It's A Wonderful Riff, Rifftrax, But It Could Have Been Better

 

This has been the Holy Grail for Rifftrax fans: seeing the riff of the ultimate holiday movie, and which has been the source of many riffs from this and MST3K.

The week before Christmas, Rifftrax finally presented a VOD of.....MOST of It's A Wonderful Life.
The entire movie is still owned by Paramount, although it was a TV favorite in the 80s when it was under public domain until 1996. 
Fans have been clamoring for a "just the jokes" version for the past three years, since it seems a VOD is out of the question.

Then Mike Nelson and the gang discovered most of the story, except for act three, is public domain. Some of the music is also under copyright but certainly not Buffalo Gals.
This is how he was able to provide an edited version of the movie, although some had thought they were getting the whole thing.

The story, of course, is about how George Bailey, who had big dreams, thinks he's a failure being stuck in his home town of Bedford Falls. An angel named Clarence, who wants to earn his wings (yet apparently hasn't had too many chances to get them), figures out he can show what life would have been without George.

This version is almost able to cleanly remove act three and still let the movie make sense, but those who have watched the movie may miss the "Potterstown" scenes.
Actually, the Rifftrax Yule Log has some copywritten clips from the movie, including the scene where George tries to convince Mary she's his wife. 

The riffs are pretty good, and can get dark at times. Note the scene where George finds out Harry had married and was offered a new job outside Bedford Falls. The riff at this moment is a little unexpected.
Then there's Mike talking as George's dad admitting he'd rather have a daughter.
Uh, this movie might change his mind. 

While the VOD is good, it would have been better to have the "just the jokes" soundtrack for the whole movie. Several other fans have the same idea apparently, and it should happen. Imagine the comedy gold the RT gang would have mined from George's inability to recognize he's in an alternate world that doesn't include him. He passes it off as a dream, spell or bad liquor.
At least in Tiny Toons' version of the movie in 1992, Buster Bunny recognizes where he is after it's literally spelled out to him. It takes a while for George to get the message.

So, let's get to the riffs:

The title is in quotes
Seems kind of sarcastic

George (talking about suitcases):  I want a big one
I thought this was a family movie.

"Why don't you kiss her instead of talking her to death?"
Good advice, voyeuristic porch guy.

Ruth, Harry's new wife:  "George, George, George, that's all Harry talks about"
Even in bed

George mopes after refusing a job offer from Potter (but then why take it?) but then learns he'll be a father. 
Kind of creepy to remember that Clarence is silently watching all this

George: We've got to find that money!
Have you looked under a big W?

There's also riffs on Willy Wonka, Robert Altman, Quibi, Dianetics, and Lana Turner. 

Rifftrax's version of It's A Wonderful Life can be found on its website. 

Coronavirus Is Killing Too Much of Reno

 

Coronavirus has taken too much from this nation.
As of this typing, nearly 241 thousand people have died nationwide, but it has also killed a lot of businesses. The Nugget in Reno, known for a famous burger, went under. So did a Japanese restaurant, and a few stores.

What really upset me is that this happened: 
Reno 1868, which had the best record in the USL in 2020, is CLOSED. 

Why? Part of it is having no fans thanks to the virus, but it's also the fact that the team would prefer its home pitch rather than sharing it with the Reno Aces.
This is why Fresno FC had to move out of town this year, but will go somewhere else. 
I have been to a few games over the team's short history. I remember when they place balloons at the Virginia Street Bridge to celebrate the team's arrival. I even wore the special scarf USL had to celebrate the team entering the league. After I had to leave Sacramento and miss its soccer success, I was so happy soccer would have its chance in Reno. Since it was the top team this past season, I fully expected to come back next season. Seeing that e-mail at work horrified me more than the idea of Trump winning.

A Facebook page called the Battle Born Brigade has had a lot to say about this, and it's not wasting time trying to resurrect itself, as you can see in this link.
Actually, a site called Zac Electrify has even more to this story, including the fact that the team has never turned a profit and the Earthquakes might be pulling out of its partnership. He does have a plan where we'd have a team in the lower divisions but would be a start to get back to the USL Championship level.
Sadly it means the Las Vegas Lights will smirk at Reno for quite a while, but Reno fans can turn to Sacramento Republic for a while. 

Remember, San Jose Earthquake fans were in the wilderness for more than a decade until Major League Soccer arrived. It's Reno's turn, and it can create something to get back to USL League Two at least.

In the meantime, fans can keep their jerseys and masks and other gear until the city's back in a league. I still plan to wear any of the four jerseys and five or six scarves.

Reno can be big league again, but it will take time. Medical malpractice will not rob Reno of its status as a soccer town!

Rifftrax Live Battles Jack-O, Not That One

This is me in a movie theater for the first time since February, thanks to Dr. Trump.
To be honest, if there were movies worth risking coronavirus for, I would go to an Imax theater, since I got a Galaxy gift card at a discount.
Sadly, Tenet ain't it.

However, Rifftrax is a different matter.
At this time, we were supposed to see a TV-movie knockoff of the Amityville Horror involving an evil lamp. Thanks to the pandemic, we have to wait a year for that.

This year, instead, we got a movie called Jack-O, about an evil pumpkin demon who's gunning for the ancestors of the family who offed him.

To be honest, having a VOD at theaters is just not the same as a live show. The excitement is not there. That's why Jack-O was a bit dull, but good considering the circumstances.

Anyway, the movie is about a nerdy kid named Sean Kelly, the ancestor of the last guy who killed Jack-O at the risk of his own life.
Thanks to some drunk teens who like Hamm's Special Light a bit too much, Jack-O is revived and starts killing people. They include one of the teens and a mean grocer who doesn't give out candy.

The parents have no idea, but a strange woman with Billy Squier hair seems to know something, and decides to get too close to Sean.
A really sexy babysitter played by Leanna Quigley (a horror film superstar) also figures into all of this.

A big question is why the movie included cameos by John Carradine (as a so-called wizard) and Cameron Mitchell (as a TV horror host), since both died before the movie was done.
Also, how did they get Carradine if he died seven years before this movie was made? He did look Photoshopped in there (but IMDB hints this may have come from stock footage and why this was the reason behind this movie). 
If both were healthier at the time, we could have had a knockoff of Fright Night.

Also, the opening titles has "Jack-O" and the word "Lantern". Were they worried people would think the movie had Michael Jackson in it?

On top of that, they come up with a really dumb way to kill the Pumpkin Guy. Let's say it's an insult to the "chosen one" cliche.

The riffing was pretty good, though, with a lot of variety of subjects from Equus and  Billy Joel to Tik Tok and My Pillow.
Some examples:

"Pumpkinhead"
What a great new insult for Trump on Twitter

Jack-O's at the mean grocer's house
I need directions to Ichabod Crane's house

The wife of the guy who's trying to kill Jack-O in 1915
I wonder if the Sears Roebuck catalog sells new husbands.

Before the movie there was a short about Halloween safety that was also shown during the Mads (Trace and TV's Frank) festival of shorts the night before. Granted, there aren't too many Halloween safety shorts, but maybe they should have dug a bit deeper.
I still say the kid that had to change his robot costume to make it safer was actually wearing a ballot box, and Rifftrax should have made a riff from that.
Actually, Bridget Nelson and Mary Jo Pehl have a better Halloween short, plus other clips with this offering at the Rifftrax site.

As far as going to the movies was concerned, it wasn't that different than the old days. There was only a plexiglass shield to protect the ticket takers, and posters about how the theater was staying COVID-free. If only there were movies that would get them back, 
There are....but at streaming services.

By the way, an R-rated version of Jack-O is now available on Rifftrax. It means seeing the baby sitter in the shower, in a pervy way, plus some bloodier scenes. 
Is this what Frankie Goes to Hollywood meant when they said "Are we living in a land where sex and horror are the new gods?"
In the 1990s home video world, pretty much. 

Rifftrax Provides Debate Relief With Starship Troopers Online Show

This group of citizens are just as happy as those who chose Rifftrax's online presentation of Starship Troopers instead of the political cage match between Donald Trump and Joe Biden in Cleveland Tuesday night.
If the bugs from that movie also were part of the debate, they would've won based on their coronavirus plan and support for Medicare For All. They'd be too smart to eat Trump.

Anyway, the third attempt by Rifftrax to show a movie via Scener was the best attempt of all when Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy figured out if they turned off their cameras but left their mikes on to riff, it would be a smooth show. 
It was. Fathom Events may have something to worry about now.
The only problem was that the pre-game show was 45 minutes late because of problems getting Scener off the ground. Considering the show started 15 minutes after the debate started, it may have been the alternative people were looking for.

Otherwise, it was a great show. Anyone who's seen the Mads' online shows would have been happy with this show. It was just like the live show seven years ago except no gorillagrams were there to cover Diz's bare chest...or hide Carmen's face trying to look smart.

The movie, of course, is a "war movie" where young teens from the Beverly Hills section of Buenos Aires become "citizens" fighting big bugs from outer space. It's supposed to be satire, and could have been with better actors.
Just remember one thing, whatever Jake Busey was in that movie, he outgrew it and became better looking by Stranger Things (yes, he's in season three). 

The riffs are about the same as the mp3, with some updates, like Denise Richards as Carmen flying a ship while thinking "I'm going to be a Real Housewife".
Surprisingly, no Trump or coronavirus jokes, but there were these...

"Rico"
Polo

Diz asks Rico why they never got together
Well, crucifying a squirrel on my front yard...(actually she was way sexier than Carmen)

"I'm going for federal service"
I'm going to be a mailman

Carmen is in a Dear John letter to Rico (which winds up not being that)
Let me tell you about the Flex Belt
and of course, Rico's sad
Just like my childhood letter to Captain Kangaroo

"We thought we were smarter than the bugs"
Just like Elmer thought he was smarter than Bugs

Diz and Rico have sex
Now call me Saber Raine
She later dies in battle
Give my hair to Felicity (or is it Zorii Bliss?)

Then Carmen and Zander meet the Big Bug
Van Morrison has not aged well (maybe the only coronavirus joke after all)

There were also riffs on How I Met Your Mother, Pretty in Pink, United Airlines, Chris Farley, Twitter and Albert Knobbs. Again, though, the riff from the Scener show is about the same as the mp3.
You can get the riff at the Rifftrax site.
Next up, coronavirus pandemic pending, people can see a VOD Halloween show on three weeks in theaters. The movie is Jack-O, and it's about a scarecrow that kills people.
It also includes Rifftrax staples John Carradine and Cameron Mitchell....sort of.
Some of the gore is also taken out to make it PG-13, but there will be a horrifying short. The event will be a regular VOD about two months later.

Rifftrax Tries Live Online Riffing, Gets Stuck In Upside Down For A While

After the country was overrun by the coronavirus, media companies have been forced to provide us with entertainment through cable or streaming channels. That's why we got several concerts or Zoom gatherings at first, followed by more complex events.

Since Rifftrax's theater events have been in limbo thanks to the pandemic (we're still waiting for Hobgoblins, which will be shown in theaters just before Halloween...we hope), the gang decided to experiment with something called Scener, where a couple thousand people can see the same screen and respond with others. The idea was to have Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy riff the first episode of Stranger Things while the viewers also rant via text. It was similar to The Mads doing an online riff on Glen or Glenda recently. The viewers were mostly either backers through Kickstarter or Patreon.

It was a rough first voyage for the crew, more glitchy than the live broadcast of MST3K's final day of their Kickstarter campaign. It started about five minutes late, and the tech crew had a tough time trying to get all three riffers online. At one point, Bill's mike was down and Kevin and Mike had to reboot like crazy to be heard. It was something to see.

Also, Mike was singing like Bing Crosby while coming up with puns. For example, he thought about a broken golf club that was "Stranger Pings" or how Chandler from Friends would show up in a spinoff called "Stranger Bings". This was while he couldn't hear or see anything else.
Ah, bloopers.

Once they got past the opening credits at around 6 PM Pacific, it worked very well. All three riffers were online, the video lagged a bit, but it worked great.
This shows Mike and the guys should try a couple more "beta tests" before making this the alternative to Fathom Events shows since nearly all theaters are closed for now, They have riffed on Game of Thrones, Westworld and Walking Dead's first episodes. They can use those for future beta tests or maybe a chapter from the Batman serial.

OK, now, how about the riffs?
They were rather 80s-centric, even commenting on what songs were being played in the background.
Again, they got much better once the Scener process worked better.

Now, let's list a few:

A scientist at the Hawkins lab runs into an elevator after something goes wrong (natch)
The elevator blood from The Shining is very late today.

Chief Hopper makes his first appearance
My Joe Don Baker Detector is going off the charts

The scientists at the lab get into hazmat suits before they confront the Upside Down
They're going to the grocery store in 2020 (only current riff)

Hopper talking to Will's friends:  One at a damn time
My personal feeling about Marvel movies

Eleven stares at a fan and makes it stop
Kubrick stare. Everybody duck!

Joyce, Will's mom, answers the phone, hoping for news
Do you like scary movies? Oops, sorry, wrong number.

This version, different from the "Just the Jokes"version, also included riffs on Toto, Molly Ringwald, Schlitz, Delaware, and Stand By Me.

The riff for Stranger Things is available now at the website. It can be downloaded into the app, and people can synch it up if they see it on Netflix, or have the download or the DVD set