As of 11:00am Eastern Time, 1/31/04, “Mystery Science Theater 3000” is officially off the air. Again.
As a fan, I’d like to thank SciFi Channel for bringing MST3K back to TV after it was dumped by Comedy Central. But, at the same time, I want to take SciFi to task for losing faith and patience in the show, and pulling that old network trick of constantly changing the timeslot, then saying “the ratings are down”.
MST3K was the proto-typical cable show when it first came on the air in the early 90’s – it was cheap, it was reasonably quick to produce, but it had a hook that drew viewers in, not unlike one of my other favorite shows, Space Ghost: Coast to Coast. It would be copied and imitated, but never equalled.
Hopefully, one day, my favorite “cow-town puppet show” will find its way back onto a cable channel. (One can only hope.) And so, on this extremely cold winter’s day, I salute Joel, Mike, and the Bots (and, lest I forget, Dr. Forrester and TV’s Frank).