Here’s a thing I should’ve been promoting for many weeks: the Centre for Inquiry Regina has been hosting regular Sunday night meetings at the Industrial Park Café (101 Hodsman Rd) to watch the new Cosmos series.
This Sunday is your last chance to join them as it’s the final episode. Show starts at 8:00 but people will start showing up at 7:00 for drinks and food. I’ve met the CFI Regina crew and they’re pretty cool so it should be a good time. (I’d like to go but I’ll be in Winnipeg this weekend.)
Frankly, I’ve been very impressed with this new incarnation of Cosmos and if I ever get a chance to blog again I’d like to write up something on it. My thoughts in short: It’s great but not as great as the original.
I’m really missing the Vangelis score from the Sagan version, which surprises me because I always thought it sounded just too… 1980. But now with this genero-symphonic thing that the new series is using I’m looking back with new appreciation for the original’s genius.
Also, as much as I like Neil deGrasse Tyson as a host, he’s no Carl Sagan. But hey, who is? And I’m sure my fondness for Sagan’s sonorous delivery has a lot to do with the fact that I was just a wee, impressionable kid when I first saw the show on PBS.
Speaking of, having the show on network television — while it guarantees a ginormous audience — means commercials, and they’re really breaking up the flow of the show and they also mean that there’s about 15 minutes less time to work with per episode. And that means less science.
But apparently the DVD release will have two hours more content though, so once I own those, the advertising critique vanishes.
So… beyond those trifles, I’m loving the new Cosmos. And last week’s episode totally knocked me out. It was the update of the original’s “Heaven And Hell” episode which compares Venus to Earth and it tackled environmental issues. And, big surprise considering this is airing on a Rupert Murdoch network, it took on human-caused climate change. It was probably the best, most succinct explanation of the issue I’ve seen on television — what we know about global warming, how we know it, how we know that humans are the problem, and what are a couple possible solutions. It was kind of perfect. Bravo.
Anyway, if you haven’t watched the series up to now, the DVD will be out June 10. And if you’re looking for a group of science buffs to watch the last episode with, check out the Industrial Park Café this Sunday.
