Conflicting and confusing reports are emerging about a new Buck Rogers film project. Some of the releases claim that Frank Miller’s to direct - which could be a great thing - but that’s apparently either not true or not certain. There’s a bit of other information that runs through the coverage, though, which makes me want to run and hide.

It’s this sort of thing:

The cheapness of the low-budget effects will be a running joke in the movie, which will retain the campiness of the 1980s TV series Buck Rogers in the 25th Century starring Gil Gerard. (from IGN)

Okay, what’s right about that sentence? Answer: the grammar.

The Variety piece is less alarming and seems to have checked its facts, which was apparently beyond IGN. The IGN version’s been regurgitated in loads of places already, includng the io9 blog,

Any new incarnation of Buck Rogers that even admits there was a cheesy Gil Gerard version will leave me crying in my beer, mainly because it’ll be nigh impossible to try to get it right again for a couple of decades afterwards. “Getting it right”, admittedly, is a pretty subjective aim - but this, which sounds so much like Sci Fi’s Flash Gordon reboot, will not be it.

A pall of silence falls over the retro-future, and the people mourn.

Technorati Tags: buck rogers, millenium, dille, film, movie, space opera, sci fi, science fiction, ideas as appetizing as a lemur placenta

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In the demented mad science project that is Lockwasher Design you’ll find a treasure trove of fantastic ray guns, robots, rockets, and autos that are assembled from the sort of bin-diver’s paradise that we dream of. Well. Some of us.

Vintage containers, Electrolux vacuums, spray guns, gauges and unidentifiable parts are here recombined into a retro-futuristic collection of bizarre and engaging sculptures.

There’s a stand-alone gallery site and a larger series of Flickr streams, all full of these wonders. Partake.

Via Boigboing, Via Neatorama, Via Aurelia. Nope, I got that last one from Rudyard Kipling. Via the Romans.

Technorati Tags: sculpture, found objects, vintage, hardware, rocket, robot, ray gun, lockwasher design

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Steve Forde has added some new work in progress photos of Go Hero’s upcoming classic Buck Rogers action figure. The latest are some views of the head and helmet.

In fact since my last post about this, he’s also done some nice work on the gloves, shirt, and pants… and, come to think of it, the boots, too.

The body sections are still based on an off-the-shelf action figure body and that’s due to change. (In fact I’m slightly confused about how that’s going to work. But “slightly confused” is pretty much where I live, so I’m not worried about it.) Looking good!

Technorati Tags: Buck Rogers, action figure, statue, retro science fiction, classic science fiction, go hero, work in progress

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Golden Age Comic Book Stories once again thrills! and amazes! me with a collection of covers for Big Little Books featuring Buck Rogers, dating from 1933 to 1943.

They’re divided into sequential posts - as everything there is - so here are permalinks to the three collections:

Buck Rogers, Part One
Buck Rogers, Part Two
Buck Rogers, Part Three

Technorati Tags: buck rogers, vintage, retro, big little books, whitman, rockets, ray guns, raygun, golden age

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I don’t actually read the io9 blog every day, but I make up for it when I do. They’ve featured some great science fiction related topics and some entertaining silliness in the few months they’ve been up, and I enjoy it enough that I’ve been linking to it in the “Notable Blogs” blogroll over on the left column (well, on my main pages, that is).

So imagine my surprise and delight to find that they’ve chosen my Retropolis Transit Authority site as the only T-shirt vendor in yesterday’s Triviagasm feature, Scifi Clothing You Can Wear on the Street Without Fear of Reprisals.To wit:

So how do we pick just one? The answer is simple: we don’t. We just have a giant closet full of scifi shirts ready to go at a moment’s notice, and the flavor of the day is Retropolis. These awesome t-shirts have a steampunk/BioShock feeling to them, and the designs are retro-cool. Plus check out their entire vintage futurism t-shirts section as well for extra retro-style. The t-shirt really is the most widely used geek badge of honor out there, so make your selection esoteric and fun.

My vacuum tubes are glowing in appreciation!

Technorati Tags: t shirts, retropolis transit authority, science fiction, sci fi, robot, rocket, retro, tee shirts, tees, io9

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