Shatner and Wheaton Narrate Mars Rover's Landing Sequence 114
A reader tips news that William Shatner and Wil Wheaton have each narrated a NASA video titled "Grand Entrance," which documents the upcoming descent and landing of Mars rover Curiosity onto the Red planet. Curiosity is the nickname for the Mars Science Laboratory, the largest rover ever sent to another world. It is scheduled to land on Mars on August 5 at 10:31PM PDT (August 6 at 05:31 UTC), and the event will be broadcast live on NASA TV. The landing process documented in the video will take about 7 minutes, and it has to go perfectly all on its own — the time delay caused by the 154-million-mile distance to Earth means that signals will take 14 minutes to even reach us. For further details, check out Wil's video or William's. NASA's fact sheet (PDF) has more information as well.
Expected TL:DR Transcript (Score:5, Funny)
Wheaton: We're still waiting for the first signal.
Shatner: The... probe... must have... broken... up.
Re:Expected TL:DR Transcript (Score:5, Funny)
I was actually expecting Shatner to start with "Mars... The NEXT ... frontier."
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Wheaton: We're still waiting for the first signal.
Shatner: The... probe... must have... broken... up.
Earth life-forms that hitched a ride but escaped into the Mars atmosphere at the last minute: But thanks to the MarsLine Negotiator(TM), we got 50% off of our trip!
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Shatner: I'm talking with native Martian life. I want to get to the raw nerve.
Re:Expected TL:DR Transcript (Score:4, Funny)
Shatner: I'm talking with native Martian life. I want to get to the raw nerve.
Yeah, somehow I doubt that. I've seen what Kirk does with the natives....
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What I'm hoping for, actually, is that somewhere during the recording session, Bill said this:
We are so cool, we're beyond cool. We are in orbit man. [slashdot.org]
Oh Dear God No (Score:1)
I don't want Shatner narrating anything. Couldn't we have Nimoy instead? Heck Nemoy and Spiner or Stewart would rock.
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You'll take what you get an like it! Now shup the fuck up!
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I disagree, Shatner is an excellent narrator. I was quite surprised by his talent for it in "Trinity and Beyond: The Atomic Bomb Movie"
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He's actually done a few narrations over the years and I have to agree, he's rather good at them. I have no problem with him narrating.
Re:Oh Dear God No (Score:4, Interesting)
I've heard him narrate before, but nobody narrates like Nemoy.
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No... I did not. I kept misspelling it even after I linked to the wikipedia page.
Yeah...... I get it now.
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So who is this 'Nemoy' everyone is talking about?
There was some pixar movie about fish....
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For the record, I was not flaming you. The spelling mistake was totally lost on me.
I wasn't sure if you were kidding or not, so I just posted the link to his Wikipedia page.
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Shatner is batshit insane, but so are most narrators. Keeps it interesting.
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One of Wil Wheaton's current projects is his Tabletop [geekandsundry.com] board game show that appears bi-weekly on Fridays on the geekandsundry Youtube channel [youtube.com].
Speaking of Geek and Sundry... it's Felicia Day's channel. 3 Felicia Day
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Speaking of Geek and Sundry... it's Felicia Day's channel. 3 Felicia Day
+1 :)
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Er... I just now noticed it ate my < I meant <3 Felicia Day.
Not that 3 Felicia Days would be bad...
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Shatners Acting style. Isn't... This... Bad... as.. the... Parities.... Portrait... it... But it comes from a more traditional acting style which stemmed for the day of acting in a large room with an echo, or on TV or Radio that had about the same sound your standard laptop has, with some static based on your location. You needed to enunciate each word, so the viewers can get it. That and the TV had a lot less technical editing tricks, so he had to get his words right more often, and with TOS budget gett
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That is a good question, you could just be living a normal happy life if you don't let stuff like that bother you. Just classify it as an auto-correct mistake.
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I vote for George Takei.
Re:Oh Dear God No (Score:5, Funny)
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Just as I scrolled to this comment, the college radio station I'm listening played a clip of George Takei saying that. I'm a little unnerved.
Re:Oh Dear God No (Score:5, Funny)
Considering the time lag in sending instructions to the rover, getting Shatner to... issue... the... commands... would probably fix the time delay problem (assuming he could synch up with the rover's communications lag).
Nimoy did a documentary on ants! (Score:2)
"In Search Of... Deadly Ants" (S2E22) Two Parts:
1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUzisH9OZoo [youtube.com]
2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTrsa7TBksA [youtube.com]
That was rad(ical).
Au Contraire, Mon Frere (Score:2)
Batshit crazy he most certainly is(affordability is everything), however, he did a fantastic job on NASA's Space Shuttle documentary [nasa.gov].
To boldly go (Score:2)
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I wonder which future NASA project will be narrated by Jeri Ryan
Pluto - no longer 1 of 9
Re:To boldly go (Score:5, Funny)
I wonder which future NASA project will be narrated by Jeri Ryan
Back when Voyager was created, Uranus was the 7th of the 9 planets in the Solar System.
Therefore, she'll narrate when NASA goes to probe Uranus.
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I can see this now....*start dream sequence*
Scientist (on phone): Uh, hi, Jeri Ryan? I'm *scientist* from NASA. We're calling to see if you'd be willing to provide a narrative while we probe Uranus.
Jeri: What?!?! Look, I know I did Co-Ed Call girl back when, but this is too much! *click*
The Original NASA One Was Fine (Score:5, Informative)
I thought the one they posted earlier with the actual NASA scientists/engineers was pretty solid: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/video/index.cfm?id=1090 [nasa.gov]
Transcript: (Score:2)
MSL Directory: You wouldn't crash a multimillion dollar rover just to win a bowling game!
Wil Wheaton: Keep on thinking that!
Hey Mister Tambourine Man! (Score:2)
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To counter that I actually recommend listening to Shatner doing "Common People", or really just about anything off of the "Has Been" album.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Has_Been [wikipedia.org]
Mars Lander Party! (Score:3)
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Is anyone else having a Mars lander party? It's like a geek sporting event
More like gladiatorial combat, at least if Mars wins this battle in the lithobraking round. Those who are about to re-enter salute you, Caesar!
As for BYOB are the guests supposed to bring liter or quart booze bottles? Don't want to mix up imperial and metric again.
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Indeed. It's a battle of Wils.
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The Planetary Society is having a landing party ("Planetfest"); check out their web site. You can join at your local planetarium or they might offer web access to their "Planetfest".
Amazing (Score:5, Insightful)
Leaving the discussion about Shatner's narrating abilities to the side for a moment, I am shocked at how little excitement this rover is generating.
From my nerd perspective, I think about how freaking hard it is to launch something into orbit, get the payload into the right trajectory, travel nearly 600 million kilometers and then land on a relatively small and fast moving rock. The landing must be controlled, but cannot be done remotely becuase light itself takes several minutes to get from Earth to Mars. That in and of itself is freaking amazing.
The rover itself is about the size of a compact car and filled with electronics that have been optimized to run off of solar power. This solar power is mich weaker than on earth in terms of Watts/m^2. Also amazing. I understand it also has a small nuke reactor so it won't freeze in the winter, but I'm not sure if it supplements the electrical capactity for the toolsor not. Also amazing.
Other countries are partnering up to provide instruments that measure atmospheric pressure, temperature and other attributes of Mars. Also pretty darn cool.
Yet I hear very little about it on the news and surprisingly little in even tech websites like this one. I don't get it.
An onboard laser will vaporize rocks (okay, really small rocks) looking at chemical composition including organic compounds. We are looking at answering questions that have been around for centuries. Very exciting stuff.
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Yet I hear very little about it on the news
"The news" is no longer relevant culturally anymore. Even among the luddites. What is a great news show rating, like 1% of the population?
surprisingly little in even tech websites like this one. I don't get it.
Too many recent lithobraking outcomes. Combined with the usual data silence period for a year (or so) all we'll know is pretty much binary, did it land or crash. Boring. It would like like if superbowel football coverage was minimized to one binary bit of which team won.
Now on the other hand if I had a live telemetry data feed to watch and we could all gather around
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An interesting concept. I can imagine corporate sponsors handling the hosting of the servers for video feeds...
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I think the greatest PR thing NASA could do would be to say "F all this data blackout shite, taxpayers get a live "CBS big brother" feed of whatever we download, as it arrives". Of course that would result in their webservers melting, and a lot of idiotic comments, but it would also result in explosive interest levels.
It appears that is EXACTLY what the MarsOne organization has in mind http://mars-one.com/en/ [mars-one.com].. They plan on getting major funding thru making the astronaut selection (supposedly to begin in a few years) and everything else in the initial planning and execution stages between now and 2023, as essentially a reality-tv series.. From reading their website, they seem to have their act together.. Admittedly, they are going for a VERY far-fetched goal, but geez.. if you wait for NASA or even other governments to d
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>It appears that is EXACTLY what the MarsOne organization has in mind
Isn't that the weirdest thing you've ever seen? If tax payers pay for it, its closed. If a private company pays for it, its open.
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There is a live telemety during the landing
Where? In mission control? URL or it didn't happen.
And I'm not interested in a CGI simulation of what might happen in the future if all goes well, I mean real telemetry.
Finally telemetry is more than a altitude scale. I want the scientific data as it arrives.
Re:Amazing (Score:5, Informative)
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Thanks for the correction.
Re:Amazing (Score:4, Insightful)
Yet I hear very little about it on the news and surprisingly little in even tech websites like this one. I don't get it.
Well, we have had two articles on it this week on /. that I recall, so it isn't as if there is no discussion or awareness that it's on its way.
I think the general lack of excitement is due to a number of factors, including what I perceive to be a general distrust of science by a significant part of the American population. However, the two biggest issues I see are the following:
I think you'll see much more interest when Curiosity a) lands safely and b) sends its first pictures/videos back to Earth. That's something people can sink their teeth into. For my part, I know I'll be keeping a keen eye on the news next weekend around landing time to hear if the rover was successful in its manoeuvres.
Yaz
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It has little, if anything, to do with a "general distrust of science".
More like a "lack of interest" in something that fits well within the "been there, done that" part of reality.
Mars won't be "exciting" again till we discover life (and then only for a few days), or send people there (and then only now and then - how long can
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If the things lands like the Genesis spacecraft, it will be very anti-climactic. (That isn't a cheap s
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To simulate the listening experience (Score:1)
The headline needs about 8 periods.
Opposite ends of the spectrum... (Score:1)
My first impression when I read the subject line was, "Wow, what an odd couple selection." Who would have thunked that in the aftermath, my childhood hero (Shatner) would have such a devistating fall from grace; while, at the same time, as an adult...my contempt for the young brat (Wheaton) would turn into admiration (if not respect). What they have done with their fame/notoriety... what they model in real life, as role constructs for the impressionable, could not be more diametrically opposed.
Wheaton...
Real News (Score:4, Insightful)
I can't spare a moment to watch the advertising debacle that is the Olympics; I won't waste a second of my time to endorse or support the corruption of the IOC by watching; I can't be bothered to weather 25 minutes of backstory, 30 minutes of commercials, to see 5 minutes of competition quick-cut between 15 different events, none of which NBC will ever let me witness the beginning or conclusion of; and furthermore as much as I can appreciate supreme human effort in pursuit of a goal, these athletes are the very class of people we geeks were neglected and abused for in school, while we tried to solve the problems that plagued civilization and tried to improve mankind's lot, so I don't have a whole heck of a lot of sympathy. Sorry.
But for all that, the Olympics are about *games*. That is, they don't matter. They produce no outcomes that advance the human species, beyond tertiary considerations.
The Mars landing, now, that represents a new frontier. Everything we do within our solar system or the universe to understand our place within it matters. Our grandchildren will wonder that we found the time to explore other worlds while most of the world's governments' attention was absorbed with worthless things like the Olympics. They'll shake their heads at the unfathomable naivete of beggaring the future to satisfy the momentary, ephemeral impulses of manufactured demand.
It's like pooh-poohing Columbus's discovery in favor of the local bull-fighting results.
I, for one, will be awaiting this landing with the ardor that others watch football. Football doesn't matter. This does (tm). Hope all you other /.-ers are there with me.
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"these athletes are the very class of people we geeks were neglected and abused for in school"
Here is where you lost me. If you are saying you got beat up in school by an athlete and are now lumping in all athletes into the same category, you are guilty of stereotyping. I agree we have far too great an emphasis on professional athletics, but your statement is off base.
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The point remains that sports in school are promoted to the detriment of all other aspects of the school. Its supposed to be a distraction, not a focus.
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You, sir, have beautifully tied "News for nerds" with "Stuff that matters". Well done.
I really fear this landing is not going to succeed (Score:1)
Considering how complicated this landing is going to be, all the different parts that come into play, and the inability to really test the full blown procedure, I just don't think this is going to be a successful landing.
I understand literally some of the best minds in the world are working on this project, but that still doesn't negate the inherent difficultly of having such a complicated system work perfectly.
I really want this to succeed, but I just don't see the landing working out. The bad part is, thi
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I think it will fail because it is probably the most complicated robotic landing sequence ever attempted in the history of robotic space missions.
I also see no evidence they tested other than via simulation the heat shield blowing off, the parachute separation, the rocket hovering and the lowering of the rover from the hovering rocket platform.
I don't blame them for not testing it, I understand it is next to impossible to test those things, but that doesn't change the fact they are untested.
Hopefully I'll
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That may well be. But one difference between those missions and this mission is the number of steps involved.
Consider the current Mars rovers. What had to work? Heat shield and parachute and inflators. Consider the Mars Polar Lander. What had to work? Heat shield and landing rockets. Consider this mission. What has to work? Heat shield and parachute and hovering rockets and crane. There's a lot more that can go wrong.
That's not to say it will go wrong. It's easier to predict gloom and doom becaus
Please John de Lancie and Leonard Nimoy next. (Score:1)
A better landing time, please (Score:2)
Don't you guys ever think of this? I mean, you're NASA for crying out loud, you put a man on the moon, you're geniuses! You're the guys that're thinking shit up! I'm sure you got a team of men sitting around somewhere right now just thinking shit up and somebody backing t
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Their landing time is 1:31 AM, Monday morning, here on the Eastern side of the U.S. It would have been nice, NASA, since you're also on this side of the country, to have done a better job of planning when the rover was going to land..
Yeah you are right... The Director of NASA should have contacted the local Deity and had the orbit of Mars/Earth adjusted to suit your viewing pleasure !
Love watching these things (Score:2)
Not because of the making of history, but to watch the change of facial expressions when they finally realize they neglected to convert Imperial units to Metric.
Humans are strange creatures (Score:2)
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Hint: the "pretend space program" is...wait for it...interesting.
The real one is, alas, mostly boring. Wow, VW-sized robot goes to Mars. Yah, that'll get people excited!
Or not.
Put some men there, people might get excited. Or even send men back to the moon. But you don't get breathless anticipation and excitement o
Shatner? Serious (Score:1)
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But his only competition is Wil Wheaton?
Shatner FTW.
WHEATON!!!!!!! (Score:2)
ntr
BBC Horizon documentary is much more interesting (Score:2)
This week the BBC had a one-hour special on Curiosity. Despite entirely too much focus on "ZOMG the landing sequence is soo complicated" (*) it's worth watching (**) as it gives an overview of the whole project.
*: Deplorably, even Horizon has fallen prey to the same decline we've seen on the Discover and NatGeo channels, where documentaries are poisoned with faux suspense at the expense of information. In this case, Horizon forgets to mention WHY the landing sequence is so complicated.
**: finding the torren
While nice (Score:2)
Is Wheaton a decent narrator? (Score:2)
I've heard Shatner's work and I think he's really good. I'm a little skeptical about Wheaton as I've seen some terrible celeb narrators like Christian Slater, Sigourney Weaver, and John Goodman.
Searching for life on Mars is a mistake (Score:1)
Evidence of life on Mars is the kind of thing you find by accident. Serendipity. It's the kind of thing you find when you least expect it.
These missions should be about finding gold, or oil. Yeah, yeah.... I know, I'm not stupid. But most people are and support for these programs among the taxpayer citizens would increase dramatically.
Then maybe we'd really have a chance of finding something cool up there.
Sky crane? (Score:2)
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Whoever Steve Sell's (Deputy Operations Lead for Entry, Descent, and Landing) [phys.org] boss is came up with it, or at least is going to end up taking credit/blame for it.
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Is this a case of ... (Score:2)
Is this a case of NASA double jumping the shark ?
Wil Wheaton (Score:2)
Does Wil Wheaton have a Clever Nick Name?
Nuclear Power - Really? (Score:1)
He just repeat (Score:1)
"Get your ass to Mars."