You won't find many MST fans who profess a fondness for Hamlet. It's not a great episode, though I find it watchable, probably because I'm a Shakespeare buff.

There are plenty of fans who prefer Mike, and plenty who prefer Joel. I can enjoy both, though if I'm picking a random episode to watch just for the heck of it I'm more likely to go with Mike. Joel's humor is more...free-form, more allusive and associative. He's not necessarily going for the big laff all the time, so much as simply playing up the absurdity of an idea. Mike's writing and delivery are more geared toward basic, go-for-the-gag style. As has been often observed, they also had different relationships with the bots; Joel was essentially a (somewhat goofy) father figure, while Mike was a more of a brother. And of course, Joel was the prop comic, so the "invention exchange" stopped soon after Mike became the host.

Now in terms of the Mads, I do think the Pearl/Bobo/Brain Guy team is funny, and I like the more plot-oriented host segments of the SciFi years more than a lot of fans. That said, the team of Dr. Forrester and TV's Frank is, for my money, far and away the funniest characters the show ever had. The show clearly lost something when Frank left (after season 6) and then Trace (after season 7), and in fact I think they proved more difficult--and, really, impossible--to replace than Joel.

Somewhat oddly, while I slightly prefer Mike to Joel on MST, I actually think Joel's Cinematic Titanic venture is consistently funnier and more re-watchable than Mike's Rifftrax. Perhaps it's because the RT crew just pumps out too much material; in the last few years they've done full-length riffs for close to 100 movies, plus dozens of shorts. Inevitably, there starts to be a lot of repetition and some of the material starts to fall flat. By contrast CT has done just 9 DVD releases, and while they took a little while to really find their rhythm the last several have been terrific. I highly recommend giving them a try. What's really interesting is that of the five performers in CT, I think the funniest has been Josh Weinstein, who left MST after its first season and was never really missed. He was very, very young back then, and his Dr. Erhardt character was simply grating, with a very annoying voice and manner. He's matured into a relaxed, confident performer who routinely cracks me up several times in every movie.