Get a sense of scale, would ya?

I spent last week at Digital ID World in San Francisco, an interesting experience. More on that later; the main reason for this post is a very cool website.

Jeff Russell's Starship Dimensions website has scale model replicas of all the science fiction spaceships you can think of, and a number you can't. From the Star Trek Galileo to Halo itself. You can compare the size of all of them!

http://www.merzo.net/index.html

Though come to think of it, I didn't see the Pillar of Autumn there...

Beyond the movie

Yes, there is a Hitchhiker's beyond the movie, and it's quite healthy. The BBC is continuing the radio series based on the remainder of Douglas Adam's books. They've done one set of six (the Tertiary Phase), and are on the next set (the Quandary Phase). You can listen to them when aired, over the web and for a week afterward, here.

Simon Jones (aka Arthur Dent) and Geoffrey McGivern (aka Ford Prefect) did a webcast the other day, and it's pretty humorous to read as well.

Success for Hitchhiker's?

I heard on the radio that the Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy movies, despite mixed reviews, was the top-grossing movie in the country over the weekend. Apparently Disney now plans to make a sequel.

At first I was elated. Adams’ series is long overdue for a wider audience, and if this movie can steer people back to the original it’s a force for good. However, I’m not so sure I’m keen on any kind of sequel. I still haven’t seen the movie*, but Douglas only wrote so much. If the script goes beyond what he wrote, it’s isn’t really Hitchhiker’s any more. Adams was such a unique talent, I don’t see how sequel-generating scriptwriters can create anything but a parody of the original.

Of course this won’t stop them from trying.

* We went to a concert and dinner yesterday with a friend of Connor’s who had already seen the movie. It took dire warnings, imprecations, and threats of duct-taping his mouth to keep him from giving anything away. We’ve been waiting for a movie for ten years before this kid was born; we’re not about to put up with him spoiling it!