MST3K kickstarter launches to make more episodes

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

You just can't keep Mystery Science Theater 3000 down. Over the decades, the hilarious series that riffed terrible movies has been cancelled several times, most recently at Netflix, but it somehow manages to crawl back time and time again. Well, MST3K is looking to stage yet another resurrection as series creator Joel Hodgson has launched a new Kickstarter to fund new episodes of the series.

This isn't the first time that MST3K has taken to Kickstarter, as they successfully launched a record-breaking campaign in 2015 that wound up bringing the series to Netflix, but this time around, Joel Hodgson and company wants to leave the fate of the series in the hands of the fans, rather than any particular network. "A year in quarantine gave us a lot of time to think, and we realized two important things," Hodgson said in a statement. "First, nobody’s virtual Zoom background is as amusing as they think it is. And second, that ‘Mystery Science Theater 3000’ is back because it’s what the fans wanted. So, you know, it doesn’t make sense for a network to decide the show’s fate after each season. That should be up to the people we’re making the show for. We want our fans to decide how long we keep going, and how many new episodes we make each year." The first goal of $2 million would bring Jonah, Tom Servo, and Crow together for three brand-new episodes, but it would also fund The Gizmoplex, a virtual online theater where they'll be able to host live-screenings, premieres, and community events and where fans can host watch-parties with friends whenever they want. As I write this, they've already raised over half of their goal with over 5000 backers contributing, so they'll likely be hitting their goal very soon.

The more the MST3K Kickstarter campaign raises, the more episodes and goodies fans will receive; for example, $3.3 million will increase the episode count to six and include the development of Gizmoplex apps; $4.4 million will fund nine episodes and a full year of live events; and $5.5 million will push the episode count to twelve as well as fund twelve new shorts. Not bad at all. Joel Hodgson also have plenty of other ideas to include, but that all depends on how much they'll be able to raise over the next thirty days. For more information, you can check out the MST3K Kickstarter right here.