As it turns out, the role for BB-8, the plucky ball-shaped droid featured in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, wasn't always so ball-shaped or plucky. Well, at least according to a recent Funny or Die short featuring some Mystery Science Theater 3000 guests.
The notorious Crow T. Robot and Tom Servo, both bots, try out for a variety of roles in the upcoming movie before quickly being typecast. When you're a robot, turns out that casting directors expect you to play a certain kind of part, one with lots of bleeps and bloops. Crow and Tom don't exactly take kindly to this suggestion.
After all, why can't Kylo Ren also be a robot? What's stopping Han Solo from being portrayed by what's essentially a gum ball machine? Plus, there's already C-3PO—a robot that pretty much revolves around linguistics—so it's not like there aren't examples of wordy versions. Hollywood really needs to get its act together, it seems.
The short is, of course, a comedic promotion for the ongoing crowdfunding campaign to bring back Mystery Science Theater 3000. Well, sort of. Much of the old cast won't be returning, and both bots have new voices, but it does have Felicia Day and Patton Oswalt attached to it as well as original MST3K creator and star Joel Hodgson. They've currently funded a total of six episodes with eight remaining days in the campaign to potentially hit a stretch goal of 12 total episodes.
