Sandman (Logan's Run)

Logan's Run

Logan's Run is a novel by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson. Published in 1967, it depicts a dystopian future society in which population and the consumption of resources is managed and maintained in equilibrium by the simple expedience of demanding the death of everyone upon reaching a particular age, thus avoiding the issue of overpopulation. The story follows the actions of Logan, a Deep Sleep Operative or "Sandman" charged with enforcing the rule, as he tracks down and kills citizens who "run" from society's lethal demand only to himself ultimately "run."

The introduction to the book states:

"The seeds of the Little War were planted in a restless summer during the mid-1960s, with sit-ins and student demonstrations as youth tested its strength. By the early 1970s over 75 percent of the people living on Earth were under 21 years of age. The population continued to climb — and with it the youth percentage.

In the 1980s the figure was 79.7 percent.

In the 1990s, 82.4 percent.

In the year 2000 — critical mass."

Plot summary

Crystal color	Age
Yellow	Birth to 7 years
Blue	7 to 14 years
Red	14 years to Lastday (21 years)
Blinking red/black	21 (Lastday)
Black	End of Lastday (death)

In the world of 2116, a person's maximum age is strictly legislated: twenty-one years, to the day. When people reach this Lastday they report to a Sleepshop in which they are willingly executed. A person's age is revealed by their palm flower — a crystal embedded in the palm of their right hand that changes color every seven years, then turns black on Lastday.

Runners are those who refuse to report to a Sleepshop and attempt to avoid their fate by escaping to Sanctuary. Logan 3 is a Deep Sleep Operative (or Sandman) whose job is to terminate Runners using a special weapon called the Gun, an unusual revolver which can fire a number of different projectiles, and Omnite, a fictional hybrid martial arts style. On his own Lastday he becomes a Runner himself in an attempt to infiltrate an apparent underground railroad for runners seeking Sanctuary — a place where they can live freely in defiance of society's dictates. For most of the book, therefore, Logan is an antihero; however, his character develops a growing sympathy towards Runners and in the end he himself is truly a Runner.

Jessica 6, a contact Logan made after he chased her Runner brother Doyle 10 into Cathedral where he was killed by the vicious preteen "Cubs," helps him, despite her initial distrust of him. Francis, another Sandman and a friend of Logan, catches up with Logan and Jessica after they have managed to make it to the final staging area before Sanctuary. He reveals that he is actually the legendary Ballard, who has been helping arrange their escape. The 42-year-old Ballard is working from within the system; he believes that the computer that controls the city, buried beneath Crazy Horse Mountain, is beginning to malfunction, and that the society will die with it.

Sanctuary turns out to be an abandoned space colony near Mars. Logan and Jessica escape to the colony on a rocket that departs from a former space program launch site in Florida. Ballard remains to help others escape.

Style

Logan's Run is fast-paced, but dark, and was considered quite graphic for its time. The novel has a wide variety of characters including a libidinous cyborg and an army of deadly androids recreating the American Civil War.

Both the novel and the film detail a future society that is very permissive where sex and recreational drugs are concerned. Tobacco, however, is a banned substance, and police are known to raid places where cigarettes are smoked.

A novel by Louis Carbonneau called Barrier World (1970) has a similar storyline, where a closed society is sustained by systematic elimination of defective people, which included old age. The age is 30 instead of 21.

Sequels and spinoffs

Nolan wrote two sequels, Logan's World and Logan's Search, published after the film's release. There is also a novelette, Logan's Return, that has been published as an e-book.

Logan's World deals with events following Logan's returning to Earth, amidst the survivors and ruins of the system he escaped in the first novel, while Logan's Search deals with Logan going to an alternate reality (with the assistance of some alien friends) to once again stop the government system he escaped in the first novel, albeit with some minor changes.

George Clayton Johnson has also been working, off and on, on a sequel to the novel, reported at various times to be entitled either LastDay or Jessica's Run.

Film, TV, and theatrical adaptations

Film

The novel was adapted in 1976 as a film, directed by Michael Anderson and starring Michael York as Logan 5 (not 3), Jenny Agutter as Jessica, and Richard Jordan as Francis. The film only uses the basic premise from the novel (everyone must die at a specific age, Logan runs with Jessica as his companion while being chased by Francis). However, the world is postapocalyptic and people now live inside huge domed cities and are unaware of the world outside believing it to be a barren, poisonous environment. The motivations of the characters are also quite different in the film. The age of death is 30, and Logan is a 26 year old Sandman, sent by the computer to find Sanctuary and report back. The computer alters his palm flower to show him as a Lastday, and he becomes a runner. Sanctuary turns out not to exist, and only one old man (Peter Ustinov) lives in the largely intact ruins of Washington, DC nearby. Logan kills Francis, in the movie simply a Sandman, not a rebel leader, and leads "Old Man" back to just outside the domed city, returns to try to lead a revolt against the culling. No one believes or listens to him or Jessica, and instead he is captured by sandmen. In his interrogation by the computer, his honest information that there is no Sanctuary causes the computer to self-destruct. The ending implies that the old man will lead the young throngs as they leave the confines of the Domed City.

Remake

In the mid-1990s, Warner Bros. began development of a remake of the movie. In April 2000, director Skip Woods entered negotiations with the studio and producer Joel Silver to write and direct the remake. The director planned to make it closer to the novel than the original film, restoring previously-removed elements including Crazy Horse Mountain and sky gypsies.

In March 2004, director Bryan Singer was brought in to develop and direct Logan's Run. Singer had begun working with production designer Gy Dyas from his previous film X2. Screenwriters Ethan Gross and Paul Todisco were hired to write the script with the director, with the film being slated for a 2005 release. In October, the director said he had begun previsualization of Logan's Run, which would be completed by the time he finished production of his project at the time, Superman Returns. The following December, screenwriter Dan Harris said that he and the director had turned in a first draft for Logan's Run. Harris said that further development of the project would take place in Sydney after production for Superman Returns, for which he also collaborated, was finalized. The screenwriter said that the remake would contain more action than the original film, describing the premise to be "a remake of the concept of the movie plus the book".

In February 2005, screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie was hired to rewrite the script, with filming to take place in Australia. In February 2006, Logan's Run was scheduled to begin production in fall of 2006 in Vancouver. The following May, Singer's availability to direct Logan's Run was questioned due to scheduling conflicts with filming the sequel to Superman Returns. By May, Singer confirmed that he would not direct Logan's Run, seeking a vacation from the scheduled demands of his job. Directors Robert Schwentke and James McTeigue were approached for the project, but neither ultimately signed on.

In August 2006, production offices for Logan's Run were taken over by the production for the 2008 film Speed Racer. In April 2007, producer Joel Silver reiterated his plan to remake the original film. The following July, Silver said that since Singer's departure, no new director had come aboard the project. In August 2007, the project was reinvigorated with Joseph Kosinski hired as the new director and a new script being written by screenwriter Timothy J. Sexton. Kosinski had made a presentation to Warner Bros. including graphic art and animated previsualization that illustrated his plan for the film, whose low budget appealed to the studio.

TV

A television series spun off from the film, starring Gregory Harrison as Logan 5 and Heather Menzies as Jessica 6, lasted one season of 14 episodes from September 16 1977 through January 7 1978 on U.S. television (CBS-TV). D.C. Fontana served as story editor, and employed several other writers from Star Trek as well as the original novel's authors. The series was produced by Ivan Goff.

To save money, the series depicted Logan and Jessica — still pursued by Francis (Randolph Powell) — on a cross-country trek to Sanctuary in a post-apocalyptic America. The domed city was seen only in the pilot and two other episodes, using recycled footage from the film. In a change from the book and film, the television series had the city run by a cabal of elderly citizens. Logan and Jessica were joined by an android, "REM", played for comic relief by Donald Moffat. Most of the plots were conventional genre clichés, including one "Logan-has-amnesia" episode.

Episode list with air dates

Logan's Run (pilot 90 minute episode) — September 16, 1977
The Collectors — September 23, 1977
Capture — September 30, 1977
The Innocent — October 10, 1977
Man Out of Time — October 17, 1977
Half Life — October 31, 1977
Crypt — November 7, 1977
Fear Factor — November 14, 1977
Judas Goat — December 19, 1977
Futurepast — January 2, 1978
Carousel — January 16, 1978
Night Visitors — January 23, 1978
Turnabout — January 30, 1978
Stargate — February 6, 1978

Others

A comic strip version of the story, written by Angus P. Allan, was printed in the British TV comic Look-In. Marvel Comics also published a short-lived comic book series, which adapted the movie's story, and continued it shortly before it was cancelled at issue #7.
From June 1990 to March 1992, Malibu Comics published mini-series comics adaptations of Logan's Run and Logan's World, six issues each, with art by Barry Blair.
In 2000, Emperor Norton Records published Logan's Sanctuary, an album of electronica music conceived as the soundtrack to an imagined Logan's Run sequel, written and performed by Roger Joseph Manning Jr. and Brian Reitzell, and featuring contributions from Jason Falkner.
City of Domes, an alternative reality game (ARG), was created by the web development group at VirtuQuest.com. The game was a recreation of the Logan's Run city, some 30 years after Logan 5's adventures. City of Domes
In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode named Half a Life the people of a planet commit ritual suicide at age 60, to avoid becoming a burden to their families and society.
In its original theatrical release there is a scene now missing from all existing video releases. When Logan and Jessica escape the dome, they share an apple (à la Adam and Eve) in the forest. This scene also had a blooper version that aired on the Academy Awards show the year of the film's release.