Rifftrax and iRiffs: Making fun of movies

No sooner had I started this blog than it was time for the big plasma physics conference--putting together a poster, throwing together the last bits of our machinery, getting results, schmoozing for a week, then back just in time to get ready for Thanksgiving. Now it’s finally Black Friday and I have time to put together a new post.  I always appreciated the irony of using vacations to catch up on work.

Anyways, I love bad movies and by extension, mystery science theater 3000 (mst3k).  

Here’s a paragraph explaining what MST3K is, because I need to explain everything to you people: mst3k was a tv show in the ‘90s, essentially about 3 people (2 of whom are robots) viewing bad movies and making fun of them while they watched. Essentially they’re a very cynical commentary track. After 10 seasons, MST3K came to an end, but its creators  continued on, under different headings. Much of the crew and the original host, Joel, went on to create Cinematic Titanic, while Mike, the later host, and a few regulars created Rifftrax. Cinematic Titanic keeps to MST3K’s theme of riffing on low-quality B-movies, while Rifftrax mostly works on mainstream and Hollywood movies (though they will still work on the low-budget schlock from time to time).

Rifftrax is pleasant enough to have an entire community dedicated to fan-generated tracks, iRiffs. On the consumer end, iRiffs is identical to Rifftrax--you buy a riff mp3 ( usually $3-4 for Rifftrax, under $2 for iRiffs), and you play it alongside the movie (movie sold separately), with audio cues to help you line them up.

Now I bring this up because one of my old college roommates, Jared Shaffer, and I love watching bad movies enough that we’ve made a couple such commentary tracks. And below I’d like to present them. I encourage you to support us by clicking on the posters and downloading the tracks to watch with these terrible, terrible movies.

If you happen to be a cheapskate, or poor, or something, and don’t want to pay for our iRiffs, let Jared or me know and we’ll help you out.  We would honestly have distributed for free, but iRiffs seems to be the most popular distribution site. These were labors of love, and considering how long it took to make these, with how much our time is worth, we’re never going to break even on them if we’re looking for profit. 

I have a blog now!

Salutations, reader(s)!

In case you don't know who I am (in which case, how did you get here?), I am Zachary Tobin, Chief Executive President of Tobincorporated™, an enterprise I made up to brand my creative endeavors.

After years of impediment, I decided to finally start forcing myself to progress in the hopes of someday decapitating Bill Nye and Neil DeGrasse Tyson, thus assuming their powers.  Having no networking or people skills to speak of, though, I'll have to start small, here.

I have no specific goals or tasks for this weblog. The primary purpose is to keep me on task.  My current plans are to post about my projects, opinion pieces, and maybe some remedial science lessons. That's right, pay attention and you might learn something.