It’s a little warmer in Cicely, Alaska this week, and there is a lot going on, and it all relates to vanity, it’s all there in the title. All Is Vanity was written by Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider and debuted on 22 April, 1991. Holling (John Cullum) goes to see Joel (Rob Morrow) after…
Tag: astronaut
Dark Skies (1996) – Moving Targets, and Mercury Rising
So after the Kennedy assassination and their options off the table, what do Loengard (Eric Close) and Kim (Megan Ward) do in the first episode following the pilot movie? They become Moving Targets. Written by the series creators, Bryce Zabel and Brent Friedman, this episode was first broadcast on 28 September, 1996. Loengard and Kim…
Northern Exposure (1990) – Pilot, and Brains, Know-How and Native Intelligence
I adored Northern Exposure whenever I came across an episode on television, and totally dug Chris-In-The-Morning (John Corbett), but I never watched the series from beginning to end. So it’s time to dig in to the classic series. Rob Morrow stars as Dr. Joel Fleischman. He’s had his med school paid for by the state…
The Ninth Configuration (1980) – William Peter Blatty
William Peter Blatty the author of The Exorcist, wrote and directed this spiritual sequel, now defined as part of the faith trilogy formed by The Exorcist, The Ninth Configuration, and The Exorcist III. It’s a fascinating film, in parts funny, in parts heartbreaking, and in parts horrifying. In a remote part of the Pacific Northwest…
Star Trek: Picard (2022) – Fly Me to the Moon, and Two of One
Jonathan Frakes directs Fly Me to the Moon, which brings us to the halfway marl of season two of Star Trek: Picard, and features a brief cameo by Lea Thompson who directed the previous pair of episodes. Written by Cindy Appel, the episode debuted on 31 March, 2022, and reveals what Picard (Patrick Stewart) has…
Ad Astra (2019) – James Gray
James Gray delivers one of the most authentic looks at space travel since Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, throw in a little of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and you have the basic groundwork for this science fiction drama that sees astronaut Roy McBride (Brad Pitt) travelling to the outer reaches of our solar system, all…
Night Shift (1978) – Stephen King
I was craving some Stephen King, but couldn’t decide which of his novels to tackle next, so instead, I figured I fill that need with some short stories, and fug into his first published collection, which gathered a variety of different tales under the title of Night Shift. I remember seeing the paperback cover as…
The Apollo Murders (2021) – Chris Hadfield
Retired astronaut and national treasure Chris Hadfield delivers a fast-paced thriller with The Apollo Murders. It’s a look at an all too believable reality as the story follows the training, launch, and mission of Apollo 18. It’s made all the more believable because Hadfield not only knows his subject matter, emotionally and technically, using an…
Gwendy’s Final Task (2022) – Stephen King and Richard Chizmar
Stephen King pairs up for a second time with Richard Chizmar to deliver the final book in the Gwendy trilogy. The book solidly ties itself into The Dark Tower universe as Gwendy now a junior senator, and about to be an astronaut because once again, the enigmatic Mr. Farris has shown up with the increasingly…
Moonfall (2022) – Roland Emmerich
Roland Emmerich seems to really enjoy putting global destruction, and cardboard characters on the screen, and Moonfall is no different, but unlike 2012 , and Independence Day: Resurgence this one actually like a lot of fun, though there’s a bit of a stumble with the last third of the film, though there may have been…
The Mind Reels 