Captain's 50th Anniversary Theatre & Library SPACE: 1999 "Breakaway" Conclusion

We Have Already Seen...

It's the year 1999, and Commander John Koenig has just assumed command of Moonbase Alpha!

His assignment: prepare the Meta Probe crew, who will launch shortly to explore a rogue planet that's entered the Solar System.
But something...not disease nor radiation...is crippling and killing the Meta Probe crew, as well as other Moonbase personnel!
Koenig, Medical officer Dr Helena Russell, and renowned scientist Professor Victor Bergman figure out that magnetic radiation from Nuclear Waste Disposal Area #1 all the affected people worked near caused their physical decay and deaths.
Shortly after they've implemented safeguards, Waste Dump #1's contents combust, destroying the site.
The much larger Nuclear Waste Disposal Area #2, which had been showing similar readings, now begins the same progression towards fission/fusion.
To forestall that, the entire base's staff begin trying to extract and spread out the nuclear waste over the surface of the Moon...

As we continue, you can listen to the audio by clicking HERE 

(The audio will open in a new window and you'll have to set the playback at 7:20 to continue from where it left off yesterday.) and read the comic!

Think of it as a podcast...with visuals!

Penciled by Russ Heath & Rich Buckler and inked by Dick Giordano & Terry Austin, this original-material comic was one of two produced by Power Records in 1975.

The scripter of the adaptation of the pilot episode is unknown.

The other comic/record, "Return to the Beginning" wasn't an adaptation of a TV episode, but a new story by an unknown writer.
Here's a kool bonus for you...audio from all seven of Power Records' Space: 1999 episodes!
Just click on the ep's title and the audio will open up in a new window.
"Breakaway" (without the comic book), along with "Death's Other Dominion" and "Mission of the Darians" were released on a 33 1/3 LP record album.
"Return to the Beginning" (also without the comic book), along with another original story, "It Played So Softly On the Ear" and adaptations of episodes "End of Eternity" and "Dragon's Domain"were on a second 33 13 LP record album.

Enjoy!

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Space: 1999
The Complete Series

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Captain's 50th Anniversary Theatre & Library SPACE: 1999 "Breakaway" Part 1

You Saw the "Semi-Animated Comic" of This Tale HERE.

Now you can listen to the audio by clicking HERE (The audio will open in a new window.) and read it as a comic!
Think of it as a podcast...with visuals!

Pause the audio, since the story will continue...tomorrow!

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Space: 1999
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Captain's 50th Anniversary Library SPACE: 1999 "Moonless Night"

Our final graphic adaptation of the pilot episode, "Breakaway", from the first issue of the color Charlton comic series.

Script by Nicola Cuti (who also wrote last week's "The Last Moonrise").

Art by Joe Staton (who, most recently, helped reboot the long-running Dick Tracy newspaper strip).

Next Week:
The Never-Seen-in-America Illustrated Short Story Adaptation of "Breakaway" from the 1975 British Space: 1999 Annual!

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Space: 1999
The Complete Series

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Captain's 50th Anniversary Library: SPACE: 1999 "The Last Moonrise"

We presented the first of three different comic adaptations of the pilot episode, "Breakaway".

Today, we offer the second adaptation, from #1 of Charlton's Space: 1999 b/w magazine.

Written by Nicola Cuti, drawn by Gray Morrow.

It's interesting to see how much is left out of the five-page story, as opposed to the twenty-page Power Records version, which is much more complete.

Artist Gray Morrow was also the magazine's art editor, and painted all eight covers, some of which were reused on merchandise like t-shirts and puzzles.

The cover art for #1, shown above, was also used as advertising key art for first season print ads.

Next Week:

...the Four-Color Comic Adaptation!

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Captain's 50th Anniversary Theatre SPACE: 1999 "Breakaway"

 

Space: 1999 debuted in 1975 with a major licensing push, including audio adventures, novelizations (along with original novels), and both comic books and b/w magazines.
Power Records, the premier children's audio line of the era did two lp record albums and two comic book/45 record adventures, including the pilot episode "Breakaway".
Charlton Comics published two different series, one as a standard four-color comic, the other a b/w magazine, both of which adapted the pilot episode with far different results.
With three different graphic adaptations (not including the prose novelization from Pocket Books), "Breakaway" was the single most adapted sci-fi movie or tv show in history, until Battlestar Galactica came along in 1979.
To celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Space: 1999, on Wednesdays though October, we're going to present all three adaptations of "Breakaway", plus the prose short story from the rarely-seen-in-America hardcover Space: 1999 Annual published in England!
First up, the Power Records version, complete with soundtrack!
(After all, it was meant as a read-along adventure!)


The writer who adapted the screenplay is unknown, but the art is by Rich Buckler, Dick Giordano, Frank McLaughlin, and Neal Adams' Continuity Studios crew.
Trivia: While the various American licensors had the rights to use the likenesses of most of the cast, for some reason recently-deceased actor Prentis Hancock couldn't be used as Paul Morrow!

In all the American comics (including the two Power Records stories), artist/art director Gray Morrow served as the visual model for Paul Morrow!
However, the British comic strips in the Annuals and Look-In Magazine did use Prentiss' mustachioed visage as the stalwart Main Mission Controller!

Next Wednesday, the b/w magazine version.

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Captain's Library: SPACE: 1999 "Breakaway" (Power Records) Conclusion

We have already seen...

Art by Rich Bucker and Dick Giordano

Problems plague the upcoming Meta Probe mission and newly-appointed commander of MoonBase Alpha, John Koenig, discovers the "official" story to be a pack of lies with the "virus" ravaging the personnel actually being magnetic radiation from the nuclear waste pits on the far side of the Moon.

And there's another, unexpected, problem besides the deterioration of human brains and bodies...

The writer who adapted the screenplay is unknown, but the art is by Rich Buckler, Dick Giordano, Frank McLaughlin, and Neal Adams' Continuity Studios team.

There were two lp albums from Power Records of Space: 1999 stories.

The first one featured three adaptations of Year One stories: "Breakaway", "Death's Other Dominion" and "Mission of the Darians".

Only "Breakaway" was adapted into separate comic book form with a 45 rpm record.

The second lp album, despite having Year Two cover photos (including Maya and Tony Verdeschi), consisted of two Year One adaptations; "Dragon's Domain" and  "End of Eternity" and two original tales; "Return to the Beginning" (adapted into comics form with a 45 rpm lp record) and "It Played So Softly on the Ear" which were both based on the Year One format.

Oddly, though rocketry pioneer Wernher Von Braun gave the show a commendation, noted science fact/science fiction author Isaac Asimov railed against the series' scientific inaccuracies in a couple of newspaper and magazine articles, HERE and HERE.

"Breakaway" is probably the single most-adapted tv show episode or movie in history!

In English alone, there's no less than three different comic book versions (all of which we've presented), plus a novelization, a short story that appeared in the first British Space:1999 Annual, as well as the story being adapted into EC Tubb's epic EarthFall novel which, after the incidents of "Breakaway", did an "alternate-universe" story covering decades, and finally returning a second generations of Alphans to Earth!

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