28 August 2015

Birthdays
Quvenzhane Wallis b. 2003 (Beasts of the Southern Wild)
Kyle Massey b. 1991 (Gotham)
Katie Findlay b. 1990 (After the Dark, Continuum, Crash Site, SGU Stargate Universe, Fringe)
Armie Hammer b. 1986 (Stan Lee’s Mighty 7, Mirror Mirror, 2081, Reaper)
Sarah Roemer b. 1984 (The Event, The Grudge 2)
Carly Pope b. 1980 (The Tomorrow People, Elysium, Yeti: Curse of the Snow Demon, The 4400, 10.5: Apocalypse, Jake 2.0, NightMan)
Kelly Overton b. 1978 (True Blood, Beauty and the Beast [2012], Tekken, The Ring Two)
Amber Sainsbury b. 1978 (Fairy Tales, 30 Days of Night, Hex, Hercules: The Legendary Journeys)
Nick E. Tarabay b. 1975 (Arrow, Believe, Star Trek Into Darkness)
Eugene Byrd b. 1975 (True Blood, American Horror Story, Eureka, Night Stalker [2006])
Kristin Booth b. 1974 (Orphan Black, Supernatural, ReGenesis, Total Recall 2070)
J. August Richards b. 1973 (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Arrow, Warehouse 13, The 4400, Angel, Sliders, Space: Above and Beyond)
Stephanie Belding b. 1971 (Lost Girl, Eureka, Watchmen, Reaper, Earth: Final Conflict, eXistenZ)
Daniel Goddard b. 1971 (Immortally Yours, Dream Warrior, BeastMaster)
Jack Black b. 1969 (Ghost Ghirls, Gulliver’s Travels, King Kong, The X-Files, Waterworld, The Neverending Story III, Demolition Man)
Jason Priestley b. 1969 (Haven, Day of the Triffids [2009], Termination Point, Jeremiah, Quantum Leap)
Billy Boyd b. 1968 (Space Milkshake, The Witches of Oz, Glenn, the Flying Robot, Lord of the Rings, Seed of Chucky, Urban Ghost Story)
Amanda Tapping b. 1965 (Supernatural, Stargate, Space Milkshake, Sanctuary, Earthsea, The X Files, Flash Forward, Forever Knight)
Dermot Keaney b. 1964 (Atlantis [TV], Game of Thrones, Pirates of the Caribbean, Strange)
Melissa Rosenberg b. 1962 (writer, Twilight)
David Fincher b. 1962 (director, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Alien³)
Jennifer Coolidge b. 1961 (Click, Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, Not of this Earth)
Emma Samms b. 1960 (The Little Unicorn, Humanoids from the Deep, Tales from the Crypt, Lois & Clark, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, Arabian Adventure)
Brian Thompson b. 1959 (Flight of the Living Dead, Star Trek: Enterprise, Epoch: Evolution, Charmed, Birds of Prey, The X Files, Jason and the Argonauts [TV], Buffy, Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, DragonHeart, Deep Space Nine, Weird Science, Kindred: The Embraced, Hercules, Star Trek: Generations, Doctor Mordred, Superboy, Alien Nation [TV], Star Trek: The Next Generation, Alien Nation, Fright Night Part 2, Werewolf, Knight Rider, Otherworld, The Terminator)
John Allen Nelson b. 1959 (Knight Rider, Seven Days, Quantum Leap, Killer Klowns from Outer Space)
Daniel Stern b. 1957 (SeaQuest 2032, Little Monsters, Leviathan, C.H.U.D.)
Rick Rossovich b. 1957 (Legend of the Lost Tomb, Black Scorpion, Future Shock, Tales from the Crypt, The Terminator)
Luis Guzman b. 1956 (Journey 2: The Mysterious Island, Rise of the Damned, Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, The Adventures of Pluto Nash, SeaQuest 2032, Innocent Blood, *batteries not included)
Vonda N. McIntyre b. 1948 (won 1979 Hugo and Nebula for Dreamsnake, won 1998 Nebula for The Moon and the Sun)
Alice Playten b. 1947 died 25 June 2011 (Pioneer 12, Legend, Disco Beaver from Outer Space, The Lost Saucer)
David Soul b. 1943 (Doctor Who: Death Comes to Time, Deadly Nightmares, World War III, Salem’s Lot, Star Trek, I Dream of Jeannie)
Ken Jenkins b. 1940 (The X Files, Sliders, Babylon 5, Star Trek: The Next Generation, The Abyss, Hard Time on Planet Earth)
Donald O’Connor b. 1925 died 27 September 2003 (Alice in Wonderland [1985 and 1983], The Bionic Woman, The Wonders of Aladdin)
Nancy Kulp b. 1921 died 3 February 1991 (Quantum Leap, Twilight Zone, Moon Pilot)
Jack Kirby b. 1917 died 6 February 1994 (artist, Marvel and DC comics)
Jack Vance b. 1916 died 23 May 2013 (author, The Dying Earth, Big Planet)
Simon Oakland b. 1915 died 29 August 1983 (Tucker’s Witch, Kolchak: The Night Stalker, The Starlost, Captain Nice, The Satan Bug, The Outer Limits, My Favorite Martian, Twilight Zone)
Morris Ankrum b. 1897 died 2 September 1964 (X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes, From the Earth to the Moon, Giant from the Unknown, Beginning of the End, The Giant Claw, Kronos, Zombies of Mora Tau, Earth vs. the Flying Saucers, Invaders from Mars, Red Planet Mars, Rocketship X-M)

Notes from the birthday list.
1. The Picture Slot. In previous years, I used Jack Kirby and J. August Richards. There were several options for today - David Soul from Star Trek, Brian Thompson from any of a number of roles, Billy Boyd from Lord of the Rings, Jack Black from King Kong - but I decided to go with Quvenzhane Wallis facing off with the Auroch from the end of Beasts of the Southern Wild.

2. Spot the Canadians! There are six today: Katie Findlay, Carly Pope, Kristin Booth, Stephanie Belding, Jason Priestley and Amanda Tapping.

3. Wait... she's dead? Alice Playten was a comic actress who did a lot of voice work. I remember her from Martin Mull's first album and from National Lampoon's Lemmings. I still haven't quite processed that she is dead.

4. MST3K. Morris Ankrum spent most of his career in Westerns, but he also made a lot of 1950s sci-fi, so many of them I saw when I was a kid watching TV in the 1960. Two of his movies got the Best Brains treatment, Beginning of the End and Rocketship X-M.

Many happy returns to all the living on the list and to the dead, thanks for all the memories.

Predictor: H.G. Wells in his 1901 book Anticipations

Prediction:  How will the New Republic treat the inferior races? How will it deal with the black? how will it deal with the yellow man? how will it tackle that alleged termite in the civilized woodwork, the Jew? Certainly not as races at all. It will aim to establish, and it will at last, though probably only after a second century has passed, establish a world-state with a common language and a common rule. All over the world its roads, its standards, its laws, and its apparatus of control will run. It will, I have said, make the multiplication of those who fall behind a certain standard of social efficiency unpleasant and difficult, and it will have cast aside any coddling laws to save adult men from themselves. It will tolerate no dark corners where the people of the Abyss may fester, no vast diffused slums of peasant proprietors, no stagnant plague-preserves. Whatever men may come into its efficient citizenship it will let come--white, black, red, or brown; the efficiency will be the test. And the Jew also it will treat as any other man. It is said that the Jew is incurably a parasite on the apparatus of credit. If there are parasites on the apparatus of credit, that is a reason for the legislative cleaning of the apparatus of credit, but it is no reason for the special treatment of the Jew. If the Jew has a certain incurable tendency to social parasitism, and we make social parasitism impossible, we shall abolish the Jew, and if he has not, there is no need to abolish the Jew. We are much more likely to find we have abolished the Caucasian solicitor.

Reality: Wells is listed as a socialist, but this version of race relations sounds a lot like the conservative argument for "color-blindness", which means other races, if lucky, can eventually become honorary white people.

So yet again, we find H.G. Wells is a scumbag.
 
Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

This month, I read Brave New World for the first time and I will give a book report. The ghost of Aldous Huxley will not be pleased.
  
Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!