Odds and Ends: April 2026

Star Trek historian extraordinaire Jörg Hillebrand has written a fascinating thread on Blue Sky, about the "Denebian slime devil."

The alien beast was made up for a throw-away insult in the classic "Trouble With Tribbles" episode, before getting a few different representations in manuals and guidebooks over the decades and eventually working its way back to the canon of the show.

I think it's so fun how franchises can evolve like this over time, when people care enough to track and expand on tiny details.

Also, there's a sci-fi artist connection: None other than Don Ivan Punchatz himself did this beautiful 1989 illustration for The Worlds of the Federation, by Lora Johnson.

Speaking of science fiction art history tidbits, here's an interesting question posed on Tumblr by firagasoap, who writes "I can’t help but wonder, was the artist for Dodonpachi inspired by [this] image by the sci fi artist Tony Roberts."

Dodonpachi appears to be a 1997 video game, but I don't have any further info about this possible connection.

Here's a roundup of articles and projects that all center around Lego control panel bricks.

A while back I posted a small, blurry version of the stunning 1978 Don Davis cover for Carl Sagan's The Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence on Tumblr, and asked if anyone had a better scan. (I said the same in this post for my blog here.)

Five months later, art blogger le-tas-d-art sent me one! Another piece of art history preserved: This is easily the best scan of this image available online.

Well, technically, this is the largest version. It's 8000 pixels wide, so I'm just linking to the Google Drive copy here, if anyone's looking for a new desktop background.

Check out these three artworks on the same theme, by Hiroo Isono. I've posted the third one several times already on this blog, but this is the first time I've seen the other two. They're all in wildly different sizes, since Isono's work can be hard to find.

Thanks to the jca-archive tumblr for the third scan - the others are from this insta and this company.

The only downside to making my huge blog post of Robert Tinney's lesser-known art? I'm bound to keep discovering more and more of his artwork long after hitting publish. Here's one I stumbled across on Tumblr.

I found two more pieces posted or referenced in the comments section of this obituary.

One commenter was a technical editor at Wayne Green Books and Kilobaud magazine in the '80s, and comissioned Tinney for this cover. (Also if you're reading this, I'd love a full scan of the image!)

Next, Tinney's cover painting for Circuit Cellar, Issue 29, on “Measurement and Control.”

He has more covers for that publication – read this dishy article about the magazine's orgins for more on how it borrowed far more talent from Byte than just Tinney.

I'll have to look up his other Circuit Cellar cover at some point. I also need to decide if I want to update my Tinney post or just start planning a sequel...

Does anyone know how to get in touch with NASA artist Pamela Lee?? She did this interview a few years back, and I've exchanged a few emails in the past with the documentarian behind it, but I can't seem to get through to him now.

If you know anyone who knows anyone who might know her, get in touch! Also, check out the interview.

Since I'm sharing YouTube links, here's a cool video essay exploring all the different iterations of classic sci-fi story The Thing, including a 2002 video game I didn't know existed.

Retro book blogger Battered, Tattered, Yellowed, & Creased has this gallery of Virgil Finlay's color covers, including this September 1952 Weird Tales cover and “The Spot of Life,” his February 1941 cover to Famous Fantastic Mysteries.

Cool Links:

The Blade (1995): The Edges of Wuxia

New video essay from Every Frame a Painting, the world's best video essayists.

You've Never Seen the Best Adaptation of Dune - Pop Cultural Precursors

A summary of cult director Alejandro Jodorowsky's never-completed 1970s Dune adaptation, featuring art from a lot of the iconic 70s sci-fi artists who worked on it.

Music rec: The "evil gay scientist" playlist

Next Time: Masks