After months of preparation and contentious saber-rattling by series creator Harlan Ellison, who demands to have his name replaced with a pseudonym after quitting the series he devised, The Starlost premieres in Canada and the United States with the episode Voyage Of Discovery, showcasing an intriguing (but ultimately under-utilized) series premise with a shockingly low-budget, shot-on-video look. It’s the first science fiction series produced in Canada with the intention of broadcast in the United States, which would become a common practice in the 21st century. It runs for only a single, truncated season, and for many years is much-maligned as “the worst TV sci-fi series ever”; Ellison’s complaints about the treatment of his own creation in the years to come does little to dispel this opinion.
