NOTES ON WRITING MISSION TO PLUTO

I had some help from some of the old story guides from Mosher that I had in my collection. Of course, they paid no attention to continuity...and why should they, television was still in its infancy.  I sent Jean-Noel copies which she was able to use in some of the background stories for her book. One in particular, dealt with the interplanetary wars and how devastated the planets were, etc. A very early one dealt with the fact that the SP had barely reached the planets, etc.  Many years ago I bought a ton of the early 15 minute SP scripts from Andy Anderson and when you read them, you can see the impact of a few of the early “style sheets” on the stories.  However, as time passed within a year, they’re all over the place.  Once the ABC shows began they paid a lot more attention to continuity.  However, since radio had no such limitations and because SP was continually in the top 10 of all shows for a Saturday (quite a feat actually), they went a lot further.  For example, many have thought that the tiny wing like space craft in the opening of the show had no name.  Actually it did.  It was the “Atmosphere Ship” and used for travel, mostly around a planet.  Radio named it and used it quite a bit, though it was never used in the television series.

My thinking is that over time we can tie everything together so that it all makes some sense...at least a story at a time.  When we’re done, we should have a novel ready for publication – a few more tie in graphics – and some fun in the meantime.

Since TV and the time of SP was shadowy and dark – the people few, etc., I wanted to actually make that part of the SP world...something that would actually have happened if the wars had been that severe.  It would also account for the need for a Space Patrol to actually keep the “Space Lanes” clear.

I’ve always thought the concept of atmosphere locks was a brilliant concept of Mosher’s. Today’s science could otherwise impact pretty harshly given we know that Venus, Mars, etc., are pretty uninhabitable and since the NASA scientists have ruled out silicone cell life as a possibility, that only leaves carbon based life.  Now, if we expand the idea of the atmosphere locks to encompass some gravitational properties that wouldn’t throw off the orbit of the other planets, we have a way that an earlier earth could have populated the planets.  Sci-Fi wise, this makes us original in that instead of other planets coming to our world and creating civilization, we travel to theirs.  Space Patrol’s time line which was many thousands of years into the future, lets us do that.  It’s more than enough time for outer planetary civilizations to have come and gone (such as the Martian Carnigans).  

-- Warren Chaney