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Monday, February 28, 2011
The Cult-TV Faces of: The Control Room
award-winning creator of Enter The House Between and author of 32 books including Horror Films FAQ (2013), Horror Films of the 1990s (2011), Horror Films of the 1980s (2007), TV Year (2007), The Rock and Roll Film Encyclopedia (2007), Mercy in Her Eyes: The Films of Mira Nair (2006),, Best in Show: The Films of Christopher Guest and Company (2004), The Unseen Force: The Films of Sam Raimi (2004), An Askew View: The Films of Kevin Smith (2002), The Encyclopedia of Superheroes on Film & Television (2004), Exploring Space:1999 (1997), An Analytical Guide to TV's Battlestar Galactica (1998), Terror Television (2001), Space:1999 - The Forsaken (2003) and Horror Films of the 1970s (2002).
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Last year at around this time (or a month earlier, perhaps), I posted galleries of cinematic and TV spaceships from the 1970s, 1980s, 1...
1. The Seaview (Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea)
ReplyDelete2. Nission Control from Lost In Space pilot
3. U.S.S. Enterprise (Star Trek)
4. The Time Tunnel
5. The Prisoner
6. UFO
7. The Starlost
8. Main Mission (Space: 1999 Season 1)
9. Command Centre (Space: 1999 Season 2)
10. The TARDIS Console Room (Doctor Who)
11. Star Maidens?
12. Gallifreyan Control room (Doctor Who)?
13. Battlestar Galactica
14. The Liberator (Blake's 7)
15. The Searcher (Buck Rogers in the 25th Century season 2)
16. Visitor Mothership (V-The Final Battle)
17. U.S.S. Enterprise-D (Star Trek: The Next Generation)
18. Deep Space Nine
19. U.S.S. Voyager
20. Moya (Farscape)
21. Enterprise NX-01
22. Serenity (Firefly)
What happened to the C-in-C from Babylon 5, or Power Base from Captain Power?
Let's see here...
ReplyDelete3.) That's the bridge of the Enterprise from original Star Trek days.
10.) The control chamber of the Tardis from Dr.Who (with one Mr. Baker at the helm)
14.) From Blake's 7, the control room of the Liberator (with Orac in repose in the foreground, surrounded by his adoring crew.)
15.) Can't place the precise where, but that looks Buck Rogers-ish. (Wilma approaching in the background, yes?)
17.) The Star Trek:TNG variant of the Enterprise bridge
18.) And this is from ST:Deep Space Nine.
19.) Which would, I think, imply that one has to be Voyager, though I'm not positive.
20.) Pilot in Pilot's Den, deep inside Farscape's Moya.
21.) Enterprise bridge from the Bakula-helmed Trek outing, yes?
1) Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea
ReplyDelete3) ST:TOS
4) The TIme Tunnel
6) UFO
8) Space:1999, season 1
9) Space:1999, season 2
10) Dr. Who, Tom Baker era
14) Blake's 7
17) ST:TNG
19) ST:Voyager
21) Enterprise
22) Firefly
Some low-hanging fruit gathering, but also hopefully a few of the more obscure ones, also.
~~Meredith
Wow, great job everyone, recognizing these famous (and not so famous) control rooms.
ReplyDeleteHoward ran the table right out the chute! :) The only ones he didn't correct are numbers #11 and #12.
As usual, woodchuckgod and Meredith are also extremely impressive, and did a fantastic job recognizing and id'ing these images.
So for now, we are down to two left:
#11?
#12?
My best to all of you for a great job!
Best,
JKM
12. Jason of Star Command?
ReplyDeleteHi JB:
ReplyDeleteVery nicely done, sir! #12 is indeed the control room from the mid-1970s series Space Academy and Jason of Star Command.
Outstanding!
best,
JKM
John,
ReplyDeleteI just want to say that if I had to pick my favorite control room visually and the one that worked so well for me as far as design and camera technique in showing it off and all of its wonderful attributes it would have to be Star Trek: The Original Series.
Once again, ST:TOS gives us another reason why it was the best based on the images here.
In second place for me would probably be Space:1999, Enterprise, Firefly, Battlestar Galactica and Lost In Space [in the Jupiter].
Fun Cult TV Faces as always John.
SFF
Hey SFF!
ReplyDeleteNCC-1701 is a great choice for favorite control room. I also like the "Bridge" from TOS very much. I sat in Kirk's chair at the Smithsonian back in 1993, and I've never forgotten it...
But still, I think I would pick Main Mission from Space:1999 as my favorite control room, especially with Koenig's adjoining office overlooking it. It's a very majestic control center, with the overhead ledge and bank of windows. Just an amazing set that I wish the show had never gotten rid of in favor of the crowded basement-look for Command Center!
And, as I was putting this together, I also noticed (for the first time in a long while) how truly impressive the Galactica control room is. It's huge, ultra-detailed and very realistic seeming.
The Jupiter 2 is pretty awesome as well...
Thanks for a great comment, my friend!
best,
JKM
I completely concur. These sets are truly special. I must tell you and I suppose this is how much we think alike.
ReplyDeleteIt was a VERY close call between Space:1999 and TOS.
I think Battlestar and LIS come close in third especially Galactica as you mentioned. There was some real thought put into that design. It's a great conversation, but these control rooms either instantly work for us or they don't.
It's interesting how some of the classics had some of the best.
Hi SFF:
ReplyDeleteI couldn't agree more.
The shows from the classic era in sci-fi TV really feature some fantastic set design; especially in regards to these great control rooms.
I think the Next Generation bridge is very interesting (particularly from the angle shown in the image featured in this post), even if sadly beige, but latter-day Star Trek TV bridges are abundantly unremarkable and colorless.
Voyager and NX-01 Enterprise bridges are almost interchangeable mish-mashes of metallic silver and steel, and DS9's ops is a visual mess, in my opinion (though in some way, that chaos works for the show; given the the situation on the station...)
I also like the Firefly bridge and I must admit, I even enjoy the Seaview bridge a lot.
One interesting thing I noticed aobut newer shows such as Voyager and Enterprise: they have no sense of scope.
It's almost impossible to pull a screen grab from these TV programs that features the entire bridge set. Everything is shot in close-up and medium shot, and I find this extremely annoying. One thing I want out of my sci-fi TV is a sense of scope! I want to see the sets and believe in the "larger world." The focus on close-shots and medium shots on Voyager and Enterprise undercut that desire to see a fully-functioning future world.
best wishes, from your brother in N.C.!
JKM
OK, John, #11 have stumped me for an hour now. I give up!
ReplyDeleteHi Brian,
ReplyDeleteNumber 11 is from the 1977 series "Quark." That's the control room of the space station where Captain Quark is headquartered...
Pretty obscure, no doubt...
Best,
JKM
Thanks! I remember Quark but haven't seen it since it aired. It was not obscure enough that I couldn't have guessed...
ReplyDeleteI figured from the aliens in the scene that it wasn't Logan's Run or Man From Atlantis :-) (Hey, what did the Cetacean's bridge look like? Another memory lost in time...)
You're absolutely right about scope. That may be one of the strengths of those earlier classics. I like everything pre-1980. : )
ReplyDeleteAlso, I actually sat in the Captain's chair in the mock up of The Next Generation bridge in Las Vegas at the Star Trek experience before it shut down.
I actually bought a Spock shirt, ducked behind a corner on the set [because we went in groups] and jumped in the chair to look like a real Captain so I could buy an official photo. It worked beautifully in the end. So, we both felt the power of the Captain's chairs. : D
My best to you southern brother.
SFF
Wow, seriously, you guys are amazing. I showed this to my wife as proof that that are some people who actually are more hard core than I am.
ReplyDelete