Happy birthday to death.
Film watched: The Bubble (1966).
The Segments:
Prologue- Emily's 'Bots are visiting Joel again in his Satellite of Love and pitching him ideas for Star Trek-themed breakfast foods.
Segment 1/Invention Exchange
- Not satisfied with the meager selection of butter, caramel, and nacho cheese, Joel's Pop Duster turns any concession food into popcorn toppings for new taste twists on the old cinema standard. Lens-B-Safe is Kinga's way of protecting glasses lenses from scratches (if one doesn't mind walking totally blind).
Segment 2
- The crew questions the point of gratuitous 3D effects in movies (this experiment was originally presented in that format and it's obvious). M. Waverly and Growler are gathering moon rocks in utter boredom until a stray rock hits Waverly in the head and he starts picking up radio stations.
Segment 3
- Seeing as how Servo has no depth perception, Joel offers him his new invention, the Arch Obolus Rift, to allow him to better view the movie in 3D. It works well until Servo is made to watch the hallucination scene and freaks out.
Post-Intermission
- Servo is still locked in a delirious trance. Fortunately, Joel finds his vision switches and turns them back on to snap him out of it.
Segment 4
- With the 'Bots on break, Joel calls a rhyming meeting with Jonah and Emily to go over their plan for escape. Joel intends to use Jonah's Percussive Drive to commandeer the Deep Hurting and drag Joel's SOL into the Timebag to freedom with the hosts inside. To this end, they need to do something unheard of in MST3K history: have all three of them riff a movie together.
Segment 5
- While Kinga and Max are away, Joel puts Phase 1 of the escape plan into action. He tricks Pearl into letting Jonah and Emily gather onto his SOL so they can all perform a Christmas special. Pearl thinks it's a good idea. So does Dr. Kabahl.
The Mystery Science Theater 3000 presentation of The Bubble has examples of:
- Call-Back: One of the radio DJs that M. Waverly picks up is named "Big Stupid".
- Continuity Nod:
- When Kinga boasts that The Bubble is one of the worst movies they've ever shown, Joel initially scoffs by pointing out that he's already riffed Manos: The Hands of Fate.
- Jonah's Percussive Drive, his invention for Gizmonic Institute from all the way back in his first episode, comes into play as part of Joel's escape plan.
- Evil Laugh: Dr. Kabahl lets one off when he announces his approval for the Christmas special.
- Glad You Thought of It: Joel sells Pearl on the idea of an all-host Christmas special by "reminding" her that it was her own brilliant idea.
- Lame Pun Reaction: Servo's riff of "Tree, meet sap" when Mark is hiding behind a tree gets him a time-out from Joel, albeit only briefly.
- Mythology Gag: Joel's blueprint for his escape plan is dated "Next Sunday AD".
- Running Gag:
- Mark's constant theories about the Bubble's purpose.
- "Arch Obeler's The Bubble" as the reaction riff to every inexplicably weird moment.
- Echoing the cab driver's single repeated phrase "Cab, mister?" as the name of the mishmash town.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Near the end, Crow gets completely fed up with how bad the movie is and outright leaves the theater. He comes back in time for the last scene, though.
- Shout-Out:
- "Buy my book! Buy my book!"
- "One of these warp pipes should get us out of here."
- "Can you spare a square?"
- Special Effects Failure: In-Universe: When a tray of drinks appears to float off the bar and right up to the camera, the crew observes, "The 3-D is so realistic, I feel like I could reach out and touch the [very obvious] strings."
- Take That!: When a character speculates that a film company built the bizarre town they're stuck in, Joel contributes, "Netflix, those monsters."
- This Is Gonna Suck: Ardy points out to Kinga that Manos: The Hands of Fate is the base standard by which the entire Kingachrome system is built around, yet The Bubble is so bad on a "profound existential level" that the system itself is being overwhelmed. He calls it "The wolfmother of all bad movies."
- Welcome to Corneria: The repetitive dialogue of the townspeople is likened to a video game character with limited dialogue.Cab driver: Cab, mister? Cab, mister?
Joel: Oh, NPC! - What Are Records?:Servo: Our younger viewers might require some explanation. That's a phone booth: your grandparents used to see how many people they could cram in there because they liked rubbing their bodies against other people without consequences. It also made phone calls.
