Hard to believe the Halloween season came and went so quickly! Although we have one festival out of the way, we surely have another on the rise! December will once again feature a very merry Kung Fu Christmas, so be on the lookout!

For right now, however, we must focus on the present. Today we begin our coverage of the Mystery Science Theater 3000: Volume XXII box set. From that set, we begin today by looking at the episode Time of the Apes. A definite highlight from the set, to be sure!

The Plot: Joel Robinson is trapped on the Satellite of Love with a group of robot friends who he has created. This crew of misfits are forced by the evil Dr. Forrester to endure many incredibly bad movies. The only thing that makes this process bearable is the fact that they riff and crack jokes during the entire ordeal. This week’s feature film that the crew must survive is the Japanese sci fi feature Time of the Apes. The basic story is as follows: Johnny and his sister Caroline are two adventurous young ones who are having a blast when they get to visit their uncle’s scientific laboratory. This laboratory has a specialty in animal health, but they have recently been moving into cryogenics. When a massive earthquake erupts mid-tour, Johnny, his sister, and their tour guide Catherine, all jump inside of separate cryogenic pods which are then activated. The three end up forgotten in time and when they finally awake they appear to be several hundred years in the future, and apes have taken over the world. Scared and frightened, the group initially escapes from a group of the apes and heads off into the jungle. Here they run into the only other known human, Goto. A wild man who actually strikes fear into the hearts of the outnumbering apes. Goto is actually quite gentle as it turns out, and is relatively misunderstood. He takes in his human confidants and the group struggles to stay together and survive while in the time of the apes!