The Starlog Project: Starlog #28, November 1979: Stuck with Buck

Decades after this issue was published, longtime Starlog editor David McDonnell would commiserate about life back before cable TV brought us a surplus of science-fiction and fantasy television shows. Back in the late 1970s, SF fans felt compelled to support even weak shows such as Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. How else can we explain its featured spot on the cover of issue #28?

Starlog #28
68 pages (including covers)
Cover price: $1.95

It's another fall SF-TV preview, so prepare yourself for a reminder of just what genre television was like more than 30 years ago.

   

Just because Buck's on the cover, it doesn't mean that Starlog's going to treat the time-travelling hero with kid gloves. Though the behind-the-scenes contents page photo (David Houston snapped Gil Gerard getting a quick shave between scenes) is kind of a neat touch, publisher Kerry O'Quinn takes a mallet to Buck Rogers, mourning the jokey, campy aim of the new show and wishing that O'Quinn's friend Gil Gerard would be given the chance to play the character as a real hero. Letters in the Communications pages include a notice that Starlog will be publishing an Official Starlog Communications Handbook, which would become one of the magazine's unique reader-service products of its lifetime, as well as letters from France, Sweden and even the exotic land of North Carolina; Log Entries short items include the completion of filming of Beyond Westworld, the Starlog staff has a picnic, production news of Altered States, the cancellation of plans for an Atlas Shrugged mini series, and more.


David Houston previews the new Buck Rogers in the 25th Century TV series from Glen Larson; Alan Brender visits the Universal Studios' Galactica amusement ride; David Gerrold explores "The Cracker Jack Theory of Storytelling"; Susan Sackett's Star Trek Report covers the wind-down of the movie's production; David Houston visits Don Post Studios, a famous mask maker; Samuel J. Maronie tells us how The New Adventures of Wonder Woman was done in by Diff'rent Strokes, and he provides an episode guide to the show's ABC and CBS seasons; Sam Maronie's back with an interview with The Incredible Hulk himself, Lou Ferrigno; Jonathan Eberhart -- though it's not listed as being his Interplanetary Excursions, Inc., column -- nonetheless visits "Venus: Veil by Veil"; Gerry Anderon gives the scoop on his Five Star Five movie; Alan Brender interviews Herb Jefferson Jr., who played Lt. Boomer in Battlestar Galactica; Al Taylor and David Hutchison profile Les Bowie, "The Father of British Special Effects" in the SFX section; David Houston's Visions column explores the origins of Buck Rogers (and thought he touches on it, I don't think he quite nails just how mind-bogglingly racist the first Buck Rogers stories were back in the early 20th century); and, finally, Howard Zimmerman's Lastword column talks about reader praise for his Alien comments and about dealing with mundane journalists who don't understand science fiction.

"The reason we will see a buffoon instead of a hero [in Buck Rogers] is really the subject for a longer article, but it has to do with the way television executives guess at what the public wants to see. In my opinion, the network people have an incredibly low and inaccurate opinion of their viewing audience. So, I will not only be disappointed this fall; I will also be insulted by implication."

--Kerry O'Quinn, publisher, From the Bridge: "Buck in the 20th Century"

To view previous Starlog Archive issues, click on "Starlog Internet Archive Project" in the keywords below.

The Starlog Project: Starlog #27, October 1979: Galactica Lives ... Not

Just like with issue #23, the image on the cover of #27 is cut off (or the image ended long before the top of the cover) and replaced with black. Look inside the "A" in the logo, just above the crossbar. Years later, it would become very easy to use the Adobe Creative Suite of tools to smoothly blend the image and the black, but 1979 was an ancient time, with tools nonexistent, and most magazines were hand-painted by roomfuls of monks. Or the Starlog art staff just was too rushed. Who knows?

Starlog #27
76 pages (including covers)
Cover price: $1.95

The very first issue of Starlog that I ever ordered as a back issue, #27 has always remained a favorite of mine. It's a very nice-looking issue, and it features some great articles to please the science-fiction fan. And for fans mourning the loss of Battlestar Galactica, it was a treasure trove of information and great photos.

Kerry O'Quinn uses his From the Bridge column to complain about the injection of religion into science stories (using George Pal's Conquest of Space as an example); letter writers fill the Communications section with praise for space artist Adolf Schaller, questions about Obi Wan Kenobi's presence in The Empire Strikes Back, excitement about special effects, bemusement at a religious TV station's censorship of an episode of Battle of the Planets, and more; short news in Log Entries includes note that Saturn 3 has wrapped production, Heavy Metal magazine is making a movie, Soviet displeasure over Battlestar Galactica, Isaac Asimov was approached to write the script for the Battlestar Galactica revival TV film (wouldn't that have been interesting?), and more.

A two-page un-bylined article looks at Filmation's SF-themed programs; Bob Martin previews NBC's Martian Chronicles mini series; Jonathan Eberhart's Interplanetary Excursions, Inc., returns, this time to visit Solis Lacus on Mars; David Houston goes behind the scenes of the model makers working on the troubled SFX of Star Trek -- The Motion Picture; Susan Sackett's Star Trek Report looks at the movie's Klingon contingent; David Houston reveals the tug-of-war for special effects capacity between Battlestar Galactica and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century; an eight-page yellow-pages insert features a complete Galactica episode guide, spiced up with short articles on a possible revival of the series, Mattel's Galactica toy line; a glossary to Galactica terminology, Marvel Comics' Galactica series, and definitions of the various vehicles in the series. Gerry Anderson's Space Report answers more reader mail, and it includes a flash announcement that the producer's Five Star Five space adventure is about to commence production; David Houston gives an on-the-set sneak preview of The Black Hole; David Gerrold's Rumblings column features "The Return of Solomon Short"; David Houston (who must have written half of this issue) interviews Time After Time director Nicholas Meyer; Bob Woods gives Houston a rest and previews Urshurak, an illustrated fantasy novel from the Brothers Hildebrandt; David Hutchison's SFX section features Brian Johnson and Nick Allder's special effects for Alien; David Houston's Visions column looks at "The Filming of Dune"; and Howard Zimmerman wraps up the busy issue with his Lastword look at NASA, meteors and Meteor.

"The movie will have a lot of explicit sex and nudity and a lot of violence, so it will certainly be rated R. We won't do anything that will get us an X, though, because that would bee the kiss of death. On the other hand, we can't settle for a PG either, because that wouldn't be faithful to the spirit of the magazine."

--Michael Gross, associate producer of Heavy Metal film, quoted in Log Entries

To view previous Starlog Archive issues, click on "Starlog Internet Archive Project" in the keywords below.

Alien vs. Winnie the Pooh -- Best. Online Book. Ever.

There is no better use of your time than to read this Alien vs. Pooh (as in "Winnie the," to quote Judy Dench) online illustrated story.

The Starlog Project: Starlog #26, September 1979: Loving the Alien

The Starlog top brass made some great decisions over the years, and they took some big risks that really paid off. But when you look at the ad on page 22 of this issue, you do have to wonder who bought the Salvage I SF Poster Book. Probably a better idea was the special one-shot John Wayne & The Great Cowboy Heroes advertised on page 7.

Starlog #26
76 pages (including covers)
Cover price: $1.95

It's another Alien-heavy issue, as the 20th Century Fox flick continues to blow minds. No doubt, the Starlog staff (at least the straight male members of that staff) (um, I didn't mean that to sound quite that way; let's try "the heterosexual males on the staff") was thrilled with the mildly pornographic H.R. Giger painting on the contents page.

Kerry O'Quinn's From the Bridge column pumps up artist Don Dixon's SFX article in this issue (step-by-step instructions on making a space painting); Communications letters range from reactions to a large-screen Battlestar Galactica movie to people praising or damning David Gerrold's column to others ranting about the Harlan Ellision & Mark Hamill smackdown, and so much more; in Log Entries short news, another (as yet unnamed) Space: 1999 movie is being planned, Hugo award nominees are listed, scientists in Mountain View, California, create a mini-universe on a computer, and more.

David Houston interviews Alien director Ridley Scott; Houston also interviews H.R. Giger about his surrealist designs for the movie (and, er, the contents page); Howard Zimmerman profiles SF movies about the moon (A Trip to the Moon, Woman in the Moon, 2001: A Space Odyssey, etc.); in an eight-page special fold-out, Starlog's newest photo guidebook, Science Fiction Weapons, is previewed, complete with blueprints; David Hirsh relates how and why Gerry Anderson created the TV production of The Day After Tomorrow; David Houston profiles artist Steve Scherer; Alan Brender interviews Bo Brundin, who plays Rolf Mannheim in the upcoming disaster flick Meteor; a two-page color spread features photos from Moonraker; Susan Sackett discusses the audio side of Star Trek; in Unreel, the magazine takes a look at some of the SF Short Film Search winners; Stephen J. Sansweet uncovers SF toys from Buck Rogers to the present (er, 1979) day; J. Blake Mitchell looks at Grady Hunt's SF costume designs; Don Dixon writes "Secrets of a Space Artist," this month's SFX section; David Gerrold's Rumblings column (which is printed accidentally without the logo, though the logo background appears -- oops) compares Star Trek to later SF TV productions such as Space: 1999 and Battlestar Galactica, which both pale in his comparison; David Houston's Visions column examines Arthur C. Clarke's classic Childhood's End; and Howard Zimmerman's Lastword column praises the movie Alien.

"Battlestar Galactica isn't even that hopeful in its premise. Nine-tenths of the human race has been wiped out and the survivors are fleeing the enemy Cylons, a race of chrome robots. (I fail to understand why a robot even wants an oxygen-atmosphere planet; oxygen encourages rust.) The premise here is even less honorable: 'They're after us! Let's run like hell!'"

--David Gerrold, columnist, Rumblings

To view previous Starlog Archive issues, click on "Starlog Internet Archive Project" in the keywords below.

The Starlog Project: Starlog #25, August 1979: Now with More Bradbury!

It's a good issue, but Starlog had some headaches coming off the blocks to begin its fourth year of publication. For example, on the cover above the logo (in what we in the magazine biz call "roof text") is a blurb announcing a pinball art contest and directing readers to the entry form on page 45. Except -- you guessed it -- it's not on page 45. The full-page contest form is on page 49, instead. No biggie, I know. But subscribers' versions of Starlog #25 included a bind-in card that reads: "Dear Subscriber: Due to a mistake at our printing plant, the subscription copies of Starlog #24, the 3rd Anniversary issue, were not wrapped in our usual protector. This does not indicate a change of policy. You will find that because the cover is laminated, the mailing label can be carefully peeled off without damage to the magazine. Our sincere apologies. -- Starlog Magazine." Ah, well, the issue gets better from there. And we have two more photo guidebooks released: Robots and Science Fiction Weapons. I think it'd be cool if they put out a combined book of Science Fiction Robot Weapons. But that's just me.

Starlog #25
68 pages (including covers)
Cover price: $1.95

The colorful cover painting of the new U.S.S. Enterprise from the Star Trek movie is also printed as a full centerfold. This fourth year of publication would be the Year of Trek at Starlog, with three covers devoted to the movie, a three-issue excerpt from Walter Koenig's nonfiction book about the filming of the movie (read it and you'll always remember Koenig asking to kiss Persis Khambatta's bald head), Harlan Ellison's review that takes apart the movie and Gene Roddenberry (one of the most controversial articles Starlog would ever publish), and numerous other articles. So might as well start off the year with a Trek-heavy issue, right?

Kerry O'Quinn's From the Bridge does two things: talks about strange behavior at science fiction conventions, and takes issue with a recent article (the Day The Earth Stood Still retrospective in #23) that took aim at nuclear weapons. Communications letters include pleas to revive Battlestar Galactica (but in Galactica 1980, it would be a revival much like that in The Monkey's Paw), reader praise for Starlog's diverse articles, someone who really hated the satirical article "Statues of the Gods," and more; Log Entries short news includes the impending release of the movie Meteor, ABC's announcement of a new two-hour Galactica movie (seriously, don't get your hopes up, kids!), winners of Starlog's first annual SF Short Film Search, news that Star Wars would be serialized as a special National Public Radio program, Starlog's beautiful Space Art Photo Guidebook was excerpted for 10 pages in the publishing behemoth Reader's Digest (I had not known that before now; I had seen that Omni magazine excerpted Space Art in its second issue but hadn't known that Reader's Digest had done so), and more.

Bob Woods kicks off the feature section with a profile of Dale Enzenbacher, the "Mad Sculptor of San Francisco" (and the article is illustrated with many color and black-and-white photos of his fantasy sculptures); David Gerrold was pulling your legs last issue when he said that was the last edition of his State of the Art column, because he's back this issue with Rumblings, the new name of his column, in which he tells an emperor-has-no-clothes fable; Susan Sackett's Star Trek Report relates some "Trivia & Teasers" (such as "Which actor has LEMLI on his car's license plate, and what does it stand for?"). Barbara Lewis interviews the great Ray Bradbury, who discusses his life and the upcoming production of The Martian Chronicles; a one-page SFX-TRA looks at the making of Howard Hawks' The Thing; David Hutchison interviews artist and Trek production designer Mike Minor; Gerry Anderson answers more reader letters in his Space Report column; Brick Price and Cory Faucher give a behind-the-scenes SFX look at how models of the original Enterprise can be lit up; a two-page photo layout showcases the Alien movie; Michael A. Banks visits the Neil Armstrong Air & Space Museum; Barbara Lewis gives a progress report on Star Trek -- The Motion Picture, including a sidebar on"The FX Mess" (which would be covered in-depth in a future issue); Bob Martin profiles pinball machine manufacturer Bally; Jonathan Eberhart's Interplanetary Excursions, Inc., visits Caloris Basin (on the sunny planet of Mercury); it's part III of the series of career profiles in the SFX section, with David Hutchison profiling Frank van der Veer and Paul Mandell profiling Susan Turner; David Houston's Visions column continues his Charles Darwin linkage to modern science fiction, including 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes; and Howard Zimmerman's Lastword column covers some sciencey things to do during those long summer months.

"One can scarcely tour the spaceways looking at one spectacular after another without trying to visualize how such features formed. The eruption of Beta on Venus, the colorful evolution of Io, the exotically layered sand dune of Mars -- each evokes dramatic images of its genesis. And the genesis of Caloris Basin would have been a sight to behold."

--Jonathan Eberhart, columnist (and space sciences editor of Science News magazine), Interplanetary Excursions, Inc.

To view previous Starlog Archive issues, click on "Starlog Internet Archive Project" in the keywords below.

Video of Virgin Galactic's "Captive Carry" Flight of the Enterprise

Here's some high-quality video from Virgin Galactic from yesterday's captive carry flight of the VSS Enterprise over the Mojave.

So, Apparently Curious George Was Fleeing the Nazis ...

... according to this article from the Huffington Post.

Virgin Galactic's First "Captive Carry" Flight a Success

The VSS Enterprise had a successful flight March 22, 2010. Photo by Mark Greenberg.

Virgin Galactic -- the private space firm headed by Sir Richard Branson (and the leading reason you or I might actually get into space) -- announced today the successful inaugural "captive carry" flight of the VSS Enterprise.

Captive carry refers to a flight in which a mothership supports the secondary ship, such as a missile or, in this case, a spaceship.

Enterprise's flight, which took place over the Mojave desert from the Mojave Air and Spaceport, was "a huge success," according to Virgin Galactic.

"Seeing the finished spaceship in December was a major day for us, but watching VSS Enterprise fly for the first time really brings home what beautiful, ground-breaking vehicles [spacecraft designer Burt Rutan] and his team have developed for us," said Branson. "It comes as no surprise that the flight went so well; the Scaled team is uniquely qualified to bring this important and incredible dream to reality. Today was another major step along that road and a testament to U.S. engineering and innovation."

Rutan himself called it a "momentous day for the Scaled and Virgin Teams" and said it was the start of "what we believe will be extremely exciting and successful spaceship flight test program." Scaled Composities is a Mojave-based air vehicle design firm.

Virgin will continue testing VSS Enterprise through next year, moving from more captive carry flights to independent powered flight.

The Starlog Project: Starlog #24, July 1979: Third Anniversary Celebration

The magazine publishes its first 100-page issue, celebrating its three-year growth into a behemoth in the niche that is the science fiction magazine publishing world. It includes a rare two-page table of contents, a buxom (I'm running out of adjectives) two-page publisher's column, a bunch of extra color pages, and a look back at the previous year in science fiction. In short, it's a muscle-flexing issue that tells the SF world that Starlog's the new measure of success and quality. Of note: For the first time, we see that sister magazine Fantastica has been renamed Fangoria.

Starlog #24
100 pages (including covers)
Cover price: $2.95

The double-sized contents page includes a collage of science-fiction images, created by editor Howard Zimmerman (something he would continue for the next couple anniversary issues). The cover is also the blocked-photo design the magazine's annual birthday parties would retain for nearly a decade.

Kerry O'Quinn jump-starts the party by retelling "The Roots of Starlog," how it was born in a manger... wait, that's not it. Actually, two art directors start their own business, and after a number of publications, attempt to put out for another publisher a one-shot magazine devoted to Star Trek. That publisher was unable to get his distributor to agree to a Trek-themed magazine, so Norman Jacobs and O'Quinn rethought the entire concept, making it an ongoing science fiction magazine that would cover many topics. "We decided that what was needed was a beautiful magazine (to help pull SF out of the pulp ghetto) with full-color art and photos -- an authoritative magazine featuring expert columnists, writers, and researchers -- an informative magazine including speedy news and behind-the-scenes interviews and articles," O'Quinn remembers. They eventually convince their distributor to carry the magazine, which quickly became a collectors item. O'Quinn, of course, doesn't neglect the proliferation within the Starlog family: trade paperbacks, records, Future/Future Life, SF Color Poster Books, Cinemagic, and Fangoria. Unmentioned in this column are the other titles produced by their company, such as Daily TV Serials (a soap-opera publication that lasted quite a few years in the 1970s and was briefly revived in the mid-1980s) and specials such as Hollywood Musclemen, The Fab 50s, and licensed movie magazines and posterbooks (there's an ad on page 71 of this issue advertising "official movie posterbooks" for Moonraker and Rocky II. Licensed movie magazines would become a very lucrative business for the company in the 1980s, when the company would reign as the number-one publisher of licensed movie publications in the country.

Now, on with the issue! The letters in Communications range from arguments over socialism and capitalism to news about model kits to a follow-up for the "Statues of the Gods" spoof article, and more; short news in Log Entries includes an SF and fantasy art gallery in Los Angeles, an update on Superman II, SF-themed pinball games, David Gerrold wins the Skylark award, and more. David Gerrold's State of the Art column features a grab-bag of news and notes, including a literal note that George Lucas passed along explaining his use of "parsec" as a time measurement instead of a distance in Star Wars, and the column ends with Gerrold's announcement that this is "the last State of the Art column that I would write." William G. Fowler compiles a seven-page index to Starlog's first 22 issues; a one-page "Space-Age Spaceware" looks at SF toys and games; Susan Sackett's Star Trek Report presents a roundup of news, including the item that "Bill Shatner is also active on our softball team." Speak of the devil! Barbara Lewis interviews Shatner (his third talk with the magazine in its short life so far, by my count).

A 32-page color anniversary section is fronted by a reprint of the Star Trek art from the cover of Starlog #1. Included inside is a photo-heavy recap of recent big SF events: Star Wars, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Superman, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Buck Rogers, Starcrash, a roundup of other films, some classic films, a "Best of SFX" section, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Space: 1999, a roundup of other TV programs, three pages of space art, and Jonathan Eberhart on the photographic results of Jupiter probes.

Barbara Lewis also brings back Leonard Nimoy for another Starlog interview ("He Is Spock"); Allan Hendry gives advice for making photographs of things you think are UFOs; David Houston describes an SF-themed radio program called Hour 25; a four-page "Anniversary Salute to Starlog" prints birthday congratulations from the SF famous (such as this from Arthur C. Clarke: "I'm still in a daze this morning having just spent two hours on the phone with Carl Sagan, Ray Bradbury and the Voyager team, as the closeups of Jupiter arrive at J.P.L. in Pasadena. Now there's some spectacular artwork for you to publish and, I suspect, where the action is in the centuries to come. Best wishes to Starlog." Or this from Harlan Ellison: "Starlog deserves to flourish. ... You deserve praise and support because you fight the good fight, trapped between your own lofty ethics and your need to purvey cheap thrills to get [readers'] attention. It cannot be an easy task ... and I applaud you."). Bob Martin explains the Moonraker story; Fredrick King previews The Cry of Cthulhu; David Hutchison goes behind the scenes of the Major Mars film, which was to be part of the Intergalactic Picture Show, Starlog's never-realized feature film that was supposed to come out in the autumn of 1979; Bob Martin returns with an interview of Alien producer Walter Hill; David Houtson's Visions continues his look at Charles Darwin's influence on science fiction; and Howard Zimmerman's Lastword urges readers to be discerning in their appreciation of film and TV during this boom period in the genre.

"Starlog, with three years behind it, is a lusty young giant, symbolic of the new stature of science fiction in the visual media. May you and SF continue to grow and may humanity enter a good science-fictional world of space exploration for a growing and united world."

--Isaac Asimov, author, "An Anniversary Salute to Starlog"

To view previous Starlog Archive issues, click on "Starlog Internet Archive Project" in the keywords below.

Nancy Pelosi, Health-Care Hero?

Saturday night politics:

It's looking like my congresswoman, Nancy Pelosi, is the muscle behind the health-care push. If we get some sort of health-care reform out of this government, it'll be to her credit.

Also, props to my mayor, Gavin Newsom, who was fantastic on the health-care issue last night on HBO's Bill Maher program. He was particularly strong in making the small businessman's case for health-care reform, drawing both on his restaurant business experience and on San Francisco's efforts to create universal health-care on a local level.

Sometimes, our politicians do deliver.