Starring: Bill Bryant, Wanda Curtis, Douglas Henderson, Patti Gallagher, Marvin Miller. Producer: Robert L. Lippert. Written, produced and directed by Bert I. Gordon. Released in 1955.
X Marks the Spot – Starring: Edmon Ryan, George Matthews, Richard Gordon, Del Sharbutt, Commissioner Arthur W. Magee, N.J. DMV. Directed by Warren Murray. Presented by the State of New Jersey. Released in 1940.
Original air date: December 22, 1990
“King Dinosaur” – the rousing tale of four horny astronauts who land on a new planet infested with stock footage. Robert Lippert strikes again in another run-of-the-mill monster movie the Mystery Science Theater 3000 crew must watch. Lippert knew how to make movies, especially on the cheap. Find bad actors, raid the public domain stock footage shelves for shots of animals and scenery, and pad out the action with pointless walking scenes. He must have been cranking out these turds once a week. And he probably made millions!
Best part of “King Dinosaur”: we never see a dinosaur, just super-imposed giant lizards. Although one of the characters tries to convince us we’re looking at a T-Rex. Sure we are…
To be fair, “King Dinosaur’s” creatures aren’t all brought in through stock footage. Several of the lizard scenes are shot on miniature sets, especially the ones where they’re fighting. And these aren’t fights achieved through clever editing; these lizards are really going at, blood and all. PETA would have a fit seeing this film.
As for the riffing, this film lets the crew have some real fun. It’s not the best of the second season, but it’s a bit above average. The writers are getting sharper, funnier and nastier. Quite a few jokes fall flat, like in #209 “The Hellcats,” but they’re trying new stuff to see what works and what doesn’t. The terribleness of the movie and quirky jokes makes this an enjoyable episode.
Before Joel and the robots endure “King Dinosaur,” they must first watch a short film. It’s the first short that isn’t taken directly from a serial. This time it’s from a “scare film,” which were used back in the days to teach children and adults what’s right and what’s wrong. For the rest of the series’ run, we’ll see shorts delving into morality tales, instruction films, Canadian expositions, and tourist videos. The short in this episode is “X Marks the Spot,” which deals with driving infractions. In it, Joe is proven to be one of the worst drivers in New Jersey and pays the ultimate price. I’m sure this was shown to repeat offenders back in the day.
The short is an odd set up; Joe dies in a crash that is his fault. He’s brought to heavenly traffic court where his guardian angel proceeds to tell the judge how awful a driver he was. Joe then asks forgiveness, to which the judge then turns to us at home to ask if Joe should be given a second chance, then asking if we’re even qualified to make that decision. The undercurrent of the short is deadly serious, but how can you take it seriously when the guardian angel is played like a retarded Sid Melton (see #208)? In actuality, the angel is played by former prize fighter George Matthews. The guardian angel was once a bad driver, which we learn through the judge; “You see, I stopped a car with my face once. My forehead’s all bondo!” Servo says, imitating the angel.
The riffing, like many shorts in the show, is some of the tightest and funniest all season. When the narrator tells us we recognize Joe because he lives on our street, Joel chimes in “In fact, he’s under your bed right now.” At one point, the angel tells the judge Joe liked a cocktail or two before he drove, to which Crow says “A half-gallon or two.” And Joel gets exacerbated at the judge’s insistence on talking to the audience to decide Joe’s fate: “We’re stranded here in space and we still have to pull jury duty.” With the end of “X Marks the Spot,” it’s evident we’ll see a lot more fun in future shorts.
And now the movie: “King Dinosaur” starts with a frenzied narrator setting up the plot of four astronauts – two men, two women – visiting Planet Nova for study, which looks a lot like a field in Wisconsin (“That’s one step for man, one giant leap into a cow patty,” Servo says). Upon landing, they spend a long time walking and discovering stock footage of deer, owls and other animals. They even adopt a furry little animal Joel and the bots dub “Joe the Lemur.” Problem is, it’s not a lemur, but Joel has fun doing its voice now and then. Eventually, two of the party discovers an island where giant lizards roam and duke it out occasionally.
The film drags quite a bit until the giant lizards show up. True to form, we get a lot of walking scenes early on (“Fifteen minute break everyone. Lippert rules apply here,” Servo intones). There is a funny fight between Dr. Ralph (Bill Bryant) and a rubber alligator. When Ralph comes to, he sees a giant spider, which he shoots because it’s different. Everyone tells him to relax (“Relax?! There’s a bee the size of a moose over there and you tell him to relax?!” Crow shouts).
There’s no relaxing when the lizard fights begin. For the last quarter of the movie, Drs. Richard (Douglas Henderson) and Patricia (Wanda Curtis) watch as giant lizard after giant lizard kill each other (“Mr. Lippert, I’m appalled!” Crow says of the animal abuse). Dr. Ralph and Nora (Patti Gallagher) come to the rescue, equipped with an atomic bomb. Apparently that’s standard issue on all planetary explorations.
Herein lies the most confounding part of the movie – the ending, which makes me angry. All four explorers run for their lives from the giant animals. It’s clear they’ll probably get away just fine, but still they feel the need to trigger the A-bomb. In the end, the island of animals explodes, forever disrupting the natural course of Planet Nova. What the hell was the point of that? It’s another in a long line of Lippert moments where the characters destroy things because they do not understand them. “Looks like we brought civilization to Planet Nova,” Dr. Richard states in so many words. Please. “Thanks for annihilating all that I know,” Crow says as the lemur. That’s actually more like it.
I can’t fail to mention that “King Dinosaur” is actually the brainchild of Bert I. Gordon – Mr. BIG himself. One of the more famous of the B-movie directors, Gordon made a career out of superimposing ordinary animals onto the silver screen to make them huge. In typical Bert I. Gordon fashion, he wrote the story as an excuse to feature special effects. To hell with character development and direction for actors (George Lucas must have taken notice). Just watch Douglas Henderson shove the actresses around several times. You’d think Bert would tell him to tone it down. Nope. Instead, we see Henderson literally throw these women to the ground and it looks painful! Regardless, we’ll see plenty more of Bert’s movies in the coming seasons.
The sketches are a little sub-par this time around. The invention exchanges are funny, but aren’t really inventions – Joel’s is really stinky socks. The “Joe the Lemur” bit is overdone and not funny, and comes before we even see the “lemur” in the film. The Emotional Scientist bit isn’t much better. Same with the closing moments. But Crow’s questioning whether he’s qualified, based off what the “X Marks the Spot” judge asks is really funny. It’s easily the best sketch here. The beat poetry moment in the beginning is amusing, too. Joel has shaved his ‘50s goatee, but the bots have grown their own.
“King Dinosaur” makes for a fun experiment for the show. Not the best riffing and certainly lacking on the sketches, but it’s still a memorable episode.
Rating: ***
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