Re: OT Buck Rogers aliens [was Errand of Mercy - Thoughts]
- From: "DDAY" <zirconic@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 01 Jun 2007 02:42:30 GMT
----------
In article <183r53t5ki3hhhlokbj1upsfa7s2kd8vuq@xxxxxxx>, Jack Bohn
<jackbohn@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I've seen a preliminary sketch of Crichton, the important point
was its elbows were akimbo. While attached at the shoulders, the
other end of the "arms" sat in tracks that ran up and down the
body. So all the arms were really for was from going straight
down at the sides to the "hands on hips" position.
You've never seen him in the show?
Worst. Robot. Ever.
Seriously, his design was ugly and he was portrayed as a pompous jerk. It
never made any sense. Why would humans design a robot that was so annoying?
Why wouldn't they simply turn him off?
The original pilot (I think it started as a TV pilot that got a theatrical
release) had some decent ideas. I thought that the computer council was a
decent idea. The story was that humanity was essentially ruled by a council
of maybe a dozen benevolent computer brains. They were carried around by
robots called "ambuquads" (I know, I don't get it either). That's where the
annoying Twikki the robot came in--he carried one of the council member
computers.
I think that the original intention was that Buck would convince the humans
that they should not be ruled by the computers anymore, even if the
computers were benevolent and not evil. He wanted them to take
responsibility for their own actions. Essentially, he would be the person
to help lead them out of the last bit of their dependency. Earth had been
devastated and was only recently recovering and starting to move out into
the stars. But humanity was still not living up to its potential and the
man from the 20th century was going to show them the way.
Anyway, that was the intention, and I think it had some promise. Not a lot,
but some. And I think that star Gil Gerard wanted Buck to spend more time
on Earth, helping with the recovery, venturing out into the wastelands and
things like that.
But the show very quickly turned into camp. Pretty soon they were doing all
kinds of wacky episodes, like the space vampire. The humans were flying all
over into space and they dropped any hints that humanity had only recently
regained space travel. And Twikki became comic relief, a dancing robot. I
seem to remember reading somewhere that the writers would get notes from the
studio saying "Twikki needs more lines."
Then by the second season they went in another direction. They toned down
Twikki for awhile (and they had a contract dispute with Mel Blanc over the
voice), and then they introduced a pompous ass robot, Crichton. Stupid.
Stupid. Stupid.
I have no idea why I remember any of this stuff.
D
.
- Follow-Ups:
- Re: OT Buck Rogers aliens [was Errand of Mercy - Thoughts]
- From: Jack Bohn
- Re: OT Buck Rogers aliens [was Errand of Mercy - Thoughts]
- Prev by Date: Re: OT Buck Rogers ships, & others [was Buck Rogers aliens]
- Next by Date: Re: OT Buck Rogers ships, & others [was Buck Rogers aliens]
- Previous by thread: Re: OT Buck Rogers ships, & others [was Buck Rogers aliens]
- Next by thread: Re: OT Buck Rogers aliens [was Errand of Mercy - Thoughts]
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
