Something about the way they aggressively released all their content, streaming it 24/7 on all platforms, removed the magic for me completely.
I used to love these, but now I can't sit through more than 5 minutes, because that sense of "oh this is special" is gone. I think for slow burn/buildup art, you have to kind of keep it special.
Back in the 90's, the Sci-Fi channel would regularly run MST3K marathons that would last all weekend. It was pretty much the same experience as the modern streaming channels, and I loved it. The golden age of cable was full of those kinds of marathon runs of series.
All, if anyone is interested in the classic episodes without ads, I believe that the official MST3K/Gizmoplex channel on Roku/AndroidTV/Apple TV etc and gizmoplex.com website are still ad-free for the classic episodes. You have to register, but it's free. Note, I used the Roku app (I do not use any ad-blocking software/infra) and did not encounter ads, but have no experience with the website or other app platforms.
The technically unnecessary due to pluto.tv, twitch streams etc. if you want to relive that early 2000's period of pre-youtube Shoutcast streaming, a guy has kept a number of low-rez streams going for posterity and nostalgia - including two MST3k streams. You can control-n these right into VLC:
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[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 24.9 ms ] threadI used to love these, but now I can't sit through more than 5 minutes, because that sense of "oh this is special" is gone. I think for slow burn/buildup art, you have to kind of keep it special.
https://mst3k.com/gizmoplex-visit/
https://www.pracdev.org/channel99/pls_files/channel_3000.pls
https://www.pracdev.org/channel99/pls_files/channel_3000_hal...
from his site: https://www.pracdev.org/channel99/