Giant Freakin Robot

Friday night is often a dead zone when it comes to finding good TV, but thankfully Ron Moore’s Helix has given our DVRs something productive to do with the first night of the weekend. The fourth episode of the show’s initial 13 episode run premieres tonight on Syfy, and you can bet things are only going to get worse up there in the Arctic. Never mess around with creepy black fluids, man. Mulder and Scully could have told you that.

Tonight’s episode is called “Single Strand,” and the synopsis is unsurprisingly vague:

Alan and the team deal with secrets and suspicion as the crisis heightens and deadly consequences follow. Meanwhile, Walker tries to survive on Level R.

Kickstarter is the new hot thing these days, with high-profile projects from people like Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas and Scrubs actor Zack Braff making headlines with projects on the crowdfunding site. One questions that’s been asked quite a few times is simply this: Why should I give some famous person my hard-earned money to make their thing when I’m not going to profit from it myself? Of course, your pledge will get you goodies ranging from the banal to the extravagant, but it’s a vaild point. Ultimately, the only reason to donate to a Kickstarter project is if you are excited about it and you want to help make it happen. In that spirit, here’s one for your consideration: a new science fiction series based on David Gerrold’s Star Wolf novels.

Many die-hard science fiction fans know writer David Gerrold as the guy who wrote the classic Star Trek episode “The Trouble with Tribbles.” He’s also worked on countless other shows over the years, including the original Twilight Zone, Babylon 5, Sliders, and even the campy Sid and Marty Krofft kids’ series Land of the Lost. Now he’s offering his fans a chance to check out the original script for one of his Land of the Lost episodes, entitled “The Possession.” It differs quite significantly from the aired episode, and Gerrold has decided to make it available as a PDF for $12.50 via Paypal.

On his Facebook page, Gerrold went into detail about how his original script was altered on the way to the screen:

In July and August of 1974, I wrote the “The Possession” for the Land of the Lost television series.

As written, the script was a parody/mashup/homage to several popular science fiction films.

As filmed, the episode was much leaner and a much more straight-forward story. Much of the parody/mashup/homage was missing.

But the original script is great fun to read and imagine, because (in my mind, anyway) it captures the true spirit of the series. It represents what I most wanted to be able to accomplish, even on our limited budget.