January 12, 2009
The Rover NASA Should Put in the Inaugural Parade
"Wall-E" Wins a Golden Globe for Best Animated Film, MacBlogz
"Disney Pixar's animated film Wall-E took home a golden globe Sunday evening for best animated film. Director Andrew Stanton was on hand to accept the award. Stanton thanked Pixar Animations which produced the film, and Walt Disney, which distributed the film. Specifically, he said the entire message and communication between humans and obscure robots "couldn't have been made anywhere else."
NASA and Disney Invite Kids to Explore Space With Wall-E, NASA
"NASA and Disney have signed a Space Act Agreement for a series of educational and public outreach activities related to Disney-Pixar's new movie, WALL-E, opening in theaters nationwide on June 27, 2008."
WALL-E, Box Office Mojo
"Domestic Total Gross: $223,808,164"
Editor's note: If NASA was really paying attention to what people are interested in - with the thought of how to engage their interest in space exploration - they'd have WALL-E in the Inaugrual Parade. Oh wait - WALL-E is just a make believe rover - in many ways, just like JSC's rover. Yet I will bet more people watching the parade would know WALL-E's name ...
Name NASA's Next Mars Rover, NASA JPL
NASA WALL-E Video Below
Don't forget Buzz Lightyear!
http://www.daylife.com/photo/06zYfJm3uS9hC
Posted by: Pixar at January 12, 2009 9:59 AMGreat idea, I have been a long time advocate of a commercial rover project with Disney. I'm certainly not the first person with this thought, LunarCorp was a great concept perhaps a nanosecond before its time and I'm sure Google Lunar X-Prize teams have recently approached Disney/Pixar with similar concepts. If I were such a team, I would model my rover after WALL-E and pitch the idea.
So here's my concept for WALL-E Part 2, the prequel.
It starts off with the WALL-E robots being built to manage the trash situation on Earth, one of them, our adventurous friend from the 1st movie, somehow hitches a ride to the Moon where he drives around visiting historic sites, future lunar bases, and meets other robots/landers/rovers etc. from the past, present and future. They’re all animated of course, a Soviet/Russian probe voiced by Sasha Cohen Baron, NASA LEM decent module voiced by Tom Hanks, other probes that are Indian, Japanese, European, Chinese, etc, you get the idea. WALL-E needs to find a ride back home so he can carry out his prime directive, insert story here (it writes itself), use actual HD video from the Google Lunar X-Prize team as a backdrop, tie in the Happy Meal and merchandising rights and viola!, you have a multi-million (if not billion) dollar commercial space venture.
So you read it here first, all I ask for is 1/4 point of the gross and merchandising rights. Call my agent Saul and we’ll do lunch.
;-)
Squeezing commercial product placement for Disney Pixar into the Inaugural Parade! What a great idea! Not!
Editor's note: The entire Inaugural celebration itself is one big nonstop corporate product placement and endorsement scheme. Why would this be any different?!
Posted by: Nemo at January 12, 2009 11:00 AMWell, unfortunately, NASA is forbidden from pursuing commerical sponsorships.
Editor's note: NASA has a Space Act Agreement in place that would easily allow WALL-E to be in the parade - if he actually existed, that is.
Posted by: JB at January 12, 2009 11:01 AMWell if NASA's next Mars rover had a better name (Mars Science Laboratory - YAWN!) it might be a household name by now. The Mars Rover naming contest is a good idea, but why does NASA have this stupid policy of renaming missions? Do they realize what bad PR it is and how confusing it is to the public to keep renaming missions? GLAST=Fermi, AXAF=Chandra, NEAR=Shoemaker, Deep Impact=EPOXI, etc.
Posted by: KC at January 12, 2009 11:24 AMI used WALL-E, the scene where it shows the planet surrounded with space junk, as a reason America should focus on LEO2GEO in space ships for getting rid of space debris and satellite repair and routine servicing.
Posted by: Vladislaw at January 12, 2009 11:55 AM