Chiron & the Moons of Jupiter

 

In Starlog Issue #13 from May 1978, Terran Travel Agent Jonathan Eberhart announces an exciting new travel destination. Dubbed "Object Kowal" after astronomer Charles Kowal, this recently spotted spacial body could be a planet or a comet. Alternatively, it could also be an asteroid, or even a moon that escaped its planet's orbit.

In case the scientific community decided it was a planet, Charles Kowal suggested the name Chiron. Some in the popular press welcomed this new addition to our solar system with open arms. "Welcome tenth planet Chiron," their headlines proclaimed.

Much has changed since 1978. Pluto, the only other spacial body rotating our sun that shares a blue atmosphere with Earth, no longer allures as a possible travel destination, since it has been striped of its status a planet. Yet Object Kowal, or Chiron, still intrigues. 

 

 

As it orbits our sun, and exhibits the characteristics of a comet, the scientific community recognizes Chiron as both a minor planet and a comet. As a minor planet (or possibly, like Pluto, a dwarf planet), it is known as 2060 Chiron. As a comet, it is called 95P/Chiron. 

If the possibility of traveling to a place that is both a planet and a comet doesn't excite you, how about taking a tour of Jupiter's moons instead? In the same May 1978 Starlog article, Terran Travel Agent Jonathan Eberhart informs us that astronomer Charles Kowal has recently discovered Jupiter's thirteen moon, as well as another spacial body that might someday be confirmed as the planet's fourteenth moon. These days, in the shiny new year 2021, the scientific community recognizes not just fourteen Jovian moons, but seventy-nine.

I repeat: Jupiter has a whopping seventy-nine moons! Jupiter has a staggering seventy-nine moons! Jupiter has a mind-blowing seventy-nine moons!

The pandemic may currently be limiting Terran travel destinations. Yet I cannot help be excited by the possibilities. Imagine visiting a place that is both a minor planet and a comet! Imagine exploring all of Jupiter's seventy-nine moons!

When the pandemic winds down, and the interplanetary cruise industry ramps up, I know which tour I want to book. How about you?

Dragon Dave

The Mystery of the Mask

Sure, everyone likes the helmet.
But a musical Boba Fett, sporting his
giant orange tuning fork?
Somehow, that look never caught on.

Jeremy Bullock had been acting for twenty-five years when he was offered the part of Boba Fett in The Empire Strikes Back.  But Sci-Fi resonates with people more that other forms of entertainment.  His older son (who was eleven in 1981, when the interview for Starlog Magazine Issue 50 was written) might say, “I like that play you were in,” but both boys kept a photo of Boba Fett close to hand when his father toured the country in a production of Hamlet.

After the movie’s release, Jeremy Bulloch received masses of fan letters.  Young boys might write something like, “Gee, we like you, you’re awesome,” while girls and young women found him alluring.  One woman asked if the voice Lucasfilm used was his real voice.  (It wasn’t).  In her letter, she added, “Mind you, if it isn’t your voice, I won’t stop loving you.”  Some asked him what Boba Fett would do in the next movie, and if his character represented “the other hope” that Yoda had spoken of.

Up to this point, Bullock had appeared in two James Bond movies.  Of his role on The Spy Who Loved Me, he told the interviewer (with a smile): “They put these charges under me, and I get ripped apart after twenty minutes—the story of my life.”  He played more memorable roles in two Doctor Who stories.  After the Doctor and his companions escape the warriors from Richard the Lionheart’s court in “The Crusade,” the Tardis lands in “The Space Museum.”  Bulloch says of his role, “I was the leader of a race of children. We had this swept back hair, pointed ears and sort of funny eyebrows on top of our foreheads.”  (Obviously, he wasn't wowed by the Black & White show's special effects budget).  Later, he returned to the TV show (this time in color) to play Hal, an archer who helps the third Doctor defeat a Sontaran in “The Time Warrior.”  Despite acting in a popular Sci-Fi show, he didn't get much attention from those roles, as he never went on to play a continuing character, and the BBC rarely repeated Doctor Who stories.  (Nor did most viewers have the means to record a TV show in the 1960s and '70s).  So it wasn't until the 1980s, when he donned Boba Fett’s costume, that the fan letters overloaded his mailbox.  Viewers suddenly begged him for photographs, or old articles of clothing.  Or even just a snippet off one of his ties.

I once spoke with a plumber who claimed he could instantly assess anyone he met.  When he visited a customer, he said that he could accurately guess how much the person would be willing to pay for his services.  As it happened, I was speaking with him at a yard sale, and he offered me insights on a woman browsing the sale tables.  I don’t know if he was correct in his assertions about the woman, but at the time he was living rent-free in a condominium owned by his father.  So even if he was pulling my leg about his ability to read strangers, he obviously knew how to get around his dad.

Nevertheless, masks and costumes are powerful tools that we use in real life.  We may not wear an actual mask, but we adapt our facial expressions, dialogue, and clothing in relation to the people we are with.  We have learned what others expect from us, and we either act in accordance with their expectations, or in defiance of them.  Such masks shield the truth from others, and hence repress true growth, but we use them because life has taught us that they are necessary.  Like actors, we play the roles assigned to us, because others have stereotyped us based upon their expectations and desires, as well as our previous performances. 

Of course, it would be nice if we could interact with everyone without hiding behind a mask, or portraying the persona we’ve decided to show the world.  But that way lays danger, and unlike Boba Fett, most of us don’t carry blasters.

Dragon Dave

Related Dragon Cache entries

Richard the Lionheart in“The Crusade”

Related Internet Links

The Space Museum

The Time Warrior

David Gerrold’s Protégé

What's bugging Mr. Spock?
(Not to mention Katalya!)

The “Star Trek” novel Vulcan!, written by Kathleen Sky, includes an introduction by David Gerrold.  He wrote this, he says, not at the invitation of the author or the publisher, but because he insisted on it.  In eight pages, he describes his friendship with Kathleen Sky, and how he has watched her grow and mature as a writer.  He describes the pride he felt when she wrote a story good enough for his anthology Generation, even though “she claims she was a student of the David Gerrold Bludgeon and Blast school of science fiction criticism,” in which he threw each manuscript into the air, and jumped up and down while yelling at her how terrible each story was. 

In my teen years, I found David Gerrold a consistent source of entertainment and inspiration.  Each month, I paged through “Starlog” magazine, seeking out his columns.  I remember how he compared Roy Neary’s experience with UFOs in Steven Spielberg’s “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” to that of a believer who claims to have been visited by an angel.  Reading his columns every month made me want to read his books, and I still regard two of his novels, When HARLEY was One and The Man Who Folded Himself, as all-time favorites.  Then, of course, there was his book The Trouble With Tribbles, in which he offered a behind-the-scenes view of how the “Star Trek” TV show took his story from the initial pitch stage through to a filmed episode. 

In Kathleen Sky’s novel, the Enterprise is sent to investigate the planet Arachnae.  Mr. Spock believes the inhabitants to be sentient, but the scientist sent to study them, Dr. Katalya Tremain, contends they are no smarter than insects.  The creatures resemble the bugs in “Starship Troopers,” the movie version of Robert Heinlein’s novel portrayed so vividly (and viciously) by director Paul Verhoeven.  Could the Arachaens be capable of rational thought, and worthy of joining the Federation?  This is not the only source of contention between the two officers who will lead the expedition.  Dr. Katalya Tremain, a scientist Spock has previously respected for her logic, loathes not just him, but the entire Vulcan race.

Dr. Leonard McCoy finds himself defending Mr. Spock against her attacks, when he is usually the one who derides Spock for his cold, unemotional nature.  As deplorable as he sees her racism, Dr. McCoy cannot help his growing attraction for her.  Thus he studies her as he woos her, yearning to rid her, if he can, of what he sees as an inexplicable psychological disorder.  He ends up worrying over both of them when an Arachnaen attack kills all expedition members but Katalya and Spock, and circumstances prevent the Enterprise from beaming the two back to safety.  So it is Mr. Spock, the man she hates, who must unravel the twisted threads of Katalya’s past, while the two investigate (and are attacked by) these bugs that may or may not be sentient, but are definitely lethal.

I found reading the novel again every bit as satisfying as I remembered it.  Her engrossing story left me wondering if my own efforts might be improved by “the David Gerrold Bludgeon and Blast method.”  Sadly, I may never get to know him, or receive the benefit of his opinion concerning one of the novels I hope to publish.  Nevertheless, his books, stories, and columns fed my own dreams of becoming a storyteller.  Unlike Kathleen Sky, I may not have the honor of being called his protégé, let alone become his friend, but I can envy her for the relationship she shared with the great David Gerrold.

Remembering my early influences,

Dragon Dave

Related Dragon Cache entries

Star Trek: The Cage 

Robert E. Vardeman: Keeping Us on Course