Thank you all, once again, for your many comments! It's very gratifying to know that this little timeline of mine can inspire so much fruitful discussion
On Jane Fonda - I think it would take some very, very strong and specifically targeted butterflies to take her out career-wise when it has already made a significant change in her favor. Fonda will not have the PR issues she had IOTL, and she will have a very successful career. This is one thing I am afraid is pretty inevitable barring some serious monkeying - basically a second POD.
Precisely. ITTL, she'll be one of the biggest stars in 1970s Hollywood. Yet more proof that I am
not writing a utopia!
Hum... maybe a chance of an upcoming big-budget adaptation of Thomas J. Ryan's "The Adolescence of P1" (of 1977)?
I'll have to keep that in mind for the future.
Can I suggest a small cheat? Mention (in passing) films based on non-OTL books?
We'll have to see. That goes into the same problem I had when I was creating episode synopses for the later episodes of
Star Trek; namely it requires a certain kind of creativity that is different from writing timelines, and is much more challenging to me. If I was really good at that sort of thing, I would be doing it for a living
phx1138 said:
Prototype is still impossible today. In the '70s, even moreso.
Space elevators are not happening in
That Wacky Redhead, for that very reason.
That's a shame. By "strict historical accuracy" I guess that you mean that there would have to be more American POWs.
Among other things, yes.
NCW8 said:
Just a final note that Kenny Everett seems to have played an important role in getting Bohemian Rhapsody released as a single. He also gave William Shatner's version of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds some air play (as part of his "Bottom 30").
He, or someone like him, would have an embarrassment of riches ITTL, as Shatner released
three albums, rather than just the one. The material he might cover on the latter two is endless. "Space Oddity" seems a fairly reasonable choice, and how about "Your Song", or "A Case of You"?
Also I haven't yet praised Brainbin for the update in question--while I did help him out, a lot of it is original research on his part, and very well researched it is too.
Thank you, Thande
Thande said:
Using The Library Mob for Last of the Summer Wine is eminently plausible though because apparently it was even on the shooting scripts and was changed at the last moment. Funny how they came up with the much better OTL title just on the spur of the moment.
Titles are usually very ephemeral things, and are the most subject to change due to outside forces - certainly, all the titles that were proposed but rejected for
Monty Python's Flying Circus are an example (fun fact: I toyed with going ahead and using
Whither Canada? instead, but decided against it). I agree that the OTL title was much better, but I like
The Library Mob because it strikes me as a more "quintessentially British" title (
They're A Weird Mob, The Lavender Hill Mob, and so on).
Thande said:
(You might want to mention in a footnote that Those Were The Days is TTL's equivalent of All in the Family--I know you said it's the American remake of Till Death Do Us Part just the same, but few people in the US seem to realise that All in the Family was a foreign remake in the first place).
I added footnotes linking the reader to previous posts on those subjects - part of the reason that I was relatively sparse on the details in the update proper
Oho, I see what you mean. Yes, they might do that, and it could happen. Their producer, John Ammonds, was famous in the business for being able to get anyone as a guest star, no exceptions.* Eddie Braben says in his book that sometimes he half suspected that Ammonds had a collection of blackmail photos on every great theatrical actor and TV superstar in the United Kingdom. Getting Shatner and Nimoy would be hard but if anyone could do it, it would be Ammonds.
Shatner would definitely be game c. 1973, by which time the only ways to keep that sketch fresh would be to reverse it (what is Mr Darcy doing aboard the
Enterprise?),
or to actually feature Shatner and Nimoy as Kirk and Spock; no doubt with them joking about "imposters" running around, and referencing how this sort of thing keeps happening ever since having met the Doctor some years before. Nimoy, on the other hand... though he always got along fairly well with Shatner and would be willing to share the stage with him once again, he's primarily directing by this point ITTL. But if you're sure that Ammonds can swing
anyone, then why not? Have him flown in, all-expenses-paid, stopping by as the guest of honour at some
Star Trek convention while he's over there,
et voila! And put them in a Golden Age musical, to boot? Sounds good to me!
Due to my lack of knowledge on anything related to British television, I can't really say much. That being said, interesting update!
Thank you, vultan! I always appreciate your encouraging words. I'm sure you'll find the next update more
intriguing
Still it one of the forgoten TV sci fi
alone with the Half hour Pilot of The House with a Clock in the Wall based on the John Bellairs
The Finish Lord of the RIng adaption call the Hobbits
and the Play of the Day two part adaption of William Gibson Neuromancer
All in the OTL
And I shall have to investigate the viability of their potential production ITTL. Thank you for those suggestions.
Murder, Accidents, and Infections should be pretty easy to butterfly away if desired.
Heart Attacks and Cancer less so without a causal lifestyle change, though the timing of death could be different by months even a year or two. Once we get into the 1980s with some people liviing different lives even more is possible.
This is very true - although both Cooper and Morecambe died in 1984 IOTL, eighteen years after the POD. But on the whole, butterflying away natural deaths is always a tough call for me to make. It seems far too contrived to save lives, especially when I am not having characters
die earlier than IOTL in retribution. (That said, there
is a premature death on the way that I'm "putting in the bank", so to speak, to use against potential life-saving). Accidents and events, I agree, are easily butterflied.
Or, one might argue, butterfly in, if desired... (Did somebody say "Jane Fonda"?
)
Please stop asking me to kill characters off. I'm not J.K. Rowling, you know
Not "secondary chaos" effects--a direct chain of cause and effect.
1) Lucy stays in control of Desilu instead of selling it to Paramount and focusing on her continuing acting career.
2) Because of that, and her noted tendency to stand up for ideas she liked when she felt were strong, she goes to bat for Star Trek with NBC, getting it a better timeslot by bumping Laugh-In by half and hour.
3) George Schlatter, that show's creator, quits over the incident (believing that it's favoring an unproven show over his proven ability, and that he can do better elsewhere) much as Roddenberry almost did OTL (only stopped by the fact that he didn't think anywhere else would give his ideas a chance, since Star Trek wasn't exactly a smash success).
4) Because of that, Schlatter isn't there to suggest having the 1968 candidates on for cameos on the show--a cameo which Nixon took and Humphery did not.
Brainbin then used demographic data and election math to make a solid case that without the appearance on Laugh-In, Nixon might fall just short of victory instead of just barely getting a win. Far from being hand-waved "choas effect" butterflies, it's a direct causal chain--exactly the sort of thing Glen was talking about Brainbin preferring.
That's a very sound explanation of my reasoning, e of pi, thank you very much. I had to be
very careful with that one, because it happened so soon after my POD. Now, that said, there
will be "secondary chaos effects" - pure butterflies - in this timeline, as our distance from the POD increases, and Humphrey makes a great cover
It seems we're having quite the violent agreement.
Dude, happens. Peace!
Awww, you guys
I hope to have the Tripartite Political Update ready in the next couple of days. I hope to have it stand out as one of the marquee updates of the timeline!