What happens when you take really bad comics and insert the characters and humor of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and mix it together in a comic book? Well you get Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Comic #3.

Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Comic #3
Written By: Joel Hodgson, Harold Buchholz, Matt McGinnis, Mary Robinson, Seth Robinson, Sharyl Volpe
Art By: Todd Nauck, Mike Manley, Jack Pollock
Published By: Dark Horse Comics
Price: $3.99 
Release Date: 12/12/2018

What happens when you take really bad comics and insert the characters and humor of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and mix it together in a comic book? Well you get Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Comic #3. There are a few plots in this latest issue. The main plot that bookends the other stories features Kinga and Max from the current iteration of MST3K. It’s their plan to saturate the market with bad comics that feature our riffing heroes on the Satellite of Love. One of the subplots features Tom Servo as a teen reporter in ‘Tom Servo: Teen Reporter’ where he is interviewing the family of a wealthy young Hollywood starlet. The Jonah subplot features him lost in the wilderness and the Crow subplot is something that you could see Crow getting into. I don’t want to reveal anything because it could spoil the jokes.

This writing team led by Joel Hodgson is fantastic and they deliver a fun MST3K experience that is unique for a comic book. This issue definitely felt like I was watching an episode of the show where they just watched really bad shorts and made fun of them. I found myself laughing out loud at times while reading the stories with how funny the jokes were. The scenes that bookend the book felt very natural and developed the characters of Kinga and Max even more. There are a lot of references to past episodes and current episodes galore. I have to say that I really enjoyed the writing.

The art in this issue is on point and it delivers. The art for the bookend panels is very modern where as the art for the stories or shorts looks like it was taken from an old school comic book. My favorite pieces of art are in ‘Tom Servo: Teen Reporter’ where Tom’s head is on top of a buff human body. It’s a great joke and no one seems to question it. I found myself laughing pretty hard at the visual gags that were sprinkled throughout. I just found myself really enjoying the art styles that are here.

While this book is very funny and I found myself enjoying it, I have to say that not all of the jokes land and the middle story featuring Jonah was a little weak. I think that the stories that heavily feature the bots were the strongest. There are a couple of jokes in the Tom Servo in a breakfast scene that just didn’t work. One of them features Tom breaking the fourth wall and talking about how he can’t wait to use his new stomach. I didn’t find it funny and the jokes that followed during the breakfast scene were a little weak as well. With the Jonah story, it features him wandering through the wilderness and coming across a cabin. This story felt a little too serious and just took me out of the fun of the book. Maybe at the end of the day, readers just want to see the bots making fun of things.

I had a lot of fun reading this but I don’t think I will pick up the next issue.

3 Tom Servo/human hybrids out of 5