With thanks to yanchagraffiti, the Sunbow Marvel Archive is proud to present the first episode script from Marvel Productions' ill-fated series The Young Astronauts. Written by Karl Geurs, with a story by Jack Mendelsohn and Michael O'Mahony, A Fall Of Marsdust would have introduced viewers of CBS' 1985 Saturday morning lineup to the Hampton family and the crew of the mothership Courageous.
To read the script, and to hear dialogue audio from the first episode to actually be produced, Ghost Ship, head to Marvel Network Shows
The series was first delayed, then cancelled following the Challenger tragedy, but that was not the end of the story for this particular script. Even after Challenger, hope remained that the already-planned Marvel comic could still be published in the summer of 1986, on the STAR Comics imprint. As described by writer Denny O'Neil in Marvel Age #37, he adapted this animation script to become the first issue of the comic, drawn by June Brigham and inked by Pat Redding.
Alas, this too was not to be, as the Young Astronauts Council chose to extricate itself from their agreement with Marvel. A decision that would later spark a lawsuit in 1988..