Is Harlan Ellison due for a revival? J. Michael Straczynski is working to make it so

By Michael Grossberg

Harlan Ellison, the late great and rebellious “bad boy” of science fiction, may be due for a major revival of his works.

Ellison, whose Hugo-winning 1965 story “’Repent Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman” was inducted in 2015 into the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction, certainly deserves the recognition and new readership.


File 770 reports that the renewed interest in Ellison and the plans for his “posthumous comeback” are largely due to the efforts of writer/producer J. Michael Straczynski. For starters, Straczynski has edited Greatest Hits, a recently published new Ellison story collection.

And later in 2024, Straczynski plans to publish The Last Dangerous Visions – according to a Los Angeles Times story, the “long-promised, long-controversial and never-delivered” third and final volume in Ellison’s landmark anthology series of provocative short fiction.

Continue reading Is Harlan Ellison due for a revival? J. Michael Straczynski is working to make it so

Individualism and self-determination in landmark TV series: Patrick McGoohan’s The Prisoner, the 2002 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner

Here’s the Prometheus Blog Appreciation for The Prisoner,” the 2002 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner for Best Classic Fiction and the first TV series to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.

 

By Michael Grossberg

“I am not a number. I am a free man!”
Actor Patrick McGoohan utters those defiant words as the heroic individualist at the center of The Prisoner, one of the most unusual, enigmatic and evocative TV series ever broadcast.
Today, that emblematic catchphrase remains well-known in popular culture, and ranks high among the most familiar lines of dialogue from any TV show or movie of the 20th century.
“I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered. My life is my own,” McGoohan declared in the first episode – another among many memorable anti-authoritarian and individualist lines of dialogue that he would utter throughout the iconic series.
Such explicit affirmations of individuality, self-determination and resistance to tyranny were highly unusual on television half a century ago – and sadly remain relatively rare today.

Continue reading Individualism and self-determination in landmark TV series: Patrick McGoohan’s The Prisoner, the 2002 Prometheus Hall of Fame winner