With this morning’s successful launch and return of 90-year-old William Shatner into outer space aboard the Blue Origin New Shepard spacecraft, Shatner gave his fans worldwide perhaps the greatest single moment in the annals of science fiction. Melding the best of fantasy and reality, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ New Shepard NS-18 mission took the most famous fictional character, Star Trek’s Captain James T. Kirk, and made him an actual space traveler, 60 years since the first manned spaceflight, 52 years since the first Moonshot, and 55 years since Shatner first stepped onto the bridge of the Enterprise set. It’s something no fan of Shatner or Star Trek ever could have dreamed of, a landmark, one-of-a-kind, impossible opportunity that is a giant leap for any writer, actor, or other creator of the ideas behind science fiction, back to all those past dreams of space travel, from the science fiction of Jules Verne’s From the Earth to the Moon, H.G. Wells’ The First Men in the Moon, and George Méliès’ A Trip to the Moon, to crewmembers of the fictional starship Enterprise invited by NASA to the ribbon-cutting for the first space shuttle named for the Enterprise, to actual astronaut Mae Jemison flying aboard the space shuttle Endeavor and returning to be a guest star on Star Trek: The Next Generation. Does anyone not want Star Trek to be “real”?
Only William Shatner could have done something like this. If you’ve met the man in person, you know he has unbounded energy like probably nobody else, certainly no one at the age of 90, showing no signs of slowing down, as evidenced again today. The approximately 10-minute flight took the actor and crewmates above the 62-mile (100 kilometers) Kármán line at 9:53 a.m., which is the most commonly recognized boundary of the edge of space.
Jeff Bezos’ spaceflight company Blue Origin postponed the flight to today due to forecasted high winds at its launch site (Bezos, a fan of Star Trek, had a cameo as an alien in the movie Star Trek Beyond). The flight had liftoff at Blue Origin’s Launch Site One near Van Horn, Texas, at 9:49 a.m. (Central Time), returning at 10 a.m. sharp.
Currently housed in a Tudor-style mansion in Manhattan, The Explorers Club is a real place with a legacy of adventurers among its ranks. Parodied in The Freshman, the club is a meeting place established in 1904 for the purposes of promoting scientific exploration around the planet, and it does host an annual dinner with unusual flair. A table can cost you $100,000 and features food including tarantula and other exotic animals that would be a nightmare for animal rights advocates, not to mention the taxidermy displays (Wes Anderson’s The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou was filmed there). Honorary members include the likes of Theodore Roosevelt, John Glenn, Sir Edmund Hillary, Buzz Aldrin, and the club has bestowed its highest award to notables including Mary Leakey, Jane Goodall, Robert Ballard, and Neil deGrasse Tyson.
Not quite a secret society, the members have circumnavigated the world, flown, sailed, driven, and walked across each continent in search of the next discovery, returning back to the club to share the stories of their accomplishments. In one of his last projects before his death in 2003, journalist and noted personality George Plimpton (himself a member) collected 51 first-hand accounts of these journeys from the club’s ranks and published them as As Told at the Explorers Club: More Than Fifty Gripping Tales of Adventure, available now in a new edition from Lyons Press.
Outer space looks so peaceful and tranquil from the images we have received over the years from NASA astronauts. Yet the reality of space is that it is an unforgiving place, and impossible to survive in without adequate protective gear. Without a space suit you would lose consciousness within seconds because there is no oxygen. Blood boils and then freezes because of the lack of air pressure. Extreme changes in temperature would kill you one way or the other: In sunlight temperatures reach 248 degrees Fahrenheit and in shade temperatures drop to -148 Fahrenheit. And you’d be exposed to radiation. Basically, no spacesuit… and you’re done for.
Above is an image of the actual space suits used by American astronauts in the 1960s and 1970s. I grew up with stories from my dad about being on one of the recovery ships for John Glenn’s (first!) historic space flight. I was fortunate to have worked with a NASA spacesuit on display at the National Air and Space Museum at the Smithsonian Institution on the Moon Landing’s 20th anniversary, and witnessed the three Apollo 11 astronauts speaking of their journey. Since then I have met two other men who went to the moon. On the one hand they are just people like everyone else. On the other, they all realize they have done something incredible.
Harrison H. Schmitt, the 12th and last man to walk on the moon, at book launch with Elizabeth C. Bunce and C.J. Bunce.
I’ve also been lucky enough to see in person not only the several space capsules in Washington, DC, but something I never thought I’d see when I was a kid–Gus Grissom’s Liberty Bell 7 capsule, cleaned up after being found at the bottom of the Atlantic resulting from his controversial flight. Real life space travel carries a special kind of magic, and to try to match it, Hollywood has its work cut out for it.
Gus Grissom’s restored Liberty Bell 7 module, now at the Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center.
More than a century of science fiction has recognized the need for some travel suit or the other for space travelers of the future. As reflected in science fiction films, costumers in Hollywood have adapted to the cutting edge science of the day to perfect the look and feel of the future for their science fiction fan audience. But it wasn’t until the space race that the modern real space suit look was established as the standard, when costumers realized that realistic travel in space required pressurized suits, including what is obvious today, components like gloves and airtight helmets.
Whether film producers are making TV series or movies, space suits end up as a large chunk of the production budget. Looking right costs money. Leading the way in the future of dress in outer space was the original Star Trek series and subsequent Star Trek series. But because of budget constraints there was a surprising lack of actual space suits on each of these series. Even though the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation referred to their shipwear as “space suits” on a daily basis on set, that’s not the type of gear we’re discussing here. A chronicle of those types of suits would fill a book, from Star Trek to Babylon 5 to all the other science fiction TV series made by the Syfy Network alone. Those typically form-fitting and more military styled suits were a much cheaper way to make a TV series that could survive financially. Likewise, we’ll save for another day space pilot suits, like Luke Skywalker’s X-Wing fighter flight suit from Star Wars and Apollo’s Viper flight suit from Battlestar Galactica. But even Star Trek was able to spend budget dollars on space “outer wear” over the years from time to time.
The following is a look at the change of the design of the space suit in film over the years. Literally thousands of artists’ renderings of space suits can be found in countless covers to pulp novels, comic books, and other works, too. Many of them influenced or mirrored the designs below, and ultimately the costume designers rarely stray from reflecting the forward looking vision of their time. Note: Please send us your updates, new images and old, suits we missed and those published since this article was written, care of editor@borg.com.
In the 1902’s A Trip to the Moon, probably the first real science fiction film, they didn’t even bother with a space suit, just the explorer’s formal dress of the day.
The dawn of sci-fi serials arrived. In the 1950s serial Captain Video, the heroes wore basically modified football helmets and contemporary air force gear.
But Captain Video also had more futuristic garb.
In 1950’s Destination Moon, we see the first of the color-coded space walkers, a concept used as recently as in Star Trek 2009.
In 1950’s Space Patrol we begin to see a costuming theme–the multiple cuff rolls–an element that makes it to the Star Trek movies in the form of the radiological suits.
In 1951, serious science fiction comes of age with The Day the Earth Stood Still, and with it we get a peak at not what Earthlings might wear in space, but what the aliens already there wear.
In Cat-Women of the Moon (1953) we see more of the rolled armwear that would become typical of 1950s TV and film, and the glass globe found in many lesser sci-fi works.
More cuff rolls! With the comedy Have Rocket Will Travel (1959) the Three Stooges enter the Space Age.
Throughout the span of the series, The Twilight Zone featured several episodes focusing on astronauts, and made the best of a small budget, including these costumes in the episode Elegy…
… and Little People, again with the football helmet.
In 1961, no “costume” was necessary as Earth witnessed the first astronaut donning a space suit in outer space, with Yuri Gagarin’s epic flightas the first human in space.
In 1965 Lost in Space not only featured John Williams’ first sci-fi soundtrack, but cutting edge, cool space stories and characters filled the TV screen, including Dr. John Robinson’s space suit.
The TV series The Outer Limits offered up various versions of spacesuits in the early 1960s, but no performance in-suit was as memorable as that of William Shatner in the episode “Cold Hands, Warm Heart,” a realistic space suit like those worn by real astronauts.
In the 1970s one of my favorite comedic actors was Jerry Lewis. Being a kid I laughed at everything he did, and I remember not quite understanding more of the risque bits of his 1966 film with Connie Stevens about bringing both sexes together in space: Way, Way Out. It also makes me think this was the start of me thinking all space suits should be made of aluminum fabric.
My love of the silver space suits, of course, may also be because of the Mercury program space suits…
… and of the great astronaut G.I. Joe.
In 1966 the original Star Trek arrived. I’m not sure if it is truly a space suit or more of protective wear, but here is Spock sporting full gear in the episode The Naked Time.
1967 saw the first of the James Bond films addressing outer space with You Only Live Twice, with Russians in space.
In the bawdy comedy In Like Flint, James Coburn ends up in space with a silver suit… and good company
The typical bumbling Don Knotts role was even more fun in space, as seen in 1967’s The Reluctant Astronaut.
In 1968 Star Trek got real space suits instead of velour shirts, as seen here worn by the Enterprise crew in the classic episode The Tholian Web.
Upping the ante, Stanley Kubrick spared no expense to create multiple space suit variants for 2001: A Space Odyssey in 1968. Here we have that color-coding concept again.
Here is David’s red-orange suit close-up.
And the yellow version of the suit.
And 1960s camp participated in the Space Race as well, as seen in 1968’s Barbarella.
But it didn’t stay on long.
In the same year, Charlton Heston & Co. soar off in space gear to a very familar planet in The Planet of the Apes.
Tons of Doctor Who shows featured often bizarre space travel outfits. One Doctor Who special had its own take on the space suit, here in the 1968 film Doctor Who and the Wheel in Space. (Watch out for those Cybermen!)
In 1971, Earthlings saw Heston’s character leave in a rocket and apes return in Escape from the Planet of the Apes.
Strange goings-on for Sean Connery’s James Bond in 1971’s Diamonds are Forever.
As a big John Carpenter fan, I was surprised his early film Dark Star was so hard to watch. And he used very odd space suits.
In 1975, Space: 1999 had Martin Landau and even women astronauts in these great, orange suits, similar to the Star Wars X-Wing pilot suits filmed around the same time.
I’ve heard that NASA loaned real space suits to The Six Million Dollar Man series for at least one episode. I wouldn’t be surprised, as they look perfect.
Here Jenny Agutter is shown guest starring on an episode of The Six Million Dollar Man in a great suit.
In 1977 Capricorn One showed us what conspiracy theorists thought all along, that even the real astronauts were wearing costumes. Waterston, Brolin, and Simpson.
Strangely enough there are not a lot of space suits used in the Star Wars series since, like Star Trek, they didn’t have pressurization or other environmental concerns with their vehicles. One standout is an astronaut hanging at the Mos Eisley spaceport cantina. This photo is actually from the Superbowl ad from this year, creatures created by Tom Spina Design.
The original cantina guy in space suit.
Between 1978 and 1982, Mork & Mindy catapulted Robin Williams career. He arrived in a space suit complete with strange helmet. The series had access to the Star Trek archives and was able to use original series costumes and props.
In this episode of Mork & Mindy, Mindy’s dad wears a space suit consisting of the Star Trek original series Tholian Web space helmet mismatched with The Naked Time protective suit!
Come back tomorrow and we will continue with part 2–42 more uses of space suits in TV and movies, from 1979 to today.
On the eve of the last scheduled, American manned space flight it’s a good time to look back… wait a second…can that be right?
Yep.
Although the 135th and final space shuttle mission–before retiring the space shuttle program–is scheduled to depart Friday, July 8 at 11:26 a.m. Eastern time, like a lot of past missions weather will likely push launch out a few days or weeks. But once this Atlantis space shuttle mission is over, there are no future American space flights currently in the works. That said, we do plan to hitch a ride with various future Russian rocket flights to continue international space station projects. Read that again–the United States will be hitching a ride along flights of the Russian space program going forward.
Does any of this make sense?
When Yuri Gagarin became the first Earthling to pierce the outer ether, it didn’t go over very well back in the States. In fact it probably did more than anything to catapult the U.S. space program into the stratosphere, so to speak. To infinity and beyond, or at least to somewhere as ambitious as our moon. But the good part is we’re working together now with other countries–if not anywhere else–at least as far as space exploration is concerned. I am still in awe that mankind actually made it to the moon and NASA, a group of America’s best and brightest over more than fifty years, got us there. But now a great number of NASA employees, including engineers and other scientists, are all out of work, filtering into private industry, college teaching, etc.
Say it isn’t so! We aren’t even to Mars yet!
I remember getting up early to watch the first space shuttle mission, the launch of Columbia, on April 12, 1981. My friend had gone with his family for the maiden voyage and brought me back this print a few days later that was on my wall for years:
When you’re watching this next space shuttle flight, don’t just look back at the long and successful space shuttle program but the entire space program before John Glenn and the creation of the Mercury program to Glenn’s second flight as elder statesman to now the 135th and final shuttle voyage. Last week NASA posted the following on their website, claiming the future of NASA is not as bleak as it seems. I hope they are right:
“The end of the space shuttle program does not mean the end of NASA, or even of NASA sending humans into space. NASA has a robust program of exploration, technology development and scientific research that will last for years to come. Here is what’s next for NASA:
Exploration NASA is designing and building the capabilities to send humans to explore the solar system, working toward a goal of landing humans on Mars. We will build the Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, based on the design for the Orion capsule, with a capacity to take four astronauts on 21-day missions.
We will soon announce the design for the heavy-lift Space Launch System that will carry us out of low Earth orbit. We are developing the technologies we will need for human exploration of the solar system, including solar electric propulsion, refueling depots in orbit, radiation protection and high-reliability life support systems.
International Space Station The International Space Station is the centerpiece of our human spaceflight activities in low Earth orbit. The ISS is fully staffed with a crew of six, and American astronauts will continue to live and work there in space 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Part of the U.S. portion of the station has been designated as a national laboratory, and NASA is committed to using this unique resource for scientific research.
The ISS is a test bed for exploration technologies such as autonomous refueling of spacecraft, advanced life support systems and human/robotic interfaces. Commercial companies are well on their way to providing cargo and crew flights to the ISS, allowing NASA to focus its attention on the next steps into our solar system.
Aeronautics NASA is researching ways to design and build aircraft that are safer, more fuel-efficient, quieter, and environmentally responsible. We are also working to create traffic management systems that are safer, more efficient and more flexible. We are developing technologies that improve routing during flights and enable aircraft to climb to and descend from their cruising altitude without interruption.
We believe it is possible to build an aircraft that uses less fuel, gives off fewer emissions, and is quieter, and we are working on the technologies to create that aircraft. NASA is also part of the government team that is working to develop the Next Generation Air Transportation System, or NextGen, to be in place by the year 2025. We will continue to validate new, complex aircraft and air traffic control systems to ensure that they meet extremely high safety levels.
Science NASA is conducting an unprecedented array of missions that will seek new knowledge and understanding of Earth, the solar system and the universe. On July 16, the Dawn spacecraft begins a year-long visit to the large asteroid Vesta to help us understand the earliest chapter of our solar system’s history. In August, the Juno spacecraft will launch to investigate Jupiter’s origins, structure, and atmosphere. The September launch of the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System Preparatory Project is a critical first step in building a next-generation Earth-monitoring satellite system.
NASA returns to the moon to study the moon’s gravity field and determine the structure of the lunar interior with the October launch of GRAIL. In November, we launch the Mars Science Laboratory named Curiosity on its journey to Mars to look for evidence of microbial life on the red planet. And in February 2012, we will launch the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array to search for black holes, map supernova explosions, and study the most extreme active galaxies.”
I feel fortunate to have seen a number of space shuttle documentaries on IMAX screens years ago before IMAX films were mainstream and included popular movies. I saw these on visits to the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum (NASM) at their IMAX theater. These are still available via DVD and/or Blu-Ray and are worth a second (or first) look to get a close-up of early shuttle missions, and they include voice-overs from the likes of Walter Cronkite to Leonard Nimoy. Although you won’t get to feel the intensity of liftoff and the sheer scope of vast outer space in the comfort of your living room, maybe you have a big enough screen to get you a decent viewing experience.
So don’t miss out on watching the last flight Friday, or or later if delayed. At a minimum it will be the last manned American space flight we’ll see for a long time.
