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Luna Uncrewed Spaceflight

Luna 1

Luna 1With the international race for space technology supremacy heats up, the Soviet Union scores a first: the unmanned Luna 1 is the first human-made object to completely escape Earth’s gravity. Luna 1 is meant to impact the mon, but the nearly-800-pound space probe barely comes within 4,000 miles of the lunar surface. Luna 1 later becomes the first artificial object to orbit the sun, after running out of power at a point in deep space between the orbits of Earth and Mars. The state-run Soviet press agency gives Luna 1 a new name, Mechta, and tries to declare the wayward moonship a “new planet.”

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Television

The Invaders: The Possessed

The InvadersThe 34th episode of Larry Cohen’s science fiction series The Invaders, starring Roy Thinnes and produced by Quinn Martin’s QM Productions, is broadcast on ABC. William Smithers guest stars.

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Television

The Next Step Beyond: Tsunami

The Next Step BeyondThe week-long syndication window opens for the first episode of The Next Step Beyond, a revival of the 1950s/60s supernatural anthology series One Step Beyond. John Newland resumes his hosting and directing duties from the original series; Laraine Stephens (Matt Helm) guest stars. Though syndicated genre programming will become commonplace in the late 1980s, this is a rare example of a genre show produced for first-run syndication in the late 1970s.

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Television

Blake’s 7 premieres

Blake's 7Terry Nation, the television writer who created Doctor Who’s greatest foes, the Daleks, graces the world with another science fiction creation on the BBC, Blake’s 7. Set centuries in the future, the show depicts a government so corrupt that the audience is left with a band of terrorists, guerilla fighters and deeply flawed human beings with whom to sympathize (and luckily, they have the cathedralesque Liberator, the fastest ship in the galaxy, on their side too). The show’s only drawback? Delivering post-Star Wars sci-fi action on the budget it inherited from the cop show that previously held that Monday night timeslot.

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Hear about it on the Sci-Fi 5 podcast

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Video Games

Coleco shuts down video game division

ColecovisionColeco Industries formally announces the complete discontinuation of its Adam computer and the Colecovision home video game console, after revealing a $55,000,000 loss for 1984, a loss incurred largely by the market failure of Adam; only the hugely popular Cabbage Patch Kids dolls, another Coleco product, keep the company from losing any more money. Coleco’s remaining game and computer stock is sold to closeout retail chain Odd Lot, and the video game market crash claims another victim.

More about Colecovision in Phosphor Dot Fossils

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Television

Deadly Games: The Trash Man

Deadly GamesThe 11th episode of science fiction series Deadly Games is broadcast on UPN, starring James Calvert, Cynthia Gibb, and Chrstopher Lloyd (Taxi, Back To The Future); Leonard Nimoy serves as the series’ executive producer. Mike Starr guest stars.

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Deaths Matters of Life & Death

Frank Kelly Freas, SF/fantasy artist, dies

News Of The WorldRenowned SF artist (and 11-time Hugo winner) Frank Kelly Freas dies at the age of 82. Perhaps best known to the general public for his painted cover art that adorned Mad Magazine from 1955 through 1962, “Kelly” Freas painted the cover art for such pulp SF magazines as Planet Stories, Science Fiction Quarterly, Weird Tales and especially Analog, to which he contributed cover art many times over five decades. He painted book covers for the works of Arthur C. Clarke, Joe Haldeman, A.E. Van Vogt, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Ray Bradbury, Frederik Pohl, Poul Anderson and Ursula Le Guin, among others. He was commissioned by the crew of the first Skylab mission to design their mission patch, and painted the cover of the hit album News Of The World for the rock group Queen.

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Television

Who revival kicks BBC into Hyperdrive

HyperdriveWhile the much-talked-about Red Dwarf movie continues to languish in the realm of big-screen vaporware, the BBC lines up its successor. According to a report in the London Times, the new Doctor Who series has put science fiction back on the British broadcasting map, with the BBC’s rivals at ITV preparing a series called Primeval with a multi-million-pound budget and CGI dinosaur effects. In the meantime, the BBC announces a new science fiction comedy for BBC2 called Hyperdrive, which is said to “consciously echo” Red Dwarf, which remains the highest-rated sitcom in BBC2′s history.

More about Hyperdrive in the LogBook