Mystery Science Theater 3000/Recap/S06/E17 The Sword and the Dragon

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Film watched: The Sword and the Dragon

As you can guess, despite having quite a lot of good special effects for the late-1950s, this movie was prime riffing material for Mystery Science Theater 3000. Among other things, the riffing often centered on the fact that the movie "came from Finland," despite being a Russian-made movie. Like a previous Russian-made-otherwise film that appeared on the show, the changes were likely made to avoid mentions of Russia during the height of the Cold War... but it doesn't change how goofy the whole thing was.

The Mystery Science Theater 3000 presentation has examples of:

  • Disney Creatures of the Farce: Gypsy parodies the scene where Ilya's wife sings as forest creatures help her create a magic tablecloth, with the help of Mike & the 'Bots. Gypsy bails on the sketch early because it's too weird for her.
  • Ho Yay:

Crow: It may be the wine, Lars, but you're a pretty man...
Tom: Sven, no! Don't! You mustn't!

"For it is HAM that I seek! HAM! HAAAMM!"