OT: MST3k to stay on Sci-Fi for another month!

[Pietro]

I got this info from THE OFFICIAL MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 INFO CLUB WEB SITE (http://www.mst3kinfo.com/):


In our original "The Final Schedule?" news item, we purposely included the question mark to indicate that things were still up in the air when it came to Sci-Fi's plans for the series, and now they seem to be positively atmospheric. We're getting mixed signals from the network on exactly what's going on, but we do know this: MST3K is being broadcast in January. Here's what's tentatively scheduled:

JANUARY
1/5 - 9 a.m. - [822] OVERDRAWN AT THE MEMORY BANK
1/12 - 9 a.m. - [910] FINAL SACRIFICE
1/19 - 9 a.m. - [913] QUEST OF THE DELTA KNIGHTS
1/26 - 9 a.m. - [811] PARTS: THE CLONUS HORROR


-Pietro:D

[The Dork Knight]

It would be great if the last episode they air would be "Manos: The Hands Of Fate". MST3k shall live on forever!

- Foley Is Good

[Joe Tully]

Sci-Fi doesn't have rights to Manos, since that was a CC ep.

It's probably in vain, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed for syndication.

[Greg Method]

Unfortunately January will be it. Best Brains' five year contract with Sci-Fi ends February 1rst.

So far, no other cable network has expressed interest in running repeats. There was a strong rumor last year that AMC was going to carry the series, but there was never any confirmation.

For a while, there was a C-band satellite network called the B-Movie Network that claimed to be "in serious talks" with Best Brains about reruns. Of course, now their web site is completely gone! :rolleyes:

I personally think the "new" TNN would be a good home for MST3K reruns, but since they only recently dropped their old country/western theme I don't think a lot of fans have also considered it yet and written to the network.

Outside of them, there's really no other channel that has the resources to pay for the rights to the numerous movies featured. E! seems to have an overall budget of whatever it costs to copy an electronic press kit video, the Turner group probably wouldn't touch it because Best Brains probably wouldn't let AOL Time Warner own the series, Comedy Central has zero interest in bringing it back, etc.

What's worse is that Rhino has stopped producing any new videos of the series and is concentrating on only four DVD releases a year. I've been collecting the videos since 1996, and frankly the idea that the DVD's are simply coming from the library of already-released episodes isn't that great. As much as I like having "Manos" on DVD, does Rhino honestly think "Beginning of the End" should have been on DVD instead of an "all-new" episode like, say, "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians?"

[Brandon Pierce]

I would love to see the pilot MST3K episode "The Crawling Eye" released on video.