Eyes Turned Skywards

[AndyC]

Sounds good for the Uk's first. Baxter is an interesting suggestion, I'll keep him in mind for the future--the language restriction, though, isn't likely to entirely go away.

If you need a few more for a British astronaut corps:

Nigel Woods' backup was Lieutenant Colonel Richard Farrimond (an Army Signaller)

The second astronaut (accompanying Skynet 4B) was to be Lieutenant Commander Peter Longhurst (Royal Navy); backup was Mr Christopher Holmes (civil servant).

And if you get through to the late nineties and into the 2000's, I was a starry eyed physics graduate who joined the RAF as an Engineering Officer in 1995 with the aim of working on space-related stuff (and hoped that the above opportunities would come around again), did Spacecraft Operation training in 2000 (to control the Skynet spacecraft) and ended up leaving the RAF as a Sqn Ldr in June this year ... and in this TL, I'd have actually had a shot at space.

 

[Bahamut-255]

... and in this TL, I'd have actually had a shot at space.

Now THAT, would be something to see here! Makes me wonder what TTL ah.com would be like with you on the site.

You'd have one hell of a Sig though, that's for sure!

 

[AndyC]

Now THAT, would be something to see here! Makes me wonder what TTL ah.com would be like with you on the site.

You'd have one hell of a Sig though, that's for sure!

My last real shot was this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7662416.stm

The UK space policy review in 2008. I was a Squadron Leader, had commanded the Satcom Training School, physics graduate, had been sponsored through an MSc by the RAF and had the best security clearance you could get (so joint missions with the DoD were actually feasible) - and was working in Whitehall itself at the time. If they'd given the nod, by the time we had to put a candidate into astronaut training would have been mid-2010, which was when my tour in Whitehall was up.

I'd then have not taken my exit option for 2012, of course ... and then, of course, the shuttle program had the retirement announcement in 2010 for 2011 (I know that the writing was officially on the wall after Columbia in 2004 when Bush announced it would end about then, but it had kept being extended before. And even if the above had happened and I'd managed to get through to being selected (odds would have been against me; the RAF always favours pilots for this kind of thing even though they'd never be allowed anywhere near the controls ... my key argument would be that I was one of the best trained RAF Officers in orbital dynamics and spacecraft operations, having even taught the course), I could see myself being left high and dry after the cancellation).

 

[e of pi]

Will the Industrial Space Facility be launched in TTL?

I'm not sure the situation is similar enough--no Shuttle to promise regular large-scale up and downmass, and Freedom's coming along in about 1989, about when the ISF would have OTL as opposed to about 1996. (More benefits of having your prep work done beforehand.) I'm not going to say there won't be commercial space platforms eventually, but that particular one is pretty susceptible to butterflies here.

The lengths you go to reassure your readers are impressive and thorough, thank you!

Not like I had anything better to do sitting around in an airport, but thanks.

He also wants to know (I keep telling him to just get an account!) if we'll see other orbital scopes earlier: x-ray, IR, gamma and especially gravitational radiation.

Yes, un-named friend of Expat, jooooiiin usss. Anyway, that stuff tends to be more truth's end than mine, and that's actually the update he's working on either right now or next, so all I can really say is that those are still likely to be priorities for the astronomical community once Hubble is launched, the question will be the budget to develop and fly them, and the effects of that specific on aperture sizes and priority given to observatory in certain wavelengths.

If you need a few more for a British astronaut corps:

Nigel Woods' backup was Lieutenant Colonel Richard Farrimond (an Army Signaller)

The second astronaut (accompanying Skynet 4B) was to be Lieutenant Commander Peter Longhurst (Royal Navy); backup was Mr Christopher Holmes (civil servant).

Thanks, I'll keep them in mind as well.

And if you get through to the late nineties and into the 2000's, I was a starry eyed physics graduate who joined the RAF as an Engineering Officer in 1995 with the aim of working on space-related stuff (and hoped that the above opportunities would come around again), did Spacecraft Operation training in 2000 (to control the Skynet spacecraft) and ended up leaving the RAF as a Sqn Ldr in June this year ... and in this TL, I'd have actually had a shot at space.

Well, now, that is interesting, isn't it? Obviously, that's a bit beyond the ~1992 end of Part II, and really might end up beyond Part III, but I'll keep it in mind.

 

[Workable Goblin]

Yes, un-named friend of Expat, jooooiiin usss. Anyway, that stuff tends to be more truth's end than mine, and that's actually the update he's working on either right now or next, so all I can really say is that those are still likely to be priorities for the astronomical community once Hubble is launched, the question will be the budget to develop and fly them, and the effects of that specific on aperture sizes and priority given to observatory in certain wavelengths.

Those posts are presently in an extremely early state of development, so to be honest I'm not completely sure what will end up flying. About all I can say is that the prospects for LISA do look rather dim ITTL just as much as IOTL given [REDACTED] which will take a lot of the budget about the time it started to get practical. There were grav-wave experiments in space OTL, using interplanetary probes, and undoubtedly there will be ITTL, but an actual observatory...

 

[SAVORYapple]

I'm not sure the situation is similar enough--no Shuttle to promise regular large-scale up and downmass, and Freedom's coming along in about 1989, about when the ISF would have OTL as opposed to about 1996. (More benefits of having your prep work done beforehand).

http://www.astronautix.com/craft/flem.htm

This is a fascinating concept, though I shudder at the amount of radiation that would expose the crew to, but it may be possible. If OTL Buran doesn't fly, that opens up money. Sure, that might not be spent on space, but if it does........

However, it does go against the general feeling of your TL. No dickwaving stunts, just slow and steady buildup....

 

[sharlin]

A question, how would a Mars team deal with solar radiation as that's got to be just as leathal to them given mars' lack of any form of protection against solar radiation.

 

[Bahamut-255]

A question, how would a Mars team deal with solar radiation as that's got to be just as leathal to them given mars' lack of any form of protection against solar radiation.

Wrong. There is protection from both Solar Radiation and Cosmic Background Radiation on Mars. Even with its - very - thin atmosphere, and general lack of magnetosphere it can still stop at least some of it, while the Martian Body itself will keep you safe from up to half of it by acting as a very solid barrier - up to 6,752 Km of it.

Just one reason why Conjunction Class Missions to Mars have taken favour over the Opposition Class Mission.

 

[Expat]

Those posts are presently in an extremely early state of development, so to be honest I'm not completely sure what will end up flying. About all I can say is that the prospects for LISA do look rather dim ITTL just as much as IOTL given [REDACTED] which will take a lot of the budget about the time it started to get practical. There were grav-wave experiments in space OTL, using interplanetary probes, and undoubtedly there will be ITTL, but an actual observatory...

Aw man, his research opportunities will be quashed in two TLs! Now he's never gonna join the board.

 

[Brainbin]

Salutations, everyone! I am the Brainbin, and I come to you today with another interlude, exploring the popular culture in the world (and beyond!) of Eyes Turned Skywards. I’ve been graciously invited by e of pi and truth is life to continue picking up on some of the plot strands I began in my previous guest post, and to further contextualize one of the major themes of this part of the story within the sphere of popular culture. Therefore, without further delay, I now present to you…

Eyes Turned Skyward, Interlude #2

Vulkan Panic.

The term reflected an anxiety, even a fear, held by the American people with regards to being left behind (in technological terms) not felt with the same immediacy since the Sputnik Crisis a quarter-century before. In some ways, it proved the culmination of a long and varied series of events that had shaken American pride and optimism over the last several decades: race riots, campus unrest, unpopular and failed wars, sexual revolutions, assassinations, corruption, and recession, to name but a few. The space program had seemed to be their one saving grace, once they had firmly lapped the Soviets by the late 1960s. But even in this arena, they were again falling behind. The sheer hysteria of the halcyon Sputnik days, however, was replaced with a more subtle unease; and as with so many other cultural phenomena, it quickly percolated into mass media.

2001: A Space Odyssey had, by the early 1980s, become the most highly acclaimed science-fiction film of all time, and a sequel was obviously a desirable proposition. At the very least, attempts to clarify the many, many questions raised by the first film were a key factor in approving the production of a second. However, in contrast to the original novel and film, which had been written simultaneously in collaboration between Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick, the second novel, entitled 2010: Odyssey Two, was written solely by Clarke; it had no input whatsoever from the director, who had since moved on to other projects. Clarke completed his sequel novel in 1982, greatly inspired by the events of Vulkan Panic, and the film adaptation was released two years later. It was given the more ostentatious subtitle The Year We Make Contact, and was directed by Peter Hyams, who had some experience with the science-fiction genre, though he lacked the undeniable gravitas of Kubrick (who declined to direct, or indeed have any involvement at all in the film – he would not direct another motion picture himself until the Vietnam War film Full Metal Jacket, released in 1987).

2010 depicted both the Americans and the Soviets working to return to Jupiter, the terminus of 2001, to determine what became of the crew of the Discovery (in a none-too-subtle echo of the confusion felt by audiences at the climax of the prior film). An immediate roadblock for the Americans was that their technology had fallen several years behind that of the Soviets; thus, realpolitik necessitated an arrangement that would see both sides conduct the retrieval mission jointly. However, this tentative détente endured only long enough for the Soviet ship, Leonov, to arrive at the derelict Discovery; by this time, tensions were once again on the rise (due to ever-shifting relations on the ground – literally) and the American crewmen were ordered to commandeer the Discovery and return it to Earth; among the tasks that were completed in order to accomplish this was the reactivation of the iconic HAL 9000. However, there was no hope for smooth sailing, as the lone “surviving” crewman of the Discovery, Dave Bowman (now reincarnated as the Star Child) arrived to inform both crews that the strange, monolithic aliens were planning to convert Jupiter into another star within the Solar System, and the process of doing so would doom everyone in orbit unless they prepared an imminent escape. The crew of the Leonov was all set to do so, but Discovery lacked sufficient fuel, seemingly leaving the Americans to their fate… until the crew of the Leonov decided to rescue them, transcending the bitterness of the terrestrial rivalry between their overseers. [1] HAL, meanwhile, remained behind aboard the Discovery, agreeing to sacrifice himself so that the human crew could escape; his redemptive act earned him an eternity with Bowman in a higher plane of existence. This humanistic ending stood in stark contrast to the deterministic tone of the original film, and it appealed to both leftists (due to its positive portrayal of the Soviets) and rightists (due to its ominous warnings of American technological inferiority leaving them helpless against their enemies, should they choose not to extend such courtesy as the Soviets did in this film). Critical responses to 2010 were good, though they obviously paled in comparison to those for 2001; the sequel finished at #12 in the box office for 1984, with over $50 million, one spot higher than that year’s Best Picture winner, Amadeus. (It was also the top-grossing science-fiction film). [2]

Even the third and final installment of the Star Wars trilogy, Return of the Jedi, was accused of plumbing the present-day sociopolitical situation for allegorical purposes. George Lucas vehemently denied this, but the parallels were obvious: the Empire, despite all of the setbacks it had faced in the previous two films, was successfully able to use its industrial base to create a second Death Star in a fraction of the time that it had taken to build the first; comparisons to the seemingly-indefatigable Soviet Union were obvious. The Rebels, meanwhile, continued to struggle to make headway against them, falling afoul of the Hutt syndicate (standing in for the international criminal underworld) in the process. Finally, the Empire became embroiled in a conflict based around a small, isolated, and seemingly backward planet whose natives were able to give them a run for their money and contribute to their embarrassing defeat; this was seen as so blatant a reference to Afghanistan that many critics denounced it as too obvious. It certainly didn’t help that the cute, teddy-bear “Ewok” characters wore turbans, leading to uncomfortable accusations of racist stereotyping on the part of Lucas. [3] Regardless of any underlying allegorical messages, the film was a smash success, finishing (as its two predecessors did) as the top-grossing picture of its year. Though perhaps not as satisfying as the original Star Wars, nor as ambitious as The Empire Strikes Back, it was a rousing conclusion to the Star Wars trilogy, the toyetic Ewoks proving the only real black mark on the franchise (other than the notorious Holiday Special of 1978, which even Lucas himself had emphatically disowned). He showed surprisingly little interest in continuing the franchise after 1983, which was likely due to his bitter divorce from his wife and business partner, Marcia; which, in turn, had greatly influenced the dark tone of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, the film he was producing at the time. It would go on to spur the creation of the PG-13 rating in 1984.

And then there was Star Trek. And showrunner Harve Bennett had a problem. Ratings for Star Trek: The New Voyages (colloquially TNV), though still very good overall, were in decline; the novelty of the returning Enterprise crew had waned, the enthusiasm for American space exploration had hit the brick wall that was Vulkan Panic, and the momentary economic reprieve of the mid-1970s had fallen into a malaise, which had even defeated the incumbent President of the United States. From the soaring heights of being the #4 series overall, with a 28 rating (translating to over 20 million households tuning in), during the first season in 1977-78 (which was overseen by Gene Roddenberry), TNV was in its fourth season lucky to get a 20 rating (or 15 million households – a drop of over 25% from its debut), and barely clung to the bottom rungs of the Top 30 overall for 1980-81; even airing on NBC, the third-place network, might not have been enough for a reprieve, considering the sheer expense of keeping the show going. Bennett had slowed the rising costs, but he could not stop them entirely, and indeed each episode would cost over $1 million by the final season in 1983-84, making TNV the most expensive show on television (and the first to top seven figures on a consistent basis). [4] Their one ally in high places was NBC CEO Fred Silverman, who, for his part, had been working for another network in 1969, at the time that NBC had originally cancelled Star Trek; he therefore had obvious reservations about making the same mistake twice. Silverman’s tenure at NBC, however, was riddled with embarrassing failures, in marked contrast his sterling record at both CBS and later ABC; he eventually left the Peacock Network in 1981, to be replaced by Grant Tinker, who had a rather more intimate affiliation with Star Trek: he had been a network executive for NBC in 1964, and in that capacity had approved the original pilot and had overseen its development. And just as he and his superiors had done nearly two decades before, he gave the production team another chance to get things right.

Bennett repeated his tried-and-true strategy of combing the archives of what had retroactively come to be known as The Original Voyages, or TOV, for story ideas. He accomplished this in a number of ways, including re-introducing the classic trickster Harry Mudd as a recurring character. [5] However, he had grander, more ambitious ideas as well. Though he had judged “Space Seed” as the likeliest candidate for a sequel story, the first-runner-up had always been “The Doomsday Machine”, an episode featuring an automated robotic – and implacable – planet killer, built by an ancient race from another galaxy. The episode had forebodingly concluded with the possibility of other such planet killers roaming around the universe, an oddly disquieting coda to an otherwise triumphant conclusion. The episode’s original writer, science-fiction and alternate history scribe Norman Spinrad, was recruited to provide additional story ideas and plotlines that could be derived from a return (properly, a follow-up invasion) of these planet killers. [6] Having been vocally dissatisfied with the original model for the planet killer, he suggested that the lone automaton be a “prototype” model; its arrival about a decade ahead of the (much larger) fleet would justify its less advanced design. He collaborated with both D.C. Fontana and David Gerrold on finer story points. The central idea was to tap into the zeitgeist, and do what Star Trek had always done best: allegory, in order to present a more sophisticated response to Vulkan Panic. The three main powers of the galaxy – the Federation, the Klingons, and the Romulans – had always been fairly transparent representations of the three main Cold War powers: the Western Allies, the Soviet Union, and Red China. Already, writers had depicted tensions between the three sides to be rising, allegorizing the end of détente under President Ronald Reagan (and, belatedly, replicating the Sino-Soviet split; the Klingons and Romulans had only been depicted as erstwhile allies in TOV for entirely budgetary reasons). [7]

However, this new, greater power, capable of obliterating any of the three of them, could only be matched by their combined resources: the speed, agility, maneuverability, and durability of Federation designs; the efficiency and rate of production harnessing the Klingon industrial base; and the raw firepower and stealth capabilities available through the use of Romulan technology; all of these, when taken together, would prove the equal, perhaps even the superior, of the seemingly infinite array of planet killers. They would also prove highly effective at patching the respective weaknesses of all three sides: the inability of Federation vessels to avoid detection; the ineffectiveness of Klingon weaponry; and the prohibitive costs of Romulan losses. Thus, plans for a meeting of the minds between the three powers, and plans for formal co-operation, became the over-arcing plotline of the season. Prominently featured to this end, was Ambassador Sarek, Spock’s father who had first appeared in an episode of TOV, and who would represent the Federation in these crucial talks. He would feature in several other episodes of TNV, both before and after this season (appearing in about as many, all told, as Spock himself), but this would constitute his only major character arc. The conclusion was inevitable, but fulfilling nonetheless: a proper alliance was formed, and all three powers banded together to defeat the legion of planet killers, resulting in an “Era of Good Feelings” through the enactment of a permanent, tripartite peace treaty. [8] Meanwhile, this grand allegory was anchored by firm character development, particularly for the heretofore underutilized First Officer, Commander Will Decker. For the man who had discovered the original planet killer was his father, Commodore Matt Decker; he had faced it only to lose his entire crew and then, driven by a crazed passion to avenge them, very nearly lost the crew of the Enterprise as well. Unable to bear the agonizing guilt, he then hijacked a shuttle and flew into the great maw of the machine. Though his suicide would indirectly provide a solution for destroying the planet killer, his reputation was tarnished beyond repair; and his legacy was an albatross around the younger Decker wherever he went. The Doomsday War (as it was quickly labelled by fans) provided him with an opportunity to avenge his father, and escape his shadow at the same time – metafictionally speaking, it would allow him to stand out at last amongst his TOV-era crewmates. It was not easy taking the primary role for which the mostly-absent and widely-beloved Spock was so well-known, and indeed, Richard Hatch, who played the character, had publicly noted such fan resistance. But, to his credit, he soldiered on, and audience reception to Decker’s character arc was overwhelmingly positive; his redemption proved a rousing success. Indeed, “pulling a Decker” became a widespread term for rescuing an unpopular character in fandom.

The ratings recovery was modest, but undeniable. The fifth season of TNV – which contained the complete Doomsday War arc – finished at #21 overall, with over 16 million households tuning in; this was an increase of nearly one million over season four, when the show had ranked at only #26. Nevertheless, executives were extremely reluctant to allow Bennett to continue with such heavily arc-driven storylines; indeed, the concept met with as much criticism as praise, often derided as “ Dallas in Space” by its detractors. (In retrospect, perhaps a comparison to then-fledgling Dynasty, co-created by Bennett’s old boss Aaron Spelling, might have been more apt.) The following sixth season, at the network’s insistence, returned to a primarily episodic format. The groundbreaking Hill Street Blues would be allowed to carry on with story arcs, but the notion of a serialized Star Trek, or indeed any properly arc-based science-fiction series continued to be, perhaps, too much for certain people to accept. [9] So with the conclusion of the Doomsday War, the Enterprise was assigned to a long-term exploration mission in a remote region, far beyond Federation space. This kept them – literally and figuratively – away from Federation politics. Ratings overall held relatively stable with the previous, more ambitious fifth season, serving merely to delay the inevitable. Thus, when it came time to shoot the next – and ultimately the last – season, the writers were allowed some latitude in creating another over-arcing plotline, though it proved challenging to top the truly impressive Doomsday War storyline of two years before; eventually, the answer came when Bennett and his writers decided to spin an apparent weakness (being sent into an unexplored sector of space, far from Federation intrigues, the Klingons, and the Romulans) into an unexpected source of strength, because unknown space meant unknown enemies. And here, Bennett again went with his established tack of finding new story opportunities from events in previous episodes. Thus began the seventh and final season of TNV.

The region of space in which the Enterprise found itself was revealed, through the course of the season, to be dominated by a barbarous and prolific group of pirates known as the Elasi. [10] Reports indicated that they had, until very recently, been leaderless and bitterly divided into numerous infighting bands, before something – or someone – had brought them together. It was eventually made clear that the Elasi were, to a man, filthy and loutish brutes, barely capable of flying a ship, let alone forming any kind of organized society, and it soon became apparent that whoever had reformed the Elasi had been an outsider – but who could it have been? A season-long tease ensued, that would not be resolved until the grand finale. The Elasi, for their part, were actually introduced in the finale to the previous season; for though a full story arc had been out of the question, partial cliffhangers were deemed acceptable (as the legacy of Dallas had been a game-changer, derogatory nicknames aside). The crew of the Enterprise was tasked with opening formal diplomatic relations with the new, centralized leadership of the Elasi; it took most of the season for the crew to track down their power base (though not without a few scenic detours, of course). It did not help that they were running against the clock: it had already been decided that the ongoing mission of the Enterprise would not be extended past its presently scheduled end, and Kirk, who had deferred promotion to the Admiralty in order to assume command in the first place, now faced a difficult choice as to whether or not he would do the same again. On the one hand, he wasn’t getting any younger, and his remaining in a command position stymied the upward aspirations of those beneath him in the hierarchy, including his First Officer, Commander Decker. And certainly, if anyone in all of Starfleet was worthy of promotion, it was James T. Kirk, the most accomplished commanding officer in its history. But on the other hand, commanding a starship was undeniably that at which he excelled beyond all else. And it was what he loved above all else. The prospect of riding a desk for the rest of his career filled him with dread. This internal debate would define his character throughout the season. Stand-alone adventures were still quite common, and pursuit of the itinerant Elasi resulted in many “near-misses” and wild goose chases. In the episode immediately preceding the two-part feature length season (and series) finale, the Enterprise finally caught up with the Elasi “court”, and encountered its new leader.

It turned out to be none other Khan Noonien Singh, who was very much living up to his name as he continued to prove his incredible leadership and organizational skills, emerging as the leader of the Elasi; his cadre of Supermen formed the aristocracy of the society, which pillaged the resources and technologies of all who would dare challenge it (worlds willing to accept the sovereignty of Khan were permitted to remain completely autonomous, provided that they made regular tribute payments). Khan’s rise to power did not come without personal cost – his wife, the former Lt. Marla McGivers, was assassinated by Elasi dissidents, as she was unlike her fellow aristocrats, lacking both super-strength and intelligence. (The assassination of McGivers was driven by real life circumstances – Madlyn Rhue’s multiple sclerosis had resulted in her condition continuing to deteriorate; she was now confined to a wheelchair, and it was decided that incorporating this into her onscreen character would be too on-the-nose for anyone’s liking). [11] The death of her character gave Khan a more immediate drive, to create a lasting Empire in her memory, so that her death would not be in vain. The crew of the Enterprise, meanwhile, many of whom had known and served with McGivers, did their best to mourn her loss, and in doing so lament the choices that she had made that led to her death. Kirk, in particular, took the news of her passing very hard, for it was he who had given her the choice between following Khan to Ceti Alpha V and facing court-martial – a decision that would have ruined her Starfleet career, no doubt, but would almost certainly result in her having a much longer and more stable life.

Tentative negotiations ultimately went nowhere, and it became clear that conflict was inevitable. And in the ensuing battle, Kirk defeated Khan, this time once and for all; the Elasi, who were again rendered leaderless, immediately fractured, with Federation diplomats attempting to assist the now-beaten society. The Enterprise hobbled back to Earth, and Kirk, once again the Hero of the Federation, was even offered another command mission in lieu of promotion, in gratitude. He sought counsel from his closest friends before making his decision: in speaking with Decker, who was like a son to him, he decided that his First Officer had earned the chance to become Captain himself; he learned from Bones, his oldest friend, that the good Doctor was planning to accept a promotion of his own, to work in a research position at Starfleet Medical; and finally, he spoke to none other than perhaps his most trusted confidant, Mr. Spock, who had very positive memories of his time in Starfleet, and had perhaps the most fulfilling experiences of his life there; but he had also wished to broaden his horizons, to become a better person and to do more good. He then reminded Kirk that, as a flag officer, he could provide leadership and guidance for a great many throughout the galaxy, as opposed to the relative few under his personal authority as Captain of the Enterprise. Having taken all this advice to heart, Kirk therefore decided to decline the offer from Starfleet and accept promotion to Rear Admiral, knowing that his time in command had ended definitively, on a triumphant note. TNV ended with Kirk officially handing over command of the Enterprise to the newly-promoted Captain Willard Decker, with his last words being those of the new mission assigned to the ship – which was, naturally, nearly identical to the missions assigned in TOV, TAV, and TNV. The final shot was of the Enterprise, now under the command of Decker, departing from Earth for parts unknown. The grand finale, highly anticipated and heavily promoted, aired on May 23, 1984, and was a smash success, becoming the third-highest-rated telecast of the 1980s, with a 50.9 rating (indicating over 42.5 million households watching), and a 74 share (indicating an audience of 74% of all people watching television at that moment). [12] It was the exclamation mark to an otherwise lackluster season in terms of viewers, with the series just barely maintaining its berth in the Top 30 (though it was still enough to give TNV the distinction of having been one of the thirty most popular shows on the air throughout its run).

In contrast to the pessimism with regards to the space program as a result of Vulkan Panic, the ultimate tonic was a nostalgic reflection on days of yore: The Right Stuff, a popular film (adapted from the non-fiction book by Tom Wolfe) which told the story of the Mercury Seven. Inevitably emerging as the central character was John Glenn, who, as it happened, had since switched careers, having been a U.S. Senator for Ohio since 1974. At first, Glenn wasn’t sure what to make of the movie as it was in production, but he decided to accept an invitation to attend the premiere on October 16, 1983. Impressed by his heroic portrayal in the film by actor Ed Harris, he immediately embraced the picture, presciently seeing it as a potential career-booster. [13] Being an astronaut and therefore accustomed to very literally reaching toward the stars, he naturally had higher ambitions than being just one man in 100. He wanted to sit in the White House. He had been a Senator for almost two full terms by the time of the 1984 elections, so he was considered sufficiently experienced to seek higher office. It certainly helped that The Right Stuff was a substantial hit, finishing 19th at the Box Office for 1983, grossing over $35 million. [14] It was also nominated for nine Academy Awards, including a Best Actor nomination for Harris. [15] Sen. Glenn attended the 56th Academy Awards on April 9, 1984, as a guest of the cast and crew of the film, and received an ovation from the audience when he was singled out by host Johnny Carson. By this time, he was already competing in the Democratic Party primaries for President, and this would prove the ultimate, and very well-needed, late boost to his campaign.

Walter Mondale, who had been the Vice-President of the United States under Jimmy Carter, emerged very early on as frontrunner for the 1984 contest; his only real competition was Colorado Sen. Gary Hart, who was shown in the grind of campaigning to be something of a lightweight, and Rev. Jesse Jackson, who lacked political experience (beyond his advocacy for civil rights) and had little appeal beyond the African-American bloc of the Democratic Party (critically wounding his chances for the nomination after making anti-Semitic remarks). In choosing a running-mate, he weighed distinctiveness (in order to create a balanced ticket) against electability; he eventually selected Glenn, who had received the fourth-highest number of delegates in the nomination contest, performing well in debates against his rivals. [16] Glenn had a number of strengths: he was well-known by the American public, with his popular reputation revitalized by The Right Stuff, and he could plausibly attack incumbent President Ronald Reagan on one of his weaker foreign policy points: his lukewarm support for the space program, which looked very bad in the face of Vulkan Panic. A staunch anti-communist, Reagan had decisively ended the period of détente that had defined the 1970s, which had certainly helped to escalate the popular hysteria in the first place.

The Mondale/Glenn ticket had one advantage over the equally disastrous McGovern/Shriver ticket of a dozen years before; the bottom half of this ticket actively worked to mitigate the disastrous top half. But to no avail; Glenn was photogenic, moderate, and actively campaigned against Reagan on his one weak foreign policy plank, but he was also something of a stuffed shirt: interesting but not truly engaging. President Reagan, on the other hand, was extremely charismatic: one of his many nicknames was “the Great Communicator”. And his primary benefit was an extrinsic one: the economy, which had been somewhere between “bad” and “worse” for most of the past decade, was finally booming once again. Despite having a very strong foreign policy orientation, Reagan did not hesitate to take advantage of the American (and global) economic recovery for political purposes. He also gained from the drastic missteps of his opponent, Mondale, who famously promised to raise taxes (as part of a claim that Reagan would do the same, and was lying when he claimed otherwise; but only his own promise, divorced from its context or the attempted smear on his opponent, had any traction).

Reagan won very decisively in the popular vote, with the support of over 57% of the electorate. Mondale and Glenn, meanwhile, won only 42% of the vote. [17] The Electoral College tally was even more lopsided: Reagan won 49 states; Mondale, meanwhile, claimed only his home state of Minnesota (which he won by a mere half-percentage point), along with the District of Columbia, for a total of 13 electoral votes against the 525 accumulated by Reagan and Bush (the worst-ever showing for the Democratic Party in its long history – even McGovern had managed 17 against the 520 mustered by Richard Nixon). Mondale performed best in the Northeast and the Midwest, but came within five points of winning in only two other states: Rhode Island and Massachusetts. [18] Reagan enjoyed massive popularity, and would go on to define the 1980s as few Presidents before or since have defined their respective tenures. With regards to space travel and exploration, however, his legacy faced considerable dispute…

---

[1] IOTL, neither the Leonov nor the Discovery had sufficient fuel to escape the Jovian gravity well, necessitating both sides to pool their resources. The changed ending ITTL better reflects the palpable sense that the USA is being left behind at present (the early 1980s), and that the current gap will only widen as the years progress.

[2] 2010 finished at #17 IOTL, with a gross of about $40 million. It ranked second among pure science-fiction films, behind Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (at #9, with $76 million), which does not exist ITTL. For the purposes of the narrative, I’m treating Ghostbusters (IOTL #2, with $230 million) as a fantasy film rather than science-fiction. However, by (guest) authorial fiat, that movie will finish as the top-grossing film of 1984 ITTL, ahead of Beverly Hills Cop (which turned the trick IOTL, with $235 million).

[3] You will notice that Return of the Jedi has the exact same basic plot as IOTL. This is deliberate; the different sociopolitical situation of TTL has resulted in critics and analysts choosing to interpret the film in such a way as to make it relevant to their own world. This is a demonstration of the concept known as Death of the Author.

[4] What is traditionally regarded as the first series to break the $1-million-per-episode mark IOTL, Battlestar Galactica, actually did not do so consistently; the average was over $1 million, because certain episodes (particularly the pilot) inflated the overall budget. Though sources differ (because producers and executives tend to be secretive about budget figures), what appears to have been the first series to break $1 million per episode on a consistent basis IOTL was Miami Vice, in 1984-85.

[5] Harry Mudd was played by Roger C. Carmel, and has the distinction of being the only non-Starfleet character to appear in more than episode of the original Star Trek. IOTL, there were plans to reintroduce him to TNG, evading the prospect of his death by old age or misadventure by having him cryogenically frozen and discovered in this state by the crew of the Enterprise-D. Unfortunately, the high-living Carmel died of alcohol- and drug-induced heart problems (or he may have committed suicide; there is some dispute on the matter) in late 1986. The episode in which Mudd would have returned was then reworked into “The Neutral Zone”. ITTL, Carmel, by returning as Harry Mudd, becomes one of a handful of actors to appear in all three Star Trek series: TOV, TNV, and the cartoon (The Animated Voyages, or TAV).

[6] Spinrad, though he was dissatisfied with the finished product of “The Doomsday Machine” (he also wanted Robert Ryan as the Ahab figure of Commodore Decker, as opposed to William Windom, who landed the part and did a fantastic job in this editor’s not-so-humble opinion), was willing to contribute further to the franchise IOTL. A second script for the original series (“He Walked Among Us”) was discarded due to disputes between Spinrad and then-producer Gene L. Coon, but Spinrad did later contribute a spec script called “To Attain the All” to the development of Phase II IOTL (and ITTL – it became an episode of the first season of TNV).

[7] Those budgetary reasons being that they couldn’t afford more models for Romulan warbirds, so they had to reuse Klingon birds-of-prey instead.

[8] Thus fulfilling the Organian prediction of the Federation and the Klingons becoming “fast friends”, which is noted by Spock himself.

[9] The Sci-Fi Ghetto strikes again. But even so, do note that Hill Street Blues, popularly credited as the show that brought serialized story arcs to primetime (not counting soap operas) only premiered in 1981; they did not become dominant until the 2000s, before which time shows with standalone episodes continued to dominate (including within Star Trek; note that the decision by the makers of DS9 to write arc-based storylines met with considerable resistance on all sides IOTL).

[10] The Elasi space pirates are borrowed from two early 1990s PC adventure games: Star Trek: 25th Anniversary and Star Trek: Judgment Rites. The latter of these features the final performance by the entire original cast, as an ensemble (as was the custom of the time, only the advanced CD-ROM versions featured voice acting). As those games were explicitly made to “bridge the gap” between the original series and the OTL movies, they will likely be very different games ITTL, if they exist at all.

[11] Though this has never been said explicitly, it is very likely that the same reasoning was applied with regards to Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan IOTL.

[12] The TNV finale finished behind two broadcasts, both of which existed IOTL: the resolution to the famed “Who Shot J.R.?” cliffhanger on Dallas, airing on November 21, 1980, and receiving a 53.3 rating and a 76 share; and the “Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen” finale of M*A*S*H, airing on February 28, 1983, and receiving a 60.2 rating and a 77 share.

[13] Glenn did not attend the premiere IOTL; by the time he and his staff decided to emphasize his connection to the film, it was too late. In this more space-happy timeline, the original book written by Tom Wolfe in 1979 would likely be less critical in its portrayal of Glenn, described in the OTL version as a “zealous moralizer”. Therefore, he would have less reason to be suspicious of the film adaptation, and could embrace it from the beginning, to the benefit of his political career.

[14] The Right Stuff finished at #33 in the box office for the year 1983 IOTL, grossing $21 million.

[15] Ed Harris did not receive a Best Actor nomination for his role as John Glenn IOTL.

[16] Glenn also finished fourth IOTL - a far more distant fourth. He had also left the nomination contest by the time his home state of Ohio was in contention (on May 8, 1984), whereas ITTL, he is able to win his home state in a three-way race with Mondale and Hart (though he carries no other states).

[17] The OTL popular results were: 58.8% for Reagan, and 40.6% for Mondale.

[18] Glenn’s presence on the ticket improves the Democratic result in numerous Midwestern states, including his home state of Ohio; however, the Democrats perform slightly more poorly in the Northeast, which was the home region of Mondale’s OTL running-mate, Rep. Geraldine Ferraro.

 

[Bahamut-255]

So Star Wars Episode VI is essentially the same as OTL - the key difference being that the different geopolitical climate makes determining references between it and the World much, much easier. Ouch. And the Star Wars Holiday Special? Well, there are 20+ Billion toilets in the World. It'll never be enough.

As for the Mondale/Glenn Ticket in 1984? So they perform only very slightly better than IOTL, with Reagan still getting 98% of the States. Mondale really should have thought twice before deciding to tell the US Public the truth. It really didn't work. The question is, will people remember it in 1987? When the taxes went up? I still doubt it.

And while Star Trek TNV began to become rather lacklustre in its ratings, it did, at the very least managed to end on one hell of a high! And what a way to end it too! It really does provide a much-needed sense of closure, while still allowing for a new series to be picked up a couple of years down the line.

In truth, this is a little out of my field, so looking at the shows and how things happen on Terra Firma is something I really struggle to give good opinion on.

 

[Michel Van]

Brainbin
Interlude #2 is wonderful

I wish that your "Star Trek: Doomsday War" plot end up on desk of JJ Abrams or at Paramount

i wounder, has Alexandro Jodobrosky or Ridley Scott made there version of "Dune" in this ITTL ?

 

[Expat]

Very interesting and well-reasoned. I was thinking the public would sway slightly away from Reagan for almost the opposite reason you gave, but yours makes sense. Especially since *perception* that the Russians are winning the space race is probably more important than the reality.

Here's hoping Glenn wins in '88!

With the rise of first-run syndication on the horizon, I'd say Star Trek is still a good candidate for a further iteration before too long. I suppose there'd be pressure to bring Hatch in as the captain, especially considering how he behaved around the BSG reboot IOTL.

More traditional sci-fi has had a better run ITTL but it's almost all "soft" sci-fi- allegory, spirituality, a look at the "human element" of the future. I wonder if the backlash of technology-driven Cyberpunk will be even bigger ITTL or if the audience for it has been lost to a more traditional vision of the future.

 

[Shevek23]

I see others comment on the other shows/movies (but I thank you so much Brainbin, and truth is life and e of pi for showcasing him, for your tantalizing and rather inspirational TNV!) and that leaves me to ask something about 2010.

OTL, the Soviet/American conflict stuff was the very framework of the movie 2010: The Year We Make Contact, but while it has been a good long time since I've read Clarke's OTL version of the book, which came first this time, any such stuff there was very subtle, on a par with the superficially friendly, only somewhat tense sparring we saw in the original 2001 movie when the delegation of Soviet scientists confronts Heywood Floyd on Space Station V. I don't think the rivalry even rose to that level in Clarke's book OTL; the whole superpower conflict issue was largely displaced onto the Chinese, who stole a march on both leading superpowers to beat both of them back to Jupiter in a surprise ship that was disguised as a space station.

And then the Chinese all died on Europa when the Europan life, attracted to their spotlights, broke through the ice and attacked their ship due to phototropism. IIRC, in Clarke's book OTL none of the joint Soviet/American crew of Leonov/Discovery got killed, unless Dr. Chandra decided to die with HAL, it's been a long while since I read it as I said! I'm not sure I ever reread it since it first came out in '82! In the OTL movie a Soviet cosmonaut does get killed--well anyway the Monolith takes him; audiences might wonder if he'll pop up again, though he doesn't in Clarke's books because Clarke never killed him off in the first place I think. (Frank Poole gets resurrected though).

So OTL the book wasn't saturated with superpower conflict themes, no more than they typically crop up in Clarke stories, and there they tend to take a back seat.

Here, you say "Clarke completed his sequel novel in 1982, greatly inspired by the events of Vulkan Panic..." But most of your description is of the movie, which differs from the OTL movie only in that Discovery is not needed as a booster to enable Leonov to escape.

That makes HAL's sacrifical role in helping the humans survive much less clear; in the OTL movie Discovery had to be sacrificed since boosting both ships it would hardly achieve sufficient distance from nova Jupiter in time. Here, it isn't clear why Discovery couldn't, under HAL's control, orbit up nearly escaping Jupiter with an apiJove high enough to survive--after all Europa winds up being illuminated much as Earth is by Sol, so even allowing for the initial burst being extra-bright a modest orbit change should do the job, leaving Discovery as a robot observer of the new system.

Presumably Discovery has to play some other role that somehow buys Leonov time to escape?

Also in the OTL movie, and I think in the book, Bowman/Starchild doesn't spell out what is going to happen exactly; he just gives a deadline saying, be gone by this time, and leaves them all to guess just why they'd better be elsewhere. (Which is rather frustrating, wouldn't it be more effective for the Aliens to just let Bowman say what's going to happen and let the astronaut/cosmonauts do their own math? Or maybe the Aliens figured if the humans knew why they had to beat it, they'd scheme to come back or leave something behind, whereas if they are either incinerated or running for Earth when they get the ultimatum to leave Europa alone, they will be sufficiently impressed to comply?) So anyway all that's OTL.

Perhaps ITTL, Clarke wrote it the way that would make more sense to me (but admittedly lacks dramatic mystery and suspense)--Bowman just tells them, hey, this planet's turning into a star and it will be 10 times brighter (or whatever the right number is) than it will stabilize to for a few days, so you'd better head back to Earth. No, sorry, the Aliens don't take your Exxon card, Dr. Floyd, so no refueling...Then the rest follows and maybe it becomes clear why Discovery and HAL can't survive if the humans are to have a chance. So we get the same drama of HAL coming through of his own will in the pinch.

Anyway in all this, both movies OTL and ITTL are full of the Soviet/American rivalry. When I saw the movie when it came out OTL, in 1984, I was pretty put off and disappointed by that; I felt that Clarke's more Olympian take had been prostituted to ripped-from-the-headlines sensationalism.* When I rewatch the movie now, I like it though. But it was definitely a big revision of the book.

ITTL, when you say Clarke was inspired by the Vulkan Panic, does this mean he put that stark conflict, or at least something intermediate between the mostly collegial relations in his OTL book and the drama of the OTL movie, right in his original text?

Did he then, as the movie OTL, leave the Chinese out of it?


*Brainbin and main authors, will there be anything like The Day After ITTL? I actually avoided seeing that but I gather Reagan didn't; I've seen it cited as a factor in his eventual rapproachment with Gorbachev a couple years later. Not that this history suggested he was quite the "Movie America" caricature Jules Feiffer liked portraying him as in his cartoons of the time, but it did move him to ask his military advisors, "hey, this isn't what would happen, is it? You can prevent this, right?" Then they demurred and had to admit it might happen; it motivated him to get serious about detente again.

Meanwhile I'm here to tell you, as a young college student in these very days, the nuclear war panic was a definite thing in the early '80s. The perception among the lefty/hippie types I hung out with was that Reagan was a cowboy itching for a showdown; among right wing types such as I grew up among, it was that the Soviets were the ones looking for a fight and it was past time to shut them down. The difference was that lefties didn't think anything much worth mentioning would survive while rightists seemed to think that the righteous might be saved if they worked hard enough at it; perceptions of Reagan as the champion of the Christian Right, who seemed to think WWIII would in fact be Biblical Armageddon, didn't help either.

It was pretty amazing to us when Reagan turned up meeting amicably with Gorby. But that was years later.

 

[Athelstane]

Hello Shevek,

Anyway in all this, both movies OTL and ITTL are full of the Soviet/American rivalry. When I saw the movie when it came out OTL, in 1984, I was pretty put off and disappointed by that; I felt that Clarke's more Olympian take had been prostituted to ripped-from-the-headlines sensationalism.* When I rewatch the movie now, I like it though. But it was definitely a big revision of the book.

I was bothered by the changes from the book as well. One accepts that compressions and alterations are usually needed to bring a novel off the printed page to the big screen - they are very different mediums, with different dramatic demands. But one hopes that the changes actually serve the visual medium.

I had assumed that the Chinese mission to Europa was chopped out as a compression, a distraction from the main storyline of Soviet-American cooperation and conflict and the ultimate contact with extraterrestrial intelligence. And it might be defensible for that reason. The difficulty, however, was that it at least made it crystal clear, in the book, that there was indeed life on Europa. In the movie, the Leonov probe failure left it ambiguous.

But I thought the creation of a Soviet-American crisis was a false note, too much of an attempt to politicize the movie, to hammer us over the head with how evil and stupid the Cold War was, to make it as topical as possible. Yet the dramatic tension at Jupiter not only did not need the added crisis, it was ill-served by the distraction. And of course it all seems quite anachronistic now, given that the Berlin Wall fell only five years after the movie in OTL.

It's interesting to see it made an important cultural moment, even in modified form, for the Eyes Turned Skywards timeline. In OTL, 2010 was largely quiet at the box office, a rather workmanlike successor to a very famous and influential original. When one thinks of the great sci-fi flicks of the 80's, one thinks of Star Wars and Star Trek, and perhaps E.T., Aliens, Terminator, or Blade Runner. But none of those films touched the U.S. space program in quite the same direct way, preferring much more distant timeframes, or near-term dystopias. I think that's not a surprise, given the shrunken horizons of the U.S. space program in the 80's, versus its 60's heyday.

 

[Shevek23]

Thanks for the affirmation, Athelstane!

As I said, looking back at it now (I am not sure where to lay hands on a copy of Clarke's 2010, my local library does not have it, but I have a DVD of the movie) I appreciate the movie more. Somehow at the time the references to the loony US President made me wince with pain; perhaps the succeeding decades have boiled this particular frog a bit too hardboiled? Loony stupid belligerent American President, ho hum... But yes, it was mainly that it seemed to be a downright tabloidish repetition of what I could see in Time or Newsweek or the LA Times any old day. (Not to mention the alternative press; the LA Weekly was a pretty good free paper back in the '80s, from my hippie perspective anyway. Actually I wasn't much of a hippie in '84 yet, just headed that way).

Something else that initially grated was the radical difference between the way Heywood Floyd looked and acted in 2001 and in 2010; the new film made zero attempt to carry over the old character, just threw in someone much more 80s-filmish, almost like a Kirk Douglas character.

But aside from the dissonance, actually once you stop seeing the 2010 character through the lens of the old version, he grows on you, in fact he might be a much more realistic type for a high-ranking NASA official than the old one. Action-heroish and macho enough to get ahead in Washington high-level appointive bureaucracy, nuanced and cultured enough to plausibly be a scientist and to have gotten into political trouble--and be the intelligent man of action he was on the expedition. Gradually it's the old Dr. Floyd who seems to need some explaining, and anyway I just let them be two different people who had the same name or something.

Also now I rather like the positive elements of cooperation that do happen in the movie, particularly the challenge the Soviet envoy issues to Dr. Floyd, and the gradual development of a rapport between the crews of the Leonov. Or more accurately the Soviet crew and their ambiguously welcome American guests.

And as special effects eye candy that makes at least half-sense as a Hollywooded up version of plausible early 21st century space tech, and spectacular Jovian scenery, it holds up amazingly well. (It helps that, whenever something like a computer display does seem amazingly 80s-dated, one can reflect, well, this is a state of the art Soviet spacecraft! Seriously they keep using tech long after it's gone out of style in the West, so why not?)

So the question remains for Brainbin, did Clarke himself get so caught up in the hysteria he put the harsher elements of the conflict--the orders from the respective goverments that they split up and come home separately for instance--in the book itself, or is most of that still just in the film version?

 

[Workable Goblin]

As I said, looking back at it now (I am not sure where to lay hands on a copy of Clarke's 2010, my local library does not have it, but I have a DVD of the movie)

Try ILL. Some library in the US is sure to have it. I've personally had good luck with ILLing books (as a matter of fact, it greatly assisted with developing the robotic probe segments of this story).

 

[Expat]

The Day After, that's a good one to bring up. There was a mini-boom of these nuclear holocaust movies at the time, but that's the big one.

The sentiment would certainly be there- angst about the space race doesn't replace angst about nuclear war, it just colors it a little darker maybe. I'd have to guess something like it would come along.

For the record, it is just about the most depressing piece of fiction film I've ever seen. It's like if hope were a game of whack-a-mole with only one hole and they just keep beating it down every time it pokes its head up.

I've heard rumors that the making of Red Dawn was somewhat inspired by those anti-nuclear movies. Very fun film, but full of paranoia- Soviets infiltrate campuses to promote pacifism, there's immigration paranoia as Cubans and Nicaraguans sneak through the Mexican border to attack us from within, and there's anti-European sentiment in that they're "too pansy" to fight this time. It'd be interesting if space paranoia made its way into the film this time. Nukes first fired from Vulkan take out our defenses?

 

[Workable Goblin]

I've heard rumors that the making of Red Dawn was somewhat inspired by those anti-nuclear movies. Very fun film, but full of paranoia- Soviets infiltrate campuses to promote pacifism, there's immigration paranoia as Cubans and Nicaraguans sneak through the Mexican border to attack us from within, and there's anti-European sentiment in that they're "too pansy" to fight this time. It'd be interesting if space paranoia made its way into the film this time. Nukes first fired from Vulkan take out our defenses?

I suggest Soviet space superiority:

• Takes out America's missile defense platforms in the first wave (SDI was started earlier ITTL);
• Enables their missile defense platforms (...I mean, they're better than us, so they have their own version of SDI, right?) to survive, neutralizing America's response;
• And provides another attack vector (space-to-Earth, however implausible that actually is). If you want to get really fun, have Pournelle get involved...

Vulkan itself is just a launch vehicle, after all.

 

[Expat]

Vulkan itself is just a launch vehicle, after all.

...or IS it?