Big Sci-Fi with a Little Budget

Since we haven’t had the time to really go into that great realm that is science fiction, I thought I would bring up a series near and dear to my heart – which very few people around here have heard of. Red Dwarf ran for 8 wonderful seasons from 1988 to 1999 – an excellent run for a sci-fi comedy. Now what makes Red Dwarf different from all others of its kind is that it (for seasons I - VI) was filmed with a live studio audience. That’s right; a show that takes place on a mining ship that is 6 miles long is shot with a live audience.

For those who aren’t familiar to the series (which I imagine is nearly everyone – it was a British show that started running when we were babies), Red Dwarf follows the misadventures of David Lister, the last living human on the ship, Arnold Rimmer, a hologram, the Cat, an evolved form of an ordinary housecat, Kryten, an android, and Holly, a computer program who occasionally switches gender. Now, something that really adds to the overall humor of the program is how small the show’s budget was and what they did to work around it. For example, the only thing that distinguishes the holographic people from the living ones is an H on their foreheads. And even though they’re on a huge ship, we only ever see a few rooms. In order to not offend people, Red Dwarf developed a rather catchy language of swear words – all based on the word ‘smeg’.

Despite it all, Red Dwarf has had more than its share of notoriety. An episode from 1994, entitled “Gunmen of the Apocalypse” won an International Emmy Award. The series has also won a British Science Fiction Award and the Royal Television Society Award for Special Effects. Surprizingly, in 2007, the show was voted "Best Sci-Fi Show of All Time" by the readers of Radio Times magazine - despite the fact that there hadn't been new episodes since 1999.

Now, it might seem odd to suggest that a series that ran for 8 seasons ended before it’s time, but Red Dwarf seems to have done just that. The final episode of season VIII does not have a definitive conclusion. Keeping in mind that there were 2 years between the release of seasons VI and VII, it could be that they are just waiting for the right moment to add more to this epic series. Over the years, there have also been many attempts to make a Red Dwarf movie…maybe someday they’ll be able make it reality. Anyway, Happy 20th Anniversary Red Dwarf!!!!

For more information, click here

In the not-too-distant future...

What do you get when you put a man and some robots on a satellite and force them to watch awful movies?

Only one of the greatest shows of all time, Mystery Science Theater 3000.



First airing on a Twin Cities UHF station in 1988, the show went through multiple channel and schedule changes, but still kept the original idea and spirit. In the beginning, a research facility janitor named Joel Robinson (played by series creator Joel Hodgson) is sent into space by his bosses. He is forced to watch terrible movies, and his reactions are studied. His only companions on the satellite are the robots he himself built. Two of them, Crow T. Robot and Tom Servo, join him in the theater to joke about the films. Hodgson eventually left the series in its fifth season, and the head writer, Mike Nelson, was brought in as the new host/victim. The evil mad scientists that ran the game were replaced by one of their mothers, along with an omniscient alien with his brain in a pan and a primate (literally) professor.

Though the outer space setting would definitely seem to firmly cement the show in the “science fiction” column, the connections often were somewhat tenuous. As the theme song says, “if you’re wondering how he eats and breathes, and other science facts, just repeat to yourself 'it’s just a show, I should really just relax'.” The characters constantly flouted the laws of science and physics, doing things like taking sharp left turns in space and venturing outside the satellite without any sort of protection from the vacuum of space. However, many of the movies they were forced to watch had science fiction, fantasy, or horror themes. (A rule from which they often deviated, even in the years on the SciFi channel, who were far more strict about it than Comedy Central had been.)

Part of what makes the show so significant to us is its postmodernist nature. The structure was mostly its own, but the jokes during the movies were PACKED with references. They range from the lowbrow (dish soap commercials and Hagar the Horrible) to the erudite (Mark Rothko and Archduke Ferdinand). It’s difficult to catch everything they say the first time. This makes the show ripe for rewatching multiple times. You always catch something you missed before. Attempts have been made to compile a sort of reference for the sources of all of the quotes, but these aren’t always very thorough.


MST3K was a bizarre concept that somehow caught on. It starred nobody famous or glamorous, had production values lower than some of the films they watched, and every episode is two hours long. However, the intelligence that clearly existed in the crew was able to show through in its own unique way. Unfortunately it ended in 1999, with reruns continuing only for a couple years more. However, its spirit lives on.

For more information, there are many comprehensive website dedicated to the show.
MST3K.booyaka.com
Satellite News
There are also many episodes available on DVD (or on YouTube).

They Be Huntin' Vampires!

As I was scouring the Internet after Buffy week, I came across an interesting article from The Independent, which is a newspaper from the United Kingdom. The article is entitled, “The Real Vampire Slayers”. Alright, are you interested? Here’s a link:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/europe/the-real-vampire-slayers-397874.html

For those of you who have decided not to actually read the article, let me summarize it now. The article talks about the filming of a documentary for the discovery channel, called “Real Vampires”. I had never heard of it before, so maybe you haven’t either. An archeologist, Dr. Timothy Taylor, who studies visceral human behavior (such as cannibalism, or human sacrifice – hey, remember that?), had been studying the culture in the Romanian town of Transylvania (for those who don’t know, yes, it really exists) for several years. He had been drawn there, as many people often are, by the stories of Count Dracula. As many often do, when they travel to this part of the world, they want to learn about the REAL Count Dracula, Vladislav the Impaler. No, folks, that’s not just a nickname, it was also a hobby of his. If you want to learn more Vladislav, here’s a link to a wikipedia article on him.

Getting back to the article, Taylor decided to venture to Transylvania with his partner, Kathryn Denning, and a film crew. They wanted to study not only Vladislav, but also the vampire beliefs that are ingrained in the culture there. You see, the vampire slaying came out a period when there was sickness in the world (there was an outbreak of rabies at the time), and a great fear of dying. Somehow this fear of dying turned into a fear of those who seemed to not die. At the time, not much was understood about death, particularly of corpses. Certainly strange things can occur in a dead body that has not been properly cared for (it can even explode).

They are very ritualistic in the caring for the dead. They may present gifts of food for the dead for up to seven years after a death. If someone is determined to have become a strigoi, which is basically like a demon (or vampire), then there is also a ritual for that as well. The chest of the body must be opened in a specific way, and the heart cut out. The heart is then taken outside of town and burned. The ashes from this are then ground up into a powder and put into water. The victim who is being haunted by the strigoi must then drink this mixture. Ew.

The strigoi are the real world equivalent of vampires. They don’t actually suck blood, but are believed to feast on the heart (in other words, the soul) of the victim. Since this culture has such a strong believe that blood is like the energy or power of the soul, it is not hard to see how the legend turned into actual blood sucking.

The article reminded me about the stories of real zombies several years ago. Apparently the real world equivalent comes from a Voodoo practice. A Voodoo witch would use a substance from a puffer fish, which would paralyze the victim to the point that they appear dead. As is often found in third world areas, bodies are usually buried very quickly, as there isn’t the kind of preservation available, like we have in the U.S. Soon after the body was buried, the witch would retrieve the body and wait for it to come to life. There is the thought that sometimes the oxygen deprivation may have caused brain damage. However, most who have studied the supposed (yet, mostly unfounded) practice think that it was more likely that the when the victim woke up, the witch would brainwash them into slavery. You can check out more information for yourself here.

X: Japan- Apocalypse Style.

Well, since we've been talking so much about the end of the world, I figured I'd talk about how our neighbors to the east have handled the Apocalypse in their respective media.  Probably the best example of Japan's attempt to handle the end of the world is the series Ekkusu, which translates simply to X.

X is a manga and Anime series created by Clamp, a creative team made up of four japanese women (a rarity in the manga business).  X is Clamp's attempt to push into apocalyptic fiction, something vastly different than their previous titles (they were previously known for creating shoujo manga, which literally translates to manga aimed at young girls).  It combines elements from various end of the world scenarios, both secular and religious, with its own mythos.

The story takes place in 1999, just before the Millennium. Many different individuals with superhuman abilities gather in Tokyo (which is to be the battleground for the End of the World) and choose sides.  The series follows the anti-hero Kamui Shirō, a young man returning to Japan for the first time in seven years in order to fulfill his mother's dying wish and protect those dear to him.  The two sides of the war, calling themselves the Dragons of Earth and the Dragons of Heaven, are vying for Kamui's strength, as each side believes him to be the one who holds the key to the future of fate of the world. X follows Kamui on his own heroic journey, where the emphasis of the story is placed on his choices and how they affect the world around him, all while he attempts to reconcile his possible roles as either savior or destroyer of the world.

One of the most interesting aspects of the story is the physical manifestation of ideological concepts (that are never overtly stated) in the Dragons of Heaven and the Dragons of Earth.  The Dragons of Earth represent the belief that conflicts between man and nature cannot be resolved peaceably, and that humans are on an irreversible path that will ultimately lead to the murder of the planet itself unless they are stopped.  As such, their mission is to destroy the earth in order to allow it to rejuvenate itself.  Conversely, The Dragons of Heaven represent the belief that conflicts between man and nature can and must be resolved peaceably, and that humanity is no less precious than the Earth itself.

X ran as a serialized manga in the publication Monthly Asuka from 1992 until 2003 when the creators put the story on hiatus without developing an official end to the series. It was animated into a feature film in 1996 with relative success in Japan, and five years later it was made into the much more successful TV series which ran for 24 episodes (a standard running time for a two-season anime) and was much more successful at exploring the original mythos and characters' back stories into the narrative, albeit in a much more violent manner.

If you're interested, you can find X on the shelves at pretty much any video store with an Anime section (Pioneer Entertainment bought the American distribution rights and released the series with both English and the original Japanese voices).  I highly recommend it if you're looking for a bit of action.

The Many Lives of Sabrina

In 1962, a character named Sabrina the Teenage Witch appeared in the comic book Archie’s Mad House. Readers liked the character, and so she appeared in several Archie Comics throughout the '60s until the publishers decided to give her her own comic book in 1971. Sabrina the Teenage Witch was published from 1971-1983, running for 77 issues. The principal characters from the comic book that later appear in the television series of the same name are Sabrina Spellman, her aunts Hilda and Zelda (who are also witches), the Spellmans’ sarcastic talking cat Salem (who used to be a warlock), and Sabrina’s mortal boyfriend Harvey, who is unaware that Sabrina is a witch.

In 1996, Hallmark Entertainment produced a TV movie for Showtime based on the Sabrina comic, starring Melissa Joan Hart, who had gained popularity from her days as Clarissa on Nickeldeon’s hit series “Clarissa Explains it All”. In the movie, Sabrina’s parents send her to live with her two eccentric aunts. On her sixteenth birthday, Sabrina finds out she is a witch. With a point of her finger, she can now change her clothes and her test scores, but as her Aunt Zelda tells her, witches can't interfere with the human heart, because "love is too precious for anyone to tamper with." The movie was a success, and ABC greenlit a series based on it. Despite differences in characters and casting, the TV movie served as the unofficial pilot. "Sabrina" ran from 1996-2003 on ABC and was part of the popular TGIF lineup along with “Boy Meets World”.

The show was clearly influenced by supernatural sitcoms "Bewitched" and "I Dream of Jeannie", as well as the 1980s sitcom "Out of This World", about a teenage girl who is half-alien. Like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", "Sabrina the Teenage Witch" (which has a very similar title but came first, mind you) was based on a bad movie of the same name and featured a teenage girl with supernatural abilities who was otherwise a normal teen. However, "Sabrina" followed more of a traditional sitcom format than "Buffy" (and Buffy was probably more of a badass). Sabrina deals with being a teenager while learning more about her powers and the secrets of her family. When Sabrina's parents got divorced, right before her sixteenth birthday, they sent her to live with her witch aunts, who they knew would take good care of her and teach her about her powers. Sabrina's father is a warlock, but her mother is a mortal. Now that Sabrina is a witch, she will turn her mortal mother into a ball of wax if she looks at her.

The show takes place in the fictional town of Westbridge, located near Boston, MA. This creative choice as well as the choice to name the Spellmans' warlock cat "Salem" are obvious references to the Salem witch trials that took place in these areas of Massachusetts in the 1600s. Sabrina often takes trips to the “Other Realm,” another dimension where witches and other supernatural creatures live. When in the Other Realm, Sabrina often deals with Drell, the head of the Witches’ Council, played by Penn of the comedic illusionist duo Penn & Teller. Barbara Eden of “I Dream of Jeannie” also shows up to play Sabrina’s Great Aunt Irma in several episodes.

In true postmodern fashion, Melissa Joan Hart showed up once in a while playing the character of Sabrina Spellman in other ABC shows in the TGIF lineup, including the television adaptation of “Clueless,” “Boy Meets World,” and the very short-lived series “Teen Angel” and “You Wish”. "Sabrina the Teenage Witch" also spun off two more TV movies – “Sabrina Goes to Rome” and “Sabrina Down Under”. After Sabrina graduated high school, we watched her take her wacky witchy antics on to college. This was when I stopped watching, because the cast completely changed (Punky Brewster and Amber from "Clueless"?!) and it just wasn't the same. The franchise later returned to its animated roots with a prequel, “Sabrina: The Animated Series,” with the younger Sabrina voiced by Hart’s younger sister and Hart voicing the two aunts. Talk about milking a franchise for all it's worth.

Regardless, this was a show that was very important to my preteen years. I'll never forget the episode when Sabrina didn't have a date to the dance, and her aunts helped her make a date out of "man dough" (and it was Brian Austen Green from 90210. Sooo '90s.)

Lost Spoilers of Season 4.

To many this topic is too tiresome but I just can't stop thinking about it and what might happen in the rest of the season. This season has been the best by far. The major episodes when finding out who will be the ultimate survivors or why they are even being called the oceanic 6 were the best ones. We know Hurley, Kate, Jack, Sun, Sayid are definite survivors because we have seen their flash forward. As for the last survivor we know Michael and Walt make it off the island but they are undercover and we really don't even know what is going on with them. So, I surmise they are not included in the “Oceanic 6”, because then it would be 7. We know Michael is suicidal but the Island has control over him still and won't allow him to kill himself- yet. Desmond's episode was the best by far. It was so well done with the jumping from one state of mind to another. Whether or not the Island was controlling this, I am not sure. The time change continuum- what is that all about? Will Desmond survive to see Penny again? Faraday-the scientist- writes "If anything goes wrong, Desmond Hume will be my constant." That’s pretty intense, it’s like saying he will be eaten by the time continuum also, but apparently it doesn’t affect everyone. Sayid made it out alive.

Alright, so Desmond is saved- for now- and Ben is saved. Ben isn’t one of the Oceanic 6, like Desmond, but he survives it all. It makes me wonder how a man can be so hated by everyone yet never be killed… He must have some power that controls this island and its happenings- though no powers that can make someone love him (Juliet in mind). Anyways, we see him in Sayid’s episode where Sayid is actually working for Ben… that was a shocker WHYY would Sayid ever work for that lying bastard. It really makes no sense unless Ben has something Sayid needs/loves/wants… so maybe Ben is using him. It just shocks me.

The 6th person hasn’t been mentioned, that I am aware of. It can be argued that Aaron is the final survivor, I don’t buy it. Aaron wasn’t on the roster when the plane crash- therefore, could he actually be the final survivor when he didn’t exist when the plane took off? I think that could be swung either way. My guess is that he isn’t. Kate’s episode was predictable, probably one of the more boring of the new season so far (The Other Woman being the worst). The moment we find out she has a kid in the future I knew it was Aaron, it wasn’t hard to pick up on at all, what is more weird about that than anything is Jack’s reaction to her raising Aaron. Does Jack find out he is related to Aaron, and doesn’t want anything to do with him? What exactly is his problem with Aaron? We saw in an earlier season of Lost that Jack and Claire are related by the father Shepard. He appears all over the island at random times, so there is something very fishy going on with this man/spirit. We have seen him this season in episode one (if you freeze frame) when Hurley sees the house of Jacob… there is a flash of Shepard. It really just blows my mind.

As for people who they can now kill off in the show, well we have Jin and Claire. Do we think they die of something horrible? We will find out. In the Sun/Jin episode we see Sun’s flash forward and Jin’s flashback (probably). There could always be a crazy time warp continuum thing going on there. Or, Jin could be undercover/ just not dead. JJ isn’t one to just let a character go- they generally find their way back into the script. Since Kate has Aaron- what happens to Claire, she probably dies. Any number of things could happen; I am pretty excited to see where that leads.

Up next I would love too see Ben’s story, I bet everyone is waiting for it, likewise with Locke. I know people aren’t fond of Locke this season however, we don’t really know why he is being all aggressive towards friends and then easy going with Ben. How does that make any sense? I think everyone needs to give him another chance, but we will really find out what’s going on when we get his point of the story, which I am longing for. Maybe he isn’t going crazy- how do we know. Now, I kind of cheated because I was reading the Lost Magazine at Borders the other day and there was an interview with a staff writer. Spoiler- so they are going to bring back Richard aka Bens lackey or whoever he was. He is the guy that hadn’t aged in 30 years, he was one of the originals on the island or as they called themselves the “hostiles”, during the Dharma times. I love his character, I think we can learn a lot, and I want to know more about them.

This show just keeps me guessing after every moment engaged with it. It’s really obsessive but I just really want to know more- they better wrap it nicely at the end with a bow and cake. I don’t want to be left outside in the dark, alone- with my teddy bear and no food. If that made any sense…

Ouroboros

While watching Millenium, we talked about the Ouroboros, as depicted to the right. It is a serpent devouring its own tail, and symbolizes multiple things, such as death, but also infinity. I personally knew a few ideas that presented the Ouroboros in other names, and decided to do some research to see where it else comes from.

The Ouroboros has shown up in many religions of cultures, from all over the world. Alongside being a serpent eating its own tail, frequently the story also includes it from being of the sea, or relating to the sea in some fashion. The story also has a lot to do with the combination of death and rebirth, as one may assume from the picture.

One of the earliest stories of this is Tiamat, the Goddess of the Salt Water, which also represents chaos. She's in the Babylonian creation myth, in which before the sky and the earth, there was only the ocean, Tiamat. Tiamat begot all the other gods, and thus was at the head of the chain (for those interested in Matriarchy, Goddess' like Tiamat and Gaia show women may have once been in control of the world). Paranoia broke out among the younger gods, and a bunch of murders likeable to a war occurred. Tiamat was displeased by this, and decided to drown the world (Great Flood anyone?), but Marduk cut Tiamat in two. Her separation became the heavens and the earth, and from her death all life came.

The one I know best is Jormugandr, form Norse mythology. Jormugandr is one of Loki's three children (four if you count Sleipnir), and has a large presence during Ragnarok. Jormugandr is described as a serpent so massive that it lives at the bottom of the ocean where the world is largest and goes across all of it to the point where its biting its own tail. As such, Jormugandr is known as the Midgard Serpent (Midgard = Norse World, so aka The World Serpent). When Ragnarok does finally come, Jormugandr will rise from the sea and poison the seas and skies. Thor will battle Jormugandr, and kills him by separating Jormugandr's upper jaw from his lower jaw to the point that it rips Jormugandr in two (*cough TIAMAT cough*. Unfortunately, in Ragnarok basically every God dies...and in the fight Thor is poisoned, and the stress of tearing Jormugandr asunder lets Thor only take a few steps forward. But, the tale of Ragnarok continues in that a few key Gods survive, and bring out a better world for us all. There are a few other Norse tales that also have large serpents biting their own tails.

While on the concept of Apocalyptic events...lets look at the Apocalypse. Leviathan is the sea serpent, and one of the enemies of man when the end comes. The word Leviathan means "Coiled," and being a Sea-serpent you get an image of a serpent biting its own tail. Some pictures of Leviathan depict him as such. I am actually much less aware of Leviathan's presence in the Apocalypse other than that seas will rise and help drown us out.

Well...so far it looks like Ouroboros is evil. Quetzalcoatl is the opposite, being one of the 4 major Aztec gods. Quetzalcoatl name symbolizes a flying serpent, and is the god of the sky. While not the god of earthly water, Rain (and as such floods) would fall under his domain and control. Quetzalcoatl's story is a little different, in that he helped created the world, and then he departed on a boat of snakes into the ocean (which if we know our American history, Spanish come back and are mistaken for their long lost God). Quetzalcoatl has been liked to Vishnu of Hinduism, who has also been described as Flying Serpent, and seen with the Ouroboros.

There's a bunch more too. Such as Hinduism having a serpent that circles the worlds ocean and helps keep the world at balance. A good amount of various African and Asian mythologies also have presented the concept of the Ouroboros in various forms.