Wednesday 24 April 2013

Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1979)

Images from the feature length first episode of the 1979 TV movie Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. Interestingly, for 37 odd episodes, I don't recall a lot of space suit action.
This is Buck wearing the suit they found him in although it appears to lack a space helmet.  Even more interesting is the fact that the suits is on loan from the prop store and has a long history through film and TV, starting in (1959) Men into Space and continuing all the way to Laverne and Shirley (1982) and possibly beyond.  Follow the "Men into Space Helmets" thread to view the history of its appearances in company with a particular space helmet.

A big thanks to blog follower Tim for bringing this latest appearance to my attention.

Steve

10 comments:

  1. Good memories with this one. I watched this and BSG back in the day, and I used to really like Colonel Deering :)! And I believe you are right...there was a lack of spacesuits in both seasons, only that dorky white flight suit with rainbow helmet.

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  2. The film was more fun the series, saw the theatrical release and there was a marked difference between that and the feature length episode. The title sequence of the film gives a good idication, even now it's enough make you spill your popcorn.

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  3. William...I had to resist a great urge to publish pictures of Deering here. I may think of some wonderful excuse in the future that justifies it. A spacesuit hanging up in the background will do! And I'm also constantly dismissing flightsuits as well in order to maintain blog integrity. some times that's a shame

    DSE...is that the title sequence that has more to do with soft core porn than sci-fi?

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    1. Yeah that's the one, some of it's quite clever, like they way it implies a huge luminous buck rogers logo. If I remember right they cut the humour out in the TV version as well as the saucy chicks in the beginning. But Wilma does get that blue lurex catsuit to prance around in.

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  4. I watched the theatrical release version again recently and agree completely that it was much better than the tv cut and the series that followed. They really dumbed it down and cheesed it up as the programme went on. Changing the format for season two was a mistake--especially adding the bird guy and the rather-too-referential naming of the captain "Asimov." Still--Wilma Deering! She makes any amount of silly dreck tolerable!

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  5. I sort of lost interest quite quickly, especially as it clashed with Doctor Who on the BBC at the same time. From what I saw of series two, bird-man, big new space ship and all, it seemed like it was considering transforming its self into Star Trek. All that said, i seem to recall collecting a very cool Buck Rogers stickers book and I did have the Twiki tiny action figure, which I must steal back off my younger brother - not that either of us are young any more

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  6. I just found another "looks like a spacesuit but isnt" from buck rogers,this one is called a sick suit
    http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-n2ogXOf5Io0/Ueld5Ok2qPI/AAAAAAAAA2g/x-xyOsyJPhc/s1600/cap587.bmp

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    1. Cheers that's new. I've got another BR image in the files with Buck in a silver version of this but I'm holding off until I find the episode and year. unfortunately I'm not that big a fan of the show to have watched all that many of them.

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    2. That would be this one,supposedly the things on the arms and chest are recycled parts of cylon "civillians" from bsg,anyway its from ep15 titled Ardala Returns starring the lovely Pamela Hensley ,now if I had been Buck I think I would have married her and gone off to rule the draconian empire as her royal consort or something,but thats just me.
      http://www.cylonempire.com/images/civ/Large/CylonCivilian-Mask.jpg
      http://m1knight.prekfun.com/cylon/BuckRogers/04.jpg
      http://m1knight.prekfun.com/cylon/BuckRogers/03.jpg
      http://m1knight.prekfun.com/cylon/BuckRogers/02.jpg
      http://m1knight.prekfun.com/cylon/BuckRogers/01.jpg

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    3. that's the fellow. Cheers

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