ALL SCI-FI

[Bud Brewster]

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The previous comment is a "rescued post" from the "lost message board" of Andrew Bogdan (Bogmeister) called the Base of Galactic Science Fiction. (<— link)

Andrew slaved away to add posts to his board for five years, from its creation in January 2010 until his death in 2015. Unfortunately. in all that time he only gained seven members — and they only made three posts . . .

The truly amazing thing, however, is that during that time Andrew was my invaluable co-site administrator right here on All Sci-Fi, starting in 2008 and lasting until the old board crashed and I restarted it from scratch (with Randy Everett's help) in 2014.

One of Andrew's clever contributions was the invention of our Alphabetical Indexes — a feature totally unique to All Sci-Fi. I've maintained and expanded them ever since.

During all those years, Andrew never mentioned the Base of Galactic Science Fiction here on All Sci-Fi! I would have been glad to help him promote it to the 261 members we had back then.

But for some unknown reason, Andrew lived his secret double life as co-site admin here and as the creator and site admin of the Base of Galactic Science Fiction, creating over 3,000 posts, many of them as elaborate as the previous comment on this thread.

Eadie discovered the Base of Galactic Science Fiction a few years ago and told me about it. It's been completely inactive since Andrew's last post in 2015 . . . but the board still exists.

Andrew only transferred 74 of his old post from our old board which crashed in 2014, when we started All Sci-Fi from scratch. We lost the thousands of post Andrew created on the old board.

When I found the Base of Galactic Science Fiction I was delighted by the chance to rescue over four hundred of his comments and post them here under Bogmeister's name.

Andrew died in July 2015. He is greatly missed.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Pow]

Andrew is missed indeed. His posts were always wonderful to read and so well written.

The Alphabetical Index has sure helped me whenever I am attempting to locate a specific film or TV show quickly.

R.I.P. Andrew.

[Pow]

"Assignment: Earth" Factoids.

The plot concept for this episode of benevolent aliens secretly guiding Earthlings would be reused by Gene Roddenberry in his sf TV-movie/backdoor pilot "The Questor Tapes" (1974).

The premise for TQT is that an unknown alien civilization has had highly sophisticated human-looking androids on earth for centuries as one android replaces another.

The first draft of the script had the crew members on the bridge of the Enterprise viewing an episode of "Bonanza" on the main screen.
Whew! I'm glad they dropped that idea.

Only episode of ST:TOS where time travel is treated as "routine."

Mr. Spock states that according to the Enterprise's historical tapes for 1968, an important assassination will take place.

This episode premiered on March 29, 1968. Six days later on April 4, 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated.

Senator Robert F. Kennedy would be assassinated on June 6, 1968.

Coincidentally, on the same day as Dr. King's death, an Apollo 6 Saturn V rocket was launched. It suffered a serious mishap and went off course.

Only episode where a Federation transporter system is used to intercept and redirect an alien transporter system.

A new effect was created for the scene where the Enterprise's transporter snares Gary Seven, causing him to beam aboard the star ship.

A wavy flame-like effect can be seen behind the opaque wall of the transporter chamber which normally doesn't occur.

It might have been due to the Enterprise forcefully capturing an unknown transporter in operation and rerouting it away from earth and to the ship's transporter pad.

Another new effect for this second season of ST seen in earlier second season episodes was for the phaser, one I really liked.
In season one, the straight line phaser beam effect was the same for both its kill & stun settings.

The second season changed the stun effect so that it was differentiated from the kill setting.

The stun setting now gave off a kind of wide halo effect instead of the straight line effect.

Gary Seven is one of the very few individuals to have manifested insensitivity to Mr. Spock's Vulcan nerve pinch.

Seven then manages to give the Vulcan ( who are significantly more powerful physically than humans) a karate chop that sends a surprised Spock reeling into a bulkhead.

The establishing shot of 1968 downtown Manhattan that is utilized was stock footage used on numerous episodes of "The Man from U.N.C.L.E."

The buildings that we see representing the space center were actually office buildings of Paramount Studio.

The original pilot script was penned by Gene Roddenberry on November 14, 1966.

In that script, Gary Seven is the only man to ever survive the transit of being sent back in time to the 20th century.
Gulp! So just how many human guinea pigs were sacrificed by this "benevolent" race of aliens?

The goal is to defeat the alien race known as the Omegans.

The Omegans are shape-shifters who have sent their agents back through time to earth. These agents are to sabotage earth's space program so that in the future the Omegans can defeat the humans.

Harth & Isis are the primary Omegan agents who are the antagonists for Gary Seven & Roberta Lincoln.

Roberta's last name was Hornblower originally.
Rodennberry was big fan of the Horatio Hornblower adventure novels.

Seven's cover on earth is that of a private investigator who operates the 7 Agency.

In addition to the servo device, Gary has a pair of x-ray glasses in this early script.

In the script, Roberta had nearly been killed by a falling chunk of building.

She is pushed out of the way by a woman who dies in the rescue...and who looks very much like Roberta.

There had to be more to this sequence regarding Roberta and her lookalike. Was her doppelganger an alien shape-shifter? Why would she sacrifice her life for Roberta?

Roberta finds a piece of paper on the dead woman's body with Gary Seven's address.
Roberta goes to the address in order to inform Gary about the deceased woman.

Not finding Gary at the penthouse apartment, Roberta is attempting to leave him a note by using the typewriter. She is startled when the typewriter begins to type all by itself.

A First Draft Script dated December 4~20, 1967 has no Isis-cat character at all.

There was a scene that takes place in the Enterprise brig between Gary Seven & Dr. McCoy.

Seven asks Bones to think like a doctor and not a mechanic.

Another unused scene had Roberta beamed aboard the Enterprise for interrogation. While there, she is comforted by Uhura who assures Roberta that they are humans just like her.

Gary comments that orbital nuclear space platforms was the same nonsense that almost destroyed planet Omicron IV.
This line was cut.

Although the alien race who trained Gary are never named in this episode, various novels & comics dealing with Gary & Roberta do assign a name to the aliens.

They are called the Aegis, which is another name for shield.

Gary & Roberta are the focus in the novel "Assignment : Eternity."

They are also the focus in the two-part novel series "The Eugenics Wars : The Rise & Fall of Khan Noonien Singh."

In those novels, both Gary & Roberta are key to thwarting Khan's ruthless rule over the earth.

I'm not familiar with those novels. Wonder if Gary & Khan throw down against one another? Love to see that fight.

"Star Trek's : Voyager" TV series intended to introduce the alien race who sent Gary to earth in the episode "Prime Factors."

The Voyager crew was to encounter the alien planet as the ship desperately strove to get back to Federation space.

The writer's thought that could be a problem since this civilization had phenomenal teleportation technology; couldn't they help Voyager to return back to earth?

So a different alien race was created for this episode.

Um, how come the writers didn't see this obvious pitfall to their script?

"Seven and Seven" was short story by Kevin Hosey.

Gary Seven arrives on board the Voyager and has to convince a reluctant Seven-of-Nine to help him deflect an asteroid that will destroy an alien world.

Gene Roddenberry created this backdoor pilot because he wasn't certain how much longer ST was going to live.
In fact, it was cancelled during its second season and was only saved via a massive fan letter writing campaign.

Yep, I was one of those fans who wrote to NBC to renew ST for another season. Ironically enough, I find the third season the least interesting to view now.

So Gene was creating another sf project that he could produce for TV after the demise of ST.

He had had such headaches regarding the special effects for ST that he purposely set his A:E pilot in present day earth.

He felt that would limit his need to spend money & time on lots of special effects, as well as having to create futuristic sets.

Makes sense. But nowadays with the enormous advancements in special & visual effects such as CGI, LED Wall, sophisticated make-up and animatronics, and so forth, a reboot of A:E would be able to be an FX feast with no limitations.

You could still set it on present day earth, but you would be able to create fantastic stories supported by today's terrific visuals.

[Pow]

In developing the concept for "Assignment: Earth," Gene Roddenberry went to futurists and scientists to ask them what advanced societies in space might do towards more primitive societies such as ours.

Gene approached actor Lloyd Bridges about playing the role of Gary Seven. Bridges, who declined playing the captain of the Enterprise on "Star Trek" also politely declined the Gary Seven part.

Also considered for the Gary Seven role were Patrick McGoohan, Patrick O'Neal, Tony Franciosa, Burt Reynolds.

I don't believe that any of these fine actors would have been an improvement over Robert Lansing.

I don't see Burt or Tony in the role at all.

Dawn Wells who played Mary Ann on "Gilligan's Island" was considered for the Roberta Lincoln role. Dawn could have done the part, but Teri brought a certain comedic & slightly eccentric quality to Roberta.

Don Keefer who played Cromwell, the Mission Control security supervisor was a guest star on the memorably classic "Twilight Zone" episode "It's a Good Life."

In that episode he played Don Hollis who agitates young Anthony Freemont (Billy Mumy) who possesses omnipotent powers.

Anthony banishes people he dislikes to the "corn field."

Hollis is horrifyingly transformed into a jack-in-the-box and then sent to the corn field by Anthony.

That scene is still a powerful and a disturbing one to this day.

Bartell La Rue provides the voice for Mission Control.

He also provided the voice for the Guardian of Forever from the award winning episode of "Star Trek:TOS" episode "The City on the Edge of Forever."

Guest star Robert Lansing happened to be playing with his servo mechanism between takes. Prop master Irving Feinberg walked up to Lansing and said "Don't play with that."

He then took the servo away from a startled Lansing.

Lansing said 'Can he do that?' The cast & crew assured Lansing that indeed, Iriving had the authority since he was in charge of protecting the valuable props from any damage.

Lesson: Don't mess with the Irv."

[Pow]

Nitpicker's Guide

Gary Seven escapes from the Enterprise by using the star ship's transporter system, but when he materializes in his NYC office, it looks like he's using his own transporter system.

The two visual effects for each transportation system clearly are different.

This is one of these issues that I never thought of prior to reading the Nitpicker's Guide.

Could we chalk it up that Seven's transporter can somehow, someway link onto the Enterprise transporter and convert it into Gary's transporter?

The premise for this episode/pilot is that the aliens that have trained Gary on their cloaked planet must have technology that is even more advanced than the Federation of Planets in the 23rd century.

Perhaps that would allow for Gary's transporter to hijack him from the Enterprise transporter.

I always thought that if Assignment: Earth was ever to be rebooted that they should go another way for Gary's transporter visually.

I'd have something like the vortex that they used on the Sliders TV show. Gary would step into this portal to travel to locations instead of having his atoms scrambled and reassembled.

The visual on A:E had Seven walk through a swirling cloud effect. So it could be that his transporter system did not entail any kind of molecular breakdown & reassembling like the Enterprise transporter system at all.

At the end of the episode, Gary makes his final report on a typewriter that transcribes speech. Earlier in the episode, Gary used the Beta 5 computer to record his thoughts.

Why then does he still work in an antiquated medium like paper? Why not always use the B5 to record his reports?

Well, the experts do say that in spite of us living in the computer era we should always back up our important documents with good ole' paper files.

Interesting that Kirk & Spock had no issues with Gary and his alien backers changing the course of Earth's history, even if it's for the better . . . and now a part of their history.

The Prime Directive is a crucial part of the Federation of Planets. The FOP is clearly not to interfere (benevolently) with another planet's normal progress if that world lacks the highly sophisticated technology possessed by the FOP.

Gary and the aliens that trained and sponsor him follow a dogma that is in opposition to what the FOP believes in.

I wonder just what the FOP & Starfleet's reaction was when Captain Kirk returned and filed his report for this mission?

It seems that it could cause some consternation given what Gary and his alien pals are up to? How many other worlds have they decided to save by changing the course of history?

I've always wondered about where this world is located and the beings that inhabit it?

What was their motivation for wishing to become involved with the affairs of Earth? Other planets?

Did they go through some kind of disaster with their race that made them determined not see other races suffer the same fate?

How did they manage to overcome their grave problems in order to become a successful civilization?

Has their meddling into other world's affairs had negative repercussions?

Are they attempting to thwart another race who are utilizing time travel to cause destruction to different planets?

And this is their best (imperfect) answer to halting this evil race?

If Gene Roddenberry had an extended game plan for A:E, I'd love to know exactly what his agenda was for this concept.

[johnnybear]

Maybe Gary Seven stopped off somewhere first before rematerialising in his office?
JB

[Pow]

Servo Pen Intel

The servo could open 20th century mechanical locks and disable a Federation star ship brig force-field.

It was also a weapon that possessed three offensive settings. One projected an invisible force that was capable of causing damage at short range.; another could kill a human being; and a third had a hypnotic effect on humans.

A collar ring on the midsection of the servo was twisted to set the device into its required mode.

When the servo was activated a pair of hidden prongs located near the top of the gizmo extended, and a sparkle of blue energy appeared between them.

Interesting that the Enterprise security team was never able to find the servo on Gary Seven when he was unconscious in sickbay.

Wouldn't it make sense for such a highly advanced alien civilization who trained Gary not to create vital equipment that anyone else could easily access?

First, we see Roberta Lincoln's hand lean on one of the pen holders on Seven's desk which immediately opens up the sliding panel that reveals his vault/transporter system.

Second, we see her take the servo and at one point aim it at Kirk & Spock. Gary quickly snatches the servo from her and puts it in sleep mode.
He states that it was set to kill as he hands it to Kirk.

That means anyone who was able to take the servo from Seven could use it right away.

No lockout codes, no kind of identification needed to utilize the servo. How about designing the servo so that it only recognized Gary's voice, eye scan, fingerprints or something which only allowed Gary to activate it?

[Gord Green]

I think we have to assume that the alien powers behind Gary Seven were greatly beyond the 23rd Century technology of the Federation.

Therefore...In a Clarksian way...Their technology was more akin to MAGIC!
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There comes a time, thief, when gold loses its lustre, and the gems cease to sparkle, and the throne room becomes a prison; and all that is left is a father's love for his child.

[Pow]

Computer Interface

A small, green translucent cube on Gary's desk was a terminal
linked to the Beta 5 computer. The cube relayed orders and comments to and from the Beta 5 unit located in the next room. It was also equipped with an advanced sensor capable of carrying out and analyzing detailed scans.

So I'm guessing that Gary would have carried the cube with him on his assignments?

The cube never impressed me as being an intriguing looking device (or prop).

I would have made his awesome servo be able to perform the functions ascribed to the cube.

[Pow]

Beta 5 Computer

Perhaps the most vital piece of technology Gary Seven had at his disposal was the astonishing Beta 5 computer.

It allowed him to monitor events anywhere on Earth; create any kind of documents he might need on an assignment.

He used it to track and destroy a nuclear weapons platform when it was 150 miles above the Earth.

Had Assignment: Earth gone to series, I would imagine that the writers would have established the B5 as being enormously powerful & possessing a multitude of capabilities in order to assist Gary on his missions.

The fly in the ointment here would have been the same issue that they ran into on ST:TOS with the Enterprise.

For the sake of the story and to be impressive for the audience, the Enterprise was a technological marvel that could perform many sensational functions. However, that also made it tricky for the script writers to continually put the star ship---and by extension the crew--- realistically in danger each week.

The B5 would be the same challenge for writers each week for A:E. It could analyze anything and everything, give Gary all his answers, point out dangers for him, devise foolproof strategies for his assignments, and so forth & so on.

It could potentially suck out the suspense & jeopardy & mysteries that all make for exciting stories.

His transporter system could also prove to be challenging for writers because it could be utilized to place him into & out of locations easily thus preventing any risk for him.

[Pow]

I wonder if it might not have been interesting to begin this episode with the crew on the planet where they first met the Guardian of Forever? They are conducting scans and examinations of not only the Guardian but the ruins of the city on the planet.

Suddenly, Gary Seven comes through the Guardian to the bewilderment of everyone. The Guardian has somehow intercepted Seven's planet's teleportation beam.

I realize this would have made the episode too expensive but it was fun to imagine.

[Bud Brewster]

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Today almost posted an apology for a mistake I didn't actually make!

Remember the previous discussion on this thread concerning which actress played Isis in Assignment: Earth? I was absolutely convinced that Victoria Vitri played her, and JohnnyBear had to patiently (and repeatedly) urge me to reconsider . . . because he know I was wrong.

I even created a comparison image which placed Miss Vitri's face over the image of Isis, hoping to convince JB I was right.







But thanks to Eadie, we eventually learned that Isis was played by April Tatro. Afterwards, I posted this,

[QueenoftheUniverse]

So if U had UNLIMITED resources, & could come up with 20 episodes of A:E, who would U cast as Gary Seven (Gary Sinese?), Isis, & Roberta Lincoln?

[Bud Brewster]

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What a great idea, Your Majesty!

I assume you mean the series that was supposed to result from the proposed pilot that the A:E was intended to generate.

With that in mind, I'll suggest actors from that period, if the original actors were not available or were recast.

Gary Seven — Roy Thinnes (immediately after The Invaders was cancelled in 1968).

__________

Roberta Lincoln — Goldie Hawn, (who was a world famous "dizzy blond" in 1968 on Laugh In.)

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Isis — Victoria Vetri (Why not? People mistakenly thought it was her for years!)

The first image below is an actual picture of Victoria Vetri which I modified to look like Isis for this thread, back in 2019 when I was sure she played the role.



And this is the real Isis, whom we later learned was played by April Tatro!


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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[scotpens]