodes 2, 4 & 5) are just magical.
Sample Schedule 2. If this seems like a lot of planning…shut up.
6 Shorts: The mortar that holds the marathon together. There’s a new sub-series of shorts featuring MST3k cast members Bridget Nelson and Mary Jo Pehl riffing women’s educational shorts that’s I’d recommend using at least some for your shorts – they’ve got a different comedic voice from their male counterparts and it would introduce a little more variety into the marathon.
Something Christmassy: The Grand Finale, to be watched once Thanksgiving is over and the Christmas season has begun in earnest. There are plenty of options here but I’m partial to Christmas with RiffTrax: Santa’s Village of Madness.
SNACKS: All your favorite movie-watching refreshments in massive quantities.