tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-40863442012-02-10T15:17:27.563-08:00Soul of Star TrekThoughts on Star Trek, related science fiction, and the future.Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.comBlogger1076125This is an XML content feed. It is intended to be viewed in a newsreader or syndicated to another site, subject to copyright and fair use.tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-88076482266269801232012-02-09T03:29:00.000-08:002012-02-09T03:29:51.713-08:002012-02-09T03:29:51.713-08:00
I know--two Doctor Who vids in a row, but I just happened on this one, from the David Tennant years, featuring all the people that brought those wonderful eps to life, including the on-screen actors doing very different stuff. Love it! Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-46340352947725397352012-01-29T02:26:00.000-08:002012-01-29T02:57:04.086-08:002012-01-29T02:57:04.086-08:00
Here's a video that includes images from EVERY existing Doctor Who episode.
There are some from the 11th Doctor on here I haven't even seen. I just finished watching the DVDs from the first half of Series 6, and these eps begin to crystallize my feelings about the newest Who. Steven Moffat's Who stories are dazzling, funny, very entertaining. But I miss the ground of reality in the core Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-66247587202934261322012-01-22T02:32:00.000-08:002012-01-23T12:59:38.417-08:002012-01-23T12:59:38.417-08:00
The Enterprise-D in HD
Captain's Log: Next Gen Blu-Ray, Trek JJA Cast and Other Cosmic News
The big news for classic Star Trek fans is the imminent release of three episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation in High Definition. This Blu-Ray sampler introduces release of the entire series in HD, beginning later this year.
The official Star Trek site has info on this, including a terrific Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-2445551415127949092011-12-27T02:56:00.000-08:002011-12-27T02:56:16.823-08:002011-12-27T02:56:16.823-08:00
Star Trek itself lost fewer people in 2011 than in recent years. The only names I could find are actors William Campbell (TOS) and Robert Easton (Star Trek VI), director Reza Badiyi (DS9) and cinematographer Don Peterman (Star Trek IV.) But these four lovely women who appeared in classic science fiction/superhero movies also passed away in 2011. They are Dana Wynter, appearing here in Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-12239722403319467812011-12-27T02:24:00.000-08:002012-01-22T03:09:02.289-08:002012-01-22T03:09:02.289-08:00
Among the men familiar on the silver screen who were lost in 2011 are Jackie Cooper, playing Perry White in the first set of Superman films; Cliff Robertson, playing Peter Parker's Uncle Ben in the first Spider-Man movie, and Michael Gough, who as Bruce Wayne's fatherly butler had to pretend he recognized his master, even though the actor playing him changed several times in the first batch of Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-37511952269920201662011-12-27T02:13:00.000-08:002011-12-27T03:14:14.171-08:002011-12-27T03:14:14.171-08:00
And one last time to say goodbye to Elisabeth Sladen, who created the character of Sarah Jane Smith in Doctor Who in the 1970s, and became the link to the new series in 2006 , and then in 2007 became a heroine to a new generation with her series, The Sarah Jane Adventures. It ran in the UK until just a few months ago. She's pictured above with my two favorite Doctors, Tom Baker and David Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-43523694656345546982011-09-08T01:49:00.000-07:002011-09-08T01:50:35.116-07:002011-09-08T01:50:35.116-07:00
Happy 45th to Star Trek!
Happy 45th, Star Trek! Its first episode aired September 8, 1966. I watched "The Man Trap" that night (above is the first image of the Enterprise and the first of that episode), and I'm going to watch it again tonight to celebrate.
The 45th is not as big a deal as the 40th was, or the 50th will be, but that we care at all is still something. Here's the first articleCaptain Futurenoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-23214645385618806452011-08-10T00:24:00.000-07:002011-09-08T23:33:23.595-07:002011-09-08T23:33:23.595-07:00The Universe and Star Trek
Star Trek in its Roddenberry Era stories worked hard to keep up with scientific discoveries about the universe, as well as the more advanced theories. But Captain Kirk's 23rd century was based on views of the universe from over 40 years ago, and Picard's 24th century on the universe as known or theorized about a quarter century ago.
But according to a new book, The Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-2059513017172758192011-07-10T00:37:00.000-07:002011-07-10T01:07:50.513-07:002011-07-10T01:07:50.513-07:00
Captain's Log: Space Shuttle and Star Trek, Torchwood Praised
The last U.S. space shuttle mission began Friday, inspiring many evaluations of the space program and the shuttle program since its beginning, and of the future of American manned spaceflight. While polls show more than half the Americans surveyed felt the shuttle program was successful, some observers feared that this final Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-41211617244636540572011-06-18T01:52:00.000-07:002011-06-18T02:05:40.242-07:002011-06-18T02:05:40.242-07:00
Captain's Log: Cosmos, Trek, Torchwood, Doctor Who & Harry Potter
A powerful beam of energy blasts out from the center of a massive black hole as it rips apart and devours a star (as artistically envisioned above), to the amazement of earth astronomers.
And while budget cutbacks threaten the search for exoplanets that might host life, the Pentagon is pumping bucks into research on Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-50456083713284279532011-05-24T01:11:00.000-07:002011-05-24T01:11:25.011-07:002011-05-24T01:11:25.011-07:00Somehow this one got by me--even before the current Endeavor crew did their Star Trek poster, the Expedition 21 crew of the International Space Station did this Next Gen poster in 2009. It was Commander Mike Finke of Expedition 18 who was interviewed for the new First Contact Next Gen film DVD, pointing out the international cooperation aboard. "I think Gene would be proud of us," he said. (Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-43333171275797246042011-05-19T01:17:00.000-07:002011-05-19T19:55:24.283-07:002011-05-19T19:55:24.283-07:00Captain's Log: Endeavor's Star Trek Logo, habitable and free-floating planets, starting over with Doctor Who
The second-to-last U.S. Space Shuttle mission is underway--and the crew of the Endeavor is using a Star Trek-styled poster as its logo. It's modeled after the 2009 film we refer to around here as Star Trek JJA (which this story calls Star Trek: The Future Begins. ?)
Despite the high Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-49288462030428199092011-05-06T02:54:00.000-07:002011-05-06T15:55:25.524-07:002011-05-06T15:55:25.524-07:00Captain's Log: First U.S. Astronaut in Space and the Next Ones, Sunpower, Planetary Alignments
It's the 50th anniversary of the first flight of a U.S. astronaut into space--the suborbital flight of Alan Shepard in Freedom 7. What a thrill it was to watch this on TV as a kid in western Pennsylvania! That I could watch it live was a huge gamble and a difference with the secret Soviet flights Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-70745491134410820942011-04-21T04:38:00.000-07:002011-04-21T16:57:45.584-07:002011-04-21T16:57:45.584-07:00
Elisabeth Sladen with David Tennant
If you're not in the UK you probably haven't heard this news. And if you're not a Doctor Who fan--especially from way back--it may not mean much to you. But for those who know who I am talking about it will be a shock: Elisabeth Sladen has died. The most beloved of the Doctor's companions from the old series, especially with Tom Baker's fourth Doctor in Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-78488560220505971102011-04-18T01:46:00.000-07:002011-05-03T05:17:00.240-07:002011-05-03T05:17:00.240-07:00Doctor Who: Series 5 as Series 6 Begins
Series (or as we say in America, Season) 6 of Doctor Who begins in both the UK and the US on April 23. It's the second season for the 11th Doctor and Steven Moffat as showrunner, so it's an appropriate moment for me to comment on their first, especially since I've just seen it all.
I saw bits of it online and on BBC America in past months but mostly Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-36094561203149554322011-04-14T03:13:00.000-07:002011-04-14T03:26:11.950-07:002011-04-14T03:26:11.950-07:00
Space: the final fronter...Fifty years ago, humanity finally got to space. That it was the Russian Yuri Gagarin meant a lot more then than it does now. Then it was cause for alarm in the West if not outright fear. But now it's a clearer cause for celebration.
Space was a real place most of my life. I grew up on Captain Video and those 1950s space shows--a whole lineup of them on Saturday Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-43031834834737268852011-03-20T21:29:00.000-07:002011-04-02T03:01:11.366-07:002011-04-02T03:01:11.366-07:00
The Dreamer and the Dream: Modeling A Better Future
David Alexander’s biography of Gene Roddenberry, and Majel Roddenberry’s preface to that bio, both emphasize GR as an obsessive and omnivorous reader. Yet there is little direct evidence of what books he read.
Others say he read several Olaf Stapledon novels, a Captain Future novel or two, Arthur C. Clarke’s nonfiction work, Profiles of the Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-10221124353819057322011-03-20T20:27:00.000-07:002011-04-02T03:02:26.968-07:002011-04-02T03:02:26.968-07:00
Thanks to Trekcore for these screencaps.
The story begins in Captain Benjamin Sisko’s office on DS9. Though the space station has recently been recaptured, the war continues. Another starship has been lost, presumably to Dominion forces. Its captain was a personal friend of Sisko’s. “I don’t know how many more friends I can lose,” he tells his father, visiting DS9 for the first time. “Every Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-56371896218529094132011-03-20T20:22:00.000-07:002011-03-20T23:29:52.735-07:002011-03-20T23:29:52.735-07:00We see Benny head for his job as a staff writer for Incredible Tales of Scientific Wonder, a pulp science fiction monthly similar to many that published in this era (its name even suggests several other magazines.) The other staff writers are based very loosely on actual science fiction writers of the time. Colm Meany (O’Brien) plays Albert Macklin, a tongue-tied writer in a tweed coat whose Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-3170534250829223892011-03-20T20:16:00.000-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.453-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.453-07:00Then it’s time to make story assignments for the next issue. J.G. Hertzler (Martok) as Roy is the artist who passes around sketches for illustrations, and each writer claims one as the basis for a story. One of the sketches is of a nameless space station we recognize as DS9. Benny gravitates towards it immediately, gets the assignment, and takes the sketch home.But not before he is stopped by twoCaptain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-71190842365983452632011-03-20T20:09:00.000-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.457-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.457-07:00Benny returns to his apartment, feverish with ideas and the hot night. He opens the refrigerator, takes out a bottle of milk and puts it to his forehead to cool it. This is exactly what James Dean does in the movie Rebel Without A Cause, also set in the 1950s. But Benny is a rebel with a cause.Benny sits down at his typewriter and begins. He’s facing a window and at one point he opens the blinds,Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-87381671565555196732011-03-20T19:52:00.000-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.461-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.461-07:00Scenes in a nearby diner deepen the social context, revealing more of what Benny is up against. A frequent customer is a star big league baseball player, Willie Hawkins, played by Michael Dorn (Worf.) Black players had been in the majors for only 6 years at this point. Like Hawkins, Willie Mays was playing for the New York Giants in 1953 and as in this story he was a popular, outgoing figure in Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-30777561513385755192011-03-20T19:45:00.000-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.464-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.464-07:00This reality is even more starkly stated by a young man, probably a teenager, who also frequents the diner. When we first see him, Jimmy is trying to sell Benny a watch he “found.” Benny tries to counsel him to stay out of trouble, and tells him about his story that Jimmy interprets as “a Negro on the moon.” He scoffs but sounds interested. That Jimmy is played by Cirroc Lofton, who normally Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-15231001538820894632011-03-20T19:38:00.000-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.468-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.468-07:00Earlier, back in the magazine office, his fellow writers are reading his story with universal admiration. But the editor says he can’t publish it because readers won’t accept it. Here the role of science fiction in challenging prejudices of the present, as well as the power of present prejudice, are subtly suggested in what is otherwise a joke.“A Negro captain—it’s not believable,” editor Pabst Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4086344.post-9379489441959410232011-03-20T19:21:00.000-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.472-07:002011-03-20T21:40:14.472-07:00There’s another theme running through this story that separates Benny from others: his insistence on being a writer. Benny’s girlfriend, like Sisko’s, is played by Penny Johnson. The Kasidy Yates of the 24th century is an independent woman, the captain and pilot of a space freighter. But her 20th century counterpart, the black woman Cassie, is a waitress in the diner. She is down to earth and Captain Futurenoreply@blogger.com0