British TV Sci-Fi

[GUBRATS]

Gabrielle Drake

Glynis Barber

But nothing beats , " the boys from the DWARF "

[HawkMan]

Hyperdrive - a BBC sci fi comedy, probably trying to reproduce the success of Red Dwarf. Didn't really work, but had a good cast of Nick Frost and Miranda Hart. Red Dwarf was a standard sit com style humour, but set in space,  and is terrific of course, Hyperdrive is sort of I.T. Crowd humour set in space.

First part of episode 1.

 

[Shadow]

What is wrong with you people?

 

 

[HawkMan]

R.I.P. Paul Darrow.

 

 

[Shadow]

Also

 

 

[HawkMan]

Backwards scenes played forwards!

 

[HawkMan]

Stephen Fry among others trying to decipher The Prisoner. 

 

[Futtocks]

24 minutes ago, HawkMan said:

Hyperdrive - a BBC sci fi comedy, probably trying to reproduce the success of Red Dwarf. Didn't really work, but had a good cast of Nick Frost and Miranda Hart. Red Dwarf was a standard sit com style humour, but set in space,  and is terrific of course, Hyperdrive is sort of I.T. Crowd humour set in space.

First part of episode 1.

 

Hyperdrive slipped through the cracks a bit. I enjoyed it at the time, but forgot it quickly. The American equivalent would be Other Space - a bunch of folks out of their depth among the stars.

[HawkMan]

U.F.O. episode Mindbender is ....mindbending.  Bizarre,  a must if you've not seen it. We actually end up with the characters watching episodes of ..er...U.F.O.!!

 

 

[ckn]

19 minutes ago, HawkMan said:

Stephen Fry among others trying to decipher The Prisoner. 

 

There was a site I had to go to regularly in the NHS, they started giving out permanent visitor passes, I saw the guy ahead of me get number 4, so I let the guy behind me go first. I was chuffed for ages about being Number 6 and I confused a lot of the younger folk in the office with my insistence that I was not a number.

[CanaBull]

Does this count? 

[Wiltshire Rhino]

Blake 7 really influenced me. I still find short haired women attractive.

 

[GUBRATS]

Best ever ten seconds of the ' Dwarf ' , the final scene from ' backwards ' as the Cat nips into the bushes to do his ' business '

[HawkMan]

There were three really interesting children's sci fi series in the 70's , all I would recommend.  Sky, about a human boy from the very distant future Earth trapped in 70's England with an assassin on his tail.

Episode 1.

Children Of The Stones. 

Strange goings on in and around a stone circle. This was a mixture of occult and sci fi and a bit of time loop jiggery pokey thrown in.

Episode 1.

Timeslip.  This was terrific,  4 serials about two kids and a time barrier taking them to different times,  where they encounter different versions of themselves from parallel worlds or possible futures. Stories set in 2nd world war with Nazis, one set in the Arctic in the future,  another in a future England turned into jungle by climate change and wrapped up with a present day story about cloning.  Really great stuff.

Episode 1 with introduction by ITN News science reporter Peter Fairley, remember him ?

 

[HawkMan]

Star Maidens ? This was really not good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                

 

 

 

 

 

                               

   

 

 

 

 

 

[Futtocks]

Children of the Stones - fantastic series, and very scary. I've been to Avebury, where it was filmed, and it is a remarkable place. Radio 4 have just done a new serialisation of it: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08tk8ff 

[HawkMan]

More Blake's 7 fun

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last edited: Oct 12, 2019

[unapologetic pedant]

13 hours ago, HawkMan said:

 

As well as Gabrielle Drake, "UFO" features numerous blink-and-you`ll-miss-it appearances of Ayshea, who at the time presented children`s TV pop show "Lift Off with Ayshea". Her picture had pride of place on my wall.

[HawkMan]

50 things I learned watching U.F.O.

1. When a UFO crashes into a house, cats inside run away, humans inside gawp out of the window.
2.Drug parties of the future will still have Beatles music playing.
3.The best way for a secret organisation to remain hidden is to splash their name and logo on the side of their vehicles.
4.Females are hired by secret organisations so that senior male officers can ogle them.
5.Siamese cats are enigmatic and different because they are vehicles for alien intelligences.
6.If you are a school kid able to guess the content of other kid's sandwiches, watch out!, aliens billions of miles away can detect it and use you forty years later.
7.Alien craft used to attack Earth don't develop radar, you can follow them home and not get detected.
8.At a magnification of x2,155 polystyrene looks like lava flow, pollen grain a futuristic building and puffed wheat a rock formation ( this might be genuinely true)
9.Film studio executives can threaten to destroy someone's ear drum with an acoustic gun with no comebacks.
10.Multi million dollar film studios are really keen to make boring films about Cornish fishermen.
11. Invading aliens play fair, they send a maximum of three attacking craft because that's all Earth's got to defend itself.
BTW I LOVE THE SHOW REALLY!

12. High-tech cameras using electrons instead of light have a mind of their own, can override their specifications and take photos using any range or magnification without recording what the magnification actually is , thus making all photos useless.
13. The best defence if an alien craft attacks a moon installation at sunrise is one bloke on the surface with a mortar.
14.Men in secret organisations wear sensible uniforms, women wear figure hugging fishnet uniforms.
15 In the future health worries about smoking will prove to have been false. Everyone will be encouraged to light up.
16.It's a man's world in the newspaper and magazine business, women are forced to be sluts to get on.
17. Russia of the future will be an insignificant entity with a tiddly out of the way moonbase and one vehicle.
18. Computers engaged in UFO investigations can't at the same time cough up financial figures that they also contain.
19.It's okay to use an amnesia drug on someone after having sex with them, then re - proposition them in a restaurant as if it's a bit of a joke.
20.Generals are brilliant at imitating the sound of a sheep. Baahh Baahh.

21. If you're an admiral tasked with destroying nerve gas that could wipe out humanity, and balls it up because of poor security, you are demoted, forced to undergo a name change and end up fighting intelligent lizards hell-bent on wiping out humanity.

 

 

 

22. Toupees of the future will still look rubbish. 

 

23. Invading aliens have no trouble getting an account with a mail order firm to ensure Ouija boards are delivered to whoever they want to telepathically control.

 

 

 

24. Makers of documentaries about earthworms are thought of as kinky.
25. Fettuccine is made by fat Italian mommas.
26. Bombs can be made from flour, which could be true.

2 7. The closer you are to an explosion,  better your chances! According to old miners.                        Part 2 Below.                             

22

[unapologetic pedant]

21 minutes ago, Futtocks said:

Children of the Stones - fantastic series, and very scary. I've been to Avebury, where it was filmed, and it is a remarkable place. Radio 4 have just done a new serialisation of it: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08tk8ff 

At the time "Children of the Stones" genuinely gave me the willies. A couple of years earlier "The Changes" on the BBC had the same effect. These tea-time children`s programmes were much more potentially unnerving than the late-night Hammer Horror offerings.

[Futtocks]

2 minutes ago, HawkMan said:

50 things I learned watching U.F.O.

1. When a UFO crashes into a house, cats inside run away, humans inside gawp out of the window.
2.Drug parties of the future will still have Beatles music playing.
3.The best way for a secret organisation to remain hidden is to splash their name and logo on the side of their vehicles.
4.Females are hired by secret organisations so that senior male officers can ogle them.
5.Siamese cats are enigmatic and different because they are vehicles for alien intelligences.
6.If you are a school kid able to guess the content of other kid's sandwiches, watch out!, aliens billions of miles away can detect it and use you forty years later.
7.Alien craft used to attack Earth don't develop radar, you can follow them home and not get detected.
8.At a magnification of x2,155 polystyrene looks like lava flow, pollen grain a futuristic building and puffed wheat a rock formation ( this might be genuinely true)
9.Film studio executives can threaten to destroy someone's ear drum with an acoustic gun with no comebacks.
10.Multi million dollar film studios are really keen to make boring films about Cornish fishermen.
11. Invading aliens play fair, they send a maximum of three attacking craft because that's all Earth's got to defend itself.
BTW I LOVE THE SHOW REALLY!

This is beginning to look like Peter's Evil Overlord List.

[Shadow]

56 minutes ago, HawkMan said:

U.F.O. Piccies. 

 

  

 

 

I'll refer you to my avatar.

[HawkMan]

50 things part 2.

28. If you're second in command of an Earth defence organization and need a clear head and incisive decision making, pour yourself a glass of whiskey whenever you're on duty.

29. Hooray, racial prejudice will burn itself out in the near future.
30. Nice to get confirmation that show jumpers are upper class right wing folk who bully " peasants "
31. Luckily alien craft laser weapons are useless and nearly always miss, Earth defence craft never miss.
32. The default name of kinky Swedish au pair girls is Olga, despite it being a Russian name.
33. It's okay to take a ten year old kid to watch a movie being made, even if it includes a scene of a girl being strangled.

34. Britain will convert to driving on the right now the Americans are using it as a base for alien defense operations.
35.Geological scanner machines are thought of as capable of buggering up radio equipment of multi million dollar space craft.
36. Senior officers of a military organization act as if STD's don't exist.
37. Alien devices thrown into a lived -in barge can remain unnoticed for ten years.
38. Luckily for aliens, derelict farms where they plant bombs will in all likelihood remain derelict and undisturbed for ten years.
39. Dead humans, revived by aliens and living for ten years will when eventually die suddenly look like they did ten years earlier and wear the same clothes.
40. Film studio bosses can promise to deliver urgent medical supplies ,at a speed only possible with unknown supersonic craft, and no one wonders how.
41. Sunspots are the number one cause of radio blackouts grounding an entire fleet.
42. Go carts are abundant in film studio premises so villains can conveniently jump in them, and heroes give chase.

43. In the near future Earth technological devices can be adjusted by alien technology to cause time itself to stop.
44. Aliens have xray photography so advanced that it can penetrate deep underground and get information to create perfect replicas of human beings working in a defense organization bunker, but the replicas can't speak, only mime to tape recordings to complete their disguise.
45. It's unusual when leaving your home to lock the doors, downright suspicious even, unless there are known burglars about.
46. Questions to ask a spirit at a séance include, " what will be next year's fashionable colour"
..........and we'll end with some philosophical musings of Ed Straker.
47. Never judge a situation by the end of a conversation.
48. The things we don't say, that's what life is all about, I guess.
49. Is our entire universe contained in a grain of sand, on a beach, in another universe. Space is infinite outwards and inwards. ( mmm, quite thought provoking)
FINALLY...I really recommend this show despite my jokey themed thread here, here is Ed Straker's poetic take on the fatalities of interstellar conflict, even if it does end with a non sequitur.
50. The long finger of tragic coincidence across a billion miles of space. Is it the end or the beginning, where does the universe end, where does it begin?

[Shadow]

I still question what is wrong with you people

 

[RidingPie]

13 hours ago, Futtocks said:

Having just watched Craig Charles and Hattie Hayridge (Red Dwarf) making a cameo appearance in The Lexx, it sets me to thinking that Avon doing a transatlantic cameo in something like well-meaning and earnest like Star Trek would have been hilarious.

Not to show how much of a Greek I am but... many years ago I was at a Babylon 5 convention in Blackpool. All the stars were there, but a highlight was Gareth Thomas dressed as Blake from the last episode presenting an award to JMS.

 The other two highlights were Walter Koenig walking past me dressed as Bester and talking-all be it very briefly- to the absolutely lovely Mira Furlan.