23 February 2014

 Birthdays
Dakota Fanning b. 1994 (Twilight, Charlotte’s Web, War of the Worlds, Taken, Dr. Seuss’ The Cat in the Hat)
Emily Blunt b. 1983 (Into the Woods, Looper, The Adjustment Bureau, Gulliver’s Travels, The Wolfman)
Kelly MacDonald b. 1976 (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy)
Kristin Davis b. 1965 (Journey 2: The Mysterious Island, The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D, Alien Nation: Body and Soul)
Peter Fonda b. 1940 (Revolution [TV movie 2009], Journey to the Center of the Earth [TV], Ghost Rider, Supernova, Escape from L.A., Futureworld)
Majel Barrett-Roddenberry b. 1932 died 12/18/2008 (Star Trek, Babylon 5, Earth: Final Conflict)
Terence Fisher b. 1904 died 18 June 1980 (Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell, Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed, Frankenstein Created Woman, Dracula: Prince of Darkness, The Earth Dies Screaming, The Gorgon, The Phantom of the Opera, The Curse of the Werewolf, The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll, The Brides of Dracula, The Mummy, The Revenge of Frankenstein, Horror of Dracula, The Curse of Frankenstein)
Victor Fleming b. 1889 died 6 January 1949 (director, The Wizard of Oz)

Last year the Picture Slot went to Majel Barrett, and when it comes to iconic sci-fi roles, she doesn't have any competition on this list, though several of the actors are bigger household names overall. If the Picture Slot went to most output, I'd have to have a picture of Terence Fisher up, the go-to director of the Hammer monster movie era. But choosing quality over quantity, here's a publicity still of Victor Fleming from the set of The Wizard of Oz, which still belongs on the short list of the most important genre films of all time. In fact, when the AFI made their 100 years of movies list in 2007, The Wizard of Oz is the only fantasy/sci-fi film in the top ten, followed closely by Star Wars (#13) and 2001: A Space Odyssey (#15). 

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

Prediction: After the arctic icecap is bombed in 1971, much of the world is flooded and a world government is inaugurated.

Predictors: James Blish and Robert W. Lowndes in The Duplicated Man, published 1953

Reality: A nuke (or nukes) in the north would definitely melt some ice, but would it stay melted? As much energy as an explosion produces, it is dwarfed by natural phenomena like volcanoes or storms. Still, Blish and Lowndes do get one thing right about today's debate on climate change. The right wing may have very little understanding of science on their side, but their main concern is the socialist bastard one worlders coming up with an excuse to take over.

Yet again, I'd like to thank Paul Brians, whose exhaustive study of nuclear war fiction is an invaluable source.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

Monday is still OMNI Future Almanac day, one of my favorite regular sources.

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!
 

7 July 2013

Birthdays
Robia LaMorte b. 1970 (Buffy)
Akiva Goldsman b. 1962 (writer I, Robot, I Am Legend, several Batman movies)
Jon Pertwee (3rd Doctor) b. 1919 died 20 May 1996
Robert A. Heinlein b 1907 died 5/8/1988
(won 1956 Hugo for Double Star)
(won 1960 Hugo for Starship Troopers)
(won 1962 Hugo for Stranger In A Strange Land)
(won 1967 Hugo for The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress)

Regular readers will know that I beat up the corpse of Heinlein on a regular basis, but even I know that he is incredibly important in the genre. He's one of the big guns from the era when most sci-fi was on the page instead of on the screen and many of his books have made the transition from book to movie. Still, Picture Slot = Pretty Girl is a solid system, and it's not like I never post a picture of old Bob, whether Sensible or Ridiculous.

Besides her role as Jenny Calendar on Buffy, Ms. LaMorte's next best known gig was as the dancer named Pearl from Prince's videos and tour for Diamonds and Pearls.

Fun facts to know and tell. I'm chock full of them.

Prediction: In the 2010 United States census, there will be five million more women than men.

Predictor: James Blish from the novel They Shall Have Stars, published 1956

Reality: He's absolutely money, as the phrase from Swingers goes. It was between 5.1 and 5.2 million in the 2010 census, so rounded to the nearest million, he's perfect.

He gets the number right, but his reason for bringing it up is wrong. One of the heroes of the book works on Jupiter. Spending time back on Earth in 2013 and in the U.S., he meets a woman who he doesn't think is quite pretty or clever or special enough to interest an important manly man such as himself, and he considers her "one of the five million surplus women of the 2010 census".

Leaving the chauvinism aside for the moment, today there aren't any "surplus women" in the pool of bachelors and bachelorettes. Between 20 and 30, men outnumber women. This is even the case is we look at the numbers between 20 to 40 and if we extend the eligible pool from 20 to 50, then the gender mix is almost exactly even.

The "surplus woman" situation of today is almost entirely about the numbers for the population 50 and older. Women live longer, or to put it more harshly, men die younger.

It's possible to have a "surplus woman" situation in the younger demographic, but it was actually worse when Blish was a young man than it is today. Big wars are the main cause for situations like this, and World War II is as big a war as humans have seen so far. The United States didn't lose anywhere near the percentage of men that the other major combatants did, but it was still over 400,000, almost all men between the ages of 20 to 40. Blish worked as a technician during WW II and married in 1947, so he was an eligible bachelor during one of America's largest "surplus women" situations. (The era after the Civil War was much more pronounced. More people died and the total population was much smaller.)

Jeez, that was long winded. Must be the last day of a four day weekend or something.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

OMNI Future Almanac gets another shot. They aren't perfect, but they are specific, I'll give them that.
  
Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!

6 July 2013

 Birthdays
Jennifer Saunders b. 1958 (Shrek 2, Coraline)
Geoffrey Rush b. 1951 (Pirates of the Caribbean)
Sylvester Stallone b. 1946 (Demolition Man, Dredd, Death Race 2000)
Burt Ward b. 1945 (Batman)

Except for Burt Ward, all these actors are better known for their work outside the genre. I often fail to include actors whose only work is in voiceover, which is the situation for Jennifer Saunders, but I have a soft spot for Absolutely Fabulous.

Many happy returns to all concerned.

Prediction: The Americans will not get into outer space until 1962, though the project was first presented to Congress in 1944.

Predictor: James Blish, They Shall Have Stars, published in 1956

Reality: I can't find the evidence of presentation in 1944, but 1962 is a damned good prediction. Alan Shepard gets into space in 1961, but the first earth orbit by an American is by John Glenn in 1962.

It should be noted that Blish is making this prediction a year before Sputnik.

Blish wrote a series of books about the future, but only They Shall Have Stars deals with years that have already passed or are just a few years away. The rest are centuries away, so not interesting as predictions we can verify or disprove.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

Blish makes another remarkably close prediction, this time about demographics in 2010. He then screws the pooch by misinterpreting the numbers, but the first part is really top notch.

 Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!

30 June 2013

Birthday
Jeri Taylor b. 1938 (Star Trek)

Ms. Taylor was a writer and producer on several Star Trek shows, including The Next Generation and Voyager. She is credited with inventing the Cardassians. (Note: NOT THE KARDASHIANS! She cannot be blamed for them in any way.)

Many happy returns to Ms. Taylor.


Movies released
Twilight Saga: Eclipse released, 2010
Spider-Man 2 released 30 June 2004

Prediction: By 2013, One in ten people is a believer. Eight of the other nine have given up religion as a bad job.

Predictor: James Blish in They Shall Have Stars, published 1956

Reality: Among readers of science fiction, these numbers might be correct. Among humans in general, it's close to the other way around.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

Alternate Mondays belong to Popular Mechanics, promising us technological marvels and sometimes even getting them right.

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!

15 June 2013

 Birthday
Elizabeth Reaser b. 1975

Ms. Reaser is best known in genre films as Esme Cullen in the Twilight series.

Movies released

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer released,  2007
Batman Begins released 2005

When I was a kid, the Fantastic Four was the comic title I looked forward to the most each month. It's a damn shame the FF movies have been so crap. I kind of liked Batman Begins because Ra's Al-Ghul is Batman's most interesting villain, but unfortunately the next movie had to have The Joker in it and the series went downhill from there.
 

Prediction: In 1981, the Titan Station is established on the moon of Saturn of the same name. No further space exploration happens until 2013.

Predictor: James Blish, They Shall Have Stars, published 1956

Reality: I'm going to give Blish some props here, though clearly we haven't established any bases even on our own moon. Most sci-fi writers not just assume space exploration, but assume it's going to be zoom, zoom, zoom, bigger, better, faster every year. Blish sees that's it's going to be start then stop, moving at a weird jerky pace. He also takes some basic math into account and realizes that we need to increase human life expectancy for space travel outsideour solar system to make any sense at all.


Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

An exact date from Stephen King. As you might expect, it does not bode well for the human race in general.

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!

23 May 2013

Birthday
James Blish b. 1921 died 29 July 1975
(won 1959 Hugo for A Case Of Conscience)

Doing a little digging, Mr. Blish also wrote some near future histories and though out of print, they are available at my local public library (yay, socialism!), so his predictions will start showing up on the blog in the next few weeks.

There are several pictures of Blish on the Internet, most of them taken when he was older. He shaved off the pencil thin mustache, which is a damned dirty shame. A man in a sharp suit with a pencil thin mustache is a man who is going places.

 

Prediction: 2010: The Chinese land on Jupiter’s moon Europa with plans to claim it, the first nation to claim part of space as their own, planning to export massive amounts of water from it.

Predictor: Arthur C. Clarke in 2010: Odyssey Two, published 1982

Reality: If Clarke gets any points for this one, it's that he sees China will be a major player about thirty years into the future. Writing in 1982, the shuttle program is boosting interest in space exploration, so he can be somewhat forgiven for assuming things were going to start moving again in a big damned hurry.

Even with excuses, he was wrong about the future of space exploration. And as for the reason, water is still plentiful enough that we don’t have to import it from off-world. Let’s hope it stays that way.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

A French postcard foresees the future of education... in the year 2000!

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!