THE ORVILLE Just Provided the Final Episode for An EARLIER TV Series!

Tonight's The Orville "If the Stars Should Appear"...

...provided a series finale for the 1973 show The Starlost!

Let's look at the similarities...

A domed generation ship!

People in the dome don't realize they're on a ship since they've been isolated and sealed in the dome for generations!

They use comparatively-primitive tech, compared to the vessel's tech.

Rulers use religion to control the populace.

Ship had an accident about a hundred years after leaving home.

Ship on collision course with a star.

Sound's like Harlan Ellison's disowned tv series (described in detail by Ellison himself in "Somehow, I Don't Think We're in Kansas Anymore, Toto!", available in the book listed below!).

Now some of you might claim the ep is actually based on Star Trek's "The World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky" or Space:1999's "Mission of the Darians", and there are elements of both, but most of the "appropriating" is clearly from The Starlost, down to the dome itself!

Agree?

Disagree?

Let me know!

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The Starlost #1

Phoenix Without Ashes

by Harlan Ellison and Edward Bryant

(novelization of the unfilmed, award-winning, pilot script, plus Ellison's behind-the-scenes autopsy of the series' corpse, entitled "Somehow, I Don't Think We're in Kansas Anymore, Toto!)

Len Wein (1948-2017)

Most remember Len Wein for co-creating Swamp Thing, Wolverine, and the All-New, All-Different X-Men...

FOOM Magazine #10 Cover Original Art by Dave Cockrum

(...particularly, Storm, Colossus, and NightCrawler.)

But I prefer to remember his earlier, quirky projects like...

Hot Wheels #6 Cover Art by Neal Adams & Dick Giordano

Hot Wheels

(based on the cartoon series based on the toy line)

Wild West Action #1 Cover Art by Syd Shores and Mike Esposito

The Bravados

(An ethnically-diverse assortment of Western heroes)
and his (believe it or not)...

Secret Hearts #148 Contents Page Art by Gray Morrow

...romance comics work!

Len was not a one-trick pony!

He had an interest in almost everything imaginable...and it showed in his work.

BTW, all the links are to material that hasn't been reprinted since publication in the early 1970s!

Check them out!

BONUS: Here's the printed version of the X-Men-themed cover for Marvel's FOOM #10...

...and that's why I wanted to run the original art!

The two-color (as compared to comics' usual four-color) printing really muddied up the art!

Adam West's Long-Lost FIRST Appearance in Comic Books!

Five years before the late Adam West played comic book character Batman on TV...

...he appeared in a comic book based on a TV show!

His character, Detective Sgt Steve Nelson was added in 1961 to the cast for the third and final season of the police procedural The Detectives, which already featured a pair of actors who would go on to other genre shows during the 1960s...Mark Goddard on Lost in Space and Tige Andrews on The Mod Squad!

See the first, never-reprinted rendering of Adam West in comic books on our "brother" RetroBlog Secret Sanctum of Captain Video...HERE!

Frankenstein in the Swinging Sixties: ZIK! THWOCK! ARRGH!

The story we showed you HERE was not the Frankenstein Monster's only 1960s comic appearance...

...though some would like to forget this version!

After publishing a very loose adaptation of Universal Pictures' 1931 movie (as seen HERE), Dell decided to ride the "Pop Art" wave and do superhero versions of the various Universal Monsters!

For whatever reason, Universal didn't approve of the concept, but Dell went ahead anyway, removing any visual or story reference to Universal's versions of the characters to avoid trademark and copyright conflicts, utilizing only elements from the original (public domain) novels.

The end results were...unique.

Read them for yourself...if you dare...

Issue #2

Issue #3

Issue #4

(Issue #1 was the movie adaptation!

The superhero version started with #2)

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Before Ultron...there was Makino!

Who created Ultron?

If you go with the new movie Avengers: Age of Ultron...Tony Stark aka Iron Man. and Bruce Banner aka The Hulk!

If you go with Marvel Comics history...Henry Pym aka Ant-Man/Giant-Man/Goliath/Yellowjacket/Wasp/etc (Don't ask. It's too long a story...).

In reality, it was writer Roy Thomas and artist John Buscema in Marvel's Avengers V1 #54 (1967).

But where did Roy come up with the idea?

Well, he "borrowed" it from Captain Video!

Yep!

In #3 of Captain Video's short-lived 1950s title, he faced a robot named Makino who killed his scientist creator and then threatened all mankind!

The story left such an impression on the young Roy Thomas that, almost two decades later, he adapted elements of that story into the long-running saga of Ultron!

Roy explained how it came about in TwoMorrows' Alter Ego #114.

You can read the actual comic story on our "brother" RetroBlog Secret Sanctum of Captain Video HERE and HERE!

Visit Our Other RetroBlogs: Secret Sanctum of Captain Video

Specializing in comic adaptations of tv shows, movies, and dramatic radio shows, Secret Sanctum of Captain Video™ runs material unseen since first publication years and sometimes decades earlier.

Recent posts include...

The Avengers

Conan the Destroyer

Man from U.N.C.L.E.

and both the radio and movie versions of The Shadow!

Check it out!

Enjoy the Spies Who Love ME Every Weekend at Captain VIdeo's Secret Sanctum!

Beginning today, Secret Sanctum of Captain Video will do several posts each weekend tying in to MeTV's new Sunday night 60s spy show block.

Besides trivia and behind-the-scenes info, there will be a classic comic adaptation of one of the series!

Dont Miss It!

Doctor Who Deja Vu!

We're into the 2nd week of the newest Doctor Who's run, and whom do we already see?

Yep, the Daleks!

Used to be we'd have to wait at least a couple of months before they turned up, but now it's "Here's The Doctor and, of course, the Daleks!"

Here's a comic book adaptation of their first movie appearance...from almost 50 years ago!

The more thing change...

Before the Dawn...there was the Battle!

Looking over the trailers for Dawn of the Planet of the Apes...

...I was struck by how similar a lot of the concepts were to the classic series' final entry...

...so we're re-presenting the never-reprinted color comics adaptation of Battle of the Planet of the Apes at our brother RetroBlog, Secret Sanctum of Captain Video!

The ORIGINAL Planet of the Apes Tale...MONKEY PLANET by Pierre Boule

You've seen the seven films and both tv series...

...but did you ever read the book that started it all?

Here's the only graphic novel adaptation of the original story...

Part 1

Part 2

Conclusion

Read it before you see the movie this weekend!

Reading Room: FLASH GORDON THE MOVIE Conclusion "Flash...AAAHHH!"

When Last We Left Our Heroes (& Heroine)...

With Vultan and the HawkMen behind him, Flash Gordon pilots the captured WarRocket Ajax towards Mingo City to

a) stop the wedding of Ming the Merciless to Dale Arden

and

b) Save Earth from Total Devastation

(in that order)

Cue up the Queen soundtrack and join us for the big finale...

"Flash...AAAHHH!"

Check out our Flash, Buck, Brick and other Space Hero goodies at...

Thrilling Fantasy Tales

Reading Room: FLASH GORDON THE MOVIE Part 3: "...He's a Miracle...King of the Impossible..."

 When Last We Left Our Hero...

Flash Gordon, Dale Arden, and Dr Zarkov are prisoners of Prince Vultan and the HawkMen

Prince Barin of Arboria, also a prisoner, and believing Flash has stolen the affections of Princess Aura, has chosen the Earthman as his opponent in a fight to the death...

Part 3 "...He's a Miracle...King of the Impossible..."

 What could have been and what will be...
Tomorrow in the thrilling conclusion!

Check out our Flash, Buck, Brick and other Space Hero goodies at...

Thrilling Fantasy Tales