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The third episode of the Glen A. Larson’s futuristic action series The Highwayman airs on NBC, starring Sam Jones (Flash Gordon), Jane Badler (V), and Tim Russ (Star Trek: Voyager). Wendie Malick (Baywatch) guest stars in an episode written by Larson. 
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The week-long national syndication window opens for the 18th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. In an rare example of what passes for a “story arc” in early TNG, the characters of Admiral Quinn and the disagreeable Commander Remmick make their first of two first-season appearances. (more…)
The fifth episode of the science fiction comedy Red Dwarf airs on BBC 2. Future late night talk show host Craig Ferguson makes his first television appearance in this episode. (more…)
CBS airs the 20th episode of Ron Koslow’s fantasy series Beauty and the Beast, starring Linda Hamilton, Ron Perlman, and Roy Dotrice. James Avery and Armin Shimermaan guest star.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 19th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. This is the first episode of the series to focus on the Klingon race – a holdover from the original series and movies that series creator Gene Roddenberry had planned to avoid revisiting until co-producer (and fellow classic Trek producer) Bob Justman convinced him otherwise during pre-production, leading to the very late creation of a “Klingon Marine” named Worf. (more…)
The sixth episode of the science fiction comedy Red Dwarf airs on BBC 2. This concludes the first season, but the BBC rushes a second season into production due to the popularity of the first six episodes. (more…)
The German arm of CBS Records releases the album Fantasie by Münchener Freiheit. The same album, except with English lyrics, will be issued in North America and the UK later in the year. (more…)
CBS airs the 21st episode of Ron Koslow’s fantasy series Beauty and the Beast, starring Linda Hamilton, Ron Perlman, and Roy Dotrice. Edward Albert guest stars.
CBS airs the 22nd episode of Ron Koslow’s fantasy series Beauty and the Beast, starring Linda Hamilton, Ron Perlman, and Roy Dotrice. This is the first season finale.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 20th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. This is the second of three occasions in the series in which the Enterprise’s saucer section is separated from the rest of the ship. (more…)
Scotti Bros. releases “Weird Al” Yankovic‘s fifth album, Even Worse, featuring the single “Fat” (inspired by Michael Jackson’s single “Bad”). (more…)
ITV airs the 109th episode of the anthology series Tales Of The Unexpected. Liza Goddard and Peter Davison (Doctor Who) guest star.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 21st episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Merritt Butrick (Star Trek II & III) and Judson Scott (The Phoenix) guest star. (more…)
ITV airs the 110th episode of the anthology series Tales Of The Unexpected. Glynis Barber (Blake’s 7) guest stars.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 22nd episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. This marks the final appearance of Denise Crosby as series regular Lt. Tasha Yar; the actress has decided to move on to less limited roles. Crosby returns to TNG several times, and later hosts several documentaries on the Star Trek phenomenon. (more…)
The 12th episode of the American-made Max Headroom series premieres on ABC, starring Matt Frewer and Amanda Pays. (This is the the American-made drama series, not the music video/talk show series featuring the same character.) This is the final episode to air on ABC; two further episodes, Lost Tapes and Baby Grobags, aren’t seen until the series goes into reruns on cable years later. (more…)
ITV airs the 111th episode of the anthology series Tales Of The Unexpected. Michael Brandon (Dinotopia, Dempsey & Makepeace) guest stars.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 23rd episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. This is one of the late first season episodes most notably affected by the Writers’ Strike, as filming had to begin without a completed final draft script. Michelle Phillips guest stars. (more…)
ITV airs the 112th episode of the anthology series Tales Of The Unexpected. David Suchet (Poirot) and Jemma Redgrave (Doctor Who) guest star.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 24th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. This is the goriest episode of the series’ entire run; even improved make-up effects in later seasons never quite match up to this story’s exploding head and torso (graphic visuals which any network with creative input or oversight would likely have nixed). Despite ending on an obvious cliffhanger, this story is never revisited by any later episodes or spinoff series. (more…)
ITV airs the 113th and final episode of the anthology series Tales Of The Unexpected. Chaim Topol guest stars in the series finale.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 25th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. This episode marks the end of the first season (with no guarantee, due the 1988 Writers’ Guild strike, that the series will be back in production anytime soon), and the return of the Romulans to the Star Trek universe, a sign that Gene Roddenberry is relaxing his stance on revisiting elements of the original series. (more…)
Cosmonauts Anatoly Solovyev, Viktor Savinykh and Aleksandr Aleksandrov lift off for a week-long visit to Soviet space station Mir aboard Soyuz TM-5. Numerous biological and astronomical experiments are conducted by the blended crew, and at the end of the week of joint activities, the Soyuz TM-5 crew use the older TM-4 capsule to return home, leaving the station crew with a newer vehicle.
Threshold Records releases the The Moody Blues’ album Sur La Mer, featuring the single “I Know You’re Out There Somewhere”. (more…)
A leading NASA climate scientist, Dr. James E. Hansen, addresses the United States Congress with a warning: the past five months of 1988, the hottest months in the history of weather records, are the beginning of a dangerous trend in Earth’s climate history, and studies conducted by experts show that the cause is increasing man-made pollution. Though Hansen’s claims will continue to be debated for decades (while only slow progress is made in the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy in that same time), the five-month period in question will not be the last consecutive stretch of rising worldwide temperatures.
Under much scrutiny due to the success of the group’s debut album, Crowded House releases its second album, Temple Of Low Men. This album includes the singles “Better Be Home Soon” and “Into Temptation”. (more…)
Atlantic Records releases the debut (and only) self-titled album from Y Kant Tori Read, a band centered around future solo artist Tori Amos. (more…)
The Soviet Union launches the first of two unmanned Phobos space probes, designed to investigate the largest of Mars’ two asteroid-like moons and deliver a lander to analyze that moon’s surface. With multiple nations pitching in resources to help the mission succeed, including the United States, the Phobos program is intended to be the definitive Mars exploration program of the 1980s, as well as the debut of a new Soviet interplanetary vehicle to take over from the Zond/Venera design in use since the 1960s.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 24th episode of Friday the 13th: The Series, starring John D. LeMay, Wendy Robie and Chris Wiggins. Michael Constantine (My Big Fat Greek Wedding) guest stars. (more…)
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 88th episode of George A. Romero’s Tales From The Darkside anthology series. Nile Lanning and Eric Jason guest star. (more…)
Having weathered the storm of the 1983 video game industry crash longer than most, Coleco Industries, maker of the early ’80s Colecovision video game system, files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. At the time of the filing, Coleco is America’s sixth largest toy company, but the video game industry isn’t its downfall. Overproduction of the company’s Cabbage Patch Kids toys has proven to be fatal, with two straight years of annual losses exceeding $100,000,000. The remains of Coleco are eventually bought up by rival toymaker Hasbro.
Dutton publishes the horror novel Demon Night by J. Michael Straczynski (The Twilight Zone, Babylon 5). (more…)
The Soviet Union launches the second of two unmanned Phobos space probes, designed to investigate the largest of Mars’ two asteroid-like moons and deliver a lander to analyze that moon’s surface. The Phobos program is intended to be the definitive Mars exploration program of the 1980s, as well as the debut of a new Soviet interplanetary vehicle to take over from the Zond/Venera design in use since the 1960s; only Phobos 2 will actually reach its target intact, but it will still fail to complete all of its mission objectives.
From within 500 million miles, cameras aboard NASA’s Voyager 2 unmanned space probe can now get a better look at planet Neptune than is possible with ground-based telescopes on Earth – even though, at present, that means a tiny disk only eight pixels across in images measuring 800 x 800 pixels. Voyager 2 is still over a year away from its closest encounter with Neptune, and even its own best photos don’t reveal any detail in the blue-green planet’s atmosphere. What is known is that, despite receiving less than half the sunlight and heat of the next innermost planet, Uranus, Neptune maintains the same temperature as Uranus. This means that Neptune is generating more heat than it receives from the sun.