MST3K: Episode 907 - Hobgoblins

I'm watching all of the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes in order. More about that here and here.

Episode 907: Hobgoblins

First aired: Sci-Fi Channel on 27 June 1998
Availability: Amazon (Volume 8), Rhino (Volume 8/out of print), Best Brains (Volume 8)

Hobgoblins are the worst kind of goblins.

Think of the worst movie you ever saw? Was it Hobgoblins? If not, you might want to rethink your decision.

This is a bad movie. A wicked, bad, naughty, evil movie. And it needs a spanking!

Now, in the movie's defense, it's not serious. It's almost a kinda spoof. Sorta like a rip-off of Gremlins written by someone who watched Porky's on Showtime the night before. Not a well-done one, though. And that's the problem.

Oh, and the plot holes. You could drive a spaceship through those plot holes. Which is kinda why MST3K did it.

Hobgoblins make a break for it.

A slacker security guard is killed by a fantasy that's brought to reality by aliens that came to earth in a canister vacuum cleaner 30 years ago, so the old security guard tells the replacement trainee that he was keeping the aliens in the vault at the old film studio they were guarding and to stay away from the vault, but the trainee doesn't listen and the Hobgoblins get loose and terrorize the town, or at least the trainees loser friends, but they end up blowing up the Hobgoblins basement vault on the fifth floor, which they shoulda done 30 years ago, and everybody's fine. The end.

This isn't watchably bad. It's just bad. It's more than just bad. It's painfully bad. Cringingly bad. Stick icepicks in your eyeballs and pencils in your ears bad.

Trying to fool Pearl.

Trying to fool Pearl.

The riffing makes up for the bad movie, but just barely.

The Host Segments are kinda fun. Like where Mike & the Bots put up the cardboard cutouts to fool Pearl while they try to make their escape. Of course, I'm still not clear on how they were going to escape. There's also a bit in the theater where Crow and Servo keep trying to run off.

The movie is bad. Did I mention that? But, overall, an okay episode. Okay, maybe more than okay.

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