So, I hope everyone had a pleasant holiday season. It was mostly time for family friendly viewing although I did get to see the Black Mirror Episode, Callisto, and Star Trek: Discovery is back for its second half. I love Discovery. This month also marks the 25th anniversary of Deep Space Nine-one of my favorite series of all time and my personal favorite Trek. And the 40th anniversary of Blake’s 7-another of my favorites. Big Finish has released an anniversary audio adventure, which is on my order wishlist.I cannot wait. I love the Blake’s 7 audio series.
Anyway, I saw the DVD release for the latest new Planet of the Apes. I haven’t watched the newer ones because…. it just never really happened, but it reminded me of the original franchise and a faint memory of a TV show or an animated show. Turns out there was both a live action TV show and an animated show.
The live action TV series has two new astronauts stranded on future/parallel earth. In this version, there are human villages-not quite as primitive as the original movies movies-ruled over by Apes as governors and guards. The two astronauts are assisted by another Ape who believes humans are capable of more. It’s a run of the mill action adventure with the planet of the apes spin. Entertaining, but not outstanding. It was, unfortunately, an expensive show and cancelled after 14 episodes.
The animated series (RETURN TO THE PLANET OF THE APES) was launched in 1975. It follows three astronauts ( one a woman this time) who land on earth in the year 3900 or so. Time travel is an accepted theory. In this version, the Ape future is a bit more sophisticated. Rather than the world created with more of an ape-like style, we have cars, apartments, airplanes. Humans can be hunted as sport or kept as pets.They do have a decree-that if humans are discovered to have language and sophisticated reasoning ability they are to be wiped out. I found it to be more engaging than the live action, if only because the themes were closer to the original. The assembly line animation with the old style block face templates is not my favorite, but getting past that, it’s a fairly good show.
THE ECHO ZONE 
DS9! Loved it. Has it really been 25 years? Where did the time go? Did a re-watch of the entire franchise late last year. Well, almost all of it. Still watching Enterprise. I don’t watch commercial TV – at all – so have not seen any of Discovery. Can’t wait for it to come to Netflix. I am not familiar with Blake’s 7. I will have to check that out. I recently noticed that X-files is doing their “second half” as well. Look forward to that one too.
As for these two Planet of the Apes – I believe I watched some of each back before I quit commercial TV. I don’t think I was impressed because I have only vague memories. Of course, that may be “old-timers-can’t-remember-shit” syndrome too.
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Time flies! I think Discovery is on some access deal US. Overseas, it’s Netflix, so I’m sure it will be soon. It’s a mature rating-just letting you know, but not like, Game of Thrones level. I want to see the X-files too as soon as its available.
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