Space Patrol Orion

[Hentzau]

Or rather "Space Patrol: the Fantastic Adventures of Spaceship Orion"

God, how I love that series. I am so thankful for Chuck to review it. In fact, I had contacted him years ago to ask him to do it, but I was a poor student, so it didn't work out. Even though I had already spent a weekend coming up with subtitles, since all the ones I found weren't sarisfactory to me.
The very language of Space Patrol is so extremely German and bureaucratic, in a rather non-tangible way, which is one of the reasons it has a special place in my heart. Science Fiction is a very english genre, as far as language is concerned. And when you read German sci-fi today, you will find lasers and radar and aliens and lots of other English words. And everything that doesn't have an English word has an agreed upon German term that everybody uses. But not "Space Patrol". They had to come up with words themselves. The "Frogs" aren't Aliens or even Außerirdische for that very reason. They are "Extraterrestrials". And they use oh so many Initialisms in German. Which gives everything a very bureaucratic-militaristic aspect.
Which is kind of the point. The series wanted to satirize a comeback of militarism in 1960s Western Germany that, for good reasons, many people weren't happy with.

Anyway, this isn't supposed to be about the series, but Chuck's review to which I have to say, once again, it was a review that gave me an interesting point of view and helped me approach something I had loved for decades from a different direction. Believe it or not, I had never thought of Tamara Yagelovsk (as an English transliteration probably would look like) as a political officer, even though it makes perfect sense to call her that.
Of course, she also works as that audience-surrogate character who doesn't know anything and has to have everything explained to them, thus helping the audience to understand stuff. And now I can't think of any other story where that kind of character was an unsympathetic one (or at least started out as one).

As for the Orion touching down on Rhea: Cliff very much just did it just to prove it could be done. He records for the Captain's Log:
"To further corroborate my claim that landing on Rhea is possible, I will touch down on Rhea in a few moments."

Thanks again Chuck, I can't even try to tell you how much I am looking forward to the next 6 episodes.


By the way, I was so sure the bit at the end would be from the very end of the episode. The debriefing by the General is over and the rest of the crew have left the office. Right before leaving themselves:
Hasso: "Say, Atan, that was all just a bad dream, wasn't it?"
Atan: "Way worse - it was Science Fiction"

[Fianna]

I think filming in black-and-white was an unexpected boon to a lot of old science fiction TV shows. It's not just that it helped disguise the cheapness of sets, costumes, effects, and the like, but it lent a lot of these shows a slightly dreamlike, creepy, and otherworldly quality that helped the vibe they were going for, and which color programs of the era had a hard time replicating.

I'm looking at this episode and imagining, if it was all rendered in the bold colors of the original Star Trek, just how different that would make the vibe of the whole thing.

[clearspira]

I'm reminded of that moment in ''Forbidden Planet'' where Leslie Nielsen's character points out in a slightly creepy, slightly victim-blamey way that his crew of twenty young men who haven't seen a woman in months probably CAN be expected to immediately what to have sex with the incredibly hot and half-naked woman they have just met.

Likewise, I can't help but think that this mostly male crew on their many month spanning mission probably CAN be expected to fap off using the apparently undetectable ''creeper cam'' in that woman's quarters. ''Stuck up enough to have farts that can break glass'' she may be, but she is also not ugly.

And as I said in my criticism of ''Forbidden Planet'', this is not me victim blaming. This is just me being realistic. A surveillance camera in a hot woman's quarters that she does not know that you are using? Eventually some guy is going to take advantage of that ESPECIALLY given how everyone hates her. Revenge porn anyone?

[Thebestoftherest]

Haven't been able to watch

[Beastro]

I think filming in black-and-white was an unexpected boon to a lot of old science fiction TV shows. It's not just that it helped disguise the cheapness of sets, costumes, effects, and the like, but it lent a lot of these shows a slightly dreamlike, creepy, and otherworldly quality that helped the vibe they were going for, and which color programs of the era had a hard time replicating.

I'm looking at this episode and imagining, if it was all rendered in the bold colors of the original Star Trek, just how different that would make the vibe of the whole thing.

Black and white was especially great because of how bold and gaudy the colour of a lot of abundant film was in the 60s. It has it's place in the era, but it was a kill joy for atompshere. Not just ST, but shows like the Wild Wild West. It's a good thing it coincided with the explosion of camp.

I think B&W should make a comeback simply because of the atmosphere building, only just not have B&W handled like it is today where it's a simple matter of removing the colour. I don't like how ultra crisp and clear "faux" B&W movies and TV shows are. It needs to emulate the styles and film quality of late 50s and 60s to appropriately grasp that vibe.

[Taurian Patriot]

The series wanted to satirize a comeback of militarism in 1960s Western Germany that, for good reasons, many people weren't happy with.

With the references to "Space War 2," the presence of a political officer to enforce correct behavior, and our hero chiding said officer for her "anthrocentrism," I was wondering how this all played off for an audience removed from WWII by only a single generation. Satirizing a resurgence of militarism seems like a perfect explanation, assuming the rest of the series continues these little digs at what happened the last time Germany went that route.

After seeing this first review, I'm genuinely interested in seeing German sci-fi horror. The way this show seems to convey it - a lot of silence, stillness, and long, fixed shots to really let an oppressive mood sink in - is so drastically different from the present American approach of using pop scares, sound stings, and quick edits to get a visceral startle reaction.

[CaptainCalvinCat]

Ahh - Raumpartro... Raumpatroui.... ach, Scheiß drauf - Raumschiff Orion.

Unfortunately this show only lasted seven episodes, as Chuck pointed out, and is, if I recall correctly, one of only two bonafide german sci-fi-shows, the other one being "Space Maidens", but even that is an english / french / german co-production.

By the way, Chuck, the reason, the aliens were called frogs is, that Atan, when he was trying to repair the communications-console, said "Ich bin keiner von diesen... Scheiß-Fröschen, ich weiß nicht, wie ich diese Anlage reparieren kann" (I'm not one of those damn Fröschen, I don't know how to repair this thing). And later on, he said "Erst haben wir sie Frösche genannt - aber das klang uns dann zu vertraut, zu irdisch - also haben wir sie Frogs genannt" (first we called them Frösche, but that sounded to familiar, to earthly, so we called them frogs).

Some little nice fun fact:
Atans actor, Friedrich G. Beckhaus, also worked on another Sci-Fi-Project in Germany - he's the German voice of Garak.
Wolfgang Völz - Mario De Monti - was the german voice of Pete Thornton over on MacGyver, also he was the voice of Captain Blaubeer on a german kids-TV-Show. He died on May 2nd 2018. His son Benjamin Völz is the german voice of Fox Mulder and Reymond Red Reddington.

And I'm gonna predict something - I'm very sure, you'll despise episode 5 (Der Kampf um die Sonne / the fight for the sun), because the Chromanians - there is a plot-twist in the story, that I'd rather not spoil - have a very holier than thou attitude.

Concerning Space Patrol in its entirety: the audience seemed to like it, the press was not keen, to say the least. They called it "fashistoid", said it would be stupid and not very good entertainment.


@Hentzau
"Viel schlimmer, das war Science Fiction" - Oh yeah, one of the best jokes of the entire series.

[Rocketboy1313]

I heartily agree with Chuck's point about the dated but function bubble shuttle and how I love science fiction that has loads of strange and dated looking elements layered on one another.
I often find myself just flipping thru old pulp covers, ray gun Gothic illustrations, and that Buck Rodgers/Flash Gordon art to appreciate how weirdly hopeful it all was.

[Madner Kami]

Unfortunately this show only lasted seven episodes, as Chuck pointed out, and is, if I recall correctly, one of only two bonafide german sci-fi-shows, the other one being "Space Maidens", but even that is an english / french / german co-production.

The question is, what makes a sci-fi movie or show a german sci-fi movie show? If it has to be made by a predominantly german cast and staff, then things get thin really fast. If you are willing to accept that movies and shows co-produced by Germany count, then there are quite a few out there. I'd especially like to highlight Lexx, both the mini-series and the TV-series, which strikes me as a particularly german-influenced show, given it's absurd surrealistic design.

Beyond that, I can heartily recommend "Hell" (2011), "Blueprint" (2003), "Cloud Atlas" (2012) and "Ice Planet" (2001) (yes, I am intentionally keeping to modern productions). Thing is, german cinema really lost a lot of talent and drive after World War 2 and tends to suffer from "Autorenfilm"-Syndrom since quite a while now (author's movie snydrome, a movie where the director is also the author, the cutter, the cinematographer and so on), which results in movies that tend to be "artsy fartsy" more than anything else. I really wish that homegrown productions hereabout would keep more of an eye on the mass market appeal of their works, because there's a lot of talent and skill available and it frequently gets used by non-german productions with great results.


Oh ffs, can someone please fix the bb-codes in the forums already?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hell_(2011_film) - Hell" (2011)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blueprint_(film) - "Blueprint" (2003)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_Atlas_(film) - "Cloud Atlas" (2012)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_Planet_(film) - "Ice Planet" (2001)

[CaptainCalvinCat]

The question is, what makes a sci-fi movie or show a german sci-fi movie show? If it has to be made by a predominantly german cast and staff, then things get thin really fast. If you are willing to accept that movies and shows co-produced by Germany count, then there are quite a few out there. I'd especially like to highlight Lexx, both the mini-series and the TV-series, which strikes me as a particularly german-influenced show, given it's absurd surrealistic design.

I concur - and Lexx is always pointed out as an example. But I'm talking about something like "Raumpatrouille - Die phantastischen Abenteuer des Raumschiffes Orion". I mean, you could count Primeval as a German show, since Pro Sieben funded the fourth season. Or you could count the "Fantastic Four"-Movies, produced by Bernd Eichinger.