Bodyswapping Is Your Future

As a sort of follow-up to the article I wrote about Time Loops, I've written another about another common plot device used in science fiction: the bodyswap episode.

Two characters exchange bodies and learn a little more about how the other person lives, feels and is treated by those around them. It's a great device that can be used for comedy as much as for serious character development.

I wrote this for Hero Collector.

"My name's not Turkey"

After Battlestar Galactica was cancelled, it returned as Galactica 1980, which unsurprisingly sees Galactica arrive in Earth's system in the year 1980. Unable to land, Adama sends a small advance party who try to blend in with flying bikes, Nazis and baseball playing children who can jump thirty feet into the air.

Not as well loved as its predecessor, Galactica 1980 is largely forgotten and often ignored. It's time to change all that and I've written this for Hero Collector to draw your attention back to it whether you like it or not.

Every Saga Has A Beginning

Star Wars, Episode I: The Phantom Menace was released twenty years ago today and a saga began anew. Sadly the film did not meet with universal acclaim and became a shorthand for cinematic disappointment.

This struck me as somewhat unfair and I think that Episode I deserves reappraisal. In honour of that I wrote this.

What He Left Behind

I love Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. So does Ira Steven Behr, so he made a documentary about it and after a long period of development it's finally doing the rounds.

What We Left Behind: Looking Back At Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is a brilliant love letter to the often overlooked series.

I wrote this for Hero Collector.

Fleeing From The Cylon Tyranny No More

Yesterday was the fortieth anniversary of the broadcast of The Hand Of God. It's the finale of the original Battlestar Galactica and for my money the best episode of the series.

This is the episode that sees Galactica stop fleeing and fight back against the Cylons. This is the episode that sees Galactica apparently arrive at or near its final destination. This is the episode that best bridges the gap between this series and the twenty-first century reimagining.

I wrote this for Hero Collector.

The Nostromo Seven

Joss Whedon, writer of Alien Resurrection, described his TV series, Firefly, as “nine People looking into the blackness of space and seeing nine different things.”, it’s an evocative description of Firefly, but it’s arguably even truer of the original Alien (although to make the maths work you have to include the alien and Jones the cat).

People talk at length about Ripley, the Alien and the relationship between them, but the rest of the crew deserve our attention too. Here they are below in a white void staring out of shot.

Today is Alien Day* and Alien is forty years old this year, so I wrote this.

* The planet featured in the first two films is designated LV-426, and in American date order this corresponds to April 26th.

Death, And What Comes After

It's Easter time and as our thoughts turn inevitably to death and resurrection. We think of an individual that changed so many lives. A leader that died and came back to us.

I refer, of course, to Captain Kathryn Janeway.

A great many Star Trek characters have kicked the bucket and returned to tell the tale. Famously, on the big screen Spock copped it and came back for more, but only once. Until Harry Mudd trapped Gabriel Lorca in time loop to kill him again and again, Janeway held the record for the number of deaths she survived. She still has the most varied demises over the course of Voyager's seven year journey.

In celebration, I wrote this for Hero Collector.