"Is that a pencil in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?"
"A Pencil!"
Or;
Writing Good Host Segments
Part three of "How to MST"
Now's time to write up your host segments. First, you take the plot line
that you came up with in the last part and you decide wether you think it would
work better in text or script form. Some plots just are better in script becasue
more conversation is needed. Of course, for plots requiring a lot of
description, text is usually better. Here's an example:
>"Hey, Crow!"
>"Yeah, what?"
>"Let's play a game!"
>"What game?"
>"Warcraft!"
>"How do you play?"
>"You click on the buttons like this... then you kill them like this... then you
>win the game
>like this!"
For those of you who didn't notice, Mike got into the conversation about
halfway down. Sure, that example wasn't very funny, but it's an example! It's
supposed to get a point across, not entertain! I thought that you learned that
in your middle school textbooks! the point was, wouldn't that have worked a bit
better in script form? You would have been able to tell who was talking. That is
the base of many riffs in a lot of MSTings, like Tuxedo Haruka.
>>"I am soooo bored."
>>"There is nothing to do today."
>>"We could play poker or something."
>>"No way. Last time we tried that, Seiya and Haruka got into a glaring
>>contest."
>>"It was *her* fault!"
>>"Oh, *please*!"
>Crow: Who's talking?
>Mike: I think that Charon meant for the story to be in script form.
Wouldn't that story have needed to be in script form? I think so. Anyway,
after you've decided script or text, go ahead with the writing. At the top of
the first page, you need to put the name of the fic that is being MSTed (ex.-
Lita's Adventure), what type of story it is (ex.-A Sailor Moon (SM) Lemon
MSTing), the original author (Sofia the Cat Grrl), and your name (M.H.
Torringjan). After that, you should always put the standard disclaimers.
> I don't own (the series that the fic is from). (so-and-so) does. I don't own
>MST3K. Best Brains does. I don't own any of the products mentioned in the
>course of this MSTing. Their respective owners/producers do.
If you happen to be using characters that aren't in MST3K, then you should
also include their creators. If you made a character, say so.
After that, you can make a theme song for your series. To do so, take the
original theme song (if you know it) and twist it around and add words until it
fits your series. You don't necessarily have to make one, it just sometimes
makes the MSTing sound and look cooler.
Next comes the actual writing. Do so in your form (script or text) and
write it in whatever way you want to. If you're going to be descriptive, though,
be descriptive! I don't want to hear, "Tom did something, it was cool." I want
to hear stuff like, "Tom walked over to the flashing screen and pressed the
little red button to begin the video gaming experience that he had been waiting
for for such a long time. He couldn't believe that they had been able to
convince Frank to send this up to them!"
If you're going to have an invention exchange (a popular feature in host
segments) then remember that the guys' invention should be something that will
help mankind and the Mads' invention should be something to hinder mankind, or
at least something so extremely stupid that only they could come up with it.
It's a good effect (in my opinion) to have the Mads' invention malfunction
during the demonstration. This shows the Mads' complete inability to work
correctly, and that some higher force is working against them.
Next, introduce the fic and send them in with a door sequence. The dor
sequence can be one of your own or the one from the television show. Megane 6.7
is considered by some the Master of MSTings, not only for his ability to do host
segments and riffs, but his work on door sequences as well. In the beginning, he
had a different door sequence for every new MSTing. By this time, he has settled
down on one that he'll stick with. The original door sequence looks something
like this:
>6,5,4,3,2,dogbone...
Assuming that everyone knows the door sequence from the show, though, is
very naive, and therefore, it is a good idea to just say what the door sequence
looks like. An original sequence looks something like this:
>Door 6: It's a curtain of peace beads. You push them out of the way and get a
>whiff of marijuana smoke as you pass through.
>
>Door 5: It opens from the center, spiralling outward.
>
>Door 4: It's a castle moat. The gate falls and misses your feet by inches.
>
>Door 3: It's a wall of bone. You break it down, only to have it rebuilt by an
>invisible force. You decide to go around it instead.
>
>Door 2: It's in the shape of a heart. You board a small ship and ride it
>through the door.
>
>Door 1: It's a vault door. The center ring swirls and the door opens easily.
Always have the vault door as door number one. I think that that's a
trademark. People also like the moat with the gate falling as door four. It's a
classic.
Anyway, that's about all there is to writing good host segments. Now comes
the good part, the actual riffing!
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