The space suits used in film and television are one of my ongoing interests. What's particularly striking about those costumes is how they get re-used and re-interpreted over the years. Costumes like the heavy excursion suits in "Alien" are justifiably praised as examples of great design, and you can see how they influenced later efforts like "Outland" and "Event Horizon". When you look back even further you see that it wasn't just design cues getting re-cycled. In some cases costumes produced back in the 60s were getting re-used and re-purposed well into the 90s and early 2000s.
That's why I was so delighted to discover "Say; Hello Spaceman", an entire blog dedicated to the history of space suits in media. It's a gloriously nerdy niche focus that you can find yourself scrolling through for hours. A good example of it's single-mindedness is the way it tracks appearances by particular designs. The 1969 film "Journey to the Far Side of the Sun" was the first big-budget film from Thunderbird's creator Gerry Anderson. It featured some well-done suits extrapolated from NASA's contemporary Mercury and Apollo designs.
The suits would then go on to be recycled in Anderson's own "UFO" television series...
Make multiple appearances in the BBC's "The Tomorrow People"...
And pop up in the comedy series "The Goodies"...
If you're looking to kill some time, stop by.
2 comments:
Thanks very much for your kind words and quite a bit of traffic thereafter. It's a pleasure to do the blog and seems to be a never ending catalogue. Tracking down a recycled suit appearance is one of the most satisfying bits and if anyone finds something I've not yet covered they're more than welcome to give me a nudge in the comments section. The blog owes quite a lot to it's regular followers for doing just that very thing. I would still do it if nobody else came but its much more fun with a participating audience. Thanks again. I'm now off to explore the delights of Propnomicon
Prop armor is a similar avenue of exploration. For example, the armor used in Starship Troopers was repainted purple and black and was used in the tragically short run Firefly television series for the Alliance troops.
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