The SF/F TV Series Renaissance of the 1970s: UFO

This week in 1970, the cult classic TV series, UFO, debuted. It became popular in both the UK and the United States and a second series (season, here in the States) was planned but it later became Space: 1999.

UFO was the first live-action series created and produced by Gerry Anderson (Fireball-XL5, Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlett). It was dark at times, downbeat; innocent, unaware civilians got caught in the crossfire and paid a terrible price—it was, after all, about a secret organization fighting an invasion of organ-harvesting aliens.

Instead of The X-Files saying “Trust no one,” UFO said “Trust us.”

From Wikipedia:

The series’ premise is that in 1980, Earth is being visited by aliens from a dying planet, who are abducting humans and harvesting their organs for their own bodies. The alien incursions may also be a prelude to a possible full-scale invasion. The series' main cast of characters are the staff of a secret, high-technology international military agency called SHADO (an acronym for Supreme Headquarters Alien Defense Organization) established by the governments of the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, France and Germany (believed to be West Germany as the city of Bonn is mentioned along with Washington, Paris and Moscow) to defend Earth and humanity against the mysterious aliens and learn more about them, while at the same time keeping the threat of an alien invasion hidden from the public.

Operating under the cover—as well as literally beneath the premises—of the Harlington-Straker Studios movie studio in England, SHADO is headed by Commander Edward Straker (Ed Bishop), a former United States Air Force colonel and astronaut, whose "cover" is his role as the studio's chief executive.

SHADO has a variety of high-tech hardware and vehicles at its disposal to implement a layered defense of Earth. Early warnings of alien attack came from SID, the Space Intruder Detector, an unmanned computerized tracking satellite that constantly scans for UFO incursions. The forward line of defense is Moonbase from which the three lunar Interceptor spacecraft, that fire a single explosive warhead, are launched. The second line of defense includes Skydiver, a submarine mated with the submersible, undersea-launched Sky One interceptor aircraft, which attacks UFOs in Earth's atmosphere. The last line of defense is ground units including the armed, IFV-like SHADO Mobiles, fitted with caterpillar tracks.

On Earth, SHADO also uses two SHADAIR aircraft, a Seagull X-ray supersonic jet; a transatlantic Lunar Carrier with a separating Lunar Module; a helicopter (actually, a small VTOL airplane with large rotating propellers; and a radio-controlled Space Dumper. The Moonbase has hovercraft-like Moon Hoppers/Moon mobiles that can be deployed for transportation or reconnaissance.

The alien race is never given a proper name, either by themselves or by human beings; they are simply referred to as "the aliens". They are humanoid in appearance, and the post-mortem examination of the first alien captured reveals that they are harvesting organs from the bodies of abducted humans to prolong their lifespans. However, the later episode “The Cat with Ten Lives” suggests that these "humanoids" are actually beings subject to alien mind control, and one “alien” body recovered was suspected of being completely Homo sapiens, "possessed" by one of the alien minds.

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In UFO, characters bickered and, at times, it was apparent they didn’t like each other. There was rarely any lighthearted fare or snappy, witty banter like the relationship between Kirk, Spock and McCoy; the storylines were also played straight and serious. Despite not being Star Trek or Lost in Space, UFO was a dark, moody and somber alternative to contemporary SF series—and I think that’s what people loved, and still love, about it. Again, the series is set in 1980 but the fashions including the Nehru jackets—that could be cringy but the rest of the series is still engaging. The opening theme by longtime Anderson associate, Barry Gray, is still amazing after these years. The special effects. The cast of British, American and Canadian actors were great—one of them, Wanda Ventham, who was Col. Virgina Lake, is more famously known as Benedict Cumberbatch’s mother.

It was different. Fresh. New. It’s easy to see why UFO has had a major impact on the genre and fandom for the last fifty-plus years; you can watch online and DVDs are available—yes, I have the complete series set. You can find the series here: 

The series is, yes, dated. I’m certain some will be upset by some of the sexism but, hey, it was 1970. No reason to get one’s knickers in a bunch. Cheesy yes but, as I’ve mentioned begore, it’s dark, paranoid and not a plucky comedic sidekick in sight.

UFO, in my opinion, was the first of the 1970s’ renaissance of SF series. It had a big impact on me as I a kid and I still love revisiting it over the years.

Watch and enjoy.

Be seeing you.

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It's time to let a story be a story.

The Maine Man is right. 

Some writers feel that it's their moral obligation to have a message or agenda--and hammer away with it as readers slog through a manifesto thinly veiled as a story.

" Can't you guys just let a story be a story?"

That's a big problem with today's writers. The message is too important to them, it overtakes the story and the characters. It's bad storytelling. The last season of Doctor Who is a good example, but that's typical for Russell T Davies.

Star Trek: Discovery. Well, that was a mess from the very beginning--on many levels--and while the second season was somewhat promising, it went back to its formula of bad, heavy handed writing and the characters doing way too much whispering and crying. Discovery is a good example of show with talented actors wasted as they played boring, cringe-inducing characters as they uttered lame and, again, cringe-inducing dialogue. 

It's a shame because actors like Tig Notaro and Mary Wiseman, to name a few, deserved better. 

More importantly, the audience deserved better.

"First tell the story and everything else will work itself out."

The great science fiction writer and screenwriter Leigh Brackett said that. A lot of today's SF/fantasy writers could learn a lot about the craft of storytelling from Brackett and her contemporaries. That's why I gravitate to those older stories; they weren't overwhelmed by messages or agendas.

Yes, it's fine that writers inject sociopolitical messages into their stories. There's nothing wrong with it. Back when I was in my Libertarian phase--mea culpa, yes, I was one of them--I had some fairly decent ideas but I was so concerned about hammering my beliefs into the reader. Looking back at those stories, they're bad; I can now say that was my Eye of Argon period. 

Some of you might want to Google that.

I want to tell a good story and throw in some social commentary. Nothing wrong with that. But, you see, that's all I want to do. My primary goal is to tell a (hopefully) damn fine story and entertain people. Now, if I can make some comments on this or that, that's okay too. Sinclair Lewis did it quite well with It Can't Happen Here. Lewis had something to say about men like Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip and he did so in an entertaining but frightening way.

Not only did it work but it worked well.

It was also prescient as the world saw Donald Trump's presidential campaign and his nightmarish administration.

It's a fine line, telling stories infused with one's various sociopolitical messages. It can be done. Stephen King has done it quite well over the years; so have other writers but you'll always have your Russell T Davies or a Brad R. Torgersen with their shite.

It happens.

But don't let it happen to you.

Well. That's my opinion.

That's all I have to say.

Be seeing you.

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The Zedverse: It’s Zed’s world—and we just live in it.

 Hello there.

Welcome to the Cortex Online. This is my website for the Zedverse stories—plus my opinions, views and everything else I want to post. Yes, I’ve tried the Midnight Eye blog before . . . but it went nowhere. I’ve imported old posts that I wanted to keep but having a new website just feels good. A fresh start. One caveat: This website/blog is a work in progress, it’s in a constant state of flux. Various sections will be updated often.

Night Zero is the first novel in the Zedverse series; it’s split into a number of intertwined novellas and novelettes that’ll introduce the protagonist, Zed, and a late 2090s Earth that has a slightly different history—in fact, even the star system is different from ours. The first chapter, “My Echo, My Shadow . . . And Me,” is currently being written.

I plan on releasing the novella as both a paperback edition and an eBook via Amazon KDP. Yes, I’ve been dismissive of self-publishing in the past; I mean, I was something of a sneering rat bastard about the whole concept until noticing that a lot of my favorite writers are turning to self-publishing. Traditional publishing is a nightmare to deal with if you don’t have an agent. The independents are somewhat unstable, at times imploding and leaving writers in the lurch, their unpublished novels in a copyright quagmire. It’s a nightmare.

So, Amazon KDP it is.

What’s the Zedverse and Night Zero about?

Well. Let’s see:

The Zedverse has both cyberpunk and transhuman themes—there are dystopian and near-utopian elements in the stories. Pluto is still a planet and a small, rocky slag heap of a planet named Vulcan is located between the Sun and Mercury; all of the terrestrial planets and large moons have been terraformed—including Venus’ moon, Ishtar. And, from time to time, ancient ruins left behind by alien civilizations have been discovered.

Planets, moons and asteroids have been colonized, even a small number of comets. Orbital habs and drifts—similar to orbital habs but drifting in interplanetary space—are scattered about the Sol star system. Chimpanzees, orangutans, gorillas, mandrills, octopi, dolphins and even orcas have been gengineered to have human-level intelligence; some live in independent city-states and others live alongside humans.

Cthulhu Mythos exists. The Shaver Mystery is real.

Oh, there’s oh so much more.

But that’s a story for another day.

Until next time.

Be seeing you.

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