I remember growing up in a military family. While we were stationed in Germany in the early ‘80s, the only English speaking TV station was run by the US Army. Basically imagine getting NBC, ABC, CBS, and PBS all rolled up into one channel. What it meant to me basically was really kick-ass anime after school and Saturday mornings (I personally salute the head of programming just for that).
I remember this book called Cosmos on the living room coffee table, and I remember every Sunday morning, sneaking into my parents’ and playing the Atari 2600 (with their permission, of course), and then seeing this show featuring the planets Jupiter and Saturn and Stars and such. That was my first encounter with Carl Sagan. So every Sunday morning, I just had to see this show. I was hooked and I was only in the 4th grade.
My father’s military career progress, and we were eventually sent stateside, and on occasion every summer, KCTS would rerun Cosmos. And I would watch it religously. The time came for me to move out on my own, and I saw to it that that copy of Cosmos came with me. I even got a copy of Pale Blue Dot, Carl Sagan’s follow-up to Cosmos. When Carl Sagan died in 1996, I mourned.
Fast forward to yesterday. There’s a new version of (more of a sequel) Cosmos, host by Neil DeGrasse Tyson. I liked what I saw in that first episode, but Tyson has some shoes to fill. It is produced by Seth MacFarlene, so there’s hope of hearing Roger the Alien or Stewie Griffith describe the stars….
And yes, I only used Wikipedia links in this post. Sorry, I’m just lazy tonight…
