Day 30 - To finish we need a great tune for the end credits - what's your favourite sci-fi theme?

I chose Rebel Alliance over The Empire but have already said that the bad guys get the best tunes. I love the Imperial March from Star Wars, as composed by the great John Williams. I've been watching some classic Irwin Allen television recently and was astonished to find out that Williams composed the original theme tunes for Lost in Space, The Time Tunnel and Land of the Giants. To be honest I could pick one of those tunes but let's stick with my original idea and march out to the Darth Vader theme.

Day 29 - Best pre 1980s sci-fi

Another film that I remember from those great days in the 1970s when all this fantastic science fiction turned up on TV. I was completely floored by the ecological message in Douglas Trumball's Silent Running and absolutely charmed by the three service robots. It was great to see Huey, Dewey and the remnant of Louie show up in the recent Where'e WALL-E? poster.

However, I haven't seen this film in years. I suspect it might be a little boring now but I shall have to get hold of a copy and let you know.

Day 28 - A great sci-fi B-Movie

Everyone loves Forbidden Planet. The only dispute could be whether it is actually a B-movie or was it something bigger than that? It's another movie which I remember having a considerable effect on me when I watched it on television in the 1970s, largely due the idea of the terrible ID creation that Professor Morbius unleashes. It was only years later that I learnt the whole thing was based on Shakespeare's The Tempest. It's got Leslie Nielsen in his straight acting days, the lovely Anne Francis and it was the first movie to feature Robby the Robot. And just look at the fantastic poster. B-Movie heaven!

Day 27 - Who are the nastiest bad guys?

Great bad guys make for great science fiction. Think of the Daleks, the Cybermen and the Borg. I'm sticking with the big screen for this category though and also sticking with yesterday's film. There is something really creepy about the Reavers from Firefly and Serenity. As Zoe put it in one of the TV episodes:

"If they take the ship, they'll rape us to death, eat our flesh, and sew our skins into their clothing - and if we're very very lucky, they'll do it in that order."


The film provides an explanation for their behaviour which was a mystery in the TV series, and it somehow made them even worse. Honestly, Reavers could give me nightmares if I let them.

Day 26 - Best battle scene

I want a space battle for this category and I'm torn between the single ship encounter at the end of Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan and the huge conflagration that occurs when the Reaver ships meet the Federation at the end of the Serenity. Both battles feature stunning examples of clever captaincy. Much as I like the shot of the Enterprise rising through the static discharges of the Mutara Nebula I'm going to go with the big shoot-out in Serenity.

Interestingly it relies on a similar gas cloud, nebula thingy as a plot device to set up a clever manoeuvre. It's short and nasty and shows off the brilliant special effects work. And stuck right in the middle is the Firefly class ship Serenity, crewed by people who are trying to do something smart and right.

Day 25 - Funniest sci-fi

There may be some Star Trek fans who find Galaxy Quest offensive. I hope not, because it seems to me to have been made with a considerable amount of affection for the source material. It makes fun of the ridiculous aspects of television science fiction and of fandom, but it also highlights the heroic intentions of Gene Roddenberry's original series.

The cast are so great it's difficult to pick out individual performances. Tim Allen does a fantastic turn as a washed up star who unleashes his inner Kirk. Sigourney Weaver gets to make knowing jokes about her hair, cleavage and those pesky air-ducts. Alan Rickman, Sam Rockwell, Tony Shaloub and Enrico Colantoni are all fantastic. The effects, story, bad guys and the jokes are all perfect. It's a comedy I can watch repeatedly. Great fun.

Day 24 - Who's the No. 1 captain?

Much as I would like to choose Captain Mal Reynolds again I'm sure that this question is asking me stick to the Star Trek universe. And it has to be Kirk. Or should I say: KIRKKKKK!!!!

He's the man with a plan, he's the one I would pick to get me out of trouble (if I can't get the Doctor that is). Whether he's played by the Shat, or by the new swaggering Chris Pine, he is the business.

Day 23 - It's party-time! Which sci-fi character are you going to dress-up as then?

I used to think I could have a go at a Judge Dredd costume but that would be a lot of work. Instead of that, let's look at a costume that is much easier. I now have to wear my glasses nearly all the time, or just for looking at stuff as we say in my house. I couldn't pull off the look of Superman, but I might manage a clumsy, bumbling Clark Kent.

This would be a straight-forward costume.

Day 22 - Coolest alien race

Thee is something that is both cool and terrifying at the same time about the Borg. I wonder which Star Trek writer came up with this brilliant concept that became the "killer app" for Star Trek: The Next Generation. Their implacable will and the stark simplicity of their spacecraft (why should space craft be streamlined?) makes them great television baddies.

They are flesh melded with machine, they return again and again, and they have a great catchphrase, in fact they are the Star Trek equivalent of the Daleks. No wonder, that they work so well.

Day 21 - Fave alien invasion movie/series

The invasion stories that disturb me the most are the silent, secret type. The big budget, let's destroy famous buildings and monuments approach is much less interesting. When I was young I was really creeped out by all the classic science fiction films that the BBC used to show. I vividly remember the horror of the idea of small town America being taken over by relentless Pod people who seemed just like us apart from a disturbing lack of emotion.

All sorts of different readings are possible for this film, and it has been linked to the politics of its era. Despite all this the writer, director and actors just thought they were making a good old scary movie. It's difficult to beat that image of Kevin McCarthy running though the traffic trying to warn his fellow travellers that "You're next!"

Invasion of the Body Snatchers is a great invasion movie.

Day 20 - What's the best adaptation of a sci-fi book/story?

Now I like this question. One option would be to go for an adaptation that radically changed the source novel like Blade Runner or Minority Report. Or I could look for a more faithful adaptation like Dune or Fahrenheit 451. Then there is another category, films which made an appalling travesty out of great books like the Will Smith I, Robot.

Having considered all that I'm going to return to an earlier theme on this blog. Like most other geeky children of the seventies I was Planet of the Apes mad at the time. After being shocked by the dramatic conclusion of the original film I sought out the original novel Monkey Planet by the French writer Pierre Boule. This was quite a different planet to the one shown in the film. In the book the Apes are very civilised and technologically advanced, and the differences between the Apes and the stranded astronaut are intellectual and philosophical.

So this is a film that, in my humble opinion, improves upon the source material. The best adaptation of a book is the original Planet of the Apes movie.

Day 19 - Empire or Rebel Alliance?

This is the boring low point of this 30 day challenge. Plucky, good guys with the coolest space-ships or evil, planet-destroying bad guys who are controlled by a demonic Emperor? I'll pick the Rebel alliance please.

I will say one thing for the Empire though. They have the better theme tune.

Day 18 - Best use of SFX on the small screen

CGI special effects on the small screen are still a bit dodgy, and very hard, and expensive, to get right. There are other effects that are very impressive. It's still hard for me to believe that the Weeping Angels in Blink were actually actors in silver paint. Classic Doctor Who. But I am trying hard to look beyond the British Invaders universe.

Let's go back to a classic. I love picking holes in Fringe but it is no X-Files. And if we're talking classic X-Files we have to be talking about the scary episode Squeeze. Eugene Tombs was a splendidly creepy bad guy and the scenes when he distorts his body to climb through a narrow chimney is really impressive. The special effects guys did a great job and, along with some thoroughly nasty sounds, it makes for a terrific episode.

Day 17 - Best use of SFX on the big screen

It's 20 years since it was released but I still think that it is hard to beat the special effects in Terminator 2: Judgement Day. It's strange that the SFX guys have still not improved on the CGI figures in this film. And it's a rip-roaring adventure film with Arnold's best moments on screen.

I echo the comments of the late, great Bill Hicks when he said "You couldn't beat these special effects .. unless..."

Day 16 - A great quote!

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.
I watched c-beams glitter in the dark near the Tanhauser Gate.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
...
Time to die.


Almost breaks your heart doesn't it? That's Roy Batty's famous Tears in the Rain speech from the end of Blade Runner, as delivered by Rutger Hauer. Has Hauer ever been better in a film? His performance as Batty is one of the great creations in all of science fiction. He is smart, menacing and, ultimately, a tragic figure. And depending on which version of events you believe Hauer actually wrote or re-wrote the above lines from the original script. Epic stuff.

Day 15 - Which Spaceship would you most like to own/fly?

I already picked my British Invaders spaceship so let's move out into the wider universe. It's far too obvious to pick the Millennium Falcon and besides, it breaks down all the time. Likewise the Nostromo from Alien blows up. X-Wing fighters crash in swamps, the Discovery one has a dodgy on-board computer, the Event Horizon goes to hell, and the Enterprise looks like it takes a lot of work to keep it up there.

On the other hand Serenity looks like you really could fix it with a Swiss army knife and a roll of gaffer tape. It's got some style, it's kept in the air by love, and it just wants to do good works. Plus I might be able to afford it or one like it.

Day 14 - An under-rated sci-fi gem

This is a tricky one. I confess I struggled to think of a movie that I believe is great but is generally under-rated. In the end I have strayed slightly outside of genre. This is more of a comic book movie than pure science fiction, but I like the slow build as the plot and the twist reveal themselves. It is a film that gets over looked in discussions about M.Night Shymalan's deteriorating career. Bruce Willis and Samuel L Jackson are reliable as ever, as are the supporting cast. The script is good and the action sequences are almost shockingly real. In particular there is one fight with Willis's character just hanging on with a grim determination until his job is done. As a comic book fan I love the way that the raincoat Willis wears becomes a super-hero's cowl and cape.

I think Unbreakable is really under rated.

Day 13 - What's your favourite flavour of Star Trek?

This question is probably meant to concentrate on the TV series and asking me to pick between TOS, TNG, Deep Space Nine, Voyager or Enterprise but I'm going to cheat. I think my favourite incarnation of Star Trek is the movie reboot by J.J.Abrams. Much has been written about the 2009 film so I'll just say that it was a really clever and cool way to restart the Star Trek universe. I thought the casting was great, the action sequences and special effects were fantastic, and it even has a green skinned woman just like classic trek. I also didn't mind the shaky camera and constant lens flare that annoyed so many viewers.

It was neat to see Captain Pike in there and to find that he appears to have avoided his fate as shown in the Menagerie. And while on the subject of Pike I can recount a rather good suggestion by Simon Mayo that during the sequence of the film where Pike is being tortured by Eric Bana to reveal the Federation security codes, British audiences might amuse themselves by shouting at the screen "Don't tell him, Pike."

Anyway, I look forward to the next film in the new Star trek flavoured series.

Day 12 - What's your Yeah I know it's rubbish but I LOVE it sci-fi film?

This one is easy. It's the science fiction film that we ALL know is is rubbish but we all love it anyway.

Dum-dum-dum-dum-dum .... Flash! Ah-ah.

We should hate this movie but it's just a great romp. The stellar cast enjoy themselves hugely. The costumes are fabulous. The dialogue is cheesy, "Flash, I love you, but we only have fourteen hours to save the Earth!". And then there is that pounding Queen soundtrack.

It's a great film. Give in to the power of the dark side and watch Flash Gordon again.

Day 11 - Fave space film series

I can't really choose the Star Wars or Star Trek movies as so many of them are rubbish. I think this question is asking me for a film series mostly set in space and I can only think of one other. I wish there was a Serenity series to pick but sadly that seems unlikely to happen. So that leaves me with the body-horror bad guys. With Colonial Marines who, if you were paying attentions, got their asses kicked. With shaven headed prisoners and a dog/bull beastie. And finally with the strange mix of Joss Whedon, the director of Amelie, and Ron Perlman.

I really like the Alien movies and I'm looking forward to the forthcoming Prometheus. Those creepy Giger monsters are my favourite space series.