There’s a lot of talk about Star Wars / Star Trek crossovers, but none better than the time Leonard Nimoy presents Star Wars back in 1983. The back story is pretty simple: Leonard Nimoy hosted the making of “Return of the Jedi” (1983) from a Nickelodeon show called “Standby…Lights! Camera! Action!” which showed behind-the-scenes segments on major motion pictures.
As with every other Nimoy project, he brings some emotional gravitas that few other actors have been able to match. I hope you enjoy watching as Leonard Nimoy presents Star Wars! I enjoy sharing fun scifi stuff every Friday. Go down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!
For today, I’m tossing in some moments from Universal Studio’s Megatron picture zone – whoever this guy is, he needs to be in the next Transformers movie. Roasts by Megatron are definitely on my bucket list – Absolutely hysterical. Check out the guy who comes in around the 7:00 mark – hard to be scared when you’re laughing so hard:
So yeah, you’ll love Roasts by Megatron, fun scifi like this is what I enjoy sharing every Friday. Go down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!
Happy Friday! Here are ‘The Martian’ outtakes, fun scifi stuff for your pre-weekend consumption. ‘The Martian’ was directed by Ridley Scott and features Matt Damon and a ton of other great people. I had forgotten how many awesome actors were in ‘The Martian,’ so this gag reel is a happy walk down memory lane featuring Jeff Daniels, Kristen Wiig, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Michael Peña. There’s nothing quite like being on set with a bunch of talented professionals who love their work and love their material.
I love the Martian for a bunch of different reasons: A, it proved you can be successful at telling a hard scifi story, something people often say is impossible. B, Andy Weir is a decent guy and has been very gracious and helpful on the couple of times I’ve reached out to him. In fact, some of its hard scifi greatness comes through in the IMDB trivia page:
NASA was consulted in order to get aspects of space and space travel, specifically in relation to Mars, with the most accuracy. NASA is federally funded, yet charges no one, including private for-profit organizations, any fees for use of and access to its archives and consultancy.
In the beginning, it is mentioned that a compromised space suit would cause decompression, giving someone about a minute to live. This is scientifically correct; contrary to popular belief, acute decompression in space or a planet with very low pressure like Mars does not cause the body to immediately explode or expand. Major effects include confusion, loss of consciousness and some subdermal bleeding, but it is generally agreed that a healthy human body can survive one minute in vacuum without life-threatening consequences.
So yeah, you’ll love ‘The Martian’ outtakes – fun scifi like this is what I enjoy sharing every Friday. Go down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!
For this Sci-Friday, take a step into early CGI with ‘Beyond the Mind’s Eye,’ which was part of the larger ‘Mind’s Eye’ series produced in the early 90s as a sort of ‘film festival in a box.’ You could buy the videos at different places, I usually saw them at Sharper Image at the mall during that time. For most of us, this was our pre-‘Toy Story’ exposure to CGI storytelling.
Jan ‘The guy who did the Miami Vice theme’ Hammer scored ‘Beyond the Mind’s Eye,’ giving us a double-helping of fun sci-fi stuff: conceptual sound and visual art. Kick back, grab your favorite beverage, and enjoy! If you like Sci-Friday, you can go down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!
For this Sci-Friday, we take a walk down memory lane to enjoy some geek music and other fun sci-fi stuff. Ever wonder how they made the Reading Rainbow theme song back in the 80s before we had access to modern computer sound editing software and hardware? Here’s a clip that shows how they made the iconic theme on 80s-era hardware:
Two fun facts about Reading Rainbow: One, the show was specifically launched by PBS because of the “‘summer loss phenomena,’ whereby a child loses some of his or her reading abilities because they tend not to read during the summer.” Two, the original theme (used from 1983 to 1998) was performed by Tina Fabrique, who plays ‘Donna Davis’ on ‘Blue Bloods’ and featured one of the first uses of the Buchla synthesizer in a TV theme song.
So yeah, the Reading Rainbow theme is a beautiful example of both geek music, and fun sci-fi stuff. I hope this was a fun walk down memory lane for you, too. If you like Sci-Friday, you can go down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!
Following up on my Tenet essay, I love this parody of the Michael Caine / John David Washington lunch scene in Tenet because it’s so close to the actual scene itself. I’ve never seen Michael Spicer before but he positively nails this gag:
Many scifi stories aren’t afraid to lampoon themselves and people fall all over themselves to satirize Chris Nolan films on Youtube. Hope you enjoy this one!
If you like Sci-Friday, you can go down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!
Remember in The Mandalorian where they rocked a stolen AT-ST on planet Sorgan? Did you wonder to yourself – “I wonder what it looks like inside?” This guy did, and for Sci-Friday, we celebrate Max Degtyarev’s detailed cross-section Star Wars art of what it looks like inside the captured Empire scout tank.
As Star Wars art goes, this is top-notch. He gets the details right, even down to expression on the alien faces and the squashed frogs under the tread of an AT-ST’s bipedal foot. Always a joy when someone can get their ideas out of their head and onto the paper. That’s the very embodiment of Geekquinox and other key pieces of the Inkican tribe. I’m sure you’ll enjoy these pics as much as I did.
If you like Sci-Friday, you can go down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!
Ever look at a scifi ray gun and wish you could have one? You aren’t the only one. For this Sci-Friday, enjoy a real-life ZORG Industries ZF1 from ‘The Fifth Element.’ According to the builder, he’d been working on the software and hardware for over a year. Now it’s finally ready to show off!
Keep watching past the original picture – he includes a walkthrough of how he put everything together. Really comprehensive if you’re into making scifi cosplay or collectibles. Everyone experiences scifi in their own way, and this guy is at the top of his game.
ALSO –
I released some new memes from ‘Real Genius’ this week to Imgur. RG is one of those classic cult 80s movies that provided some of the inspiration for Mesh. Hope you enjoy these, too:
This ZORG Industries ZF1 from ‘The Fifth Element’ validates what I’ve said before: Makers are gonna make, no matter what. That’s what I was channeling when I made those memes and I hope this inspires you to keep on making whatever makes you happy! Have a great weekend!
If you love scifi, you love Futurama – it’s that simple. Matt Groenig’s love letter to pop culture and science fiction included some of the top voice actors in Hollywood including a guy named Billy West. Billy, if you didn’t already know, had already built a successful voice career doing Ren and Stimpy. He went full ‘Mel Blanc’ in Futurama, providing many of the beloved, bizarre characters you came to know and love. It’s always fun to watch a gag reel, so sit back and enjoy these Futurama voice actor bloopers:
Don’t stop here, though. Billy West has a channel on Youtube talking about some of his experiences as a pro voice actor. Definitely worth checking out if you’re interested in that side of the business.
Part of the benefit of watching Billy West and the Futurama voice actor bloopers is that it de-mystifies the entire process of making scifi. At the end of the day, it comes down to regular people coming together to make something awesome. Always has, always will. If you like Sci-Friday, you can go down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!