Planet of the Apes-Backwards Evolution in Action!

One of these things aren't like the others, *Mr. Shoenborn*. Planet of the Apes is about some astronauts who go into space and seemingly crash-land on an alien planet. According to the ship, though they have been traveling for about a year through space, three thousand years have passed back on Earth. Immediatly, the only human female is killed off. Wonderful start to a story. The remaining three astronauts are left to cross a desert to find civilization, food, and water. They eventually find water, and they celebrate by going skinny dipping in the water. Good plan, but their clothes and supplies are stolen and trashed by feral humanoids. The astronauts follow the tribe (?) and are attacked by ape-people which are far more advanced than the humanoids, almost as advanced as the astronauts. At the middle of the film, there is only one of the original astronauts remains alive and sane (?). He flees the captivity of the apes with a female humanoid with the help of an animal psychologist, her fiance, and her nephew. The movie ends climaticly, or rather anti-climaticly with the discovery that the astronauts haven't crash-landed on an alien planet at all. It's Earth, three thousand years into the future. And therefore, not an alien movie at all, it's more along the lines of time-travel. It was a good movie either way, though. Even if it was a little boring in some parts.

Grab a Flashlight, Cuz it's gonna get Dark

Okay, here's what happens in Isaac Asimov's "Nightfall". The final sun that the planet is orbiting around, Beta I believe, is going into an eclipse. This had been accounted for and scientists are at the ready for documentation at the same time, the Cultists, as they are called, are doing everything they can to stop the scientists because they believe that if they do this, they'll get taken to heaven I guess. To them, the eclipse is the rapture I think. Anyways, the scientists are getting ready to document the eclipse and have already taken the precaution if the psychologist turns out to be right. The psychologist, Sheerin, says that man will be driven insane by the lack of light and burn the city to the ground in an attempt to attain light. The scientists put their families and anyone that's important into a heavily fortified bunker for protection. The scientists, psychologist, and journalist are attacked by a single cultist trying to stop their operation. The story ends ambiguously with the sun going into its eclipse and the city residents coming towards them in the form of a mob rallied by the Cultists. Not a bad story overall, it just took some time getting into, mostly because it was in the form of a two column page which was hard for me to read.

The Wub Tastes Delicious Apparently

"Beyond Lies the Wub" by Phillip K. Dick was very interesting. It was a really short story about a black market animal trading ship, at least I presume it was black market at least. After a successful deal, Captain Franco sees one of his crew, Peterson, leading what he called a 'Wub' by a rope. the Wub resembles a really fat, disgusting looking pig. Peterson got it from the Natives for fifty cents. Nice deal. He takes it aboard the ship and the Captain got it in his head that they can use it for food. According to the Natives, it has a very good taste. The Captain and the crew are discussing how it should be cooked when the Wub states his displeasure of the current conversation topic and suggests they move on to another. The story was good, and also had an ambiguous ending, which was expected. The only thing I didn't like was the lack of description of the crew and the ship. The only thing the author went into detail on was the Wub.

"The Sandkings" Creepy But Good

"The Sandkings" was a short story about a very malicous man named Simon Kress with an intrest in dangerous alien pets. He grows bored with his current ones and lets them eat eachother. He then goes into town to find a new interest. He finds a shady looking store in the  bad part of town and inside he finds the co-owner and she sells him the Sandkings, which will part take in wars with eachother and worship the owner as a god. The rest of the story is about Kress mistreating the Sandkings and getting his just deserts, no pun intended (find out how this is a pun when you read the story). The story was good overall but the ending gave me the creeps. It was very ominous and you don't quite know what happens, but that's what happens with most science fiction short stories, so it was expected. I liked how it showed Kress' descent into madness and paranoia near the end of the story. It was very descriptive which was great and held my attention throughout the tale.