(1) DOCTOR WHO EARLY DAYS. Charlie Jane Anders’ recent Happy Dancing newsletter, titled “Hope Is Important, But So Is Curiosity”, shares some discoveries made while reading The Doctor Who Production Diary: The Hartnell Years by David Brunt.

…Brunt managed to get access to all the paperwork on the making of Doctor Who from 1963 to 1966, the earliest years when people endlessly debated whether the show could last another 13 weeks or just be canceled immediately.

I’ve just been reading about the turmoil the Doctor Who team went through in 1964, around the time they were making “The Dalek Invasion of Earth.” This is a super important story, because it’s where the Daleks really cement themselves as epic villains — but also because it sees the show’s first departure: the Doctor’s granddaughter Susan leaves the ship, not entirely by choice.

I had never known that Terry Nation, the story’s writer, had included a new character in “The Dalek Invasion of Earth” to replace Susan aboard the TARDIS. This would have been Saida, “a beautiful Anglo-Indian girl, who will eventually replace Susan.” At the end of the story, in Nation’s original scripts, the Doctor leaves Susan behind on Earth, only to be startled to find “a bright and smiling Saida” has snuck aboard the TARDIS. Imagine if Doctor Who had introduced its first BIPOC companion, over forty years before Martha Jones. Alas, the character of Saida was aged up and turned into a white woman named Jenny, who does not join the TARDIS crew after all.

Also, around that same time, William Hartnell, William Russell and Jacqueline Hill were all asking for money — and there was talk about either canceling the show or writing Ian and Barbara in the same episode as Susan. One BBC higher-up even suggested putting the show on a short hiatus and replacing the entire cast, including Hartnell, with new actors. This doesn’t seem to have gone far, but it still boggles the mind. Would the Doctor have regenerated in 1964, two years early? Or would they have found another way to recast the role? It’s hard to imagine.

I clicked the link to the book and found more things you will discover in it:

• Which future Doctor Who scriptwriter was the first person approached to write for the series?
• How major was the overhaul to the BBC Drama Department under Sydney Newman in 1963, and who first suggested the idea before he even joined the BBC?
• How did the series manage to get made, when several people inside the BBC tried to get it cancelled before it even went into production?
• How many people turned down the offer of becoming the series’ producer before Verity Lambert was hired?
• How long before he appeared as Steven Taylor was Peter Purves contracted for the role?
• Was Vicki going to appear in ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’?
• Was Katarina originally going to survive that same story?
• When was Vicki planned to be burned as a witch?
• Was Anne Chaplet going to appear in ‘The Celestial Toymaker’?
• On what date was it first decided to write out William Hartnell as the Doctor?
• Exactly when was Patrick Troughton contracted to replace him?

(2) MELBOURNE CLUB FINDS NEW MEETING PLACE. Melbourne Science Fiction Club President Alison Barton delivered “Some exciting news for the MSFC” to the group on Facebook today.

We are moving to a new home soon!

As regular members and readers will know, the MSFC was forced to move from its much beloved West Brunswick location about 10 years ago. At the time the (quite extensive) library went into storage, an arrangement which we thought would be temporary. Finding a venue that was willing to home us *and* the library proved to be much more difficult than imagined however. The library has often been a focal point for members, both socially, but also in that “Hey wow, I’ve been wanting to read the final volume in this series for years, but it’s out of print everywhere!” kind of way.

With much thanks to Terencio (whom some might recall as our trivia master extraordinaire of some year), we have settled on a deal with a new location that will enable us to bring the whole library out of storage once more. I’m sure this will be welcome news to many.

Not wanting to leave the library in ‘limbo’ has been one of the reasons I have continued on as President of the club for such a long time, but as mentioned above, I didn’t think it would take quite this long. I announced at last year’s AGM that I would be stepping down at this year’s AGM (which will be held in July), as I need to focus more time on other things. I was a little sad that I might be stepping down before we accomplished this particular goal, so I am very very pleased to know that by the time I leave the library will be in full swing once more.

Please stay tuned for further information about the new venue address and meeting dates. Until we get everything finalised we will continue to meet at St Augustine’s Church Hall, 100 Sydney Rd, Coburg on the third Friday of each month so please keep watching for announcements so that you don’t turn up at the wrong place sometime.

(3) SEATTLE 2025 RATE HIKE MARCH 1. Adult attending membership rates for Seattle Worldcon 2025 are set to increase by $30 on March 1, to a total of $280 ($50 WSFS membership + $230 attending supplement).

Full registration information and a link to the registration portal can be found on the membership page on their website.

(4) SEATTLE 2025 COMMUNITY FUND. Seattle Worldcon 2025 has completed the first round of grants from their Community Fund which offers eligible people memberships and financial stipends to help defray the expenses of attending this year’s Worldcon.

Their news release also said:

If you have applied and haven’t yet been awarded a grant, you are still in consideration for future rounds. The next round of grants will be awarded in March.

We are still accepting applications. You can find details about our focus groups and the application link on our Community Fund web page.

In order to help as many fans as possible attend the event from the Pacific Northwest and around the world, the community fund is still accepting tax deductible donations. You can donate when you register, or by this direct donation link. Thank you to everyone who has donated so far. You are making a difference!

(5) FURTHER REPLY BY DANIEL GREENE. While Naomi King’s YouTube videos charging Daniel Greene with sexual assault have been taken down, Greene has used his archival copies of some of her videos to produce another denial titled “Proving Naomi King Lied With Their Own Words”.

(6) FILMGOERS ASSEMBLE. Apparently, somebody’s surprised. The New York Times reports “Marvel’s New ‘Captain America’ Is No. 1, Despite a Backlash and Poor Reviews”. (Behind a paywall.)

So Disney slowed the pace. Last year, Marvel released one movie (the megasuccessful “Deadpool & Wolverine”) and two Disney+ series. To compare, in 2021 Marvel churned out four movies (with mixed results) and five Disney+ series.

Factory problem fixed?

Maybe: Marvel’s “Captain America: Brave New World” was a runaway No. 1 at the global box office over the weekend. The movie, which cost at least $300 million to make and market worldwide, was on pace to sell roughly $100 million in tickets from Thursday through Monday in the United States and Canada, according to Comscore, which compiles box office data. Moviegoers overseas were poised to chip in another $92 million or so.

Maybe not: “Brave New World” received the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s lowest-ever grade (B-minus) from ticket buyers in CinemaScore exit polls. Reviews were only 50 percent positive, according to Rotten Tomatoes, which resulted in a “rotten” rating from the site. Just two Marvel movies rank lower on the Rotten Tomatoes meter, and both quickly ran out of box office steam after No. 1 starts that were driven by die-hard fans and marketing bombast.

“Brave New World” outperformed analyst expectations amid a racist backlash from some internet users and right-wing pundits, who criticized Marvel’s decision to refresh the “Captain America” franchise by giving the title role to a Black actor. (A “D.E.I. hire,” they maintained in numerous X posts, a reference to diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.) Anthony Mackie, who took over the character from Chris Evans, also came under attack as “anti-American” for a comment he made while promoting the film overseas….

 (7) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

February 17, 1912 — Andre Norton. (Died 2005.)

By Paul Weimer: I blame my own eagerness to get to the adult’s book as the reason why I neglected reading Andre Norton for a long long time. 

Back in the days of yesteryear, when I first got a library card, I was always clamoring to be allowed out of the children’s section and to be able to get into the adult section. I made such a racket about it that my parents and the librarian consented, and so for years, I went to the adult section of the New Dorp Public Library and left the children’s section behind.

As a result, a number of genre books and entire authors were missed by me. I didn’t read most of the Heinlein juveniles for years, because they were, unbeknownst by me, in the children’s section, and once I had gotten out of that small section of the library, I was not going to go back. 

And so, too, Andre Norton. 

So I did not come to Andre Norton as a teenager, it wasn’t until I was an adult, and kept hearing her name and seeing references to her work that I started picking it up and reading it. The Time Traders was in retrospect a great place for me to start her work, because it let me scratch my love of history at the same time. So I hunted her work. 

I picked up Star Man’s Son 2250 AD, which was actually in the adult section, because of the title, and the image of this poor guy pushing a raft. How could I not want to know what had happened to the world to reduce it to its parlous state? I found it an amazingly detailed, immersive and striking post-apocalyptic story with mutants, a clan looking to claw its way back to prominence and power with the ruined remnants of the old, implacable foes, and a big cat companion all in the bargain. 

I read a fair swath of Norton’s novels at that point, enjoying her characters, her worlds, and her ideas (even as recently as a couple of years ago, I am still catching up on her oeuvre now and again to try and plug the gaps. 

But the novel that remains with me the most is not a science fiction, or time travel, or fantasy, or post apocalyptic novel at all. And no, not even the expansive and sprawling Witch World novels, which are cromulent science fantasy fun (we all know my love of that subgenre by now, yes?) No, in the heady days of the early 1990’s when I was branching out into historical fiction, sometimes with some fantasy (hello Judith Tarr), it was a historical fictional fantasy novel that poleaxed me in a good way.

I think my interest in the Roman Empire (in a non ironic way, I do think about the Roman Empire frequently) helped fuel my interest (especially the striking cover) of Norton’s co-written Empire of The Eagle novel . I didn’t realize it was one of a series, because the story is so expansive in its self containment. Quintus is a tribune of the empire in the mid 40’s BC.  He goes off with the army of Crassus to fight the Parthians. If you know your history, you know that army got pummeled at Carrhae and the army destroyed and Crassus killed. But was that the entire story?  Norton invents a march of the survivors far to the east, to China, and a new life for the remnant soldiers. Quintus wants to regain the lost Eagle, but in the meantime he and his comrades need to make a new life impossibly far away from Rome, and deal with the dangers and problems there, including a dread sorcerer. There is magic, a reincarnation romance, and a lot of historical detail, and it wasn’t until I encountered Howard Lamb that I encountered any historical fiction set in this fascinating area. (I would many years later get Historical Atlases of Central Asia and trace Quintus adventures).  

Ave Atque Vale, Andre Norton.

(8) MEMORY LANE.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

February 17, 1989 — Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure released

By Paul Weimer: I admit to having slept on Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure when it came out in the theaters back in 1989. That was senior year in High School and I had other concerns on my mind at the time that winter.  So it was not until many years later and DVDs became a thing that I was even tempted to try and catch up on it. 

And the reason why I did wasn’t even the original movie, but the sequel, Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey.  A friend of mine told me that, despite all appearances, Bogus Journey actually showed some clever use and thought in time travel, doing the things that you wondered why people with time machines never thought to do, especially in the middle of conflicts and fights.  So I dutifully put in both movies into my Netflix queue and watched both back-to-back. The fact I was living in California at the time only added to the surrealism of watching these two Southern California slackers be seemingly the basis of future society was all the more surreal for me as a viewer. 

Also, this was after The Matrix, so I was, in effect, looking back at the early work of Keanu Reeves that I had missed in the process. Whoa, right?

I found Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure to be a lighthearted and extremely funny comedy that never takes itself too seriously, but its inclusive message is one solely needed in this day and age.  It wasn’t high art in the least, but the sight gags, the purposefully caricatured portrayals of historical figures, to comedic effect (Napoleon at Waterloo!) and the sense of fun the entire cast was having meant that I watched both movies a couple of times over before returning them.  And I kept renting it again and again every couple of years. There is a weird innocent magic to the movie (the sequel is very good but a slightly different kettle of fish) that makes me think of movies like Time Bandits, except for a slightly older target audience. 

Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure is coming to Prime in a couple of weeks as of the time of the writing of this.  I think a rewatch is in order, don’t you?

(9) COMICS SECTION.

• Birdbrains finds what everybody’s been looking for. 
• Bizarro regrets a name change.
• Carpe Diem checks in.
• Close to Home finds when you’re from Oz it can be hard to get through security.
• Reality Check follows police procedure.

(10) WEDNESDAY’S CHIA. Why yes, this is a real product, hard as it is to believe: “Addams Family Wednesday Chia Pet®”.

(11) TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT? [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] A recent issue of Nature’s cover story looks at asteroid detection and how it’s improving. Bruce Willis would be impressed… “Sight Unseen”.

The detection and monitoring of asteroids is key to protecting Earth from impacts. Large bodies (1 kilometre or more) in the main asteroid belt are relatively easy to spot and monitor but smaller objects (those down to 10 metres in diameter), which have the potential to move closer to Earth more frequently, are far more elusive. In this week’s issue Artem Burdanov, Julien de Wit and colleagues report the detection of 138 small asteroids in the main belt that were previously invisible to standard detection methods. The researchers made use of the JWST’s infrared capabilities that, when combined with synthetic tracking techniques such as merging multiple images, allowed them to spot the unidentified asteroids. The team suggests the JWST’s ability to monitor and study objects that have the potential to strike Earth, such as asteroid 2024 YR4, could make it an important part of future planetary-defence efforts.

The primary research is here. 

What they have observed is a distribution of a range of asteroid sizes.  All fair enough, but there is an apparent break in sizes at those with a diameter of about 100 metres. This, the researchers say, is suggestive of “a population driven by collisional cascade”.

(12) HELP WANTED. And as a result of such information as that in the previous item, the Guardian reports, “China opens recruitment for ‘planetary defence force’ amid fears of asteroid hitting Earth”.

China has begun recruiting for a planetary defence force after risk assessments determined that an asteroid could conceivably hit Earth in 2032.

Job ads posted online by China’s State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence (SASTIND) this week, sought young loyal graduates focused on aerospace engineering, international cooperation and asteroid detection.

The recruitment drive comes amid increasing focus on an asteroid with a low – but growing – likelihood of hitting earth in seven years. The 2024 YR4 asteroid is at the top of the European and US space agencies’ risk lists, and last week analysts increased their probability assessment of it hitting Earth from 1.3% to 2.2%. The UN’s Space Mission Planning Advisory Group, comprising countries with space programs including China, have been meeting regularly to discuss a response.

The ads, posted to WeChat earlier this week, listed 16 job vacancies at SASTIND, including three for a new “planetary defence force”. They invited applications from recent graduates aged under 35, with professional and technical qualifications and “a firm political stance” supporting the Chinese Communist party and an ideology aligned with its leader, Xi Jinping…

(13) GIVE A DOG A BAD NAME. Nature considers “From viral variants to devastating storms, how names shape the public’s reaction to science” in the What’s in a Name podcase.

Categorizing things is central to science. And there are dozens of systems scientists have created to name everything from the trenches on the sea bed to the stars in the sky.

But names have consequences. In our series What’s in a name we explore naming in science and how names impact the world — whether the system of naming species remains in step with society, how the names of diseases can create stigma, or even how the names of scientific concepts can drive the direction of research itself.

In episode two, we’re looking at how the names chosen by scientists help, or hinder, communication with the public.

Well chosen names can quickly convey scientific concepts or health messages — in emergency situations they can even save lives. We’ll hear how the systems of naming tropical storms and Covid-19 variants came to be, and how they took different approaches to achieve the same outcome.

We’ll also consider the language used to talk about climate change, and how the ways of describing it have been used to deliberately introduce uncertainty and confusion….

(14) YOUR CELESTIAL CALENDAR. The Late Night With Seth Myers host is watching the skies, and shares what he expects to see this year in “Seth Lays Out 2025’s Major Astronomical Events”. Many of these will be really happening. Some are facetious….

(15) VIDEO OF THE DAY. “David Tennant on playing an evil character in Jessica Jones and geeks out on Doctor Who” on YouTube.

David Tennant rolls the BAFTA dice to break down some of the iconic characters he’s played so far in his career including the Doctor in Doctor Who, The Purple Man in Jessica Jones and Alec Hardy in Broadchurch as well as … himself.. David looks back on how his acting methodology has evolved, which of his characters would vibe the most together and develops a brand new Pet Detective TV show (reluctantly) featuring Michael Sheen.

[Thanks to Steven French, Kathy Sullivan, Teddy Harvia, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, and SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Steve Davidson.]