The show has undergone many changes since its humble beginnings on Minnesota’s KTMA. The marathon began as a series of episodes interspersed with original bumpers and wrap-around segments on its network homes (Comedy Central, then the Sci-Fi Channel).
While the original marathon lasted 24 hours, the streaming version traditionally showcases six episodes of the show.
It will also be MST3K’s first Turkey Day stream since its cancellation by Netflix.
News of MST3K: The Return’s cancellation first broke via Joel Hodgson, series creator and the show’s first host as the amiable Joel Robinson, who informed the series’ backers on Kickstarter that Netflix had chosen not to go forward with a third season of the series on November 26. Netflix is expected to continue streaming classic episodes of the show as well as the first season of The Return and last year’s The Gauntlet.
Hodgson later said on Twitter that “If you didn’t see the backer update, I announced today that #MST3K is not doing a third season for Netflix. It’s not the end of MST3K, It’s just the end of the first chapter of bringing back MST3K,” indicating that some other network home might be in store for the venerable series, which has now survived three cancellations across three platforms.
Jonah Ray Rodrigues—who became the show’s third host as Jonah Heston—tweeted “So, Netflix decided to not do another season of MST3K. We are off to Get Down in Lilyhammer while the OA helps us take it One Day At A Time. We will be in group therapy with Tuca & Bertie, Jessica Jones, & Lady Dynamite. The sessions will be run by Gypsy (w/ Naomi Watts.)”
Rodrigues, too, isn’t giving up the hope of the show’s revival down the line, putting in a hint to the AMC-owned Shudder, a horror streaming network, that the show might team up well with Joe Bob Briggs’ The Last Drive In.
Mystery Science Theater 3000 is a show about an office worker sent into space as an endurance experiment by his scientist boss and assistant, who promptly creates three robots to help him survive a daily onslaught of cheesy b-movies, shorts, and television episodes. The show, after being cancelled by Comedy Central in 1996, revived by Sci-Fi Channel in 1997 and cancelled in 1999, was revived via a fan-funded Kickstarter which drew celebrity attention in 2015. It raised $5,764,229 in a month.
MST3K’s Turkey Day Marathon will begin streaming on Thanksgiving Day at noon Eastern/9 a.m. Pacific.
