One of the hands-down best stories of William Hartnell’s era, The Aztecs is also one of the best time-travel-ethics tales in the show’s entire history. No chronic hysteresis, no parallel universes, no Time Lords, no time loops, none of that technobabble. It’s about someone who wants to change the established history of one of the Earth’s most prolific lost civilizations, allowing it to continue thriving beyond when history recorded that it ceased to exist. And the Doctor must stop that person and keep things on track, without interfering in history even further in the process. That the person wanting to make the changes is a fellow TARDIS traveler adds a great deal of drama and depth to what was still considered, at the time, tea-time entertainment for kids. (more…)

Babylon 5’s second season was much more consistent than its first. After weathering the change in commanders from Michael O’Hare’s Jeffrey Sinclair to Bruce Boxleitner’s John Sheridan, the cast and crew manage to find a new level of performance. While creator J. Michael Straczynski was ramping up the series’ fabled arc in episodes like The Coming of Shadows and The Fall of Night, there was still room for Peter David, D.C. Fontana, Scott Frost and Lawrence DiTillio to offer other perspectives on the characters and life on the station. It’s a very satisfying mix that works well in a full-season box set that also boasts some worthwhile and entertaining extras. (more…)

featuring War Of The Planets and War Of The RobotsArmed with nearly 100 dollars in gift cards from a Major Electronics Chain, I scoured the shelves looking for spiffy DVDs. The blue box of the Back To The Future set was beckoning to me, as was a box of several Godzilla movies (with Rodan as a bonus!). I gazed longingly at the Godfather Saga and The Kubrick Collection.

I walked out the door with the Italian Science Fiction Collection.

Two months later my head still hurts. (more…)

Aired later the same year that its first season debuted on BBC2, Red Dwarf II proves that the first six episodes of the series had a certain universal appeal – and that the second batch of six shows could eclipse them. The second season of Red Dwarf solidifies the strengths of the core characters, while also upping the stakes in the bizarre exercise of using hard SF conventions as the cornerstone of some hilarious character humor. (more…)

I almost can’t believe I’m saying this about a Space: 1999 episode – and I’ll admit, I’ve been giving this show quite a bit of grief in my reivews – but The Troubled Spirit has one of the most interesting opening teasers I’ve seen from any show in a long time, playing out over a lengthy electric sitar jam with absolutely no dialogue. As trippy as it might sound from my description, it’s actually quite effective. The rest of the episode doesn’t quite live up to its promising intro, fading into the background among the rest of season one’s mind-possession plotlines. (more…)