stay tuned to 6-40 and 12-40 on your dial—now back to clutch cargo (10. 251)

Preceded by an episode of the multi-chapter 1939 serial The Phantom Creeps starring Bela Lugosi, the main feature getting the MST3K treatment, Rocket Attack U.S.A., aired for the first time on this day in 1990. The 1958 propaganda movie also marketed as Five Minutes to Zero by Barry Mahon—later of adult film fame—follows spy John Manston as he infiltrates the Soviet Union but is ultimately unsuccessful at preventing a nuclear attack (premised on telemetry gathered by Sputnik), with New York City destroyed. The dialogue throughout is hilarious arch and earned it cult-status even before being rediscovered by the mad scientists of Deep 13 and captors on the Satellite of Love. “This is my skull—stick around to see how that happened.”