ASSIGNMENT: OUTER SPACE - 1960

Here's one that we never did a complete post on, it's basically a soap opera in space that has little action and lots of talking, with minimal special effects. The story goes something like this... In the 22nd century (ha ha) a reporter for the Interplanetary News is assigned to write a story while aboard a space station, but he's not well received by the commander there. An errant spaceship has entered the solar system with the power to destroy Earth, can the day be saved?

Here are Ray Peterson, the reporter, and Al - X-15 in there hibernation chambers on their way to the space station. Al, the pilot, gets up first, then brings Ray out of his slumber.

Outside the space station while refueling the rocket ship, Ray has to save another crew member from some flying debris but causes the refueling tube to come loose, losing 500 gallons of fuel.

Ray speaks to the commander about what happened, he saved the man's life, but the commander says, well, you know, we lost 500 gallons of fuel because of you! Then the commander calls him a leech! Harsh!

Here are two space dudes out cruising around in their little spacemobile having to dodge a bunch of meteors that are zooming by around them.

They head back to the space station, hey, that's Al - X-15 there on the right.

Okay, a ship orbiting Mars has an emergency and calls in to the space station for help. Their ship is losing its orbit and is descending towards the planet.

One of their crew members freaks out and jumps out of the ship, you can barely see the poor guy on the center right in the photo before he hits the surface.

He's rescued but is all messed up! You think?!

Here's a nice shot of the rocket model, which just so happens to be a Lindberg model kit I had back in the day!

That deadly space ship mentioned earlier is now in our solar system and coming our way. They shoot a missile with a warhead at the rocket but it has no effect on it. Now, that's an interesting design for the missile, rocket powered no less.

Here's a nice shot of Al - X-15, played by Archie Savage, just before...

He tries to destroy the ship by running his spacemobile (with a bomb inside) into it, it fails and Al - X - 15 is gone for good.

You can see it's a grim moment for everyone. Hey, the commander looks like my dad!

It's a race against time to stop the errant space ship, they have one chance left to stop the damn thing. Believe it or not, Ray volunteers to board the ship and try to stop it from within.

He gets aboard the ship and talks to the commander on how best to deal with getting it stopped before it can approach Earth...

Pretty easy, destroy the wiring! But now Ray is trapped inside and the escape door doesn't operate now, and he's running out of air!

The commander goes over and cuts a hole in the door, and is barely able to save Ray. Which makes for a good ending. Still, a very boring movie.