From: Ermes Mercury (BetelgeuseM42@xtreme44.it) Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 22:09:37 +0100 Subj: Meta, ghost planet Hello! Hello! "Breakaway" (final synopsis, I quote from Space:1999 episode guide): "Koenig has to decide whether or not to abandone and makes his grim decision.Their only hope is to remain where they are..........And on Earth, the gravity distruption is causing devastation. At Moonbase Alpha, the unmistakable sound of Meta signals comes in, now quite loud and clear......" Well, well: we continue one's journey on Alpha, and here we are in: "Matter of life and death". Brief summary: "Now , sensationanally, Dr. Helena Russell comes face to face with Lee when he arrives on the moon in a spacecraft that has been proibing a planet, Terra Nova, which is apparently capable of sustaing human life............................... Koenig and Helena watch as a violent explosion rocks the moon, which disinte grates, the debris hurtling towards Terra Nova. Shock waves hit the planet.........". Ah! What a shame! Too bad! Neither Terra Nova could receive our Alphans! But.....Ehi! Just a moment, please! And Meta? Where is the planet? Where is the great Alphan's hope, the Simmonds's obsession? There is not logical explanation for this unexpected disappearance of Meta! Robert Ruiz, please, help me! You that are a living encyclopedia of Space:1999, you resolve this distressing enigma: what has become of Meta? Perhaps I don't understand nothing, but there is something wrong about it! A my possible conclusion: maybe the destiny of the Alphans is in the Space, and not on Meta or Terra Nova or Ultra or an other planet. Maybe, for whoever believes in the Destiny, of course! Good Evening to all! Hermes
From: "Evan Wharram" (evanww@phc.igs44.net) Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 16:33:09 -0500 Subj: Re: Meta, ghost planet Hi Ermes, I believe that the pilot episode "Breakaway" was shot before the series began as a pitch for further funding to put on a series. So Meta might have been removed from the storyline to make way for other episodes. I could be wrong though. Evan Recon Pilot# 149
From: NSHURL@aol44.com Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 16:59:30 -0500 Subj: Re: Meta, ghost planet Hey, Hermes. I recently read the novelization of BReakaway, and in it they mention that they have renamed Meta -- the new name is Terra Nova, expressing the Alphan's hope that it will indeed be a new world for them. Of course, it wasn't. Too bad. Neil in Chicago (not Neilster the other Neil)
From: ARKADIA (arkadia@pragma44.net) Date: Sun, 05 Jan 1997 17:25:26 -0800 Subj: Re: Meta, ghost planet This is the explanation as given in S9FANZINE TWO by George Eichler. "In its original form, MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH was titled : THE SIREN PLANET". In the script written by Art Wallace, the alphans come upon the planet Meta, and basically the same plot ensues (although the characters are also based on an earlier concept as well). When Johnny Byrne was added to the writing staff and subsequently became a story editor, his first assignment was to write the series second episode. He felt the story idea was sound and re-wrote the script to the format we are familiar with, sharing writing credit with Wallace when the show was aired. A slower, perhaps more intimate stroy than BREAKAWAY, the episode plots twists and turns depend greatly on the emotions and reactions of the Alphans to their surprising findings on the planet Terra Nova. Unfortunately, a man who wielded a great deal of power when it came to the series despised the episode. Abe Mandell, President of ITC in New York oversaw and approved (more often disapproving) almost everything that came from England. It was his job to sell the series to one of the three American networks. It was his idea to cast two American actors in the lead roles. it was his job, or so he felt, to make sure the series was a hit in the one market ITC coveted the most, the United States. Mandell hated MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH. He felt it was a tremendous letdown after the action-packed sequences in BREAKAWAY so the episode was rewritten to exclude the reference to Meta. The planet was renamed Terra Nova and even its color was changed from blue to red. With these changes in place, the episode cold be shown later in the season without any confusion....... Catherine
From: "Robert Ashley Ruiz" (espresso@dnai44.com) Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 15:12:48 -0700 Subj: Re: Meta, ghost planet > Robert Ruiz, please, help me! You that are a living > encyclopedia of Space:1999, you resolve this distressing enigma: what > has become of Meta? Perhaps I don't understand nothing, but there > is something wrong about it! One source I saw tried to reconcile this by saying that Meta had been renamed Terra Nova, and was the first planet in the history of space exploration to change color (from one episode to next). I don't know about that. There's no reason why Terry Nova has to be Meta. Perhaps the Meta signal was increasing as they approached but they never came close enough to make an exodus feasible, then they stumbled across Terra Nova, an entirely different planet. Robert
From: "Robert Ashley Ruiz" (espresso@dnai44.com) Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 15:12:46 -0700 Subj: Breakaway Pilot > I believe that the pilot episode "Breakaway" was shot before the > series began as a pitch for further funding to put on a series. So > Meta might have been removed from the storyline to make way for > other episodes. I could be wrong though. Evan Recon Pilot# 149 Usually a pilot is made first, but in 1999's case, I think they had the "green light" and Breakaway was just the first episode. I've never read they made Breakaway and then sat back waiting to get picked up. Also, there's an ad in Variety that says principle shooting begins today on Space: 1999, a series of 24 color episodes from ITC... blah, blah, blah, so I tend to think that it wasn't a pilot in the regular sense of the word, but was instead just the first episode. Robert
From: JTRD1@aol44.com Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 18:30:18 -0500 Subj: Re: Breakaway Pilot There must have been some sort of pilot involved, because of other changes. For instance, David Kano was not in Breakaway, so he must not have been signed on yet. There was another computer technician in his role for just that episode. Unless that guy died in the breakaway? James
From: "Mark Meskin" (plastic.gravity@newrock44.com) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 1996 23:55:18 -0600 Subj: Re: Meta, ghost planet I too read that novel about 6 mos. ago. I was appalled at the writers lack of forthought. Here you have this planet see, and it'll take "X" months to get there via our Meta probe eh? Now the moon gets blasted out of orbit, and by strange chance ( YEAH, RIGHT!)it happens to go in that direction, and arrives in a few days..................hmmmm. I like it! This is more absurd than the B.S.(Bad Science) around the moon leaving orbit. A lot of the stuff in the novelization I didn't like. The dialogue is awful, I think this guy went on to write the power records' script. But, they did make an attempt at continuity at least between the stories. An it had some nice pictures.................. -Mark
From: "Evan Wharram" (evanww@phc.igs44.net) Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 20:26:46 -0500 Subj: Re: Breakaway Pilot Hi Robert, I wasn't sure. I'd read that principal photography began on November 11, 1973, and yet didn't air until September 4, 1975. But I also read that most of the main cast had been signed up for at least 24 episodes, as oppossed to a film the pilot and then lets wait and see approach. Later, Evan
From: "Robert Ashley Ruiz" (espresso@dnai44.com) Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 18:32:53 -0700 Subj: Re: Breakaway Pilot Hi Evan: I'm still not sure. I just remember that they had invested a huge amount of money and already had the moonbase model, etc. (originally designed for the proposed UFO 2), and that if they had to build the sets now that would be a huge expense, etc. to just lay out on a pilot. I'm fairly certain they had a firm commitment. The other thing I have read is that they had a lot of technical problems that had to be solved and the production took forever to do those first 24 episodes, which is probably why we saw things getting simplified along the way (like the actors on screens being against plain backgrounds, etc.). I also know that the reason the Main Mission set was discarded for series 2 is that it was time consuming to light (not to mention it had to be filled up with extras, which in the grand scheme of things is not that expensive [I got under $30 for the day I was on Falcon Crest], but I'm sure there are other expenses involved like costuming, makeup, food, etc.). I also think if there wasn't a pilot they would still do some pilot-like things with the first episode, like finish it and sit back and see what worked and what didn't, and make changes and refinements. Which may be why Lon Statton (Ouma) was replaced by Clifton Jones (Kano). It seems also that I read that Johnny Byrne, for whatever reason, came in and had very little time to revise A Matter of Life and Death, so this makes me think Breakaway wasn't just a pilot also. Again, I'm not sure, Robert
From: FResler169@aol44.com Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 23:27:30 -0500 Subj: Re: Meta, ghost planet If I remember correctly, in the novelization of "A Matter of Life and Death", it is mentioned that the planet is in face Meta, but the Alphans renamed it Terra Nova. Floyd