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The Best of Rifftrax Shorts

A review by Nick Peron

Rifftrax for those of you who don't already know, is Mike Nelson's Post-Mystery Science Theater 3000 riffing group. It started off with Mike by himself providing semi-humorous commentary tracks to public domain classics that had been colorized by Legend Films. This eventually mutated into Rifftrax, which for the most part are downloadable commentary tracks to popular movies and TV shows, riffing the films ala MST3K. Eventually Mike was joined by his fellow MST3K alumni Bill Corbet and Kevin Murphy. He's even had guest stars on Rifftrax such as "Weird Al" Yankovic, Neil Patrick Harris, and "Lowtax" from Somethingawful.com.

While I love all things riffing, I've never been able to get into Rifftrax. The major reason is that most of my movie purchases are usually out of the mainstream, and Mike and his various Rifftrax riffers usually riff movies I would never pay a red-cent on, ether to own or to rent. I just have too much dignity to sit through a Harry Potter movie (Dignity says the man who owns the movie Fatty Drives the Bus) But occasionally, they release DVD's with commentary tracks. Prior to the Best of Rifftrax Shorts, the last DVD release with a commentary track was Mike Nelson doing a commentary track for The Three Stooges movie Swing Parade. DVD releases are sparse, and I suppose that's because they don't have to deal with rights issues for the movies, and the money they can make off a product that doesn't require any physical product being made probably is more fiscally appealing than the alternatives.

Well regardless of the reason, they have released The Best of Rifftrax Shorts on DVD. Over the last year Mike, Bill and Kevin have been riffing old short subject films, and selling the videos online through their website. Well after they released enough, they put out a best of DVD. Naturally I snatched it up, because I really love Mike, Kevin and Bill's work (I have since heard some of their Rifftrax commentaries to Daredevil, Star Trek The Undiscovered Country and The Star Wars Holiday Special) and having a physical copy of something they did does me well.

As you can guess it's a compellation of 9 short films, all with riffing by Mike, Kevin and Bill. Shorts in this collection are:

Down and Out: A safety video about all the different ways you can slip and fall and hurt yourself. The entire short is acted out by a guy in an upsetting brown jump suit and a Kramer haircut, tripping over side walk chalk and falling from places. The short in and of itself is funny because it features scene after scene of this guy slipping and falling and hurting himself (which is the height of comedy) but the riffs by Mike and Co. make it even funnier.

Buying Food: A short from our old friends at Centron Productions (Who you'll remember had many shorts savaged on MST3K) This time the folks at Centron educate us on the importance of buying food wisely. They warn us of the danger of impulse buying of food, how to choose just the right quantities, and how to select which grade of food you should buy. This is one of those Centron shorts which is about 25 minutes of common sense, and it makes me wonder how people in the 50's managed to make it through their days alive if they needed short films by Centron to teach them the dangers of everyday living. It's a point which Mike and Co. riff in various humorous ways.

Patriotism: A very, very odd little film about what it means to be patriotic in America. It features Bob Crane.. of Hogan's Heroes fame According to this film being a Patriot is doing something to make your country a better place, like planting trees and painting fences and blowing about birthday candles, and looking both ways before crossing the street, and blowing your nose, and putting the seat down after you flush, and returning your recyclables, and walking your dog, and buying a sack of peanuts... Okay, I'm getting carried away, but essentially the film gives list upon list of normal everyday things that would apparently make you a patriot to your country. So much for the guts and glory fighting the good fight and saving America from it's foreign enemies. An odd little film.

Skipper Learns a Lesson: Meet Skipper the racist dog. Seriously. This is a short film about treating people equally, and follows the story of Skipper, who doesn't want to play with other dogs that look different to him. However, he learns the folly of his ways when he gets covered with poster paint and asks the other dogs for help and gets turned down. One of the more frightening aspects to this short film are the child actors they picked for this, including a horrific ginger child that suffers from Sissy Spasecitis. Stick around for Mike & Co's coupe de grasse riff at the end of the short.

It Must Be the Neighbors: This is one of those short films where you wonder how much free time people had in the 50's and 60's to have time for all the crap that's suggested they do in all these short films. This film is about how you (YES YOU!) can prevent pests such as mosquito's, rats, and other critters from infesting your neighborhood. You can tell it's a product of it's time when people are worried about getting disease from mosquito bites. Also check out those post-war suburbanites.

The Trouble With Women: This short film features a man who can't stand the fact that women are working for his company. He goes to his boss to complain about the "trouble" women make in the workplace. Now I suppose this is a different time, but I can tell you one thing folks: If I were working for an electronics company and I was huddled over a soldering iron all day, when I pause to look up, I'd rather see some hot dame working at the table in front of me, than some sweaty balding chunk of a man. In fact, if I was baldo in this film, I'd want more women on the job.

Right or Wrong: Right or Wrong is one of the weaker shorts in this collection because it's a "morality play" where it asks the viewers to discuss if the characters actions in the film were right or wrong. It follows a boy who's caught when his friends smash a window of a warehouse, and the boy refuses to talk, his troubles with the law, etc. It's not that entertaining.

Drugs Are Like That: This film begs the question on if the makers of the film were on drugs when they made it. It's an old short film made by a PBS affiliate from the 70's warning children the dangers of drugs. It features two kids playing with a Lego set and talking about what drugs are like, as per what they were told by a guest who came to their school. Because this film was probably targeted at a younger viewing audience, showing people wired up on smack and shooting heroin into their eye sockets were put aside for subtler methods. What you get is two kids likening smoking crack to a baby sucking it's thumb. The whole thing is a test of your patience as well because it drags on and the kids natter on and on and on about stuff throughout the course of the film.

Shake Hands With Danger: This is a short that was made specially for the DVD, and it features 3-D animated versions of Mike, Kevin and Bill. Kevin and Bill appear as a bag of popcorn and inflatable toucan for reasons that are unknown to me other than probably likening things to MST3K. The short film is a treat, it's called Shake Hands With Danger and it's about safety on the construction site. It's everything you could expect from one of these old safety videos, bloody and gory but all so campy and if that wasn't enough, it's narrated and feature songs by Merle Haggard. The only negative thing I have to say about this short is the fact that the video itself is standard frame, and short film is sandwiched in a smaller than standard frame boarder of the 3-D animation. So when you try to watch it widescreen it's all stretched out and looks awkward. Frankly, I think the Rifftrax guys should either work on how these videos appear on wide screens or just dump the visual concept all together, because really, do you really need it? Yeah, it's nostalgic, but not necessary.

Well that about sums up my review of the best of Rifftrax Shorts Vol. 1, it's a really funny DVD, I recommend you go and pick it up. It's only available through the official Rifftrax website.

Most Items We Have Reviewed and Commented On Are Available Through Amazon.com. If you want to pick them up for yourself, please don't hesitate to do so through this link below, proceeds on any sales will go towards the operation of this website:


		The Best of Rifftrax Shorts A review by Nick Peron Rifftrax for those of you who don't already know, is Mike Nelson's Post-Mystery Science Theater 3000 riffing group. It started off with Mike by himself providing semi-humorous commentary tracks to public domain classics that had been colorized by Legend Films. This eventually mutated into Rifftrax, which for the most part are downloadable commentary tracks to popular movies and TV shows, riffing the films ala MST3K. Eventually Mike was joined by his fellow MST3K alumni Bill Corbet and Kevin Murphy. He's even had guest stars on Rifftrax such as "Weird Al" Yankovic, Neil Patrick Harris, and "Lowtax" from Somethingawful.com. While I love all things riffing, I've never been able to get into Rifftrax. The major reason is that most of my movie purchases are usually out of the mainstream, and Mike and his various Rifftrax riffers usually riff movies I would never pay a red-cent on, ether to own or to rent. I just have too much dignity to sit through a Harry Potter movie (Dignity says the man who owns the movie Fatty Drives the Bus) But occasionally, they release DVD's with commentary tracks. Prior to the Best of Rifftrax Shorts, the last DVD release with a commentary track was Mike Nelson doing a commentary track for The Three Stooges movie Swing Parade. DVD releases are sparse, and I suppose that's because they don't have to deal with rights issues for the movies, and the money they can make off a product that doesn't require any physical product being made probably is more fiscally appealing than the alternatives. Well regardless of the reason, they have released The Best of Rifftrax Shorts on DVD. Over the last year Mike, Bill and Kevin have been riffing old short subject films, and selling the videos online through their website. Well after they released enough, they put out a best of DVD. Naturally I snatched it up, because I really love Mike, Kevin and Bill's work (I have since heard some of their Rifftrax commentaries to Daredevil, Star Trek The Undiscovered Country and The Star Wars Holiday Special) and having a physical copy of something they did does me well. As you can guess it's a compellation of 9 short films, all with riffing by Mike, Kevin and Bill. Shorts in this collection are: Down and Out: A safety video about all the different ways you can slip and fall and hurt yourself. The entire short is acted out by a guy in an upsetting brown jump suit and a Kramer haircut, tripping over side walk chalk and falling from places. The short in and of itself is funny because it features scene after scene of this guy slipping and falling and hurting himself (which is the height of comedy) but the riffs by Mike and Co. make it even funnier. Buying Food: A short from our old friends at Centron Productions (Who you'll remember had many shorts savaged on MST3K) This time the folks at Centron educate us on the importance of buying food wisely. They warn us of the danger of impulse buying of food, how to choose just the right quantities, and how to select which grade of food you should buy. This is one of those Centron shorts which is about 25 minutes of common sense, and it makes me wonder how people in the 50's managed to make it through their days alive if they needed short films by Centron to teach them the dangers of everyday living. It's a point which Mike and Co. riff in various humorous ways. Patriotism: A very, very odd little film about what it means to be patriotic in America. It features Bob Crane.. of Hogan's Heroes fame According to this film being a Patriot is doing something to make your country a better place, like planting trees and painting fences and blowing about birthday candles, and looking both ways before crossing the street, and blowing your nose, and putting the seat down after you flush, and returning your recyclables, and walking your dog, and buying a sack of peanuts... Okay, I'm getting carried away, but essentially the film gives list upon list of normal everyday things that would apparently make you a patriot to your country. So much for the guts and glory fighting the good fight and saving America from it's foreign enemies. An odd little film. Skipper Learns a Lesson: Meet Skipper the racist dog. Seriously. This is a short film about treating people equally, and follows the story of Skipper, who doesn't want to play with other dogs that look different to him. However, he learns the folly of his ways when he gets covered with poster paint and asks the other dogs for help and gets turned down. One of the more frightening aspects to this short film are the child actors they picked for this, including a horrific ginger child that suffers from Sissy Spasecitis. Stick around for Mike & Co's coupe de grasse riff at the end of the short. It Must Be the Neighbors: This is one of those short films where you wonder how much free time people had in the 50's and 60's to have time for all the crap that's suggested they do in all these short films. This film is about how you (YES YOU!) can prevent pests such as mosquito's, rats, and other critters from infesting your neighborhood. You can tell it's a product of it's time when people are worried about getting disease from mosquito bites. Also check out those post-war suburbanites. The Trouble With Women: This short film features a man who can't stand the fact that women are working for his company. He goes to his boss to complain about the "trouble" women make in the workplace. Now I suppose this is a different time, but I can tell you one thing folks: If I were working for an electronics company and I was huddled over a soldering iron all day, when I pause to look up, I'd rather see some hot dame working at the table in front of me, than some sweaty balding chunk of a man. In fact, if I was baldo in this film, I'd want more women on the job. Right or Wrong: Right or Wrong is one of the weaker shorts in this collection because it's a "morality play" where it asks the viewers to discuss if the characters actions in the film were right or wrong. It follows a boy who's caught when his friends smash a window of a warehouse, and the boy refuses to talk, his troubles with the law, etc. It's not that entertaining. Drugs Are Like That: This film begs the question on if the makers of the film were on drugs when they made it. It's an old short film made by a PBS affiliate from the 70's warning children the dangers of drugs. It features two kids playing with a Lego set and talking about what drugs are like, as per what they were told by a guest who came to their school. Because this film was probably targeted at a younger viewing audience, showing people wired up on smack and shooting heroin into their eye sockets were put aside for subtler methods. What you get is two kids likening smoking crack to a baby sucking it's thumb. The whole thing is a test of your patience as well because it drags on and the kids natter on and on and on about stuff throughout the course of the film. Shake Hands With Danger: This is a short that was made specially for the DVD, and it features 3-D animated versions of Mike, Kevin and Bill. Kevin and Bill appear as a bag of popcorn and inflatable toucan for reasons that are unknown to me other than probably likening things to MST3K. The short film is a treat, it's called Shake Hands With Danger and it's about safety on the construction site. It's everything you could expect from one of these old safety videos, bloody and gory but all so campy and if that wasn't enough, it's narrated and feature songs by Merle Haggard. The only negative thing I have to say about this short is the fact that the video itself is standard frame, and short film is sandwiched in a smaller than standard frame boarder of the 3-D animation. So when you try to watch it widescreen it's all stretched out and looks awkward. Frankly, I think the Rifftrax guys should either work on how these videos appear on wide screens or just dump the visual concept all together, because really, do you really need it? Yeah, it's nostalgic, but not necessary. Well that about sums up my review of the best of Rifftrax Shorts Vol. 1, it's a really funny DVD, I recommend you go and pick it up. It's only available through the official Rifftrax website. But I am not done talking about riffing just yet, for this particular update of Micro-Shock.com I'm doing a tribute to Riffers, so follow along with me as I do a review of Incognito Cinema Warriors XP's Bloody Pit of Horror, as well as our review of Mystery Science Theater 3000 Vol. 14, and Cinematic Titanic's Frankenstein's Castle of Freaks.
		Most Items We Have Reviewed and Commented On Are Available Through Amazon.com. If you want to pick them up for yourself, please don't hesitate to do so through this link below, proceeds on any sales will go towards the operation of this website: