WE HAVE LIFTOFF

Decided to go back and edit Like a Dog in Space some today. I'd been holding off because it was in the semi-finals for a contest here at school, but I got beat by a bunch of grad students (which I was expecting). I'd been meaning to rewrite most of Milena and Gennady's arc since they just don't match up to the crazy dramatic tension Ivan and Valeri get up to in act two, and I had this mental image of them talking about watching videos of the Challenger explosion.

Which, I of course had to watch. For research, you know? God damn it, that is a painful tape to watch. Because you know how it ends, but the people in the recording just sound so optimistic! But It gave Milena and Gennady a lot to talk about and some decent dramatic conflict besides "Dude I think your roommate is an alien and also I am a quirky American pop culture obsessed young Muscovite?"

And then David linked me to the shuttle launch livestream, which was more nervewracking to watch than usual because I'd just watched that Challenger footage like three times. AS RESEARCH, GDI.

But I got some good lines and an awesome monologue out of it so we're all good!

MILENA

This is how I look at it. You could fly a rocket and die. You could drive a car, and die. You could get bit by your grandmother’s poodle, get gangrene, and die. You could die of an aneurism in your sleep. You could die from eating bad sushi. You could spend your entire life trying not to die, but the thing is, Gennady - Everyone dies. So if death is this big, inevitable, all-consuming black hole, you might as well do something awesome before it happens to you. Like follow Gagarin’s path to the stars, or die trying.

(Beat.)

But, if it’s any consolation, there’s no one I’d rather have backing me up at ground control than you.

I KNOW THIS HAS BEEN SAID A MILLION TIMES. IT'S CLICHE... I wonder if it's a trope?

And it was all groovy anyway because Discovery was like "Woosh, c u l8tr, Earth!"

(Rant about how fail NASA is for not having a new launch vehicle ready to replace the shuttles is PFAD.)