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 expediency of killing everyone upon reaching a particular age, thus neatly (and, according to the story's moral "inhumanely") avoiding the issue of overpopulation which was of growing concern at the time. The story follows the actions of Logan, a Deep Sleep Operative or "Sandman", as he "runs" from society's lethal demand.

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 twenty-one 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 introduction

In both the book and the film a person's maximum age is strictly legislated. When people reach the limit known as "Lastday" they are executed in a "Sleepshop". The novel sets this limit at twenty-one years whereas Lastday occurs at the age of thirty in the film. A person's age is revealed by their palm flower ("lifeclock" in the film) — a crystal embedded in the palm of their left hand that changes colour in a programmed sequence.

Lifeclock system

Crystal colour	In novel	In film
White	N/A	Birth to 7 years.
Yellow	Birth to 7 years.	7 to 15 years.
Blue:	7 to 14 years.	N/A
Green	N/A	15 to 21 years.
Red:	14 years to Lastday (21 years).	21 years to 10 days before Lastday (30 years).
Blinking red/black:	Lastday.	10 days to Lastday.
Black:	End of Lastday (death)	End of Lastday (death)

In Logan's society, all those whose palm flowers turn black must report for execution on Lastday. "Runners" are people who refuse to report in and attempt to escape this fate. Logan is a "Deep Sleep Operative" or "Sandman", whose job it is to terminate Runners. 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.

Logan decides on his own Lastday to go undercover as a Runner to find Sanctuary and destroy it so that he will be remembered as a hero. For most of the book, therefore, Logan is a much darker character, an antihero, with his character developing a growing sympathy towards Runners until he eventually desires to achieve, not destroy, Sanctuary.

Jessica 6, a contact Logan made when he terminated her Runner brother, helps him in his quest. Francis, another Sandman, catches up with Logan and Jessica after they have managed to escape the cities. He reveals that he and Ballard, a friend of Jessica and Logan who has helped them escape, are one and the same (he was wearing a disguise). The 40-year-old Ballard is working from within the system, and he believes that it is starting to die. Sanctuary turns out to be an abandoned space colony near Mars. Logan and Jessica escape to the colony on a rocket via the dark side of the moon departing from a former space program launch site in the Florida Keys. Ballard remains to continue to help others escape.

Literary significance & criticism

SF Reviews.Net - T. M. Wagner link

Style

Logan's Run is fast-paced, at times quite graphic, and was considered quite sexually explicit for its time. Although generally dark (it contains scenes of forced self-mutilation and sadistic sexual torture), Logan's Run is also quite broadly drawn, with characters such as a cryogenics- and sex-obsessed cyborg and an army of deadly American Civil War recreation androids.

Both book and film detail the future society as permissive, and include orgies and the accepted use of drugs. Tobacco, however, is a banned substance, and police are known to raid places where cigarettes are smoked.

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 Logan returning to Earth to free the rest of mankind from 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.

Film, TV or theatrical adaptations

Film

A 1976 film version, directed by Michael Anderson and starring Michael York, is largely faithful to the initial parts of the book, while deviating markedly in its latter half.
There is a remake in the works scheduled to be released in late 2007. James McTeigue is set to co-write and direct the film.^*

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.

Others

A comic strip version of the story, written by Angus P. Allan, was printed in the 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.
Emperor Norton Records published Logan's Sanctuary, the soundtrack to an imaginary Logan's Run sequel, written and performed by Roger Manning Jr. and Brian Reitzell.
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 31 years after Logan5. This game is archived and playable in the gallery at Virtuquest.com.

External links

Chronology Central's Logan's Run page - contains a chronological listing of all Logan's Run related fiction.
Logan's Run at TV.com
The World of Logan's Run The World of Logan's Run
City of Domes Alternative Reality Game by virtuquest.com

1967 novels | Dystopian novels | Post-apocalyptic fiction

Flucht ins 23. Jahrhundert | L'Âge de cristal (film) | Бегство Логана (фильм) | Logan's Run

Gourt Home::Gourt :: Logan's Run