19 November 2014

Birthdays
Liana Mendoza b. 1984 (A Haunted House, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra)
Adam Driver b. 1983 (Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens)
Tony Elias b. 1982 (Star Trek [2009])
Adele Silva b. 1980 (Strippers vs Werewolves, Doctor Who)
Eric Nenninger b. 1978 (Jeepers Creepers 2, The X Files)
Kristian Ayre b. 1977 (Stephen King’s Dead Zone, Elf, Jake 2.0, Stargate SG-1, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: The TV Show, Alien Abduction: Incident in Lake County, Space Cases, The Odyssey [1994])
Christian Martin b. 1975 (Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl)
Sandrine Holt b. 1972 (Terminator: Genisys, The Returned, Underworld: Awakening, The Phantom, Resident Evil: Apocalypse, Mutant X, Witchblade, Poltergeist: The Legacy)
Mark Bonnar b. 1968 (Doctor Who, Paradox)
Jason Scott Lee b. 1966 (Soldier, Tale of the Mummy, The Hunger [1997 TV], The Jungle Book, Back to the Future II)
Douglas Henshall b. 1965 (Dorian Gray, Primeval, Kull the Conqueror)
Terry Ferrell b. 1963 (Deep Core, Deep Space Nine, Legion, Red Dwarf, Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth, Quantum Leap, Twilight Zone)
Jodie Foster b. 1962 (Elysium, Nim’s Island, Contact, The X-Files)
Meg Ryan b. 1961 (Kate & Leopold, Innerspace, Amityville 3-D)
Allison Janney b. 1959 (Lost, Aliens in the Family, Wolf)
Charlie Kaufman b. 1958 (writer, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Being John Malkovich)
Scott McGinnis b. 1958 (Deadly Nightmares, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, Mr. Merlin)
Tom Virtue b. 1957 (A Haunted House 2, Iron Man 3, American Horror Story, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Charmed, Firefly, Star Trek: Voyager, The X-Files, Team Knight Rider, Lois & Clark)
Glynnis O’Connor b. 1956 (Twilight Zone [1986])
Kathleen Quinlan b. 1954 (SGU Stargate Universe, The Hills Have Eyes [2006], Event Horizon, Apollo 13, Twilight Zone: The Movie, Where Have All the People Gone)
Robert Beltran b. 1953 (Cry of the Winged Serpent, Fire Serpent, Manticore, Star Trek: Voyager, Lois & Clark, Night of the Comet)
Nigel Bennett b. 1949 (Starhunter, Andromeda, Mutant X, Cypher, Lexx, Dark Realm, Relic Hunter, Top of the Food Chain, Total Recall 2070Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: The TV Show, Earth: Final Conflict, Forever Knight, RoboCop [TV], The Hidden Room, Twilight Zone [1988], Bay Coven)
Udana Power b. 1944 (Jason of Star Command, Kolchak: The Night Stalker, The Lost Saucer)
Dan Haggerty b. 1941 (Axe Giant: The Wrath of Paul Bunyan)
Dick Cavett b. 1936 (Beetlejuice, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors)
Rex Holman b. 1928 (Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Land of the Lost [1976 TV], Escape to Witch Mountain, Land of the Giants, Star Trek, The Outer Limits, Panic in Year Zero!, Twilight Zone)
Gene Tierney b. 1920 died 6 November 1991 (The Ghost & Mrs. Muir [1947])
Alan Young b. 1919 (The Time Machine [2002 & 1960], FreakyLinks, Sabrina, The Teenage Witch, The Cat From Outer Space, Mr. Terrific, tom thumb)
Eleanor Audley b. 1905 died 25 November 1991 (Twilight Zone)


Notes on the birthday list.
1. The Picture Slot. So many choices. Last year, I went with Terry Ferrell and made some comment about women I lusted after turning 50, but Kathleen Quinlan turns 60 today and I lusted after her as well. For fabulous babes, I would say both Jodie Foster and Gene Tierney qualify for iconic in genre as well as gorgeous, so they have a good chance next year, as does Robert Beltran. But this year it's Alan Young, put in make-up to look like an old man in the 1960 version of The Time Machine. Guess what? Now he is an old man and he looks much better than this. More than that, he's 95 today AND he's still working! Good on ya, Mr. Young.

2. Emigrated to Canada.  It's no secret in the industry how much work there is in Canada now, and many actors born elsewhere move to Canada. There are three actors with Canadian looking C.V.s, but none of them were born there. Nigel Bennett is a Scot that moved to Canada, Sandrine Holt was born in England and her family moved to Canada when she was five, and Kristian Ayre's story is much the same.

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


Movies released
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 released, 2010
 

Predictor: General H.H. "Hap" Arnold, the basis for the LIFE magazine article The 36-Hour War, published in the November 19, 1945 issue


Prediction: The next war will be fought with nuclear warheads mounted on inter-continental ballistic missiles.

Reality: When I began this blog in early 2013, one of the first people to contact me with an interesting link was Ian Abrams of Drexel University. The story doesn't give an exact date for the next war, but it does predict how it will be fought. Luckily for us, we've gone nearly seventy years and nothing like this has happened. Still, this article, officially vetted by the Pentagon to be published in LIFE magazine at the height of its circulation, is one of the earliest and most potent sources of the biggest fear we lived with for at least forty years, toe-to-toe nuclear confrontation with the Russkies. Recall that when it is written, we are the only nuclear power and intercontinental missiles do not yet exist.

I very rarely repeat a prediction on this blog, but I declare November 19th as You Have Official Permission To Freak The Fuck Out Day. Again, thanks to Ian Drexel for creating the webpage and giving me a link to it when this blog was in its infancy.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

Thursday belongs to Lee de Forest's view of the wonders of the year 2000, predicted in 1960. 

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!

28 December 2013

Birthdays
Thomas Dekker b. 1987 (Star Trek: Generations, Village of the Damned, Star Trek: Voyager, Heroes, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, A Nightmare on Elm Street [2010])
Beau Garrett b. 1982 (TRON: Legacy, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer)
Sienna Miller b. 1981 (G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Stardust)
Noomi Rapace b. 1979 (Prometheus)
Joe Manganiello b. 1976 (True Blood, Spider-Man)
Denzel Washington b. 1954 (The Book of Eli, Virtuosity)
Dame Maggie Smith b. 1934 (Harry Potter, Nanny McPhee Returns, Hook, Clash of the Titans)
Nichelle Nichols b. 1933 (Star Trek)
Stan Lee b. 1922 (Marvel Comics)
Lew Ayres b. 1908 died 30 December 1996 (Donovan’s Brain, Battle for the Planet of the Apes, The Questor Tapes, The Bionic Woman, Wonder Woman, Damien: Omen II, Battlestar Galactica)
F.W. Murnau b. 1888 died 11 March 1931 (director, Nosferatu)

A long and varied list today of birthdays today. A lot of the good looking young people who have been in genre films and TV this century and two honest to Odin movie stars in Denzel Washington and Dame Maggie Smith. For my money, the two genre icons are Nichelle Nichols and Stan Lee, and as often happens when I allegedly flip a coin, pretty wins. I do love the story about Nichols considering quitting and being talked out of it by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who knew how important it was to have such a hopeful view of the future.

Many happy returns of the day to all the living on our list, and to Lew Ayres and F.W. Murnau, thanks for all the memories.
  

Favorite predictions published in 2013

Prediction: World War III will be fought with intercontinental missiles. The entire conflict will be over in 36 hours with millions of lives lost on both sides, though America will emerge victorious.

Predictor: General Henry "Hap" Arnold, reporting to his superiors in 1945, the findings illustrated and published in the November 19th, 1945 issue of LIFE magazine.

Reality: This prediction does not have a date of any kind assigned to it, which is usually a prerequisite on this blog. I decided to include it when it was kindly forwarded to me by Professor Ian Abrams of Drexel University because it is the start of the nuclear anxiety that was so strong in the global consciousness of the last half of the 20th Century. When Arnold wrote this, we were the only country with nuclear technology and intercontinental ballistic missiles had not been developed yet, but that situation changed soon enough. As luck would have it, all out, toe to toe nuclear confrontation with the Russkis never took place, though people were honestly and rightfully terrified by the Cuban Missile Crisis. More than that, there were several false alarms and accidents that happened during the Cold War that could have been disastrous.

This is the third time I've mentioned this prediction this year. Let's hope it isn't like Candyman. As a pre-caution, I was not looking in a mirror when I made the mentions.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

We return to previously unpublished predictions tomorrow with a warning of a pandemic that would send the human population underground.

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!

19 November 2013

 Birthdays
Sandrine Holt b. 1972 (Underworld: Awakening, Resident Evil:Apocalypse)
Jason Scott Lee b. 1966 (Back to the Future II, Soldier)
Terry Ferrell b. 1963 (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, The Twilight Zone, Quantum Leap, Hellraiser III)
Jodie Foster b. 1962 (Contact, Elysium, The X-Files)
Charlie Kaufman b. 1958 (writer, Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind)
Tom Virtue b. 1957 (Iron Man 3, Firefly, Transformers: Dark Side of the Moon, Star Trek:Voyager, The X-Files)
Kathleen Quinlan b. 1954 (Twilight Zone: The Movie, Event Horizon)
Robert Beltran b. 1953 (Night of the Comet, Star Trek:Voyager)
Alan Young b. 1919 (The Time Machine)

An unusual list today, given that everybody on it is still alive, including Alan Young, best known as Wilbur on Mr. Ed but mentioned here for his role in The Time Machine, who turns 95 today. All of the women on the list qualify for the Pretty Girl = Picture Slot criteria, but I chose Terry Ferrell because she's tallest. Regular readers will know that's how I roll.

Many happy returns to all our birthday boys and girls.

Movies released
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 released 2010  

Prediction: The next war will be fought with nuclear warheads mounted on inter-continental ballistic missiles.

Predictor: General H.H. "Hap" Arnold, the basis for the LIFE magazine article The 36-Hour War, published in the November 19, 1945

Reality: Usually, the predictions on this blog have dates attached, sometimes exact days, at least the year. That way, they can be verified or falsified. A prediction with no date such as this one is either fulfilled or unfilled, and luckily for us sixty eight years later, this one is unfulfilled and at least in terms of the exact enemy being the Soviet Union, it cannot be fulfilled.

I publish this because it sets the tone for the second half of the 20th Century. We didn't fight a nuclear war, but it was always the threat hanging over our head. I have purchased Eric Schlosser's Command and Control, but I haven't read it yet. (Still wading through Nate Silver's The Signal and the Noise, very slow going.) From the few previews I've seen, Schlosser's book makes it clear that we got lucky multiple times, barely avoiding both nuclear accidents and accidental launches based on data that made it look like a first strike was incoming, both on the American side and the Soviet.

All throughout my childhood I heard the United States is the greatest country in the world. I never heard anyone seriously dispute it back in the day, but very few people said the other part of the truth, which was that the undeniable predominant position was only attained after the end of World War II when Europe and most of Asia were in ruins.

Certainly, Arnold wrote this report and the Pentagon brass decided to release it to LIFE for self-interested motives. Our standard operating procedure was to bring military spending down to extremely modest levels once a war was over, and isolationism was a very commonly held and mainstream political position. The military didn't want this to continue, and besides their own pocketbook motives, it was clear that both Japan and Germany thought declaring war against us was a reasonable risk because we were not arming ourselves the way they were. Since then, we have armed ourselves at levels no other country has ever done consistently in peacetime.

Discussing this prediction will be a regular feature on the blog every November 19, a holiday no one officially celebrates that I call You Have Official Permission To Freak The Fuck Out Day. I want to thank Professor Ian Abrams of Drexel University for bringing this article to my attention. You can read it and look at the remarkable illustrations on his website, which you can visit by clicking this link.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

Has Obama been overthrown yet? I could have sworn that was going to happen this week.

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!

3 February 2013

Birthday
Warwick Davis b. 1970  

Many happy returns to Mr. Davis, who has appeared in the Star Wars and Harry Potter series, as well as other fantasy genre films like Willow and Labyrinth.
 

Prediction: The next war will be fought with intercontinental missiles armed with atomic bombs.

Predictor: General Henry "Hap" Arnold, United States Army Air Force, reported in the November 19, 1945 of LIFE magazine

Reality: Usually, I want a date on a prediction to use it on this blog, but this one was too important to pass up. My thanks to Professor Ian Abrams of Drexel University for letting me know about this. Follow this link to his webpage with full-size scans of all the pages from the LIFE magazine story.

A short recap: In late 1945, Gen. Arnold makes a report to his higher-ups in the Pentagon about his view of the future of warfare. It is, in the immortal words of Slim Pickens in Dr. Strangelove, toe-to-toe nuclear confrontation with the Russkies. News of this report makes it to the general public and in November of 1945, LIFE magazine turns the report into this nine page spread with beautiful and terrifying illustrations by Alexander Leydenfrost, Noel Sickles and Matt Greene, including the two page Leydenfrost spread reproduced here of exactly which cities would get nuked.

Some historical perspective on late 1945.  The bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki dropped less than six months before. The Family of Nuclear Nations has one member. Intercontinental ballistic missiles are still a few years away. At the time, LIFE's circulation was about one magazine for every ten people living in the United States. Given how many of these are going to be read by more than one person in a household - not to mention how many would be in the waiting rooms of doctors and dentists - this is most certainly the Ground Zero of the nuclear anxiety that would grip the public imagination for decades to come, especially since the source has a high placed member of the armed forces who had just successfully concluded The Biggest War Ever Fought.

I am going to re-publish this post with the link to Ian Abrams' wonderful source website every November 19 for as long as this blog exists, a day I am going to call You Have Official Permission To Freak The Fuck Out Day.

 Again, my thanks to Professor Abrams of Drexel for giving me this information.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE! It's Monday and Popular Mechanics lets us know how fabulous life will be in the new suburb named Totenville... IN THE YEAR 2000!

Join me then... IN THE FUTURE!