MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 vol. XXXIX

All good things must come to an end, and Mystery Science Theater 3000 vol. XXXIX is likely the last DVD collection of episodes from the original series.  (After this, it seems it'd be too expensive to get the rights to the rest of the movies being riffed.)  This collection wraps things up nicely for the series -- and has an interesting bonus for those of us who ordered it early.

MST3K XXXIX has three episodes, all from the Mike Nelson time of the show.  Girls Town is a black and white borderline-exploitation film with tough gals, teenagers in gangs, reform school nuns, and even a few musical numbers from crooners.  The Amazing Transparent Man is a blend of a crime movie and the invisible man.  And Diabolik is about a groovy criminal mastermind -- and the final episode of the original show.  While these aren't iconic episodes of MST3K, they all provide plenty of laughs.  Each disc also has extra features as well.

For something different, the fourth disc -- Satellite Dishes -- has just the host segments from several episodes, from the third season (when TV's Frank joined the show) up to Quest for the Delta Knights.  While it feels a bit strange watching the bits that would be around the movies without the actual movies, these demonstrate that MST3K had plenty of humor on its own, from musical numbers to Crow's evil dark specter twin (Timmy) to the early invention exchanges.

And folks who ordered this collection early got a bonus DVD: The Complete Poopie!  This has two different sets of bloopers, plus Mike Nelson and Kevin Murphy segments trying to sell this collection during the Turkey Day Marathon.  And they're all funny -- especially as the folks on screen would keep going or crack jokes after they knew they flubbed their lines or part of the puppets or set fell apart.

I'll miss seeing new collections of the first Mystery Science Theater 3000 series (while hoping the new series gets released on DVD), but at least Mystery Science Theater 3000 XXXIX is a nice way to wrap up the releases from the series.

Overall grade: B+
Reviewed by James Lynch