Earlier this week, NASA successfully tested its DART system for protecting the Earth from collisions with asteroids and comets. This reminded me of an earlier depiction of space catastrophe management, the 1968 film The Green Slime.

In this movie, an international team of astronauts blow up a 6 million ton asteroid to prevent it from smacking into the Earth. However, the apparently lifeless planetoid is not uninhabited and a bit of the titular goop makes it way back onto our heroes’ space station. There it is exposed to radiation which causes the slime to grow and evolve into a man in a rubber suit. Hilarity ensues.

The Green Slime is what happens if Alien and Armageddon dropped acid and made a baby. It was a co-production between MGM, Toei, and Italian studio Ram Films. This means the production values are relatively high, the miniature work is quite good, and everyone is dubbed. The producers also worked on the Italian-lensed “Gamma One” SF actioners and crafted The Green Slime as an unofficial entry in that series.

The Green Slime also has one of the most rockin’ theme songs in SF monster movie history!

Hope everyone enjoys a relatively slime-free day!