The show/movie that got you into Sci Fi?

[Velocity]

I had a crush on a boy in jr high who was a sf fan and he recommended a book for me to read. I don't remember the name of the book but it had a character who had a little pet named Willis which was a little fuzzball with tripod legs--or I could have it all wrong, it was 40 yrs ago. After that one I read Asimov, Poul Anderson, Heinlein, others of the old guard. Then I watched TOS and was totally hooked. The only movies I care to see are sf. It's just more interesting and exciting to me than any other genre.

 

[Rii]

Heinlein's The Rolling Stones.

 

[Mysterion]

^^^^
Close. Willis appears in Red Planet, also by Heinlein.

 

[Spider]

When I was in junior high back in the early 60s, they would run old sci-fi movies from the 50s late on Saturday evenings. Since it wasn't a school night, my parents let me stay up and watch them. But in my youth, it was mostly the original Twilight Zone and Outer Limits along with the original Star Trek in the late 60s that got me into watching sci-fi on TV.

Also I was reading sci-fi novels and subscribing to Worlds of If, Galaxy, Fantasy & Science Fiction magazines back then. Anyone here old enough to remember the old Ace Double novels? I bought every one of them on the paperback rack I could find back then.

 

[sojourner]

Back in the 70's I remember playing "6 million dollar man" with the other kids in first grade. Star Trek definitely and Star Wars. I remember reading "A Wrinkle in Time" at a very young age and being fascinated by the tesseract described there in. By the time "Empire Strikes Back" came out I had found Asimov at the library and he led me from there to the other golden age writers. First read the LOTR in 7th grade. By then Sci-Fi tv shows were back on tv with BSG, Buck Rogers and such premiering and failing on a regular basis.

ohhhh! Jason of Star Comand

 

[Mistral]

Heinlein's The Rolling Stones.

The creatures in this one were called Martian Flat Cats

^^^^
Close. Willis appears in Red Planet, also by Heinlein.

Correct. Giv'em a gold star!

When I was in junior high back in the early 60s, they would run old sci-fi movies from the 50s late on Saturday evenings. Since it wasn't a school night, my parents let me stay up and watch them. But in my youth, it was mostly the original Twilight Zone and Outer Limits along with the original Star Trek in the late 60s that got me into watching sci-fi on TV.

Also I was reading sci-fi novels and subscribing to Worlds of If, Galaxy, Fantasy & Science Fiction magazines back then. Anyone here old enough to remember the old Ace Double novels? I bought every one of them on the paperback rack I could find back then.

Those things are great-and worth a small fortune now as many of them featured a "classic" novel paired with something more obscure-and some of those obscure novels were never published again. I have about 1/2 dozen and the cheapest was about $11 that I got 6-7 years ago.

 

[Spider]

Those things are great-and worth a small fortune now as many of them featured a "classic" novel paired with something more obscure-and some of those obscure novels were never published again. I have about 1/2 dozen and the cheapest was about $11 that I got 6-7 years ago.

Some of those old Ace Double's original price was 35 cents, now they go for anywhere from $5 to $15 depending on the condition. I've got some I keep in freeze bags to keep them from aging so bad.

Also, I've got every issue of Worlds of If magazine from 1966, 67, and 68. It won the Hugo for best sci-fi magazine those three years when Fredrick Pohl was the editor.

 

[Klaus]

The first wave of TOS reruns and Tom Swift books in grade school, but the key point was in 5th grade when my mom gave me Andromeda Strain to read, followed that summer [Nixon was president lol] when I read LotR and saw 2001 for the first time [and then read the book to figure out what the frak happened at the end lol ].
Never been the same since.

 

[Silvercrest]

Heinlein's The Rolling Stones.

The creatures in this one were called Martian Flat Cats

^^^^
Close. Willis appears in Red Planet, also by Heinlein.

Correct. Giv'em a gold star!

When I was in junior high back in the early 60s, they would run old sci-fi movies from the 50s late on Saturday evenings. Since it wasn't a school night, my parents let me stay up and watch them. But in my youth, it was mostly the original Twilight Zone and Outer Limits along with the original Star Trek in the late 60s that got me into watching sci-fi on TV.

Also I was reading sci-fi novels and subscribing to Worlds of If, Galaxy, Fantasy & Science Fiction magazines back then. Anyone here old enough to remember the old Ace Double novels? I bought every one of them on the paperback rack I could find back then.

Those things are great-and worth a small fortune now as many of them featured a "classic" novel paired with something more obscure-and some of those obscure novels were never published again. I have about 1/2 dozen and the cheapest was about $11 that I got 6-7 years ago.

I used to have one that paired "The Sun Smasher" with "Starhaven". I don't know if either of those is a "classic", but I've never seen either one anywhere else. Google tells me that the former was by Edmond Hamilton and the latter was by Robert Silverberg under a pseudonym. Do you have that pair?

 

[Spider]

I used to have one that paired "The Sun Smasher" with "Starhaven". I don't know if either of those is a "classic", but I've never seen either one anywhere else. Google tells me that the former was by Edmond Hamilton and the latter was by Robert Silverberg under a pseudonym. Do you have that pair?

If you are looking to buy a copy, here's a link. I get a lot of old out of print stuff from this website.


http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?sts=t&tn=the+sun+smasher&x=0&y=0

 

[Theodore Jay Miller]

It would be British import series of some sort, because I remember that when I was young, I thought British accents were how people talked in outer space/the future. Possibly Fireball XL-5; I remember watching that.

 

[EmmanuelZorg]

Star Trek The Original Series & Next Genertion including Star Wars when i was a kid.

 

[Jono]

Star Wars: A New Hope

I was about 7 or 8 and my family was staying at a friends house and it was on TV one night and the person whose house we were at told me I should watch it, so I did. Best movie advice I have ever got.

 

[Thor Odinson]

Star Trek (TOS).

 

[Silvercrest]

I used to have one that paired "The Sun Smasher" with "Starhaven". I don't know if either of those is a "classic", but I've never seen either one anywhere else. Google tells me that the former was by Edmond Hamilton and the latter was by Robert Silverberg under a pseudonym. Do you have that pair?

If you are looking to buy a copy, here's a link. I get a lot of old out of print stuff from this website.


http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?sts=t&tn=the+sun+smasher&x=0&y=0

Thanks! I may do that. Although actually I was just wondering if you were familiar with those particular ones.

 

[Rii]

^^^^
Close. Willis appears in Red Planet, also by Heinlein.

No, I meant that The Rolling Stones was my first dose of science fiction. Any resemblance to Velocity's unknown novel is entirely coincidental.

 

[Ridcully]

Man...it was books that got me into sci-fi......
Have always seen the various flicks as entertainment...not something meant for anything of deeper thoughts.
Trek and Starwars, some other obscure stuff got me into the visual side of things.

 

[Australis]

Mmmm. Thinking about it, there was so much in my early years. Wow. My parents really did let me go ahead.

Gerry Anderson (Supercar, Fireball XL5, Stingray and their annuals)
Irwin Allen (Time Tunnel, Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea)
Catseye by Andre Norton (read it when I was in hospital with hepatitis in 1968-9)
Gumphlumph by well known actor Stratfor Johns
A couple of Tom Swift novels
There was a Brit comic that had 'The Trigan Empire'. That one.
The Apollo program, up to the Moon landing.
Seeing Comet Bennett one sunrise in, iirc, 1968. The tail was huge 3-4 times the size of the Moon.

THere were others after that, but these were the instigators.

 

[Greg Cox]

Star Trek, Dark Shadows, Planet of the Apes, comic books, Universal Monster movies . . . .

 

[Mysterion]

^^^^
Close. Willis appears in Red Planet, also by Heinlein.

No, I meant that The Rolling Stones was my first dose of science fiction. Any resemblance to Velocity's unknown novel is entirely coincidental.

Mea Culpa. Thought you were trying to identify the book he was talking about. My first does of lit Sf was Farmer in the Sky by Heinlein. The Rolling Stones wasn't too far behind that one for me.