It was a packed house at the Lounge Stage at the Rio Hotel & Casino on the morning of Thursday, August 6 to watch a documentary about a spacecraft from an entirely different franchise. It was a morning of fun and nostalgia.

The Eagle Obsession screened on August 6 at ST:LV: Trek to Vegas, Creation Entertainment’s five-day celebration of Star Trek‘s 60th anniversary. It was a full week of Trek — the Enterprise NX-01 crew reuniting for their own anniversary, thirty years of Star Trek: First Contact, William Shatner and George Takei on the main stage. And in the middle of it, a room full of people who came to talk about the Eagle Transporter.

Director Jeffrey Morris was joined for the post-screening panel by filmmaker Robert Meyer Burnett, with John Champion of Roddenberry Podcasts hosting. What began as a discussion of the film turned into a genuine deep dive: the engineering logic behind the Eagle’s design, why a 1975 television spacecraft still reads as more plausible than most of what has come since, and — inevitably — the long-running question of what made Space: 1999‘s first season work the way it did, and what changed in the second.

Two moments in the film landed especially hard with the crowd. The first was William Shatner. He doesn’t discuss the Eagle at all — he talks about critical thinking and science literacy, and about his own flight to the edge of space and how looking back at the Earth changed what he understood about it. Fans who have watched Shatner at conventions for decades were not expecting that conversation, and the room went quiet for it. The second was a visual effects shot placing the Eagle Transporter alongside the original starship Enterprise, with the two ships sharing a frame for the first time on the big screen. For an audience gathered to celebrate sixty years of Star Trek, seeing their ship next to the Eagle made the film’s argument better than any line of narration could.

That crossover is worth sitting with. These were Star Trek fans, at a Star Trek convention, in the middle of a 60th anniversary that had no shortage of competing programming. They showed up anyway, for a film about a British series that ran two seasons and ended in 1977. The Eagle has always had that reach — the design is persuasive enough that people who never watched the show recognize the ship.

Morris also recorded two episodes with the Roddenberry podcast network while in Las Vegas, continuing a relationship that began when Champion first saw the film. 

And some of the people in that room hadn’t come to Las Vegas for Star Trek at all. Several told Morris afterward that they had bought convention passes specifically to see The Eagle Obsession — that the screening was the reason they made the trip. One of them showed up to a Star Trek convention wearing a The Eagle Obsession shirt.

Fifty years on, the Eagle is still pulling people across the country to sit in a dark room and look at it together.

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New documentary  Beyond the Eagle Obsession  holds its exclusive first screening August 22 at FilmNorth in St. Paul

ST. PAUL, MN, August 13, 2026  — In 1975, the British science fiction series Space: 1999 introduced a spacecraft called the Eagle Transporter — a lattice of struts and pods that looked less like a fantasy and more like hardware NASA might actually fly.

Fifty years on, the Eagle has one of the most devoted followings in science fiction. Fan clubs with tens of thousands of members stretch across England, Denmark, Australia, and the United States. Artists have painted and reinterpreted the ship for decades. Model builders construct it by hand in plastic, resin, and metal, some spending years on a single vessel. A licensed replica released recently sold for $440 and sold out in days. Conventions built around the series fill their rooms in hours.

Two years ago, St. Paul filmmaker Jeffrey Morris set out to understand where that devotion comes from. The resulting documentary, The Eagle Obsession, premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2025 and has since won 14 awards in six countries. Making it brought Morris inside the community — and the community became the subject of his next film.

Beyond the Eagle Obsession, a new 65-minute documentary, is about those people: the builders, the artists, the collectors, and the families who have handed the obsession down a generation. Morris filmed them across England, Denmark, and the United States.

The film has its exclusive first screening at FilmNorth, 2441 University Avenue West, Suite 100, St. Paul, on Saturday, August 22, 6:00–8:30 p.m., with a reception following. The screening is open to the public and admission is free, but space is limited and RSVP is required through Eventbrite. The film’s world premiere follows in October at the Twin Cities Film Festival.

A tribute to the men who imagined it

At the film’s center is an extended retrospective on Gerry Anderson, the creator of Space: 1999, Thunderbirds, Stingray, and Captain Scarlet, whose insistence on believable hardware shaped the visual language of screen science fiction. The section is anchored by an interview with his son, Jamie Anderson, now CEO of Anderson Entertainment.

The film also stands as a tribute to Brian Johnson, the Academy Award–winning visual effects artist who designed the Eagle at Bray Studios in 1974 and whose later work included Alien and The Empire Strikes Back. Johnson sat for his final interview with Morris in May, 2024 and died in June 2026, during the film’s final edit. Morris reshaped the film as a tribute to his legacy.

Beyond the Eagle Obsession features original visual effects by Tobias Richter of The Light Works, original animation by Kelly Brown, and an original score by Michael W. Nelson (the latter are both Twin Cities residents).

A companion to an award-winning film

Beyond the Eagle Obsession is the companion to Morris’s The Eagle Obsession, which had its international premiere at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival and its world premiere at the Twin Cities Film Festival, where it was named a Best Documentary finalist.

That film has since won 14 awards across 11 festivals in six countries — including the Breakthrough Award at the RAW Science Film Festival in New York, the Audience Award at the Sydney Science Fiction Film Festival, Best Sci-Fi Documentary at Outer Rim, an Award of Excellence Special Mention from IndieFEST, and a Bronze Telly at the 47th Annual Telly Awards. It has screened in London, Italy, and Denmark, and holds a 9.5 rating on IMDb.

About Jeffrey Morris

Jeffrey Morris is a filmmaker, writer, and science communicator based in the Twin Cities. He has worked with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Lockheed Martin, and the International Space University. His short films Oceanus and Parallel Man have drawn more than seven million views.

The post A 1970s TV Spaceship Inspired a Generation. Fifty Years Later, They’re Still Building It. appeared first on FutureDude Entertainment.

As of this week, it’s finally growing quiet. 

It all started with the Eagle. A fictional spacecraft from a British television series I saw when I was seven years old. Something about that ship — its design, its purpose, the world it flew through — got into me and never let go. That was fifty years ago. Everything that has followed in my creative life has, in some way, been in conversation with that first obsession.

Beyond the Eagle Obsession: 50 Years of Fandom is complete. Locked and in the can. The companion film to The Eagle Obsession, and the second half of a two-film journey that began in August 2022 with a single question — what did the amazing science fiction of the Apollo era actually do to my generation? — and ends today with an answer built across four continents, dozens of interviews, roughly fifty hours of footage edited down into 87-minute and 65-minute films, and nearly $1.5 million raised through the belief and generosity of people who trusted me to see it through.

I feel two things at once. Relief that runs deeper than I know how to describe. And jubilation — pride in what my team accomplished. Both films are complete and are the best work I know how to make. And the mental weight of carrying this project every day for four years is finally lifting.

I want to say thank you.

To Denise, who lived every day of this with me and helped me work through the anguish and anxiety as I fought to keep the project alive for four years. 

To Fredrick, who edited both films through timelines that stretched far past what he signed on for. To Michael Nelson, who scored the films through his own personal challenges and still delivered a score that moves people to tears. To Tobias Richter, whose visual effects gave both films the visual grammar they needed to feel real. To Kelly Brown, whose animation brought sequences to life that no other technique could have. To Aaron Young, who has been a partner and counselor at every step. 

To the investors and Kickstarter backers who put real money into an unproven idea because they believed the story was worth telling. To every fan, artist, collector, and dreamer who let us into their homes and their lives to be part of these films.

To the cast — William Shatner, Gen. Charles Duke, Barbara Bain, Nick Tate, Dr. Sian Proctor, Kevin J. Anderson, Bill George, Aldo Spadoni, Jamie Anderson, Todd Morton, Chris Trice, Jan Wenneberg, and so many others — whose willingness to share their time and their voices made these films possible.

And to Brian Johnson.

Brian was one of the last interviews I did for The Eagle Obsession. He was central to Beyond the Eagle Obsession as well. He passed away during the final edit of the second film, and it made me very sad. But it also gave the film a purpose I did not fully see until he was gone. Beyond the Eagle Obsession is, in many ways, a celebration of the Eagle — the spacecraft he designed at Bray Studios more than fifty years ago — and of the man who dreamed it up. We tailored the film to hold his legacy properly, to make sure that his voice and his craft are remembered the way they deserve to be. 

What happens next: both films now go out into the world. Paul Hazen and Handshake Partners are actively representing us to major distributors. The Eagle Obsession will screen at Star Trek Las Vegas this week on August 6th. Both films will screen at Manchester: 1999 — the official 50th anniversary celebration of Space: 1999 — in Manchester, England, September 11–13. 4K UHD, Blu-ray, and DVD editions will begin reaching fans this year. 

For today, though, I just want to sit with the fact that it’s done. That the noise in my head is finally quiet. That fifty years of dreams have been captured in two films that I am, without reservation, proud of.

Thank you for being part of this. All of it.

— Jeffrey

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Join us on Thursday, August 6, at 10:30 a.m. on The Lounge Stage at the Rio Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas for a special screening of the documentary.

The event will feature special guest Robert Meyer Burnett and will be hosted by John Champion of Roddenberry Podcasts.

The Eagle Obsession explores the enduring legacy of the iconic Eagle spacecraft from Space: 1999 and the passion of the fans, artists, and creators who have kept its story alive for generations. Whether you’re a lifelong science fiction enthusiast or discovering the Eagle for the first time, we hope you’ll join us for this special screening.

If you’re attending ST:LV: Trek to Vegas, we look forward to seeing you there!

Event Details

• What: The Eagle Obsession Screening
• When: Thursday, August 6, 2026, at 10:30 a.m.
• Where: The Lounge Stage, Rio Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas
• Special Guest: Robert Meyer Burnett
• Host: John Champion (Roddenberry Podcasts)

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I just learned of the loss of one of the greatest influences in my life, and I thought this would be a good time to share a few thoughts.

I first saw his name when I was seven years old. It appeared in the closing credits of Space: 1999, four words on a spectacular animated background.

Special Effects. Brian Johnson.

I didn’t know what special effects were. I only knew that something had brought Moonbase Alpha to life on my TV screen. An amazing spaceship called an Eagle was the most extraordinary thing I had ever seen in my short life, and I immediately became obsessed with it. Learning what that special effects credit meant sent me to the library. It made me ask questions. It launched a lifetime of wanting to understand how the impossible was built. Once I understood what special effects were, I realized that Brian Johnson was the reason the Eagle and Moonbase Alpha felt so real.

A few months later, NBC aired a Gerry Anderson television special called The Day After Tomorrow. In the United Kingdom, they called it Into Infinity. Two families on a spaceship called the Altares, traveling at the speed of light toward Alpha Centauri. The effects were by Brian and his Space: 1999 team. I don’t have words for how much that little film impacted me. I was a child watching scientists and their children leave Earth for the stars, and I desperately wanted to join them on the adventure. To this day, I’m not sure there was a pile of media more targeted to my personal sensibilities. And again, Brian helped bring that world to life. 

By late 1975, the Dinky die-cast Eagle toys had arrived. My mother knew what Space: 1999 meant to me and made me a deal: get good grades and she would get me an Eagle. I delivered straight A’s, so she delivered too. Then came Christmas 1976 and the Mattel Eagle. It was the big one. The playset that became the favorite toy of my entire childhood. 

By the time The Empire Strikes Back came out a few years later, I knew exactly who Brian Johnson was. I was the kid who devoured The Art of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, who read every behind-the-scenes book and magazine I could find. for me, these were foundational and sacred text. I knew Brian had worked on Alien — although I wasn’t old enough to see it yet. I had seen 2001: A Space Odyssey on television by then. To me, 2001 was — and still is — the milestone of all visual effects. The bar against which everything else gets measured. And Brian had been part of that too.

Then came Dragonslayer in 1981, and that film changed something in me. I’ve never been a fantasy guy. But Dragonslayer is my favorite fantasy film of all time, and it is because of what Brian and his team did with Vermithrax Pejorative. The realism of that dragon — the weight, the menace, the way it moved through the air — was unlike anything I had ever seen. It still holds up 45 years later. I still watch Dragonslayer and marvel at what they pulled off with practical effects and craft and obsessive attention to detail. That dragon is alive in a way most CGI creatures still aren’t. And then came Aliens. Amazing effects on a tight budget.

For decades, his name kept appearing on the films I loved most. He was the through-line of the visual language I grew up dreaming in.

I met him in 2018. We had tea in England, and I told him about a film I was developing called Persephone — a hard science-fiction feature about a deep-space mission. He loved the project. He agreed to consult on it. We hit it off immediately. He treated me as a fellow filmmaker, not as a fan. That meant everything. The man who had designed the Eagle Transporter — the spacecraft that started my love of all of this — was helping me design my own.

In February 2023, we had lunch in Bray, England. Bray Studios was where he and his team had built the magic of Space: 1999 nearly fifty years earlier. Over that lunch, I told him about a documentary I wanted to make — a film about how the Eagle, and the era it came from, had shaped a generation of dreamers. I told him I wanted him in it. He said yes immediately. Not for the money. Not for the publicity. He said yes because he loved the idea.

In December 2023, I returned to England with my camera crew and we filmed our first interview. Brian was generous with his time and his stories. He talked about how he had stumbled into special effects almost by accident — how a man in a pub named Les Bowie had offered him a job sweeping floors at a studio, and how that simple act had changed the trajectory of his life. 

He talked about meeting two young Americans named George Lucas and Gary Kurtz at Bray Studios while working on Space: 1999, and how they had asked him to do a small film they were planning called Star Wars. He had been too busy. He talked about Kubrick. About Cameron. About the Oscars and the Special Achievement Award. He laughed about the absurdity of it all — a man who couldn’t pass his math exams to become a pilot, ending up with two Academy Awards on his shelf.

But what I remember most is the humility. Brian Johnson was one of the most important visual effects artists in the history of cinema. He never acted like it. He talked about his work the way a craftsman talks about his trade. He gave credit to the people who taught him. He gave credit to his teams. He never positioned himself above the work. He was the work.

In May 2024, I returned to England again. By then, we had built a full-scale Eagle Transporter cockpit with working lights, controls, and functional screens. I needed Brian to see it. I wanted him to be the first person to look into the cockpit of the spacecraft he had designed half a century earlier. We filmed him with it. We photographed him in front of M Stage at Pinewood — the soundstage where Space: 1999 had been filmed — and he stood next to me for the picture. The kid who had first seen his name in the closing credits at age seven was now standing shoulder to shoulder with him outside the very stage where it had all begun.

That photograph is one of the most meaningful possessions of my life.

The Eagle Obsession could not be what it is without Brian Johnson. His voice. His memories. His presence. The film is, in many ways, a love letter to the work he did and to the generation he inspired. He saw an early cut before he died. He told me he was proud of it. I will carry that with me forever.

Brian was eighty-six when he passed. He had a long, extraordinary life. He won every award there is to win. He worked with the greatest filmmakers of his era. He designed a spacecraft that will outlive all of us. But beyond the credits and the Oscars, he was a kind, generous, funny, and humble man who treated a kid from Arizona who had grown up watching his work as an equal. 

He gave his time, his blessing, and most importantly, he gave his trust.

I will never stop being grateful.

Rest well, Brian. 

The Eagle is still flying and will continue to forever. 

— Jeffrey Morris Director, The Eagle Obsession

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First — we just partnered with Paul Hazen of Handshake Partners to represent both films for theatrical and worldwide distribution. Paul is a 25-year industry veteran who has been involved in the acquisition, negotiation, and placement of over 300 independent films with major distributors, streaming platforms, and foreign sales agents. He saw The Eagle Obsession in Los Angeles, he believes in the film, and he’s now actively working to place both films with the right distribution partners. We’re thrilled to have someone of his caliber and experience on the team. This is a big step forward.

Second — The Eagle Obsession has been honored with a Bronze Telly Award in the General Documentary category at the 47th Annual Telly Awards — one of the most prestigious and competitive awards in video and television. This year’s competition drew nearly 14,000 entries — the most in the award’s 47-year history — from creators, brands, and production companies across 55 countries. 

Entries were judged by a council of over 250 industry executives from companies including Netflix, BBC, Marvel, and Shutterstock. This season’s winners include National Geographic, Paramount’s South Park, Jimmy Kimmel, Variety, and Al Jazeera English. To be recognized alongside work of that caliber is extraordinary and a testament to the quality of what our team built. That makes 13 awards and counting for The Eagle Obsession.

Third — I will attend and screen both films at Manchester: 1999 — the official 50th Anniversary Celebration of Space: 1999 — on September 12 and 13 in Manchester, England. This is the capstone event of the entire 50th anniversary and the perfect place to share both films with the global fan community. We hope to see our UK fans there!

Fourth — Beyond the Eagle Obsession is turning out to be something truly special. The response to the 15-minute backer preview has been overwhelming — people love it. The film is coming in at 65 to 70 minutes of stunning new VFX by Tobias Richter, original animation by Kelly Brown, new interviews, and footage from around the world. It includes a 10-minute tribute to Gerry Anderson with a retrospective and an interview with his son Jamie, and an extensive segment on the English fan community’s decades of Eagle Meets featuring Chris Trice. We can’t wait for everyone to see the full film.

Fifth — 4K UHD discs are finally printing this week after sorting out some licensing issues. We should be shipping by early June. We’re so sorry for the delays! However, having personally reviewed the 4K master, I can guarantee it will be worth the wait. 

A revamped Eagle Obsession website is coming soon with ways to order product and stream the film while we lock in our ultimate distribution plan with Paul. We want every fan who wants to see this film to be able to see it — and we’re building toward exactly that.

Things are moving. The 50th anniversary of Space: 1999 and the 60th anniversary of Star Trek are creating a moment that these films were made for. We’re going to make the most of it.

More soon.

— Jeffrey Morris

The post Exciting ‘Eagle Obsession’ Updates | May 2026 appeared first on FutureDude Entertainment.

This recognition places the film among Impact DOCS’ top ten awards for the season. According to the judging panel, The Eagle Obsession demonstrated “a depth of craft and creativity that is truly unique.”

The Award of Excellence Special Mention celebrates exceptional filmmaking that stands out for its artistic vision and impact. We’re grateful to Impact DOCS and their panel of judges for this honor, and to everyone who has supported this project.

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Evil, bad characters, doing evil, bad things. Dystopian futurescapes where bleakness rules. These are some of the hallmarks of most science fiction these days. And yes, the times we live in are enough to make it easy to identify with these possible futures. But science fiction is also uniquely positioned to provide hope and optimism: That the future is what we make it.

In his feature-length documentary The Eagle Obsession, director Jeffrey Morris uses his own fascination with a spaceship from the show “Space: 1999” as the jumping off point to interview prominent science fiction stars, as well as real-world astronauts / scientists, to remind us of the once optimistic future sci-fi provided, and could provide again.

We talked to Jeffrey about his film, the process of production, and the possibility of science fiction to inspire once again.

– Scrappy Cinema

Watch the full interview below or on YouTube.

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