Back to the future - way, way back

As promised a couple of posts ago, the Frau and I watched our "Flash Gordon" DVD last night. It cost a dollar at Wal-Mart, so I figured it was worth a try.

To fill you in, Flash Gordon was a comic strip that began in 1934 and continues today. It was a landmark in the history of science fiction, telling the adventures of space explorer Flash Gordon who-- along with girlfriend Dale Arden and sidekick/inventor Dr. Zarkov-- travels the universe battling a space tyrant named Ming the Merciless and other various evildoers. The DVD contained three episodes of Flash's short-lived TV show from 1954.

So how was it? Holy crap. Let me put it this way: Ray Bradbury once said that most science fiction writers aren't trying to predict the future, but to prevent it. If that's true, I hope that this show did it's job in preventing the future it shows.

But just in case, let me give you a few pointers on living life in the 33rd Century.

In the future:

• Everyone except Flash Gordon will hit like a girl.
  
• The biggest badass in the Universe will be Flash Gordon, because he is apparently the only living person who knows how to make a fist.
• Hair dryers, power drills, and caulking guns will be deadly weapons.
• Flashlight beams can kill you.
• Women of the future will "fill their heads with astrophysics, atomic science, and electronic phenomena", but they won't be able to find north on a map without Dr. Zarkov's help.
  
• The best place to hide a spaceship will be a large, open, sunlit field near a major city.
• Terrorists will plant gigantic timebombs, then lounge around police headquarters gloating while the cops run around in a panic. Nobody will think to ask the terrorist where it is.
• They will have time machines that make Napoleon Dynamite's look good by comparison.
• The planet Neptune will bear a striking resemblance to southern California.
  

A final bit of advice for the people of tomorrow: if the Mad Witch of Neptune points a very, um, inappropriate-looking scepter at you and tells you it has "the power of ten men", just take her word for it. Also, please try not to laugh when she tells you her greatest creation is called the Brain Machine.