LeVar’s the best.
For the millennials in the audience, he also taught us about recycling and care of the earth as the voice of Kwame on Captain Planet.
About a decade ago I saw someone, it might have been Hank Green or someone in his genre, talk about how Captain Planet was counterproductive, treating the executives of energy companies etc. as inhuman monsters bent on destruction for the fun of it rather than people trying to do the difficult job of meeting the ever-increasing demand from the public at large for energy, food and material goods.
Turns out they’re inhuman monsters bent on destruction for the fun of it.
More than struggling to meet energy demands, they were pressed on figuring out how they could squeeze more and more money out of everyone before the society melted away under the very preventable flame of climate change. And they buried climate research to ensure they had as long as they could to squeeze.
I never noticed that!!
He was also an inspiration to me when I was a kid growing up watching Star Trek. He got to work on all the really cool stuff. Engineering basically solved every problem, and if they couldn’t sickbay did.
And let’s not forget that Geordi was created specifically to have a character with a disability on the show. He was also named in honor of a quadriplegic fan (I’ve heard the name referenced as Jordan LaForge and George LaForge).
We just need the Bell Riots to happen to get us back on the right timeline.
My personal hero, and he never let me down. His enthusiasm as Geordi helped me embrace my passion for engineering early in school.
But you don’t have to take my word for it
Same.
Next Generation is the closest my family got to a family TV show that wasn’t the news but somehow, this moment is usually my first LeVar Burton thought.
This whole bit is so funny.
YOU CAN’T DISAPPOINT A PICTURE!
Butterfly in the sky
I can go twice as high
Take a look
It’s in a book
readiiing rainbow
All butterflies are glorious
Butterfly in the sky, I can go twice as high…
🎼Take a look, it’s in a book…
And what do Bob, Fred and Levar have in common?
PBS
A common good in the USA.
I wish I was LeVar Burton.
I wouldn’t mind a second one, love that for you
He wishes he was Lance Reddick.
Why pit two bad bitches against each other, they’re both icons
Well, he said so himself. Personally, I like both of them.
Lol that’s pretty good. Every clip I’ve ever seen of the Eric Andre Show looks like an absolute fever dream
And of course, there was a Star Trek episode of Reading Rainbow. I think Sir Patrick Stewart also read a book on a couple of episodes.
Michael Dorn comes out of his trailer in Worf makeup, and says to the camera “Stand aside. I take large steps.” which I’m still laughing at.
OMG I forgot about that! Thanks so much!
Wait. This is where the design for the “Baltimore, there’s more than murder here” bumper stickers come from?
The variety of human experience never ceases to baffle me.
Some would say he was from:
“The Next Generation”
I will see myself out.
Reading Rainbow… Part of CahLeFarNeahs Gahold. RIP Huell Howser too.
I like LeVar Burton for Star Trek: The Next Generation, but I’ve also read (and listened to) his book, Aftermath. It’s a bit heavy on racial tones, but I think that was the point. In his dystopian future, the sun causes a lot more cases of skin cancer, but only in those fairer of skin, so Black people are hunted and skinned, with their skin being grafted onto rich white people to help keep them from getting cancer. Like a skin transplant. I guess that’s easier than figuring out how to just add melanin to the skin somehow? Like reproducing it in a lab? Sounds like something Geordi and Data would attempt. But Burton didn’t write Geordi and there’s no indication he’s an engineer IRL, he just played one on TV. What he is, is a writer. And I guess he wanted to address racism. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a good book, but a bit heavy handed at times.
The book never gets mentioned and I think it should.
Give Octavia Butler’s “Xenogenesis” a read. It’s an allegory on slavery, race mixing, and the power dynamics of consent, but involving humans and aliens who are more powerful
This is the first I’ve heard of this book, I’m assuming it was written years ago prior to ‘Melanotan 2’ being a thing. It’s a peptide which at high enough doses it can effectively transform the fairest skinned caucasian to a skin complexion to that of someone who is from Sub-Saharan Africa. The entire premise seems a little far fetched when there is a relatively simple solution available.
At high enough doses it also gives you day-long priapism. There’s a reason it’s not popular lol
Levar Burton wrote a story to entertain and to make people think. Nothing wrong with that, even if the subject matter is aversive or you can think of a plot hole
Oh don’t get me wrong I LOVE Levar, and I’m interested in checking out the book. It just seems like an odd choice looking back, then again a lot of sci-fi tends to age that way.
It was written years ago, to answer your first question. Burton actually revised it, and that’s what the audiobook transcribes — he narrates it, too, so you can have him read his book to you. I don’t recall what was changed, if he said.
I’m not familiar with the product you mentioned, and he might not be, or he might have been but wrote his book in a world where it’s not an option. Also cruelty is a factor in the book, it’s white peoples exploiting and hurting Black people in s different context.
LeVar Burton is an inspiration. If you missed Roots, whatever. He’s relevant in so many more ways. Is currently in the film One Night Only (2026).
I told Pearce a thousand times I never wanted to meet Levar in person! I just wanted a picture, you can’t disappoint a picture!
