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From: karn@petrus.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.tv
Subject: Re: Space
Message-ID: <325@petrus.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 18-Apr-85 16:06:19 EST
Article-I.D.: petrus.325
Posted: Thu Apr 18 16:06:19 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 19-Apr-85 01:03:57 EST
References: <1750012@acf4.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Communications Research, Inc
Lines: 54

> Am I the only person alive who is watching "Space"?

Well, you're not, although I have my doubts about whether I should admit
it in public. This thing is so bad I don't know where to begin. But I
keep watching because I find it impossible to NOT watch anything even remotely
related to space, and out of the (so far) futile that something interesting
will happen.

First of all, it's been an excellent workout for my new VCR. I've been able
to watch 2 hour episodes in an hour and a half, and that includes timeouts
to go grab something from the kitchen, etc.  The greatest invention
of our time is that little button marked ">>" on my remote control...

As I should have expected from the many early signs, "Space" has so far
been a deplorable, fluff-brained and utterly predictable soap opera with
an incredibly superficial view of space as its backdrop. With the
amount of time that the major characters spend in bed with each other, it's
amazing that there is any time at all (out of 13 hours) to present a story
about SPACE, as caricatured as it is. Or perhaps it indicates that the
Russians must have beaten us into orbit by castrating their scientists.

Will the Senator's affair with the beautiful and ambitious young lawyer
develop into a full fledged national sex scandal? Will her dashing young
astronaut husband forgive her? Will the NASA scientist be able to reconcile
himself with his homosexual son? Will the beautiful young Korean reporter
sleep with every astronaut before they fly? Does anybody even care? Will
ANYTHING appear in this series that will have made it worth watching?

Like I said, this is a good one for the VCR. By fast forwarding through
each episode you might find some good footage of rocket launches,
including some pretty spectacular footage of some early launch failures.
Try to ignore the story line; otherwise the effect of the "real" footage
footage is totally lost because it is so poorly integrated into the show.
For example, a particularly hard one to swallow was a long shot of an
empty Pad 39A (the primary space shuttle launch pad) that was passed off
as a view of Explorer 1 (the first successful American orbital launch)
sitting on the pad!  The "special effects" that were shot for this series
are apallingly bad. Even the sound effects were ludicrous. In last night's
episode, a scene from inside a Gemini capsule dubbed recorded conversations
from a "real" mission over the audio. The characters spoke on top
of the dub, which of course had nothing to do with their conversation.
I guess they just had severe crosstalk problems in their communications.

What's most depressing about this series is that it probably reflects
the space program as it is actually perceived by the American public.
As I heard a NASA tour guide say (in response to a question about "The
Right Stuff", a *far* better but still flawed movie), "Never let the facts
get in the way of telling a good story."

A series on space that seems to have far more potential is coming up on
PBS. "Spaceflight" has been promoted several times on WNET in New York
and is supposed to start in May. Watch for it.

Phil Karn