Talk:Young Zaphod Plays It Safe

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Is this the "Jesus was a mad alien" story, with the three "coffins"? --Phil | Talk 11:36, Mar 31, 2004 (UTC)

Sure is, only 'Jesus' is Ronald Reagan... Where did you read about the Jesus title ?

I think I just assumed, from the mention of the three mad guys and the "shining city". However I've just found this comment at [1] which clears up my question:

I've got this story but mine is the extended version in The Wizards of Odd. The extra bit goes like this: "He also heard the Official from the Safety and Civil Reassurance Administration issue instructions to the effect that the missing escape capsule contained a 'Reagan' and the planet in ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha must be made 'perfectly safe'."

I obviously read the original non-extended version and never realised there was any other. --Phil | Talk 16:12, Apr 13, 2004 (UTC)

I wonder if that's a pun on "Reagan"/"ray gun"... - Furrykef 06:13, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I had only seen the abbreviated version and had wondered for years who the character was meant to be. I, too, could only assume it was Christ, never occurred to me that it was Ronald Reagan! Thanks for solving a lifelong mystery for me, Wiki-ers. -Anon, 04:16, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the bit about 'a shining city on a hill' is the only reference to Reagan in the non-extended version. -Darsular (talk) 03:12, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know anything about the extended edition, but I always assumed the escaped personality was the captain that destroys the Earth at the end of Mostly Harmless, just to change a constellation for astrology purposes. Where did this Reagan nonsense come from? CGameProgrammer (talk) 03:24, 4 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It also appears in the UK edition of The Salmon of Doubt.

I've omitted the phrase "the UK edition of" until it's shown what editions do not have it. Certainly the United States edition has it, as I live there and the copy I bought at a bookstore (which is clearly a U.S. edition, as the price is given in dollars, the copy was printed in the U.S., etc.) does have the story. - Furrykef 19:29, 7 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Is it worth mentioning that one of the US editions misspells 'Zaphod' as 'Zaphoid' on the spine? Dinferno 01:24, 21 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Is the version that does not explicitly mention the Reagan censored or self-censored? Was it published first and the story later extended bc. too many people did not get the joke? Was it published for the American market, while the version containing the 'Reagan' was for the European market? Anyone know? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.72.175.118 (talk) 23:58, 7 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The fan estimation is that when it was written, the "shining city on a hill" was expected to be easily interpreted as a Reagan reference to anyone keeping tabs on international news and rhetoric. But a decade later, the reference was become distinctly historical and less obvious, so was made explicit. The US market, I think, tended to keep the original, possibly due to the US cultural deference to their presidents, or maybe it was felt to still be obvious enough there to not need to be made explicit. …/NemoThorx (💬 • 📜) 16:17, 24 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]