S01E02 - The Robot vs. The Aztec Mummy

Plot

Short: Commando Cody is a scientist who owns a jet-pack that allows him to fly through the air. He is asked by the government to investigate a series of sabotage attacks against the US. Things quickly become clear that an advanced civilization that lives on the moon is behind these attacks, and Cody and his friends use their experimental rocketship to head to the moon to gather intelligence.

Film: A scientists calls in two of his friends for an important meeting at his house. There, the scientist tells his friends about his previous encounters with an Aztec mummy who guards two pieces of jewelery that reveal the location of priceless Aztec treasure. This treasure is being sought after a nefarious madman called the Bat, and his whereabouts have recently become known to the scientist. The story over, the scientist and his friends race to stop the Bat from obtaining the two pieces of jewelry by using a robot to defeat the powerful mummy.


Movie Review

In this episode of MST3K, we receive the very first short in the series (there were none in Season 0), and it happens to be the first episode in a serial. The first thing that immediately popped into my mind upon watching this short was, "Say, that looks a lot like the Rocketeer." Indeed, the 1982 superhero created by Dave Stevens (and later starring in a 1991 film) was an homage of Commando Cody, the eponymous hero of this serial entitled Radar Men from the Moon.

As someone who majored in physics in college, the science presented in this short is laughable. The short does have an excuse, though, having been filmed in 1957, about a decade before man first landed on the moon. Even so, watching the short nowadays displays just how much knowledge the creators of this short either lacked or intentionally ignored. For example, the rocket that flies Cody and his friends to the moon acts more like a plane than a rocket, even taking off and landing horizontally instead of vertically. And let's not forget that it takes them only several hours to go from Earth to the moon and the trip is treated like a scenic car drive.

Another thing to point out is something I mentioned in my review for The Crawling Eye, and I'll mention it again until I get bored of it: the blatant sexism. One of the female scientists who works with Cody in his lab goes along with everyone on the rocket ride to the moon, but he reasoning is so that the men won't miss a good home-cooked meal...something she herself points out. Now isn't that lovely? All those difficult degrees from MIT and she goes along on man's first trip to the moon to remain in the kitchen.

The story itself is fairly bland so far, told in the typical stiff dialogue and rehearsed scenes usually seen in poorly acted films of this era. The flying scenes are quite impressive, though, at least in some shots. The jetpack, though, doesn't feel integral to the story - in fact, it thus far appears to be nothing more than a quick means of transportation. Even the villains don't appear threatened over it, as they know full well about Cody's invention. Speaking of which, the villains leave something to be desired, though, with their cliched monologues and plot to take over the Earth (at least they give "thinning air on the moon" as an excuse).

Overall, a weak start to a serial with a gimmick. Perhaps the next episode might be more interesting.

And now for the movie...dear Lord, the movie. You know that a movie is terrible when the titular conflict only shows up at the very end of the film, and lasts for about a minute. Then again, one can't expect a film to be any good when about half of its run-time is dedicated to recapping the first two movies.

Yes, this wretched piece of cinema, The Robot vs. The Aztec Mummy, is the sequel to two previous films, The Aztec Mummy and The Curse of the Aztec Mummy. While its potential to be an epic trilogy is likely not all that great, they could've at least not attempted to pad the third film with a horrendous recap that goes on and on and on and on. At least they tried to fit the recap into the framework of the film, but the execution - a discussion by the hero with his friends - is terrible with its poor dialogue.

And let's not forget the dubbing. Originally filmed in Mexico, the film was imported to the USA through K. Gordon Murray, who was famous for dubbing Mexican films and releasing them to an unsuspecting public as kiddie matinee films in the 1960s. Robot vs. Aztec proves to be as bad as one could imagine in the dubbing department, as the voice actors overact and over-read their dialogue.

And what of the mummy and the robot themselves? The mummy is seen more often in the film than the robot (since the last two films were about the mummy, after all), and the robot appears only at the end...and wow, is the robot laughable. The Bat sees the robot as a terror that can conquer the world, but the machine is so bulky and slow that anyone could fight it with half a brain. Then again, I don't suppose the poor guy inside the robot costume could really move that much inside such a heavy suit.

This movie is so laughably poor that it could almost qualify for a so-bad-it's-good seal of approval, though the recap in the first half of the film drags it back down to the so-bad-it's-bad zone. Less recap, more new content, regardless of how thin the plot may be.


MST3K Review

As if feeling bad for the long pauses between jokes in The Crawling Eye, Joel and the bots make up for it by riffing the movie more frequently throughout the film here. However, the more rapid pace of the jokes exposes another flaw that the MST3K crew has yet to address at this stage in the series: the timing of the jokes. Many of the jokes told are indeed humorous, but too often the jokes are told at inappropriate moments, such as a couple seconds too late or while dialogue is spoken in the movie.

There is one moment in the film where the camera shifts abruptly between several characters, which prompts Joel and the bots to make wisecracks at the quick cuts. Unfortunately, their timing lags in such a way that the next camera shot is almost finished before their riff, destroying the timing of the joke. This is an extreme case, though, and it also demonstrates the relaxed atmosphere that the MST3K crew seems to have in these early episodes.

All in all, the boys demonstrated better riffing than the first episode, but need to work on their timing. Practice makes perfect, after all.