Joel Hodgson (born February 20, 1960) is an American writer, comedian, and television actor. He is best known for creating Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K) and starring in it; he played the character Joel Robinson. In 2007, MST3K was listed as "one of the top 100 television shows of all time" by Time.

From 2007 to 2013, Hodgson was part of the "movie riffing" project Cinematic Titanic with several of his fellow MST3K alumni, performing live and producing content for DVDs and direct download. He has been the creative lead for media at Cannae, a technology firm in Doylestown, Pennsylvania north of Philadelphia.

Hodgson was born on February 20, 1960, in Stevens Point, Wisconsin and lived with his family in Green Bay and Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin west of Milwaukee. He grew up with an evangelical Christian upbringing and later claimed that the various shows his church would put on had a profound influence on his desire to become an entertainer. He began performing as a magician and ventriloquist in seventh grade. He performed for local events in Green Bay, and attended Ashwaubenon High School in Ashwaubenon, Wisconsin, a village next to Green Bay. After graduating, Hodgson went to Bethel University in Arden Hills, Minnesota north of Saint Paul to study theater and mass media. While there, Hodgson further developed his magic act by adding comedy and he opened for musical acts at the university as well as performing in coffee houses and comedy clubs.

Hodgson cites a Theatre of the Absurd class at Bethel taught by Dr. David Horn for helping him crystallize the meaning of his comedy. He won the Campus Comedy Contest in 1981 and the first annual Twin Cities Comedy Invitational in 1982. In November 1982 Hodgson moved to Los Angeles where he became a regular performer at The Comedy Store in West Hollywood and the Magic Castle in Hollywood, as well as The Comedy & Magic Club in Hermosa Beach, California southwest of Inglewood. At The Comedy & Magic Club, Hodgson was spotted by Late Night with David Letterman producer Barry Sand and three months later, at age 22, had his network television debut. He made four other appearances on the show and four on Saturday Night Live as a guest act. Hodgson also was a featured performer on HBO's "Eighth Annual Young Comedians Special", hosted by John Candy. Bill Maher, Paula Poundstone, and the Amazing Johnathan were also on the program.

He worked at the Comedy Store while also traveling for stand-up performances in San Jose, California, San Francisco, Detroit, Kansas City, and Minneapolis. Hodgson left stand-up in 1985, citing the need for a creative sabbatical, and moved back to Minneapolis.

Between 1984 and 1988–Hodgson's "official" return to comedy–he built and sold sculptures, worked at a T-shirt factory, designed toys, and began designing and building props (including robots) for other comedians. In 1986 he co-wrote an HBO special with Jerry Seinfeld. He was also considered for the role of Woody Boyd in Cheers. He met Jim Mallon in 1987, and Mallon became production manager at the St. Paul UHF station KTMA Channel 23 in 1988. Hodgson was the first choice to portray "Philo" in the "Weird Al" Yankovic film UHF, but at the time of the filming in 1988, he had begun the production of a new form of television program for KTMA.

Building on his gift for designing toys and other gizmos, Hodgson built three robot puppets and created MST3K in 1988. He starred as the show's long-suffering but inventive protagonist, Joel Robinson, who in the backstory is responsible for creating his own robot companions. Hodgson cites the 1972 film Silent Running as an influence for the premise of the show.

MST3K originally aired on KTMA-TV, before becoming one of the first two shows to be picked up by the Comedy Channel, the forerunner of Comedy Central upon starting operations in 1989. The other show, also created and written by Hodgson, was the short-lived Higgins Boys and Gruber, a sketch comedy program that starred Steve Higgins, David Anthony Higgins and Dave Allen.