Sci-Fi Fans?

[davedove]

Any old-timers here remember the 1971 British series UFO?

Was that the one that dealt with the aliens harvesting organs and the main character's sister (I think) was one of the victims?

I really enjoyed the "V" miniseries. Or at least the initial miniseries. Once they went into the series continuation it started to lose it. Of course part of the reason I liked it is because Jane Balder was my kind of alien!

[Sciuropterus]

Was that the one that dealt with the aliens harvesting organs and the main character's sister (I think) was one of the victims?

Correct. 20+ years before the X-Files!

[Caradoc]

Correct. 20+ years before the X-Files!

Go back farther. The aliens in "V" weren't harvesting organs - they were eating people (and brainwashing others.)

See the old "Twilight Zone" episode, "To Serve Man ."

[smaughazard]

Here's a poll for all of you science fiction fans:

What are the Best and Worst film adaptations of a major novel or story?
My nominations:

Best: Blade Runner -really captured Phil Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep

Worst: I, Robot -stole the Good Doctor A's title, a few character names, and nothing else

[Zardoz]

Best and worst movies from novels......

Keeping in the Heinlein theme; I thought Starship Troopers, while not being that much like the book, captured the spirit of it and was quite entertaining.

Puppet Masters is the best Heinlein adaption to date though.

The worst; Battlefield Earth! Not only an injustice to a great novel, but a crappy movie on every level.

[KiltedCodeWarrior]

Best and worst movies from novels......

Keeping in the Heinliein theme; I thought Starship Troopers, while not being that much like the book, captured the spirit of it and was quite entertaining.

Puppet Masters is the best Heinlein adaption to date though.

The worst; Battlefield Earth! Not only an injustice to a great novel, but a crappy movie on every level.

Zardoz, I agree with you on Starship Troopers. Not exactly like the book, but true to the book.

Puppet Masters was good enough, but just did not really draw in the audience that much IMO. It could have been better filmed, although I can not fault their dedication to the book. I just was not impressed by the movie itself.

[Panache]

Here's a poll for all of you science fiction fans:

What are the Best and Worst film adaptations of a major novel or story?
My nominations...Worst: I, Robot -stole the Good Doctor A's title, a few character names, and nothing else

Best: "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" (1953 Disney). A straight blow by blow translation would have been unappealing. The screen writer took all the elements and fashioned a wonderful adventure that captures the spirit of the Jules Verne novel without being dragged down by it's episodic nature and lack of a cathartic ending. It added the issues of nuclear power to a generation still trying to comprehend the complex questions that entering the atomic age warranted.


Worst: "I, Robot". I was excited about a movie version of I, Robot. I really liked the series. Crossing a detective story and science fiction (and making it work) takes a lot of imagination and talent. The fact that each story has to hold to the "The Laws of Robotics" makes them that much more brilliant. As for the movie... I read a couple of reviews online and in the papers and was very disappointed. One reviewer wrote something along the lines of : ... in the credits the movie says "inspired by the works of Isaac Asimov." it should have read "With apologies to the works of Isaac Asimov". Needless to say, I didn't bother to watch it. But I still think that it rates as the worst movie adaptation of a science fiction classic.

Cheers

[Iolaus]

Here's a poll for all of you science fiction fans:

What are the Best and Worst film adaptations of a major novel or story?
My nominations:

Best: Blade Runner -really captured Phil Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep

Maybe so, but what I went to see was, I thought, the movie adaptation of "Blade Runner" by William S. Burroughs, and I was very disappointed!

I-Robot was a decent enough film, but it wasn't Asimovs story; in fact, it wasn't even I-Robots world!

Another pet peeve of mine is Beast Master; They kept the animal team working with a human, but placed it into a Conan/Swords-n-Sorcery type world, instead of Norton's Sci-Fi universe of a post interstellar war that had left Earth a blue cinder, with surviving Earth veterans settling elsewhere.

...and the story wasn't even similar - the original was all about alien holdouts from the war!

[smaughazard]

Another excellent translation from print to screen: A Boy and his Dog -from the Harlan Ellison short story

Another Turkey: Dune -the awful version with Sting

[Rob Wright]

Another excellent translation from print to screen: A Boy and his Dog -from the Harlan Ellison short story

Another Turkey: Dune -the awful version with Sting

The Director's Cut is a much better version though the tv mini-series is the best of them all as adaptions, but, DUNE did have some great visuals, the first appearance of hte Navigator was just awesome.

As an adaption Blade Runner isn't that great,(note I sad adaption, I like the movie a lot) it's mainly based on one chapter of thte book. Minority Report is the same way and a good movie by the way. A Scanner Darkly looks to be the closest adaption of Dick's work to the original to date.

The Lensman Anime movie is a decent adaption of the Lensman books, a fave series of mine.

I would like to see Jack Williamsons book Humanoids adapted into a movie.

Starship Troopers the ovie was a satire and a grwat homage to the 50's bug movies.

CJ Cherryh is an excellent writer her Merchanter Universe rocks, DOWNBELOW STATION, CYTEEN,etc as well as the Chanur novels.

Also William Gibson and Bruce Sterling are two great writers, part of the original cyberpunk movement they continue to create consistantly good works.

Bug Jack Barron by Norman Spinrad would be excellent as a series on HBO.

Comics writer Warren Ellis has a respect and love for old pulp writers and he does excellent homages to them, TRANSMETROPOLITAN and ORBITER Aare just two examples.

Rob