The fifth episode of the short-lived NBC series The Fantastic Journey premieres. A model of the space shuttle with its external tank and solid rocket boosters is referred to as a spaceship from the distant future.
A team of MIT astronomers, flying in a plane modified to serve as an airborne high-altitude telescope, plans to observe the planet Uranus as it eclipses, or “occults”, a star. But the team observes more occultations than expected both before and after the planet itself passes in front of the star. The inevitable conclusion is that Uranus has rings, made of material too dark to be detected by existing Earthbound telescopes. Further observations are given top priority: NASA’s Voyager 2 space probe, due to lift off later in 1977, may last long enough to reach Uranus, and the newly discovered rings must be taken into account when planning its flyby trajectory.
The 450th episode of Doctor Who airs on BBC1. John Bennett, Trevor Baxter and Christopher Benjamin guest star.
More about Doctor Who in the LogBook
Order VWORP!1 from theLogBook.com Store
NBC airs the sixth episode of Quinn Martin’s horror/sci-fi anthology Tales Of The Unexpected. (This series is not to be confused with the longer-lived British series of the same name, created by acclaimed author Roald Dahl.) Lloyd Bridges guest stars.
This series is not yet chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
The 33rd episode of The Bionic Woman, starring Lindsay Wagner and Richard Anderson, airs on ABC. Rene Auberjonois (Benson, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) guest stars.
This series is not yet chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
Bally introduces the Bally Professional Arcade home video game system, based on some of the same technology that Bally and its Midway division have been using in arcade games. This means the Bally Professional Arcade is perfectly suited to home versions of such Midway coin-ops as Space Zap and Wizard Of Wor – possibly the earliest instance of real arcade fidelity in a home game system. Its tiny keypad also allows Bally to claim that the Professional Arcade is a home computer waiting to happen.
More about Bally Professional Arcade in Phosphor Dot Fossils
The 451st episode of Doctor Who airs on BBC1. John Bennett, Trevor Baxter and Christopher Benjamin guest star.
More about Doctor Who in the LogBook
Order VWORP!1 from theLogBook.com Store
The 34th episode of The Bionic Woman, starring Lindsay Wagner and Richard Anderson, airs on ABC. Jeff Corey (Star Trek, Babylon 5) and Gary Lockwood (The Lieutenant, 2001: a space odyssey) guest star.
This series is not yet chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
The sixth episode of the short-lived NBC series The Fantastic Journey premieres. Varian hangs up his traveling shoes to get married; his bride, naturally, doesn’t survive to the end of the episode.
ABC airs both parts of a two-part episode of Future Cop as its Friday night movie, starring Ernest Borgnine (McHale’s Navy), Michael J. Shannon, and John Amos (Good Times). Albert Salmi and Gerrit Graham guest star.
The 452nd episode of Doctor Who airs on BBC1. John Bennett, Trevor Baxter and Christopher Benjamin guest star.
More about Doctor Who in the LogBook
Order VWORP!1 from theLogBook.com Store
The 35th episode of The Bionic Woman, starring Lindsay Wagner and Richard Anderson, airs on ABC.
This series is not yet chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
The seventh episode of the short-lived NBC series The Fantastic Journey premieres. The travelers visit an unusual circus from which there is no escape.
The 453rd episode of Doctor Who airs on BBC1. John Bennett, Trevor Baxter and Christopher Benjamin guest star. This episode brings Doctor Who’s 14th season to an end.
More about Doctor Who in the LogBook
Order VWORP!1 from theLogBook.com Store
The eighth episode of the short-lived NBC series The Fantastic Journey premieres. The travelers stumble into a deadly escalation of a war between the sexes. Joan Collins guest stars.
ABC airs the fourth episode of Future Cop, starring Ernest Borgnine (McHale’s Navy), Michael J. Shannon, and John Amos (Good Times).
The ninth episode of the short-lived NBC series The Fantastic Journey premieres. The promise of shelter for the night turns into a waking nightmare (not to mention an episode that would’ve been ideal for a Halloween special).
ABC airs the fifth episode of Future Cop, starring Ernest Borgnine (McHale’s Navy), Michael J. Shannon, and John Amos (Good Times). Peter Donat (Time Trax) guest stars.
ABC airs the sixth episode of Future Cop, starring Ernest Borgnine (McHale’s Navy), Michael J. Shannon, and John Amos (Good Times). Joan Collins (Dynasty) guest stars. The series is cancelled following the broadcast of this episode, but will reappear a year later as a new pilot for NBC.
The 36th episode of The Bionic Woman, starring Lindsay Wagner and Richard Anderson, airs on ABC. Elisha Cook Jr. (Rosemary’s Baby, Star Trek, Batman) guest stars in the final episode of season two, and the final episode to air on ABC. (NBC will pick the series up for a third season.)
This series is not yet chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
NBC airs the pilot of Quark, a new series from Get Smart creator Buck Henry which marks an unlikely combination of science fiction and sitcom. The pilot broadcast gets enough attention to merit a series pickup, but within weeks, Henry’s writing staff is presented with a much meatier target for satire than Star Trek, which Quark originally sets out to parody.
More about Quark in the LogBook
Hear about it on the Sci-Fi 5 podcast
The science fiction TV movie-of-the-week Man From Atlantis II: The Death Scouts airs on NBC, starring Patrick Duffy and Belinda J. Montgomery.
The first episode of children’s fantasy series King Of The Castle premieres on HTV. The series is created by Bristol-based writers Bob Baker and Dave Martin (Sky, Doctor Who), and stars Philip Da Costa. Talfryn Thomas (Survivors) and Milton Johns (Doctor Who, The Empire Strikes Back) also star.
This series is not yet chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
After spending months in development, the much-publicized big-screen relaunch of Star Trek is cancelled by Paramount. Unable to find a satisfactory script, and having great difficulty negotiating with the stars of the TV series, Star Trek: Planet Of The Titans is dumped by the studio, with no other plans to revive Star Trek in the works. Mere weeks later, a record-breaking movie not originating from Paramount convinces the studio to get back into the big-budget science fiction space race.
The 79th episode of The Six Million Dollar Man is broadcast on ABC, starring Lee Majors and Richard Anderson. This episode is the fourth season finale.
More about The Six Million Dollar Man in the LogBook and theLogBook.com Store
This series is not yet fully chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
The second episode of children’s fantasy series King Of The Castle is broasdcast on HTV. The series is created by Bristol-based writers Bob Baker and Dave Martin (Sky, Doctor Who), and stars Philip Da Costa. Talfryn Thomas (Survivors) and Milton Johns (Doctor Who, The Empire Strikes Back) also star.
This series is not yet chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
The science fiction TV movie-of-the-week Man From Atlantis III: Killer Spores airs on NBC, starring Patrick Duffy and Belinda J. Montgomery. James B. Sikking (Hill Street Blues) guest stars.
With the 1972 agreement having resulted in the successful Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, the United States and the Soviet Union formally renew the Space Cooperation Agreement. As an immediate goal to build on Apollo-Soyuz, both countries hold tentative discussions about docking the American Space Shuttle (which, it is still assumed, will be in space before the 1970s are out) and a Soviet Salyut space station. Though the shuttle’s first flight is still being delayed, the biggest hurdle will prove to be international relations, specifically a renewed chilling of the Cold War thanks to the Soviet Union’s 1979 invasion of Afghanistan.
NBC premieres the made-for-TV movie Spectre, starring Robert Culp, Gig Young, John Hurt and Majel Barrett. Created and co-written by Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, Spectre is an atypical Roddenberry project, dealing in magic and the occult rather than science fiction. It is intended to serve as a series pilot, though no series is ordered.
More about Gene Roddenberry’s 1970s pilot projects in the LogBook
The third episode of children’s fantasy series King Of The Castle is broasdcast on HTV. The series is created by Bristol-based writers Bob Baker and Dave Martin (Sky, Doctor Who), and stars Philip Da Costa. Talfryn Thomas (Survivors) and Milton Johns (Doctor Who, The Empire Strikes Back) also star.
This series is not yet chronicled in the LogBook. You could help change that.
