Comedy Central vs. Mystery Science Theater 3000

or a case study in how NOT to run a network

by Chris "sampo" Cornell

Okay, I have been compiling a chronology of the dysfunctional relationship between BBI and the channel, based on my data.

Here's what I have so far: I'm not sure I have all the dates and stuff right. I'd appreciate corrections and additions.

1989
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After 21 shows on KTMA-TV, Joel Hodgson and Jim Mallon take a nine-minute compilation tape of their best stuff and head to New York, where they barnstorm several cable TV channels. They sell the concept to the fledgling Comedy Channel cable network, which is preparing to go on the air.
(Note: that demo tape is included in the MST3K Scrapbook tape available from Best Brains. It is extremely rough and not terribly funny, and one can assume that either the management of the Comedy Channel were either very wise and saw great promise in the series, or they were just desperate to fill air time. :))
Mallon and Kevin Murphy quit their jobs at KTMA, and with Hodgson, Trace Beaulieu and Josh Weinstein, found Best Brains.

1990
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Best Brains finish producing the first, 13-episode season. The series is run on Saturday mornings and promoted as a kids' show. Then network demographics show that adults are watching it. It moves it to late nights, where it flourishes. During the spring and summer, a nervous period of waiting ensues, with Comedy Channel unsure if they wanted to renew it. About that time, there was a wave of enormously positive reviews and articles in the press--articles that made Comedy Channel executives look very good for supporting the series. This apparently had much to do with their being renewed for a second 13-episode season.
The second season (13 episodes) begins September 22nd.

1991
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In the middle of the second season, the Comedy Channel and its rival, Ha!, merge to become (after some confusion where it had to change its name) Comedy Central.
The third season (24 episodes) begins June 1st.
BBI produces the now-classic Turkey Day bumpers in which Dr. F. attempts to control the world while Frank entertains Thanksgiving Day guests.

1992
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The fourth season (24 episodes) begins June 6th.
Best Brains and Comedy Central make an informal agreement that the network will no longer run first-season episodes.
The network makes the "This is MST3K," a documentary about the series. It is generally reviled by MSTies because of the irksome (and seemingly clueless) presence of host Penn Jillette, and the needless comments from non-celebrities such as Neil Patrick Harris, the star of "Doogie Howser M.D." On the up side, it features many good clips and some insightful comments by TV industry executives, TV critics and fans.
BBI agrees to do Turkey Day marathon bumpers again: this time Dr. F. cruelly force-feeds Frank a whole turkey with each episode.
Late in the year, people on the internet and on-line services begin complaining about Comedy Central announcer Penn Jillette's voice-overs during the closing credits.

1993
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Over the course of this year, the once-common BBI-made promos for the series cease, as Comedy Central declines to pay for them.
Complaints about the voices-overs grow louder during the spring and summer. Comedy Central ignores this. In late May-early June, the situation becomes worse following several incidents where Penn voice-overs were played despite the fact that more than just the closing theme was playing. In one case, it was at the end of a rerun of episode 311- "It Conquered The World" where Peter Graves' dry pronouncements about mankind were drowned out by Penn's comments. Even worse was when a Penn voice-over was played, in its entirety, during the closing of episode 307- "Daddy-O"--which is actually an extended host segment in which the "button" is pushed and the theme song begins, but because of a malfunction, the button refuses to stay pushed and we are returned to Deep 13--and a startled and confused Dr. F. and Frank--several times. Fans were stunned that Comedy Central would be paying so little attention to the show that a voice-over would be run during an actual comedy bit, and the network was flooded with angry calls, letters and emails--and the network was excoriated in cyberspace.
The fifth season (24 episodes) begins July 24.
That same month Jillette makes an on-air apology (during the closing theme--grrr!) and voice-over announcements during the closing theme cease. Comedy Central gripes to BBI about that the two-hour shows are hard to program. They helpfully respond with something called The Mystery Science Theater Hour, which took some full-length season-three and -four episodes and divided them into two one-hour shows. About seven minutes from the original shows were removed from the hour-long versions. BBI later sold the Hour to syndication, where it is currently being seen in many cities. Comedy Central offers an insultingly small amount of money to BBI to once again produce the Turkey Day bumpers, and it refuses. Instead, Comedy Central films a gathering of online MSTies, who introduce the episodes in the marathon.

1994
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The Comedy Central logo begins running in the lower right hand corner of the screen, despite the fact that it is covering up Crow in the theater. Only after fans again complain loudly is it removed.
For a few episodes, the network runs little alleged jokes--and commercials for other Comedy Central programming--in a "crawl" across the bottom of the screen during episodes. Again, after an outcry from MSTies, they were stopped.
It is learned that the network is planning to cut five to seven minutes from season-two and -three episodes (which run five minutes longer than episodes in seasons four, five and six) in order to squeeze them into a two-hour time block and still have enough room for all the commercials. It is then learned that BBI had not even been consulted about making these cuts. Again outraged fans objected and the network backed down.
The sixth season (24 episodes) begins July 16.
Comedy Central baffles attendees to the MST3K convention in September with something called "Wheel of Fish." On the upside, the network contributes funds for the costume ball at the convention.
Once again BBI declines to produce the Turkey Day bumpers and Adam West hosts the marathon.
Late in the year, the network stops running reruns of the series at midnight (eastern & pacific time). Fans flooded the channel with complaints. In order to placate them, the network instituted a "viewer's choice" presentation called "Play MSTie for Me," in which viewers voted, mostly via the Prodigy on-line service, on which episode they would like to see. It was a nice idea on paper, but it was so poorly executed by Comedy Central that the result was a disaster in which non-fans controlled voting and fans were made even more irate.
In addition, Comedy Central commercials for "Play MSTie for Me" feature two supposed "programmers" talking like southern rednecks, seeming to indicate that this is how they view the show's audience.
As the sixth season winds down, the time when the series is annually renewed comes and goes with no new contract.
Contractless, Best Brains shuts down production at the end of the year. Tours of the studio are suspended. Much of the staff is laid off.

1995
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As the year begins, Jim Mallon goes to New York and meets with CC executives. The buzz immediately following those meetings is that numerous complaints and differences on both sides were aired and that relations between the two were better.
The outcry over the midnight shows prompts two unprecedented on-air appearances by then-recently hired Comedy Central programming chief Vincent Favale.
In the first appearance, Favale appears just before an episode begins and reads a brief statement defending the decision, insisting that the ratings of the midnight shows just weren't high enough. He also takes a moment to make what are deemed disparaging remarks about the people who were complaining. (For example, that angry callers to CC had made a secretary cry. In on-line postings, several cyberspace MSTies replied, "Good!"). This appearance, rather than mollifying MSTies, incenses them further: not only does the outcry continue, but personal comments about Favale's apparent cluelessness are now sprinkled among the scheduling complaints. The following week, Favale sets aside an unprecedented live half hour before an episode. With Comedy Central personality Mark Maron acting as moderator, he takes live phone calls from fans and again defends his decision. This appearance simply exasperates MSTies, confirming the impression of cluelessness he gave in the first appearance. Many, at that point, conclude that Favale is not so much malevolent as he is simply a hopelessly unteachable waste of skin, and throw up their hands. A more muted outcry continues, though many come to grumblingly accept the schedule change as a fact of life. (Not long after this, Maron, who had often praised MST as host of "Short Attention Span Theater" and seemed supportive of fans during the special appearance of Favale, quietly disappears from CC.)
In March, "Play MSTie for Me" voting is quietly discontinued, but the network continues to call it "Play MSTie for Me" even though the network itself is choosing the episodes.
CC's president joins BBI staffers in Los Angeles for a special event sponsored by the Director's Guild honoring the series. Those present that evening report the group was jovial and not all tense, and Jim Mallon assures those attending that there will be a season seven.
Season six concludes with no contract for season seven.
Eventually, the complaints about the lack of midnight shows appear to wear Comedy Central down: The channel returns reruns to weekday lineup, but at noon (eastern & pacific time), instead of midnight. Since some people only get Comedy Central in the evening hours on the cable systems, however, pleas for a return of midnight showings continue.
At the same time, the network puts the "Mystery Science Theater Hour" which had been running at noon, on "hiatus."
Finally, for whatever reason, Comedy Central has a change of heart. Beginning in mid-June, weekday midnight episodes were returned to the schedule (with promos that referred to MSTies' "bellyaching"). But, as midnight episodes returned, the networks also cut 10 hours of other showings during the week.
About mid-year, Comedy Central gets a new president. Best Brains sends him a set of tires as a peace offering, to no avail.
Best Brains and Comedy Central finally agree to a contract that calls for six episodes (and contains an option for three more).
Apparently not understanding how deeply Best Brains felt about the moratorium on season one, CC decides unilaterally to show the eight season-one shows they still have the rights to on Turkey Day without consulting Best Brains. Best Brains strenuously objects and a compromise is worked out: The number of shows shown was reduced to four, and their time slots were in late at night or early in the morning. Best Brains also got to choose which four episodes will be rerun.
In November, Friday night midnight episodes are cut.
Comedy Central runs promos for Turkey Day describing Dr. Erhardt as "a fake Frank" and infuriating Joel fans by calling Joel the "fifth bot-tle."
Backed into a corner, Best Brains accepts a tiny amount of money to create the Turkey Day bumpers, with a running story that had Dr. F. frantically trying to entertain Thanksgiving Day guests who had been invited by Frank before his departure, and at the same time trying to take over the world before his mother arrived.
In December, BBI released a statement saying that CC had no interest in ordering any more new episodes of the series and that an exclusionary clause in the contract would not let them move to another network until 1997. Executives at CC, apparently caught off-guard by BBI's announcement, which a spokesperson called "premature," hemmed and hawed for several days before admitting that, yes, they had not ordered any new episodes. They were full of contradictory responses and lame excuses about why no new episodes were being ordered. CC's president, Doug Herzog, cited "low ratings" as the reason, but the network refused to provide evidence of this. ("Ratings" are never really an issue on a basic cable channel, which measures its Neilsen ratings in tiny fractional percentages of the audience compared with the major networks. It seems extremely unlikely that MST3K's ratings were far lower than most of the rest of CC's programming. And CC's reluctance to provide proof of any sort of ratings differential seems to indicate that this claim is just a red herring.)
In any case, fans who have been following the behind-the-scenes battles between BBI and CC know that the two sides have been growing apart for some time. It seems likely that this was less about ratings than it was about those battles.
BBI then publicly told its fans that it DID want to continue doing the series, and suggested that fans write to the network and ask them to reconsider. At about the same time, CC fouled up its showings of episode 701 when it ran the Turkey Day version again in December, rather than the one with the new host segments BBI wanted them to run. This was followed by CC changing the schedule again-moving the show to some very inaccessible times: the midnight episodes moved to 2 a.m. and the Sunday 10 AM showing moved to 7 AM.

1996
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As the year began, a massive effort by fans to save the series got under way. People wrote by the thousands to CC and asked them to reconsider, or to release them from exclusionary clause of its contract. The channel had to hire five staffers to handle the avalanche of mail it receieved. Despite declarations that the series gets terribly low ratings, the network holds most of season seven until the February sweeps period.
In response to the wave of mail, CC sends out letters to those who wrote in. Containing blatant falsehoods, the letter declared that "Rumors of MST3K's cancellation have been greatly exaggerated" and attempted to placate viewers by pointing out that reruns of the series would continue.
However, the wave of mail did have some effect. In mid-February, a CC vice president flew to Minneapolis and met with BBI to make a "proposal." As it was later revealed, the proposal was that Mike and the Bots shift from watching movies to watching old sitcoms. It also included a provision that the MST characters would be used to promote other CC programming.
A few weeks later, BBI offered a counter-proposal, the details of which were not made public.
After several weeks of quiet, on March 14, 1996, Best Brains made the following announcement:

"after a long run on comedy central it's official -
yesterday cc told us they have decided not to purchase
any additional mst3k episodes and that they have agreed
to release us from our contract. we are now free to look
for a new home for mystery science theater 3000."
"the sci-fi channel has recently expressed some interest
in mst3k and we are in discussions with them."

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