drwayne":2p5pte5n said:
One other thing to keep in mind, the first to second season transition also marked the
transition from black and white into color, so they changed some things on set, and
the props changed. When I was a kid, I liked the second season "new" lasers, though
as I have gotten older, I have developed an asthetic (not technical) appreciation for the
first season "second" laser rifle. (Not the one that was used for the first few episodes)
The props did indeed change on LIS.....sometimes from episode to episode. I wonder how many people knew that the Jupiter 2 was equipped with real computers, not just blinking lights.....specifically, the Burroughs B-205, which appeared in many science fiction shows of the day. And the interior sets on the Jupiter 2 was constantly being reworked. In the first few episodes, a careful viewer could see noticeable changes in the structure and shape of the J2. One scene, for example, where Will is using the "radio telescope" to view the danger Don and his father are in from the giant cyclops creature, there is no oval porthole window next to the airlock......even though in just a few episodes previously, this window was clearly there, and they used it to watch the unfolding drama of Maureen and John being trapped outside of the airlock when the comet was passing. The reason for this is that that was a scene pulled from the never-broadcast pilot, and in that configuration, the J2 had no porthole there.....it wasn't added until later, when the J2 went through a major overhaul with the art designers. In it's original form, it had only one deck: the flight deck, where the freezing tubes and controls were located. There was no living accommodations on the J2 at all, because in the original series concept, they were to set up camp on the planet orbiting Alpha Centauri, and would not have been revived from hibernation until they entered the atmosphere of the new world. So when they added the second deck, the shape of the ship itself changed in subtle ways. The Astrogation bubble on the top of the ship shrank, as did the main forward view window. The lower half of the J2 assumed a bulkier aspect to accommodate the extra deck, and the second forward viewport was added.
One fascinating point that even most fans of the show were never aware of had to do with the Astrogator, the device in the center of the flight deck that had the little spinning replica of the Jupiter 2. It was designed to actually rise all the way up on a pedestal into the Astrogation bubble on the top of the ship....presumably in order to take fixes on known stars as it guided the ship to it's destination. There was only one scene in the entire series that it was shown to do this: the same one I mentioned above. The camera is outside the main airlock, and Will is looking through the "radio telescope". The viewer is focused on the drama of what Will is seeing as he describes it to his mother, but if you look behind them into the interior of the ship, the Astrogator is missing......all you can see is the pedestal. One would assume that since the ship had crashed and they had no further immediate use for it, the Robinsons raised the Astrogator to give themselves more room on the flight deck.....but of course, none of this is ever explained.
In the third season is when things really got whacky, when the J2 acquired a "Space Pod" and a third deck: the "power core", which was seen in only one episode. Even a casual viewer could tell that there was simply no room in the interior of the Jupiter 2 to accommodate these "props", especially the power core deck, which was ridiculously huge. Nevertheless, as campy as the show became plot-wise, it demonstrates the incredible amount of detail and lavish amounts of money that went into the Jupiter 2 design and sets....which is why it gets my vote as the "most awesome TV spaceship ever!" :mrgreen:
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