Good TV! Good Movies! Yes doughnut!

[Russ]

The Discovery Channel: Science Channel, channel 101 on my Warner Cable, has some pretty good shows on this week. They are "Cosmic Odessy" "Mission Control" and "Beyond The Stars". While obviously targeted at the general public and not at advanced amatures or pros, they were still well presented. While they were a little sensationalistic, in an effort to be entertaining, nothing jumped off the screen at me as being wrong.

Maybe some of you folks with longer attention spans than I can find some nits to pick. They are certainly worth the time to have a look.



(edit to correct dumb typo)

[skwirlinator]

To get results on your poll you should have allowed for those of us that have not seen the shows

[Candy]

I can't even find the programs.
I've been looking since he posted this September 1st.
I know, get TiVo.

[skwirlinator]

http://www.libraryvideo.com/sm/cosmico.asp

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/beyond_the_stars/

http://science.discovery.com/


Good luck

[PUDAK]

I'm tuned in just about every Tuesday night for these on the science channel. Even though I rarely learn much that I don't already know, it is nice to see astronomy programming anyway.

[Russ]

To get results on your poll you should have allowed for those of us that have not seen the shows

I appreciate your suggestion. I may try that next time.

Actually I was trying to get feedback from people who had seen the show. I think it is a good level 101 course on astronomy. Anybody else have an opinion?

[Russ]

I can't even find the programs.
I've been looking since he posted this September 1st.
I know, get TiVo.

They ran in the evening primetime almost every night, for about two weeks, and then vanished. I have not seen them since. Thanks for responding anyway.

PS - I'm an ex-Chicagolander, from the far west burbs (Downers Grove). From what part of the toll system do you hail?

[Candy]

I'm an ex-Chicagolander, from the far west burbs (Downers Grove). From what part of the toll system do you hail?

Roselle (Schaumburg) area. My back yard faces the Elgin-O'Hare (well, there is a big brown fence hiding the unfinished road). I pretend the sound of cars are the sound of the ocean.

[tracer]

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/beyond_the_stars/

The review is on Rotten Tomatoes? That can't be a good sign.

[Maksutov]

I voted "good" but would have liked something like a 1-10 scale, in which case I would have voted for a 7. The subtraction of 3 is because there are so many subtle errors that should have been caught by the editors.

Case in point: the Science Channel show last watched had to do with rocketry and orbital mechanics. The history of such stuff was shown, and Copernicus and Galileo were discussed. Unfortunately, while Copernicus was the subject, a picture of Galileo was on the screen. And (you guessed it) while Galileo was being discussed a picture of Copernicus was being shown.

I've lost count of the number of Discovery, Science Channel, Learning Channel, etc., shows I've watched where, in a clearly-defined northern hemisphere location, the Sun is shown rising with a right to left motion component. Or the number of time-lapse movies where the stars are moving backwards for no good reason.

I like the general idea of such shows. But there's little room in science for sloppiness, and some of these shows are very sloppy indeed.

[Maksutov]

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/beyond_the_stars/

The review is on Rotten Tomatoes? That can't be a good sign.

The review is for Beyond the Stars (1989).

Don't think the Discovery Channel et al were around in 1989.

[Russ]

I'm an ex-Chicagolander, from the far west burbs (Downers Grove). From what part of the toll system do you hail?

Roselle (Schaumburg) area. My back yard faces the Elgin-O'Hare (well, there is a big brown fence hiding the unfinished road). I pretend the sound of cars are the sound of the ocean.

Sound of the ocean! I haven't heard that one. :wink:

I had some friends that lived up your direction. They moved without leaving a forwarding address. I'm sure it had nothing to do with me.

[tracer]

All I can say is:


Mmmmmm ... doughnuts....

[waynek]

For those who get the Science Channel (and are reading within an hour of my posting) there's a special on tonight about SpaceShipOne and the X-Prize. Looks like it could be interesting. At the very least, it should be a good collection of footage from the flights.

[waynek]

I liked it, catch the show on a repeat if you can. "Black Sky" was the name. It was actually two shows, a two-hour about the development of the vehicles and a one-hour on the X-Prize flights.

[gethen]

I've caught a good share of these programs and found them pretty good. My only complaint is that a lot of the "Cosmic Tuesday" stuff has been shown on the channel previously, many times. It seems that I'm frequently realizing that I've already seen the programs used in that series.