Adventures in Atari BASIC: Lesson One – Programmer Kids and Plotting Stars

When someone chooses a computer to purchase today, they usually consider only what the computer can do based on available software. They’re thinking about what games they can play, what kinds of entertainment media they can enjoy, and how fast they can access the web. But in the 8-bit home computer boom of the late 1970s and early 1980s, choosing a new computer was based largely on what kind of software you wanted to create yourself…

Ninjutsu, Aerobics, and Exorcism: How ‘Ninja III: The Domination’ Embodies the 1980s Aesthetic

By Kirk Demarais

This isn’t a movie review. For those poised at the inevitable crossroads of whether or not to watch 1984’s Ninja III: The Domination, plenty of helpful play-by-plays are out there…

Flying Saucers, Common Sense, and the Enigma of Cedric Allingham

By Michael Grasso

I’ve only recently, at the beginning of my fifth decade of life, begun exploring the richness of 1950s ufology. As a child of the 1970s, my formative UFO matrix exists at the nexus of the uncanny/horrifying child-Greys toddling down the gangplank of the mothership in Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)…

A Great Painter Did It: The Compelling Weirdness of Magnus

By Richard McKenna

With a reputation for intractability and a ubiquity afforded him by a decades-long involvement in the Italian equivalent of the pulps, Magnus (not to be confused with his robot-punching namesake) was, until his death in 1996, one of Italy’s most prolific and distinctive comic book artists…

From Alphaville to Mos Eisley: How the French New Wave Influenced Hollywood Sci-Fi

By J.G. Newman

To say that the box office success of Star Wars in 1977 shifted Hollywood’s interest toward blockbuster genre fare is, to put it lightly, an understatement. Before the release of George Lucas’ space saga, realistic, Oscar-lauded films such as The Sting (1973) and The Godfather (1972) stood on nearly equal box office footing as more fantastical effects movies like Jaws (1975) and The Exorcist (1973)…

Laserium Brochure, Circa 1977

The laser light show was innovated by filmmaker Ivan Dryer in the early 1970s, after he was introduced to laser art by Caltech physicist Elsa Garmire…