Article-I.D.: ucbvax.340
Posted: Wed Dec 15 04:31:53 1982
Received: Fri Dec 17 01:12:34 1982

>From SFL@SRI-CSL  Mon Dec 13 02:27:04 1982
Reply-To: SF-LOVERS at SRI-CSL
To: SF-LOVERS@SRI-CSL


SF-LOVERS Digest        Wednesday, 15 Dec 1982    Volume 6 : Issue 105

Today's Topics:
    Books   - Cherryh's WAVE WITHOUT A SHORE, Robinson's STARDANCE
	      Adams' LIFE, THE UNIVERSE, AND EVERYTHING
    T.V.    - Star Trek The City on the Edge of Forever
    Movies  - Fantastic Voyage, Star Trek, SW/TESB/ROTJ
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Thursday,  9 Dec 1982 23:12-PST
Subject: reality as perception
From: Tim Mann 


Another book about reality as the perception of the observer is "Wave
Without a Shore," by C. J. Cherryh, which I believe was mentioned here
some months ago.

        --Tim Mann

------------------------------

Date: 10 Dec 1982 10:56 PST
From: GMeredith.ES at PARC-MAXC
Subject: Re: SF-LOVERS Digest   V6 #100

Regarding Stewart Rubenstein's comment on "Stardance".

I thought the novel was excellent, with real insight as to the
feelings and so-forth of characters involved in such a situation.
However, I thought the whole thing became very contrived, pat and
simple from the point where the aliens make their entrance.  Just too
many coincidences for good story--too much like the sort of
happen-stance I gripe about in Heinlein in his recent senile stages.

The last was a real let-down as I thought the rest of the novel was
among the best I have ever read.  I am a Robinson addict as well, and
would expect something more consistent.

------------------------------

Date: 10 Dec 82 16:25:42-PST (Fri)
From: decvax!utzoo!watmath!bstempleton at Ucb-C70
Subject: Re: Fantastic Voyage

Well, one thing that Fantastic Voyage never dealt with was that they
injected a shrunken 60 gallon drum of water into the guy with the
double shrunk submarine.

I'm not sure what would happen, but when that water expanded, boy
would he have to go to the bathroom something fierce!

Brad |-)

------------------------------

Date: 10 Dec 1982 11:05:28-EST
From: csin!cjh at CCA-UNIX
Subject: re THE CITY ON THE EDGE OF FOREVER

   Ellison's original script for this can be found in SIX SCIENCE
FICTION PLAYS, one of the few worthwhile anthologies by Roger Elwood.
It \is/ a good deal better than what finally came out; it may be too
long (though I would think Ellison had enough experience by then that
he wouldn't have made that mistake) and definitely would have run way
over budget (e.g. a long valley full of huge talking statues).

------------------------------

Date: Saturday, 11 December 1982  13:20-EST
From: Vince Fuller 
Subject: STWOK and inconsistancies

    Date: Thursday, 9 December 1982 16:11-EST
    From: Alan R. Katz 
    To:  SF-LOVERS at MIT-MC
    Re:  STWOK and inconsistancies

    In catching up on old messages, I came across a message about an
    inconsistancy in Star Trek II.  The message stated that the date
on
    the bottle of Ale said 2283, yet the start of the movie clearly
says
    "In the 23rd century."

    I suprised no one caught this, but 2283 IS IN the 23rd Century,
just
    as it is now 1982, but the 20th century!

No problem here... It's just that if the ale is dated 2283, it can't 
be all that old if it is still the 23rd century.

------------------------------

Date: 10-Dec-82 15:58:20 PST (Friday)
From: Pettit at PARC-MAXC
Subject: Star Date 2283

To Alan Katz: it was clear from the original message that the
submitter knew that 2283 is in the 23rd century.  The message said
something about Kirk's expression/comments being indicative of
appreciating a RARE OLD bottle of Brandy (or some other kind of aged
spirit), not a product aged less than 17 years.  This can be explained
either by the relativistic effects, by Romulan Brandy (or whatever it
was) being fast-aging, or as an inconsequential bug in a movie which
can't be expected to be totally consistent.  It is NOT due to someone
thinking that 2283 was in the 22nd century.

--Teri

------------------------------

Date: 10 Dec 1982 0241-EST
From: Hobbit 
Subject: Whew!

I just slogged through about a month and a half of back SFL, so please
bear with any out-of-date comments.  The following is very random:

I was surprised to notice, back in the big SF rock discussion, that no
one mentioned Judas Priest.  Okay, so some of us *don't* listen to 
high-decibel heavy metal all the time.  Anyhow, some of their titles 
include ''Invader'', something about attacking aliens; ''Metal Gods'',
about a time when machines run everything including the human race,
and ''Solar Angels''.  I could probably dig up more if I pawed through
my collection at home.

~=''The son of Skywalker must not become a Jedi''?  *Which* Skywalker?
Okay, so here's another idea:  Life was often boring on Luke's home 
planet, so the inhabitants might have sought out each other for
entertainment.  A couple of days before the Empire shows up, Luke
could have been at a helluva party.  So the ''Other'' may indeed be
*his* son??  The Force seems to have some hereditary aspects.....

I submit that the @= symbol, besides indicating nuclear topics, could 
indicate a very *large* candle, or megaflame.

Gee, if Lucasflicks got their vax on some network or other, think what
would we would see on SFL.  ''From: spielberg.dagobah@udel-relay''?

_H*

------------------------------

Date: 10 Dec 1982 01:32:51-EST
From: Ed-Tecot-H at CMU-EE-AMPERE at CMU-10A
Subject: SW : Rampid Speculation

1)  Assuming that every Jedi has a light sabre, all Darth Vader would
    have to do was to kill one in order to replace the one he lost
    to his good side

2)  The names in SW seem to be a bit symbolic:
    Sky Walker
    Solo
    Darth Vader (Dark Father?)
    Maybe some of the others can be interpreted also:
        Princess Leia
        Boba Fett
        Tarkin
        Also--does Jedi translate?

3) Not only does SW cross with Alice in Wonderland, but also consider
   C.S. Lewis's "Chronicles of Narnia".  The "other" could be the
   Lion, with Luke, Han, Luke, and Chewie comprising the party of
   four.


                                                -emt

------------------------------

Date: 8 Dec 82 14:21:08-PST (Wed)
From: teklabs!tektronix!rich at Ucb-C70
Subject: Vader death count


   Here's a question for you SW/SW-TESB/ROTJ fans... how many people 
in either of the first two movies did Darth Vader actually kill by his
own hand? Recall that it was Tarken, not Vader who wasted the planet.
   I recall only seeing him choke the commander of Leia's ship plus 
laser blasting a couple x-wings in the trench of Death Star, not to 
mention alleviating Obi-wan of his material body.
   Did we see him kill anyone in TESB? Couple of his own commanders?  
Maybe he isn't as bad as we think?  Hell, after all, Luke killed
*everybody* in the battle station (death star) by *his own hand*, so
he really isn't as good as we want him to be.

------------------------------

Date: 10-Dec-82 00:11-PST
From: DAUL at OFFICE
Subject: RotJ RFI

I have a request for information.  Does anyone know roughly when they 
(the un-specific "they") will start selling tickets for the first 
day's showing of RotJ?  I realize that the readership is from all over
the country, but I just want general information (if anyone knew about
the SF bay area in particular I would be mighty beholden!)  Thanks,
--Bi<<<

------------------------------

Date: 9 Dec 82 8:51:12-PST (Thu)
From: harpo!seismo!rocheste!heliotis at Ucb-C70
Subject: Re: No, there is another.

I disagree with some of Alexis Layton's opinions.  (1) When Luke
decided to jump off the ... thing, I think he felt that Vader was
getting the best of him, and if he didn't get away from that guy soon,
he would be sucked into the dark side of the force; if he had regained
his composure, perhaps he would not have had to jump (althought
perhaps Vader would have killed him).  Also, I think that Luke often
cried out Ben's name to keep from thinking about "Poppa Darth", and
again, being sucked into the dark side . (Oops!  I should have said
"(2)" there!)

                                        Jim@Ra-cha-cha

------------------------------

Date: Friday, 10 Dec 1982 09:50-PST
Subject: More Jedi Stuff
From: urban at RAND-UNIX

   I recently attended the LucasFilms RotJ dog-and-pony show at 
LosCon, which was by all accounts nearly identical to the presentation
at ChiCon (which I managed to miss).  Some of the stuff hasn't been 
mentioned in SFL and might affect people's speculations.  The studio 
has been really good about NOT generating serious spoilers, though.
   There is at least one other planetfall besides Tatooine and
Dagobah, which is the moon of Endor (a very Tolkien name!); this was
shot in the redwood country of northern California.
   Luke is seen (dressed in black) fighting Darth Vader in an as-yet- 
unenhanced light-sabre duel.  "Where did Luke get his light-sabre?"  
"He makes it".
   Luke is seen in an elevator with Darth Vader.  The elevator is
flanked by Royal Shakespeare Company actors in red robes (very
striking against the usual imperial black-and-white sets).  We are
told that these are the Emperor's guards.  "Do we see the Emperor in
this film?"  "Yes."
   There are indeed new characters in this film, including Admiral 
Ackbar (available as a bonus from Kenner Toys just like Boba Fett was 
"pre-released" as a toy before Empire came out).  One of these is a
woman, named (spelling wrong?) Mom Montha.  To show you how the fan
mind works, there was a Mom Montha in the ChiCon Masquerade.  That's
FAST work!  "Do we find out who the 'other' is?"  "Yes."  (strongly
implies that "another" is indeed a 'who' and not a 'what').
   At Westercon, the following non-answer was given: "Is Darth Vader
Luke's father?"  "At LucasFilms, we almost always tell the truth."
   At every presentation, the LucasFilms rep was VERY careful to point
out that Obi-Wan will look translucent in the finished film, 
regardless of how the principal photography looks.  "He's still dead, 
or in heaven or wherever Jedi go when they die".

DISCLAIMER: All these quotes are from memory.

        Mike

------------------------------

Date: 10 Dec 1982 2303-EST
From: Stephen R Balzac 
Subject: Light Sabers and caves

The object falling past Luke was indeed his hand still holding the 
light saber (at least so far as I remember).  Since the force is a 
property of all things, not just life, I don't think Luke's mechanical
hand will have any effect.

As for the cave, I suspect that Luke was supposed to go in there 
unarmed, and defeat the apparitions that came against him through the 
use of his own inner strength, not by gross physical means.  Thus, his
use of a light-saber would indicate a failure on his part because it 
would show that he lacks confidence in his own inner power.  Remember,
the cave seems to show each person his own secret fears, which can 
only be beaten by one's own strength of will, not by outside means.  
As Salvor Hardin once said, "Violence is the last refuge of the 
incompetent."  Certainly, the Jedi Knights seem to feel the same way.

------------------------------

Date: 10 Dec 82 11:47:44-PST (Fri)
From: harpo!floyd!vax135!ariel!orion!lime!we13!otuxa!nwuxc!inuxc!inuxd
From: !arlan at Ucb-C70
Subject: Re: Vader death count

Looks like the Vader/Tarkin partnership is only slightly ahead in the
mass- murder standings, with Mao Tse-Tung socialism next, then
Stalin/socialism, followed by Nazi/Socialism, then Alfred Nobel...  
arlan andrews, abi/btl,indy

------------------------------

Date: 10 Dec 82 12:50:23-PST (Fri)
From: decvax!utzoo!laura at Ucb-C70
Subject: Leia as the other?

        I never liked the pretentious, vain, haughty princess who
seems to toss her brain out the window whenever the going gets tough.
I dont care how loyal to the cause and brave she is --- i think that
she is also obnoxious. Granted, Luke and Han can act like jerks at
times, but at least they appear to be thinking and trying things --
not complaining, criticising and acting like a piece of delicate
dresden china.  Leia the other??  Oh i hope not!  My money is on
Chewbacca...


                                        Laura Creighton
                                        decvax!utzoo!laura

(after all, what's a little inter-species prejudice compared with rank
 xenophobia?  How come all the big shots are human?)

------------------------------

Date: 12 Dec 82 3:48-PST
From: mclure at SRI-UNIX
Subject: Adams book

n559  0315  12 Dec 82
BC-ADAMS-12-12
    A BOOK REVIEW
    By Christina Robb
    (c) 1982 Boston Globe (Field News Service)

    LIFE, THE UNIVERSE AND EVERYTHING, by Douglas Adams. Harmony. 227
pp. $9.95.

    (Christina Robb is Boston Globe staff writer.)

    I hope somebody figures out a way to make movies out of Douglas
Adams' three funny books about Arthur Dent loose in the unvierse. It
will be hard, because an awful lot of what's funny is Adams'
impeccable narrative sense of when to pun and when to run.
    There's a scene between a mattress and a robot in ''Life, the
Universe and Everything,'' the third and, we are told, final novel
about Adams' mild-mannered English hero and his mind-boggling
adventures in space, time and restaurants. The mattress-robot scene,
which is set in a swamp on the far side of a far galaxy, contains a
digression about intergalactic dictionaries and the dialects of
mattresses that would never make it into a screen adaption. The
30-year-old Englishman is such a word wizard that you've probably
just got to read his books to get it all, but it sure is embarrassing
to be riding along to work in the morning on the train or in your car
pool, holding this little blue book in your lap and laughing your
head off. At least in a movie theater everybody would be laughing
with you instead of staring at you.
    Arthur Dent was minding his own business, trying to prevent a
bulldozer from knocking his house down one morning in England's green
and pleasant land sometime during the '80s, when a casual
acquaintance informed him that the world was about to come to an end
and he would help him off. Dent and this acquaintance, a humanoid
mongrel from Betelgeuse called Ford Prefect, got off the planet, out
of the century and into even more trouble through the entire universe
and across a span of approximately 10 billion years.
    With their two-headed friend, Zaphod Beeblebrox, and his Earthling
friend, Trillian, they laughed, cried, drank, ate and very often,
startled themselves through the action of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to
the Galaxy'' and ''The Restaurant at the End of the Universe,'' the
first two novels in this trilogy.
    Now, in ''Life, the Universe and Everything,'' they are joined by
Slartibartfast, the Merlin of their company. With cameo appearances
in swamps and elsewhere by Marvin, the paranoid robot, they manage to
wrest the fate of the universe out of the hands of the gentle people
of Krikkit, who believe in ''peace, justice, mortality, culture,
sport, family life and the obliteration of all other life forms.''
    The Krikkiters really are a lovely lot. They sing carefree,
tuneful songs that could make a former Beatle even richer. Their only
drawback is that they are obsessed with destroying the universe, which
their foggy atmosphere prevented them from knowing was there for the
first several million years of their development. Yes, there is an
ironic echo of their dire obsession in the English Earthlings'
ridiculous game of cricket, and the final act of Krikkit's plot
against the universe is played out at Lord's, the London cricket
ground.
    Adams is not just funny. I don't think it's an accident that while
I was reading, I thought of the 1936 Olympics, and the South African
Springboks trying to play rugby around the world in 1982 while they
practice apartheid at home. But he is always funny, never preachy,
very smart, and even if he never adds another Arthur Dent book to this
universe, science fiction will never be the same.

------------------------------

End of SF-LOVERS Digest
***********************