"I did it for the kicks, man! Snow Thrills, everywhere!"
Oh, they're giving away the ending!
Films watched: Snow Thrills (short) and It Conquered the World
Snow Thrills is a newsreel detailing all kinds of winter sports, with wipeouts and the possibility of frostbite everywhere you look.
The Segments:
Prologue- Joel plans to go on Star Search with a ventriloquism act, with Crow as his dummy.
Segment 1/Invention Exchange
- The Mads show off wearable nooses as "dead guy" Halloween costumes. For people who enjoy listening to the ocean in seashells, Joel offers the Sony Seaman, a conch you hook up to headphones.
Segment 2
- The SOL crew hosts their own Winter Sports Cavalcade, with Tom commentating.
Segment 3
- Joel and the 'Bots re-enact the coffee scene from the film. Judging by the insults they trade, dinner doesn't seem to have been very good.
Segment 4
- Crow and Servo are confused after learning that James Arness and Peter Graves are siblings, asking about siblings who actually share a last name. Said siblings receive a song honoring them... largely to pad out the episode.
Segment 5
- Peter Graves' ending speech is re-experienced over TV dinners. Each of the 'Bots get to read a letter; Tom's has several illustrations of the characters in multiple pages. Back in Deep 13, the Mads are also entranced by Graves' speech.
The Mystery Science Theater 3000 presentation of Snow Thrills has examples of:
- Black Humor: This short is chock full of it. Many references to being maimed, killed and even disemboweled are present.
- Finishing Each Other's Sentences:Narrator: Beauty, grace, and rhythm.Servo: ...you won't find them here.Narrator: Thrills galore in this winter sport.Joel: ...are darn hard to come by.
- Self-Deprecation: One shot of a snowy landscape has the crew saying it's a beautiful July day in Minnesota. The show was filmed in Eden Prairie, Minnesota.
The Mystery Science Theater 3000 presentation of It Conquered the World has examples of:
- Alternate Character Interpretation: The riffers have their own for Graves' character.Dr. Paul Nelson guns down three men controlled by the Alien.
Tom:(as Graves) I hope you're all bad guys. - Breaking the Fourth Wall: Joel outright admits the movie's short this week, something he shouldn't be able to know about.
- Foreshadowing: When Tom calls out Joel for derailing their discussion about siblings with different last names with a bit about siblings with the same last names, Joel admits they needs to pad out the episode due to the movie running short. This goes a long way to explain the extended focus on the movie's ending speech...
- I Can See My House from Here: During the Stock Footage shot of a rocket launching.Joel: I can see your house from here! I can see everyone's house from here!
- Not Even Bothering with an Excuse: In the middle of discussing how certain famous siblings have different last names, Joel abruptly starts to talk about how others would have the same last name, something Tom calls him out on. Joel's response?Joel: Well, uh... (quietly) actually, the film's kinda short today, and we need to pad out the experiment... so, if you don't mind...
- Overly Long Gag: Graves' Humans Are Special speech is played not once, not twice, but three and a quarter times after the movie: on the SOL, in Deep 13, over the credits, and as The Stinger — mere seconds, of course, after the speech in the movie.
- Padding: The song about celebrity siblings with shared last names. Joel persuades the 'bots to go along with it because the movie was relatively short and they needed to fit the episode's running time. This also contributed to Graves' Patrick Stewart Speech being replayed in its entirety by both Joel and the Bots, and later the Mads, after the movie.
- Pet the Dog: The crew really liked Paul's speech. The Deep 13 version had Forrester and Frank raptly watching the ending while eating their TV dinners, which is probably how many people reacted watching it at home.
- Running Gag:
- Joel and the 'Bots poke a lot of fun at Peter Graves' Overly Long closing speech... by letting it play out, uncommented (almost) and in full, 3ΒΌ times.
- Then there's the repeated confusion of Peter Graves with his real-life brother James Arness of Gunsmoke fame.
- Shout-Out:
- Servo whistles a snatch from the theme to The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. One of the stars of this movie, Lee Van Cleef, also played Angel Eyes, "The Bad," in that movie.
- During the opening host segment Joel makes a reference to ventriloquist Jeff Dunham and his "woozle" Peanut.
- Spoofed with Their Own Words: What's the best way to poke fun at the movie's ending speech? Play it in full a little over three times.
- Take That!Claire Anderson: I won't love a monster, I won't!
Servo: That's what Ivana
said. - Too Dumb to Live: Invoked by the SOL crew, as Paul is oblivious to the fact his house has power (meaning his wife is One Of Them). Servo snarks that James Arness must have gotten all the intelligence in the family.
Dr. Paul Nelson: He learned almost too late that man is a ''feeling'' creature ... and because of it, the greatest in the universe. He learned too late for himself that men have to find their own way, to make their own mistakes. There can't be any gift of perfection from outside ourselves. And when men seek such perfection, they find only death... fire... loss... disillusionment... the end of everything that's gone forward. Men have always sought an end to the toil and misery, but it can't be given, it has to be achieved! There is hope, but it has to come from inside, from man himself.
(Fanfare plays.)
(Fanfare plays.)
