Tag Archives: Roddy McDowall

Pixel Scroll 10/15/25 And To Think That I Scrolled It On Mulpixel Street

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(1) HWA ELECTIONS. The Horror Writers Association held its annual election in September. The candidates for the Offices of Vice President and Treasurer ran unopposed. There were four contested Trustee positions.

  • Vice President: Lisa Wood (unopposed)
  • Treasurer: Marc Abbot (unopposed)
  • Trustees: Incumbents Lisa Kröger, Brian Matthews, and Patrick Barb were re-elected; and  a new Trustee, Sèphera Girón, was elected.

(2) BROWSING THE ANTHROPIC SETTLEMENT SITE. Michael J. “Orange Mike” Lowrey reminds authors to look for their names and titles using the “Works Lookup” tool on the Anthropic copyright settlement page. He wondered how many sff writers are on the list – the answer was: plenty!

I don’t have any books to my credit, but those of you who do might want to explore this site. Obviously, the search engine may return some false positives. But among people I know, the thieves have 134 items by Mercedes Lackey on the list, 28 items by Samuel Delany, one by Mary Anne Mohanraj, 27 by Joe Haldeman, 50 by Eric Flint, 68 by G.R.R. Martin, 16 by Robert Asprin (“Yang”), six by Juanita R Coulson, six by Gene DeWeese under his own name, 17 by andrew j offutt under his own name or as John Cleve, one by Erwin Strauss (“Filthy Pierre”), at least five by David Friedman (“Cariadoc of the Bow”), 12 by C. S. Friedman, two for Dave Langford, five by Bob Tucker, etc., etc.

(3) REALLY A PRATCHETT FAN? Rhianna Pratchett is impressed by Rachel Cunliffe’s New Statesman article “Has Kemi Badenoch actually read Terry Pratchett?” (Kemi Badenoch is a British politician who has served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Conservative Party since November 2024.)

It’s important for politicians to have some kind of cultural hinterland. So perhaps we should be reassured by Kemi Badenoch’s revelation on the morning broadcast round that her favourite author is the literary legend Terry Pratchett. The Tory leader apparently has all but one of Pratchett’s 60-odd books, which blend sci-fi and fantasy with searing social commentary. She finds them “very funny”.

Nonetheless, one question remains: has she actually read them?

Post-structural theory dictates that readers may take whatever meaning they like from the content they consume. If Trump and his fans want to play “Born In The USA” at a Maga rally, the fact the song is a scathing critique of the Vietnam War and the arrogance of American leadership shouldn’t stop them. The artist’s own politics or intentions are irrelevant. So Badenoch is perfectly entitled to enjoy the Discworld novels, set in a magical disc-shaped land that flies through space carried by four elephants standing on the back of a giant turtle. It makes a change from her previous top reads (the works of Thomas Sowell and Friedrich Hayek’s Road To Serfdom), but if she can find joy in tales of witches and werewolves and a wizarding university with an orangutan for a librarian, all the more power to her.

Yet something about the image of Badenoch settling down with a dog-eared copy of one of Pratchett’s masterpieces doesn’t quite compute. …

…How, for example, would Badenoch interpret the Sam Vimes “Boots” theory of socioeconomic unfairness as detailed in Men At Arms, that notes how rich people can afford to make a single purchase of high-quality products (like boots) that last forever, whereas the poor are forced into a cycle of buying cheap goods that wear out quickly and must be frequently replaced, costing them far more over time? Does she see the innate injustice of trapping people in grinding poverty, or does she just think it is good for economic growth to sell as many cheap boots as possible?

Similar points may be made about other Pratchett musings on poverty, power and class dynamics. For instance, the observation in Feet of Clay that “while it was regarded as pretty good evidence of criminality to be living in a slum, for some reason owning a whole street of them merely got you invited to the very best social occasions”, seems distinctly un-Tory in its nature. …

(4) I NOW PRONOUNCE YOU PERSON AND BEEP BOOP. “Ohio Lawmaker Wants to Ban Marriage Between Humans and AI Chatbots” reports Gizmodo.

…NBC-4 in Ohio writes that Rep. Thaddeus Claggett, who chairs the state’s House Technology and Innovation Committee, has introduced legislation that would stop such unions from occurring. Indeed, not only would House Bill 469 stop the wedding bells for AI-human relationships, it would also stop AI programs from gaining the status of legal personhood. The bill states:

“No AI system shall be recognized as a spouse, domestic partner, or hold any personal legal status analogous to marriage or union with a human or another AI system. Any purported attempt to marry or create a personal union with an AI system is void and has no legal effect.”

Claggett’s interest in banning AI-human unions would appear to have a lot more to do with maintaining exclusive legal rights for humans than it does with stopping people from getting so emotionally attached to their software programs that they decide to tie the knot with them. NBC-4 notes that the goal is to stop AI programs from being able to take on roles that the act of marriage confers upon them—stuff like holding power of attorney or making financial decisions.

“As the computer systems improve in their capacity to act more like humans, we want to be sure we have prohibitions in our law that prohibit those systems from ever being human in their agency,” Claggett told the news outlet. “People need to understand, we’re not talking about marching down the aisle to some tune and having a ceremony with the robot that’ll be on our streets here in a year or two,” he added. “That could happen, but that’s not really what we’re saying.”…

(5) SIMULTANEOUS TIMES. Space Cowboy Books of Joshua Tree, CA presents their monthly science fiction podcast Simultaneous Times episode 92 with the stories:

  • “Breathing Night” by Laura Blackwell; narration by Jean-Paul Garnier; with music by TSG 
  • “Care of Your Electric Sheep” by F.J. Bergmann; narration by Jean-Paul Garnier; with music by Oneirothopter
  • “Skeletal” by Elad Haber; narration by Jean-Paul Garnier;  with music by Phog Masheeen.

Theme music by Dain Luscombe.

(6) APEX MAGAZINE KICKSTARTER UPDATE. Apex Magazine’s 2026 Kickstarter appeal has raised $9,283 of its $20,000 goal in the first two weeks, and continues through October 31. Four of its eight pledge milestones have already been unlocked – for example:

At 10% of our goal, our Kickstarter backers will gain early access to a story slated to be published next year. “Piglet Delivers,” by Maria Haskins, is a delightfully dark story set in the Hundred Acre Wood. This will be exclusive to our Kickstarter backers, so back early so you don’t miss it! UNLOCKED!

(7) DON’T MISS THESE BANNED BOOKS. Dorset Eye has recommendations: “Defying the Censor: Essential Reads for Banned Books Week”.

Every year, Banned Books Week celebrates the freedom to read and draws attention to the dangers of censorship. It’s a stark reminder that throughout history and even today, books are challenged, restricted, or removed from shelves for their ideas. Reading these works is an act of intellectual defiance, a way to understand different perspectives, and a celebration of the very liberty that censorship seeks to suppress.

Here are some seminal works, all banned at one time or another, that deserve a place on your reading list….

Including the following title, three of the eight books listed are sff – the other two are A Clockwork Orange and Fahrenheit 451.

5. Animal Farm by George Orwell

  • The Banning: Orwell’s allegorical satire of the Soviet Union was rejected by multiple publishers, including T.S. Eliot, who felt its critique of a wartime ally (Stalin’s Russia) was ill-timed. It was later banned in the USSR and other Eastern Bloc countries, as well as in places like the UAE for its themes that contradicted Islamic values. It has also been challenged in US schools for being “anti-communist.”
  • Why You Should Read It: It is a timeless and devastating fable about how revolutions can be betrayed by tyranny and propaganda. Its warning about the corruption of power is universally applicable and remains as relevant today as it was in 1945.

(8) MEMORY LANE.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

October 15, 1928 — The Passing of Mr. Quin

We have a rarity for you this Scroll, a silent film first shown in the UK ninety-five years ago. The Passing of Mr. Quin was the first British film to be based off a short story by Agatha Christie. Though it did not feature Hercule Poirot, as that film debut wouldn’t happen for another three years.

It is a rather odd story. To wit, Professor Appleby has abused his wife, Eleanor, for years but when he is brutally murdered and her lover, Derek, goes missing under mysterious circumstances, Eleanor suspects the worst as she indeed should. 

A mysterious stranger, known mostly as “Mr Quin” appears, and begins to seduce her, but his alcoholism causes him to die quite soon. On his death bed, he confesses that he was Derek all along, and offers her to a rival, who promises to make Eleanor a happy wife.

Not cheerful at all and with just more than a soupçon of misogyny there as well but I don’t think it had any of the anti-Jewish tendencies Christie was known for early on. Need I say that the scriptwriters had their way with Christie’s original story? Well they did. 

This silent film was directed by Leslie Alibi. Three years later he directed the first ever depiction of Poirot with Austin Trevor in the lead role. That was not a silent film and Trevor once claimed he was cast as Poirot because he could speak with a French accent. The Poirot film unfortunately is now lost. 

(9) COMICS SECTION.

(10) DEFORD REVIVAL. Space Cowboy Books is taking preorders for “One Way and Other Stories a book by Miriam Allen deFord and Marie Vibbert” which will be released October 21.

Miriam Allen deFord (1888-1975) was a feminist, a suffragette, birth control advocate, journalist, editor, winner of the Mystery Writer’s of America’s Edgar Award, and author of science fiction, mystery, and true crime. Now, at long last, a collection of her science fiction short stories are back in print with One Way & Other Stories.

Mystery writer, Fortean, anti-fascist, feminist of the first generation, and science fiction trailblazer for five decades, Miriam Allen deFord masterfully weaves all of her facets into her stories, bringing a macabre, fantastic tone to her tales: Bradbury meets Hitchcock. She was already the grand dame of science fiction when the genre reached its second peak with the magazine boom of the early ’50s. Her work thus paved and led the way for SF’s Silver Age. Miriam Allen deFord somehow slips under the radar when SF luminaries are listed. With luck, this volume will remedy this oversight. – Gideon Marcus, editor of Rediscovery: Science Fiction by Women

Harlan Ellison knew this history and secured a story by deFord for his own milestone Dangerous Visions anthology.

(11) THIS POSTER IS READY OF ITS CLOSE-UP. Gizmodo assembled a gallery of “The Most Iconic Genre Movie Posters of Drew Struzan”, Hollywood’s go-to artist who died earlier this week. Here’s an example.

…Struzan first started painting this artwork for Blade Runner‘s original theatrical release in 1982, but it was ultimately passed on, leaving the piece unfinished for nearly two decades. When Ridley Scott returned to Blade Runner to release the director’s cut of the film, he went back to Struzan to ask if the piece could finally be completed, giving it the spotlight it deserved….

(12) YODA IN INTERIOR DECORATOR COLORS. [Item by Steven French.] This will already be familiar to many but I for one did not know that Yoda was ‘partly inspired’ by Albert Einstein! So says the Guardian: “Blue, Yoda originally was, archival Star Wars sources reveal”.

“You must unlearn what you have learned,” Jedi master Yoda instructed his stubborn apprentice, Luke Skywalker. And now Star Wars fans may have to do the same after confirmation that the beloved fictional alien was very nearly blue, or even purple.

Reviews of archival sources – and new testimony from a special effects makeup artist who worked on the first Yoda puppets – suggest film-makers made a decision late in the development process to switch the character’s skin colour to green.

Had producers of The Empire Strikes Back closely followed the final screenplay, then Yoda would have been “bluish”.

In the text, Luke and his droid companion, R2-D2, are surprised after being confronted by a small creature who appears on the swamp-covered planet of Dagobah. “Mysteriously standing right in front of Luke is a strange, bluish creature, not more than two feet tall. The wizened little thing is dressed in rags,” reads the screenplay….

(13) WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON’T KNOW? [Item by Mike Kennedy.] In Futurism: “Fixing Hallucinations Would Destroy ChatGPT, Expert Finds”. Or at least make it even more unprofitable per that expert. Which is pretty much the same thing.

…In simple terms, the creators of AI incentivize them to guess rather than admit they don’t know the answer — which might be a good strategy on an exam, but is outright dangerous when giving high-stakes advice about topics like medicine or law.

While OpenAI claimed in an accompanying blog post that “there is a straightforward fix” — tweaking evaluations to “penalize confident errors more than you penalize uncertainty and give partial credit for appropriate expressions of uncertainty” — one expert is warning that the strategy could pose devastating business realities.

In an essay for The Conversation, University of Sheffield lecturer and AI optimization expert Wei Xing argued that the AI industry wouldn’t be economically incentivized to make these changes, as doing so could dramatically increase costs.

Worse yet, having an AI repeatedly admit it can’t answer a prompt with a sufficient degree of confidence could deter users, who love a confidently positioned answer, even if it’s ultimately incorrect.

Even if ChatGPT admitted that it doesn’t know the answer just 30 percent of the time, users could quickly become frustrated and move on, Xing argued….

(14) GOING APE. Time for another look at “Roddy McDowall’s home movies from ‘Planet Of The Apes’ (1968)”, mainly about getting his makeup and facial prosthetics put on.

(15) VIDEO OF THE DAY. Pete Beard packs a lot of images into his 10-minute tribute to “The Fantasy Illustrations of Virgil Finlay”.

In science fiction and fantasy circles Vigil Finlay is quite rightly held in high esteem. But because most of his output appeared in pulp magazines between the 1930s and 50s his remarkable paintings and monochrome line drawings haven’t really attracted a wider legion of admirers. I hope this video will make some new converts among viewers of the channel.

[Thanks to Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Michael J. “Orange Mike” Lowrey, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, and SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Mark Roth-Whitworth, Steven French, and Kathy Sullivan for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Andrew (not Werdna).]

Pixel Scroll 9/17/25 Rick Rolled On Pixel Scroll

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(1) THE FURTHER ADVENTURES OF VURGUZZ. In a very interesting discovery, Cora Buhlert has traced the origins of Vurguzz, the booze that gained international notoriety at the 1970 Worldcon in Heidelberg (but which American and British fanwriters spelled Verguzz).

Meanwhile, I’ve actually found your mystery drink. It’s called Vurguzz and is an universe drink from the Perry Rhodan novels, though it predates Perry Rhodan and was apparently invented by Perry Rhodan co-creator Walter Ernsting a.k.a. Clark Dalton and Jesco von Puttkamer (the NASA guy, though he started out as an SF writer) in the late 1950s for some collaborative science fiction novels.

Apparently, around 1960 German fans Franz Etti and Wolfgang Thadewald decided to mix real life Vurguzz from various spirits. No one remembers the exact recipe, though it apparently tasted like peppermint and may have contained the Italian herbal bitter Centerba 72, which has 70% of alcohol. Though Centerba 72 isn’t easy to find even today and quite expensive, so I doubt it was used for larger scale manufacture.

The name Vurguzz was eventually sold to a commercial distillery who produced a somewhat weaker version that was sold at Perry Rhodan cons well into the 1990s. That said, I have never seen this stuff sold at any con, but then I don’t go to the purely Perry Rhodan cons. I also most likely wouldn’t have tried it, because a) I’m normally driving when I’m at a con, and b) novelty herbal liquors are normally not a great idea.

Assisted by the correct spelling of the name I discovered that File 770 itself once reprinted German fan Waldemar Kumming’s“The Origin Story of Vurguzz”, a 2002 account written for John Hertz’ Vanamonde.

It all started 40 years ago. In the fanzine Munich Round-Up 8 was a whole page of “advertisements” for “The Bar to the Three and a Half Planets”, for Urm, the Newsmagazine for Retrotemporarians, for “Kraahkarm in Jelly, in 20-ton Containers”, and similar things, and finally for “Vurguzz, with 250% alcohol content.” Of course the alcohol over 100% was in hyperspace; this would allegedly lead to seeing not only double but 3 times after only one small glass of the drink.

The idea of vurguzz [pronounced “foor-goots” — jh] left Franz Ettle (who unfortunately died many years ago) no peace of mind until he had after various trials perfected a booze which had some of the effects. It had about 80% alcohol, and among other ingredients something that made it work very fast and strong but lasted only a short time. This vurguzz was poured at several German conventions, including an admission ceremony of the international and still existing Saint Fantony group. Later a liqueur factory took over but the vurguzz then had only 65% alcohol in it, that being the maximum allowed under German law. Lately the Pabel Verlag has been supplying a liqueur called vurguzz with only 17% alcohol content, apparently without knowing the story of the original vurguzz.

(2) STAR WARS NEWS. “’Star Wars: Starfighter’ First Look Shows Ryan Gosling At Sea” – Deadline says the film arrives in May 2027.

Shawn Levy posted to his IG, an early look at his Lucasfilm title Star Wars: Starfighter with Ryan Gosling and actor Flynn Gray on set in the Mediterranean Sea.

“Somewhere in the Mediterranean Sea #Starfigher,” the Deadpool & Wolverine filmmaker wrote on his Instagram.

 Matt Smith, Mia Goth, Aaron Pierre, Simon Bird, Jamael Westman, Daniel Ings and Amy Adams are starring opposite Gosling in the movie penned by Jonathan Tropper. As previously reported, Starfighter isn’t part of the Skywalker saga episodes I-IX. That said, the movie is set five years after the events of Star Wars: Episode IX — The Rise of Skywalker,

The film is set to hit theaters on May 28, 2027. Levy produces with Lucasfilm boss Kathleen Kennedy. Executive producers are Gosling, Dan Levine, Mary McLaglen and Josh McLaglen. 

The next Star Wars movie is Mandalorian & Grogu set for Memorial Day weekend release next year, May 22. Disney already owns that holiday’s domestic box office opening record with this past summer’s Lilo & Stitch which bowed to $146M and is the only MPA movie year-to-date to cross $1 billion at the global box office.

(3) OCTOTHORPE. Episode 143 of the Octothorpe podcast, “A Major Movie in the Sand Genre”, has arrived. And according to their blub behind schedule, but we’re here seven days a week and ready to promote Octothorpe whenever it drops.

An abstract, geometric figure stands, their torso through a panel which has various trailing wires. There is a radio or walkie talkie on the floor and a textured background which is also geometric. The words “Octothorpe 143” appear at the top, “Walt Willis” appear at the right, and “Inside Coverage” appear at the bottom.

Octothorpe 143 is slightly late! We welcome Alison back to the podcast and read a bumper mailbag before getting into discussion of Seattle 2025, LAcon V, and Montreal 2027. Our artwork is by ATom! We recorded before the Seattle apology, and we might have more thoughts on that in a future episode.

An uncorrected transcript is here, and I for one find it invaluable.

(4) CENSORSHIP LITIGATION. Publishers Weekly says, “Book Banners Are Everywhere. These Lawyers Are Playing Offense.”.

Mark Herron isn’t exactly a media lawyer. His specialty is discrimination and employment rights, and most of his cases involve mistreatment in the workplace stemming from gender, race, or disability status.

That’s what made the case of Karen Cahall v. New Richmond Exempted Village School District so interesting to him. Cahall has been a third grade teacher in public schools south of Cincinnati for 30 years. In November 2024, she was suspended without pay for three days after a parent complained there were four books featuring LBGTQ+ characters in her classroom library: Ana On the Edge by A.J. Sass, The Fabulous Zed Watson by Basil Sylvester, Hazel Bly and the Deep Blue Sea by Ashley Herring Blake, and Too Bright to See by Kyle Lukoff. The books were stored not on shelves but in bins, through which students had to sift in order to choose what to read. The titles were neither prominently displayed nor discussed in class. They were simply there—but that was enough.

Herron says the lawsuit over his client’s suspension centers on two issues. First, the county is very conservative, and there are several pastors on the local school board. The pressure to remove those books while other workers within the school wear religious insignia, Herron argues, infringes on Cahall’s own religious belief that LGBTQ+ communities should be accepted, respected, and loved.

The second factor is a policy in the school that forbids teachers from teaching about “contentious” matters. But no one can really say what that means.

“What’s controversial and what’s not?” Herron asks. “To an extent, that’s something two people can disagree on. Reasonable people can disagree on anything, so you can’t say don’t teach something controversial without more guidance.”

Assessing which materials are controversial in public libraries and schools is a costly endeavor, both in money and in time, and the organized push to ban books from public and school library shelves has increased dramatically over the past few years. In 2024, 5,813 books were challenged throughout the country, nearly 25 times more than in 2015.

In 2023, USA Today found that taxpayers across four school districts in Florida, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Utah paid at least $270,000 to review challenged books and assess whether they included “controversial” content. That’s about $67,000 spent per institution, meaning it costs nearly the average salary of a full-time employee to ban books in a given district.

This mass push to censor reading materials requires legal intervention in order to keep control of materials in the hands of librarians and teachers rather than giving it to outside actors. In late 2022, attorney Ric Jacobs says, a patron visited the Dayton Memorial Library, the only public library in rural Columbia County, Wash., and moved a copy of Juno Dawson’s What’s the T? The Guide to All Things Trans and/or Nonbinary from one side of the children’s section to another. The book, originally shelved with college materials meant for teenagers, was moved to an area with cartoonish furniture and picture books, where the patron snapped a photo of it and shared it on Facebook.

“That misleading social media post and the fervor from it started things off,” Jacobs recalls. Soon the library director faced demands to remove that book and others. When those demands were refused, Facebook users started a smear campaign, Jacobs says, in which they accused the director of being a pedophile. The director resigned in July 2023, but before long, the fervor moved to the ballot: organizers managed to acquire enough signatures to launch a local referendum to close the public library and return its books and resources to the state of Washington.

The measure ultimately failed. Jacobs filed an injunction on behalf of a local political action committee, called Neighbors United for Progress, to remove the referendum from the November 2023 ballot, and the county court ruled that the majority of signatures acquired were fraudulent. The affidavits, Jacobs says, were filed by signatories stating that they were asked if they wanted to protect local children and to sign if they did—with no knowledge that the library would close as a result. Shortly after, the state increased the number of signatures required to close a library from 10% of voters to 25%.

(5) AFTER THE PLAGUE. Science Fiction 101 devotes the 58th installment of its podcast to “Surviving SURVIVORS”, the Seventies British TV show. The post includes a curated set of links to Survivors episodes that you can watch on the Internet Archive.

Fifty years ago, schoolboy Phil [Nichols] was knocked out by a British science fiction TV show, the post-apocalyptic Survivors. Created by Terry Nation – who also created Doctor Who‘s recurring enemy the Daleks as well as Blakes Seven – Survivors ran for three seasons. And it’s had a long afterlife as a cult favourite, and as a long-running audio drama starring many of the original cast.

Survivors was about a plague which wipes out 99.998% of the world’s population, and its often grim aftermath. It follows the struggles of a handful of British people to survive and rebuild after the collapse of civilisation. At first it’s uncomfortably close to what we all experienced when COVID-19 came along, but thankfully COVID wasn’t nearly as deadly as the Survivors plague…  

Today, Phil has persuaded Colin to take a first look at this sometimes harrowing (but ultimately life-affirming) ’70s classic, and together they discuss selected episodes from the series. As we announced a couple of weeks ago, all episodes are currently free to view on the Internet Archive, and we encourage you to at least sample the series if you’ve never seen it before. 

(6) BELATED BIRTHDAY WISHES. CordCuttersNews celebrates: “62 Years Ago Today: ‘The Outer Limits’ Premieres on ABC, Redefining Sci-Fi Television” . The article appeared yesterday – September 16 is the anniversary.

Today marks the 62nd anniversary of a pivotal moment in television history: the premiere of The Outer Limits on ABC on September 16, 1963. This groundbreaking science fiction anthology series captivated audiences with its eerie narratives, thought-provoking themes, and innovative storytelling, leaving an indelible mark on the genre and television as a whole.

On that fateful evening in 1963, viewers tuning into ABC were greeted by an unsettling voiceover: “There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission.” These iconic words introduced The Outer Limits, a show that promised to push the boundaries of imagination. Created by Leslie Stevens and produced by Joseph Stefano, the series stood out for its cinematic quality, blending science fiction, horror, and psychological drama. Unlike its contemporary, The Twilight Zone, which often leaned into moral allegories, The Outer Limits embraced a darker, more monster-driven aesthetic, earning it the nickname “the scariest show on television” at the time.

The series ran for two seasons, from 1963 to 1965, airing 49 episodes. Each episode was a standalone story, exploring themes like alien encounters, time travel, and the consequences of unchecked scientific ambition. Notable episodes include “The Architects of Fear,” which tackled Cold War paranoia, and “Demon with a Glass Hand,” a time-travel tale penned by sci-fi legend Harlan Ellison. The show’s “bears”—the term used for its often grotesque creatures—were brought to life through inventive special effects, a testament to the creativity of its production team despite a modest budget…

(7) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

September 17, 1926 — Roddy McDowall. (Died 1998.)

By Paul Weimer: Roddy McDowall’s genre work came into my awareness early.  He was the voice of V.I.N.CENT, the robot in the much maligned (but a favorite of mine) movie The Black Hole.  I might not have an ear for voices overmuch, but even I could hear his distinctive voice and connect it to the actor I then saw in episodes of Buck Rogers and Tales of the Gold Monkey. His voice popped up again in my ears as Sam in the Return of the King animated movie.

Roddy McDowall

And from there, he continued to become a very welcome actor, in and out of genre when I encountered him.  And it seemed like I kept running into him and his work everywhere I turned.  His portrayal of the TV show host in Fright Night might be my most favorite role. The original Planet of the Apes films. An episode of The Twilight Zone (where he winds up as an exhibit in an alien zoo). An episode of the 1960’s Batman TV series had him so very nearly kill Batman and Robin (who had to be saved by O’Hara and the police rather than themselves as normal). He even shows up in the 1963 Cleopatra as Octavian. 

One last thing I didn’t learn until some years ago, but delights me now (it would have made no impression until this century) is that he was an avid photographer, specializing in actor and actress portraits.  Truly, a multi-modal talent. 

(8) COMICS SECTION.

(9) IT’S CLOBBERING YOUR LEISURE TIME TIME! [Item by Daniel Dern.] Marvel’s Fantastic Four: First Steps movie is coming soon to streaming and disk. According to Marvel, the movie “will hit digital platforms September 23, including Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, and Fandango at Home [i.e., PAY-TO-WATCH, aka PVOD [“Premium Video On Demand” or vice versa — “Disambiguating” Dern], “followed by its arrival on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray, and DVD on October 14.”

Speaking of Blu-Ray, earlier today, my library system let me put in a reserve request for the BluRay. I’m number 19 on the list; at least six copies have so far been ordered by various libraries in the network. I expect my request for the new Superman movie will show up somewhat sooner.)

Also according to the above Marvel announcement, “The 4K UHD digital and Blu-ray releases feature hours of exclusive bonus content, including deleted scenes, a gag reel, behind-the-scenes featurettes, and filmmaker commentary by director Matt Shakman and production designer Kasra Farahani.

“Bonus features,” according to Marvel, may (as in, “may vary by product and retailer”) include:

* Deleted Scenes – Check out the scenes that didn’t make the final cut.

  • Thanksgiving Soup Kitchen
  • Fantastic Four Day
  • Subterranea
  • Birthday Sweater
  • Taking Turns

* Gag Reel – Enjoy fun outtakes on set with the cast and crew of The Fantastic Four: First Steps.

* Featurettes:

  • Meet The First Family – The creation of the Fantastic Four saved Marvel Comics in 1961 and has only flourished as years have passed. Matt Shakman and the cast explain how they found themselves gravitating toward each role and creating the ultimate family unit.
  • Fantastic Futurism – The filmmakers discuss the process of immersing the cast and crew in the film’s retro-futuristic aesthetic. Join Matt Shakman and crew as they discuss the experience of shooting in gigantic mid-century New York sets and stepping into an otherworldly era.
  • From Beyond and Below – The team explores bringing complex characters from the page to the screen, including a larger-than-life Galactus, grounded Harvey Elder/Mole Man, and an emotionally rich Silver Surfer.
  • Audio Commentary – Watch the film with audio commentary by director Matt Shakman and production designer Kasra Farahani.

And, from CBR.com: “The Fantastic Four: First Steps Gets Digital Release Date (And It’s Soon)”.

  • “The home releases of the film will include bonus features like a gag reel that includes actor Ebon Moss-Bachrach, who played Ben Grimm/The Thing in the film, twirling in his motion capture suit to the point of complete dizziness. The gag reel also has footage of Vanessa Kirby (Sue Storm/Invisible Woman) repeatedly walking through the same door over and over again and Joseph Quinn (Johnny Storm/Human Torch) tripping down the stairs several times.
  • A Collectible SteelBook is Also Coming: there will be an option to purchase commemorative SteelBook editions of First Steps, and an exclusive Amazon edition that comes with a magnet-front variant cover as well as five collectible cards and an issue of The Fantastic Four: First Steps #1 comic. (“SteelBooks are collectible steel cases for movies, shows, and games with unique artwork and premium feel,” sez Shout! Factory, “What’s So Special About SteelBooks?”, who distributes ’em — DuckDuckGo-ishly, Dern)

Just don’t let Krypto try to fetch or eat the disks or SteelBook 🙂

(10) CIRCULAR FILES. The New York Times says, “Cereal Box Records Sound Horrible. They Still Look Incredible.”  (Behind a paywall.)

General Mills produced records with stories about Count Chocula, Franken Berry, and Boo Berry to accompany its cereal brands.

Most record collectors want the highest quality audio. But Duane Dimock, 68, is different. He’s proud to have one of the best collections of low-quality records on the planet. “They sound really bad,” he said of the hundreds of cereal box records he has amassed at his home in San Diego.

This forgotten format emerged in the 1950s. It used a thin plastic film to stamp records onto cereal boxes, providing a cheap cutout prize for children. At the peak of the trend, artists as big as the Monkees and the Jackson 5 had their greatest hits pressed into cardboard, helping to sell millions of boxes of cereal.

The disposable nature of these low-quality records means most were eventually thrown out or destroyed by their rambunctious preteen owners. But some survived, and today a small community of collectors continues to hunt down and preserve these forgotten treasures.

“I find them at garage sales, estate sales, swap meets,” Dimock explained in a recent interview. “I’ve even found cereal boxes that were used as stuffing behind picture frames.”

Lisa Sutton, 63, is more of a wistful nostalgic. She has held onto the original records she cut out as a child over 50 years ago. “It all started back in 1970,” she remembered. “I hated cereal, but I loved Bobby Sherman. When they started putting his records on the boxes my sister and I forced my mother to buy them. We would cut off the records and listen to them all the time.”…

(11) HOLLYWOOD PROTESTOR. “’Push back – or they’ll eat you alive’: James Cromwell on life as Hollywood’s biggest troublemaker” – Guardian profiles the actor.

Amid the hustle of midtown Manhattan on Wednesday 11 May 2022, James Cromwell walked into Starbucks, glued his hand to a counter and complained about the surcharges on vegan milks. “When will you stop raking in huge profits while customers, animals and the environment suffer?” Cromwell boomed as fellow activists streamed the protest online.

But the insouciant patrons of Starbucks paid little heed. Perhaps they didn’t realise they were in the company of the tallest person ever nominated for an acting Oscar, deliverer of one of the best speeches in Succession, and the only actor to utter the words “star trek” in a Star Trek production. Police arrived to shut down the store.’…

(12) DO THAT DODO THAT YOU DO SO WELL. Forget dire wolves and mammoths, how about dodos?“Scientists claim they’ve made ‘pivotal step’ in bringing back the dodo for first time in 300 years | Science” – the Guardian has the story.

Since its demise in the 17th century, the dodo has long been synonymous with extinction. But thousands of dodos could soon again populate Mauritius, the species’ former home, according to a “de-extinction” company that has announced a major breakthrough in its quest to resurrect the flightless bird.

Colossal Biosciences said on Wednesday it has succeeded in growing pigeon primordial germ cells, precursor cells to sperm and eggs, for the first time. This is a “pivotal step” in bringing back the dodo, which was a type of pigeon, for the first time in more than 300 years, according to Colossal.

The Texas-based company, which has made splashy headlines for its plans to reestablish wooly mammoths and dire wolves, said it has also developed gene-edited chickens that will act as surrogates for the dodos. The chickens will be injected with primordial germ cells from Nicobar pigeons, the closest living relatives of dodos, which will in time, after gene edits to recreate the create the desired body and head shape, allow them to breed dodos.

“Rough ballpark, we think it’s still five to seven years out, but it’s not 20 years out,” Ben Lamm, Colossal’s chief executive, said about the timeline for the dodo’s return. Colossal is working with wildlife groups to identify safe, rat-free sites in Mauritius where the species could once again roam.

“Our goal is to make enough dodos with enough genetic diversity engineered into them that we can put them back into the wild where they can truly thrive,” he said. “So we’re not looking to make two dodos, we’re looking to make thousands.”….

(13) SHOCKWAVES. [Item by Steven French.] There is increasing evidence that an above ground cometary explosion was responsible for the disappearance of the Clovis culture in North America 13, 000 years ago, along with mammoths and other megafauna: “Evidence of cosmic impact discovered at classic Clovis archaeological sites” reports Phys.org.

Researchers continue to build on a body of evidence for a fragmented comet that is thought to have exploded over Earth almost 13,000 years ago, which may have had a role in the disappearance of mammoths, mastodons and most of other megafauna at that time, and in the vanishing of the Clovis culture from the archaeological record in North America.

Reporting in PLOS One, UC Santa Barbara Emeritus Professor of Earth Science James Kennett and collaborators present their findings of shocked quartz—grains of sand deformed by extreme pressures and temperatures—at three classic Clovis culture archaeological sites in the United States: Murray Springs in Arizona, Blackwater Draw in New Mexico and Arlington Canyon in California’s Channel Islands.

“These three sites were classic sites in the discovery and the documentation of the megafaunal extinctions in North America and the disappearance of the Clovis culture,” said Kennett.

The disappearance of the megafauna and the vanishing of the Clovis technocomplex from the archaeological record coincide with the onset of the Younger Dryas cool episode, an anomalous and abrupt return to near ice-age conditions that persisted for about a thousand or so years amid what was generally a warming transition from the Last Glacial Period.

There are several hypotheses for what may have happened to trigger that event; Kennett and team propose a scenario in which a fragmented comet exploded aboveground, sending shockwaves and extreme heat to Earth….

(14) MIRROR LIFE IS A REAL THING, AND IT IS SOMETHING OF AN ETHICAL HEADACHE FOR MOLECULAR BIOLOGISTS. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] Now, this ‘mirror life’ concept has also been a thing in science fiction.  I first came across it as a teenager reading James Blish’s Spock Must Die!. In it, Spock transports to a distant planet, but it is protected by an energy field that reflects the transporter beam back to the Enterprise.  What happens is that instead of Spock being transported (by a ‘Dirac jump’) the original remains and a duplicate appears beside him…  It turns out that this duplicate is not a duplicate at all but a mirror version of Spock right down to the molecular level…

Now, in real life many of your biomolecules have ‘handedness’; that is to say they can be ‘left’ handed or ‘right handed’ just like your hands.  If you take your hands you cannot place one hand exactly over the other; all you can do is put them palm-to-palm where they form a mirror image of themselves.

In real life, many amino acids (the building blocks of proteins) have handedness and this handedess is the same for all forms of life on Earth.  ‘Why?’, is still something of a mystery (though one reasonably favoured theory is that this arises naturally our of chemistry and physics, but there are other ideas).  Anyway, it would be possible to create ‘mirror’ amino acids hence ‘mirror’ proteins to the ones we find in real life. We might even create ‘mirror ‘microbes of life. Here, there are potential biomedical benefits as well as helping elucidate why life is handed the way it is.

The problem is that such mirror life might escape the lab, run rampant and cause unknown problems…  So, what to do?

Scientists are mulling this over as an article in today’s Nature journal: “Mirror of the unknown: should research on mirror-image molecular biology be stopped?”

[Thanks to Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Paul Weimer, John Coxon, Daniel Dern, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Mark Roth-Whitworth, Steven French, and Kathy Sullivan for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Ken Richards.]

Pixel Scroll 9/17/24 The Scroll On The Edge of Pixelever

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(1) UK MEDIA FINALLY ACKNOWLEDGES NEIL GAIMAN STORY. [Item by Nickpheas.] This isn’t news to us, but it’s still a sign of something significant. The UK media was happily ignoring the Gaiman abuse allegations, but it looks like the logjam has finally been broken.  

File 770 covered the stepping back from Good Omens 3 a few days ago, and it seems that this has provided something news reporters can hang a story on, given the UK libel courts, where “a podcast you’ve never heard of said…” is pretty much an invitation to be sued. 

(2) A NAME TO CONJURE WITH. This installment of The Midnight Society breaks me up. (Laird Barron liked it too, though he gave one note.) Here’s how it begins:

(3) WATERMELON GRANT TAKING APPLICATIONS. The inaugural The Watermelon Grant for Palestinian Creators is accepting applications through December 6, 2024.

The Watermelon Grant offers $2000 USD in unrestricted funds to an emerging Palestinian creator in the field of speculative arts. Applications are judged on a criteria which considers artistic merit and potential impact.

The 2025 grant considers works of speculative fiction and poetry.

Due to the success of the Match Me campaign, we are now able to offer a prize in fiction and in poetry. Entries must be rooted in the speculative genres.

For more information, visit the website.

(4) ARMY WELCOMES SPECULATIVE FICTION. [Item by Francis Hamit.] The Army publishes science fiction.  No pay but an opportunity for aspiring writers of hard SF in the Jerry Pournelle mode.  (As a young man, Jerry led an artillery unit in the Korean War.  So I suggest that this opportunity is best suited for those that have “seen the elephant”.) Complete guidelines at the link: “Future Warfare Writing Program Submission Guidelines” at Army.mil.

General

The Army cannot know nor predict its next fight but it can imagine the future of warfare. Fiction is a tool of the imaginative process. Fiction allows us to imagine the details of reality-as-it-might happen in order to understand potential consequences of decisions that we need, or might need, to make. It helps us imagine how current trends might play out or how new innovations might have an impact. As a tool, fiction is cousin to war-gaming. It creates opportunities to play out potential scenarios and prepare for them.

The Army University Press publishes the Future Warfare Writing Program (FWWP). This venture seeks to answer the question: What might warfare look like in the latter half of the 21st Century? Works of fiction and nonfiction should address the addresses multiple dilemmas as outlined in the Army Operating Concept. Submissions are open to current and former members of the DoD (active, guard, and reserve) and their dependents. Others may submit on a case-by-case basis based on expertise and writing skill (please query).

Consider the following guiding examples of subject matter as you compose your original works:

– How might the Army respond to sudden increases in aggression of state actors and how might budget cuts affect this?

– What role will information operations take in shaping or manifesting the climate of warfare?

– How will the Army handle humanitarian campaigns such as virulent outbreaks, natural disasters, or displaced persons in the next 20-80 years?

– What changes to values, health, and knowledge can we expect in light of Army University, an increasingly technologically advanced population, and reactions to changing social norms?

– How will the focus and capability of Army medicine and Army acquisitions change in 15-90 years?

– What technologies will shape the battlefield and the warfighter in the foreseeable future?

FWWP welcomes works of valid and sound speculative fiction; well-written essays; and any combination between the two addressing the questions above or related concerns. The intent behind this program is to give creative thinkers at all levels and positions—both within and outside the Army—the space to contribute to the conversation by generating ideas about the possible complexities of future warfare. The Army is at a critical time that requires reflection on its recent history, examination of its present reality, and exploration of its near and mid-future.

All submissions must include the publication agreement available for download. Submissions will be evaluated by the Army University Press and FWWP editorial board for relevance, writing quality, and ability to engage the reader. Review the links below for insights into what the board considers operationally and strategically relevant. The Army University Press and FWWP offers no compensation for publication. Works appear online in a blog format only, but FWWP retains the right to print or reprint published works. When possible, FWWP provides personalized feedback on all pieces….

(5) CIRCLE THAT THOUGHT. Phys.org reports on research suggesting that “Earth may have had a ring system 466 million years ago”.

In a discovery that challenges our understanding of Earth’s ancient history, researchers have found evidence suggesting that Earth may have had a ring system that formed around 466 million years ago, at the beginning of a period of unusually intense meteorite bombardment known as the Ordovician impact spike.

This surprising hypothesis, published in Earth and Planetary Science Letters, stems from plate tectonic reconstructions for the Ordovician period noting the positions of 21 asteroid impact craters. All these craters are located within 30 degrees of the equator, despite more than 70% of Earth’s continental crust being outside this region, an anomaly that conventional theories cannot explain….

… Normally, asteroids impact the Earth at random locations, so we see impact craters distributed evenly over the moon and Mars, for example. To investigate whether the distribution of Ordovician impact craters is non-random and closer to the equator, the researchers calculated the continental surface area capable of preserving craters from that time.

They focused on stable, undisturbed cratons with rocks older than the mid Ordovician period, excluding areas buried under sediments or ice, eroded regions, and those affected by tectonic activity. Using a GIS approach (Geographic Information System), they identified geologically suitable regions across different continents.

Regions like Western Australia, Africa, the North American Craton, and small parts of Europe were considered well-suited for preserving such craters. Only 30% of the suitable land area was determined to have been close to the equator, yet all the impact craters from this period were found in this region….

(6) THE FELLOWSHIP WORKED FOR PEANUTS? “Cate Blanchett Barely Got Paid for ‘Lord of the Rings,’ Cast Salaries Explained” at Business Insider. We linked to Cate’s comment in another article recently, so here’s an new excerpt:

Orlando Bloom got $175,000 for playing Legolas

While taking a retrospective look at his career on “The Howard Stern Show” in 2019, Orlando Bloom said working with iconic actors such as Ian McKellen and Christopher Lee was a “magical time,” but like Blanchett, he said didn’t get paid much for the trilogy. Bloom was 22 years old when the studio signed him.

Asked how much he was paid, laughing, the actor responded: “Nothing, nothing, nothing. I got nothing. $175 grand for three movies.”

He continued: “No listen, greatest gift of my life, are you kidding me? You’d do it again for half the money.”

(7) SERIAL DIER. “’Mickey 17′ Trailer: Robert Pattinson Toplines Bong Joon-ho Warner Bros Pic” at Deadline.

At long last, Warner Bros has unveiled the first trailer for Mickey 17, the Robert Pattinson sci-fi pic marking Bong Joon-ho’s follow-up to his Best Picture Oscar winner Parasite, which is slated for release on January 31, 2025.

Based on the the novel Mickey 17 by Edward Ashton, the film follows unlikely hero Mickey Barnes (Robert Pattinson), who is an Expendable: a disposable employee on a human expedition sent to colonize the ice world Niflheim. Whenever there’s a mission that’s too dangerous —even suicidal — the crew turns to Mickey. After one iteration dies, a new body is regenerated with most of his memories intact. After six deaths, Mickey understands the terms of his deal…and why it was the only colonial position unfilled when he took it…

(8) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

September 17, 1928 – Roddy McDowall.  (Died 1998.)

By Paul Weimer: Roddy McDowall’s genre work came into my awareness early.  He was the voice of V.I.N.CENT., the robot in the much maligned (but a favorite of mine) movie The Black Hole.  I might not have an ear for voices overmuch, but even I could hear his distinctive voice and connect it to the actor I then saw in episodes of Buck Rogers and Tales of the Gold Monkey. His voice popped up again in my ears as Sam in the Return of the King animated movie. 

And from there, he continued to become a very welcome actor, in and out of genre when I encountered him.  And it seemed like I kept running into him and his work everywhere I turned.  His portrayal of the TV show host in Fright Night might be my most favorite role. The original Planet of the Apes films. An episode of the Twilight Zone (where he winds up as an exhibit in an alien zoo). An episode of the 1960’s Batman TV series had him so very nearly kill Batman and Robin (who had to be saved by O’Hara and the police rather than themselves as normal). He even shows up in the 1963 Cleopatra as Octavian. 

One last thing I didn’t learn until some years ago, but delights me now (it would have made no impression until this century) is that he was an avid photographer, specializing in actor and actress portraits.  Truly, a multi-modal talent. 

Roddy McDowall as Joe Carraclough in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s 1943 Lassie Come Home

(9) COMICS SECTION.

(10) COWL FOUL? Comicbook.com says “Batman to Get Hollywood Walk of Fame Star”. I always thought they only went to people – preferably living people, an impression not contradicted by the Frequently Asked Questions – Hollywood Walk of Fame. But what the hell do I know.

On Monday, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce announced that Batman will receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on Thursday, September 26th, making the DC Comics character the first superhero to receive the honor. The 2,790th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame will be dedicated next to the stars of television’s Batman actor Adam West and the Dark Knight’s co-creator, Bob Kane.

Jim Lee, DC’s president, publisher, and chief creative officer, and Anne DePies, DC’s senior vice president and general manager, will attend the Batman Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony at 11:30 a.m. PT at 6764 Hollywood Boulevard in front of the Hollywood Guinness World Records Museum. The Caped Crusader himself will also appear in costume to accept his star in the category of motion pictures, plus the Guinness World Records title for the first superhero with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in a special presentation by official GWR adjudicator Michael Empric…. 

(11) GRANT GEISSMAN Q&A. “’I’ve made several little stamps on pop culture’ – Grant Geissman discusses his storied and varied career with Joseph Antoniello” in The Comics Journal.

… You mentioned in another interview that your mom had thrown away a bunch of your comics. But you said, “Okay, but don’t throw away my MAD magazines.” What was it about MAD that, over your [other] comics, you were like, no, this is the important one?

I had to draw the line somewhere, and MAD was more important than Superman and Batman. It just was. The other thing she threw away were two and a half sets of Mars Attacks cards. A buddy of mine showed me these things at school, and I went down to the five and ten where he found them, and they were gone. But then right after that, I found them in a little card vending machine at Shopwell Market. So, any time my mom would go to the market, I said, can we go to Shopwell? I would have a handful of nickels, and would keep buying cards until I got two and a half sets of Mars Attacks cards. Every now and then, she would go through my room and throw stuff away. I was like, “What are you doing? You know what? You are not to throw my MAD magazines away.” And I never put that on my daughter, I never made her throw away stuff. So she might have other issues with me, but that’s not one of them! [laughter]…

Do you think that EC fanzine culture played a significant role in the longevity of EC Comics, or do you think that it was just being kept in print by Ballantine that kept it alive?

EC really never went away. These fanzines kept the flame burning. In 1978, Cochran announced the first title in the Complete EC Library—and he announced his intention to create these box sets, complete EC titles. There was a fair amount of “He’s never going to be able to do this. This is an impossible task.” But little by little, each volume would come out, Cochran did it. It took him like 30 years, but it happened. And that really is what kept EC going. There were more comic shops, and what that meant is a producer could go in, buy the entire set of Weird Science or Tales from the Crypt and go, “Hey, there might be a TV or a movie project here.” That’s why the HBO Tales from the Crypt series happened…

What was it like working with Feldstein?

Well, I knew Al from before. I met him in 1992 at a convention in Los Angeles, and later spent some extra time with him through Jerry Weist, because Weist arranged this meeting between Al Feldstein and Ray Bradbury here in Santa Monica. He rented a hotel room and they shot video. It was the first time Feldstein and Bradbury had ever met in person. Jerry brought original EC art and books and reference stuff. I had been commissioning paintings from Feldstein for quite a while, one of them was an oil painting of the Weird Fantasy 20 cover, which is related to “I, Rocket,” a Ray Bradbury story. Jerry said, “Bring that cover painting down and we’ll show it. We’ll have Ray look at it and Al will be there, and he can show Ray what he’s been doing with these paintings.” And then we all went out to dinner, and we even went to see one of Bradbury’s plays. He would put on these little local kind of 99-seater plays based on his books….

(12) HOW RUDE! As Comicbook.com heard it, “Arrow’s Stephen Amell “Didn’t F-cking Appreciate” Peacemaker Jab”.

Arrow star Stephen Amell took aim at new DC Studios co-chief James Gunn in a new podcast interview, saying that he felt Arrow was routinely disrespected by the people behind DC’s movies and Gunn’s series Peacemaker. Amell, who played Oliver Queen/Green Arrow from 2012 until 2023 in Arrow and its various spinoffs, has apparently seen Peacemaker now and isn’t too pleased about a joke made at Green Arrow’s expense. In an episode of the series, Peacemaker says to Vigilante that Green Arrow “goes to Brony conventions dressed as the back half of Twilight Sparkle,” with a hold drilled into the back of the costume. 

Peacemaker made a number of such off-color jokes about characters including Wonder Woman and Aquaman, who had brief cameos in the season finale. After initially saying he had not yet seen the episode, Amell now says that he has, and wasn’t a fan….

(13) DAWN DATA. The Verge tells readers “What the Polaris Dawn mission could reveal about human health in space”.

…The research in the Polaris program, planned to be three flights, is particularly focused on human health and the effects of spaceflight on the body. The current mission will be studied by Baylor College of Medicine, with the astronauts giving blood and going through extensive biomedical testing both before and after the flight.

But what sets the Polaris Dawn mission apart is its altitude, 870 miles above the Earth’s surface to be exact. That’s far higher than the typical altitude of the International Space Station, at around 250 miles, and makes Polaris Dawn the farthest humans have been from Earth since the Apollo missions. 

That altitude took the craft through Earth’s inner Van Allen belt, a region of charged particles that protect the planet from dangerous radiation. The crew members are fitted with sensors to measure their cumulative radiation exposure over the mission, and the spacecraft interior is fitted with a sensor to detect the different types of radiation in the environment.

“It’s an opportunity to see what kind of [radiation] exposure that we get as they get further and further away from the surface of the Earth,” explained Baylor’s Translational Research Institute for Space Health deputy director Jimmy Wu. “That’s something that we don’t have a whole lot of data on, because we’ve been limited to the number of humans that have been that far. So that’s critically important to understand.”…

(14) CLOG DANCING. CNN explains why “47-year-old Voyager 1 spacecraft just fired up thrusters it hasn’t used in decades”.

…Voyager 1 used the thrusters for a variety of purposes as it flew by planets such as Jupiter and Saturn in 1979 and 1980, respectively.

Now, the spacecraft is traveling on an unchanging path away from our solar system, so it just requires one set of thrusters to help keep its antenna pointed at Earth. To fuel the thrusters, liquid hydrazine is converted into gas and released in about 40 short puffs per day to keep Voyager 1 oriented correctly.

Over time, engineers discovered that a fuel tube inside the thrusters can become clogged with silicon dioxide, a byproduct of the fuel tank’s rubber diaphragm aging. As the thrusters become clogged, they generate less force.

In 2002, the team commanded Voyager 1 to switch to its second set of attitude propulsion thrusters when the first set showed signs of clogging. Engineers switched again to the trajectory correction thruster set in 2018 when the second set also appeared clogged.

But when the team recently checked on the status of Voyager’s trajectory correction thrusters, they were even more clogged than the previous two sets of thrusters.

When the team initially switched Voyager over to the trajectory correction thrusters six years ago, the tube opening was 0.01 inches (0.25 millimeters) across. But now, clogging has reduced it to 0.0015 inches (0.035 millimeters) — half the width of a human hair, according to NASA.

It was time to rotate back to another set of attitude propulsion thrusters….

(15) WHAT’S THAT SMELL? “Astronauts reveal what life is like on ISS – and how they deal with ‘space smell'” at the BBC.

…A lucky few are asked to do a spacewalk, leaving the ISS for the space vacuum outside. Mr Hadfield has done two. “Those 15 hours outside, with nothing between me and the universe but my plastic visor, was as stimulating and otherworldly as any other 15 hours of my life.”

But that spacewalk can introduce something novel to the space station – the metallic “space smell”.

“On Earth we have lots of different smells, like washing machine laundry or fresh air. But in space there’s just one smell, and we get used to it quickly,” explains Helen Sharman, the first British astronaut, who spent eight days on the Soviet space station Mir in 1991.

Objects that go outside, like a suit or scientific kit, are affected by the strong radiation of space. “Radiation forms free radicals on the surface, and they react with oxygen inside the space station, creating a metallic smell,” she says.

When she returned to Earth, she valued sensory experiences much more. “There’s no weather in space – no rain on your face and or wind in your hair. I appreciate those so much more to this day now,” she says, 33 years later….

(16) MONSTER WHEELS. You might enjoy these “10 Killer Facts About Herman’s Munster Mobile Koach – The Munsters” at CarStarz.

The Munster Koach from the 1964 show “The Munsters” is a legendary automotive icon that perfectly encapsulates the series’ unique blend of horror and humor. Designed by George Barris, the Munster Koach is a stunningly macabre hot rod, fashioned from multiple Ford Model T chassises, complete with a body resembling a sleek black coffin. The vehicle is adorned with eerie spider-web detailing, a towering Dragula-shaped front end, and a crimson interior, adding to its distinctive and ghoulish charm. This one-of-a-kind creation served as both transportation and a source of endless comedy on the show. It has since become a beloved and instantly recognizable symbol of the Munster family’s quirky, endearing, and ever-memorable lifestyle, leaving an indelible imprint on the world of classic television.

(17) ROD SERLING STATUE. If you’d like to see the real thing, here’s a video of last weekend’s official unveiling: “September 15, 2024: Statue of Rod Serling Dedicated in Binghamton, NY”.

[Thanks to Teddy Harvia, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, Paul Weimer, Francis Hamit, Nickpheas, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, and Kathy Sullivan for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Jon Meltzer.]