William Shatner has become the oldest person to ever go into space when he spent three minutes above the Earth on Wednesday’s onboard Blue Origin’s latest manned flight to the stars.
The 90-year-old Canadian, best known for his role as Captain Kirk in Star Trek, was clearly emotional after touching back down on Earth. Speaking to Jeff Bezos, Shatner said: “Everybody in the world needs to do this – it was unbelievable.
“What you have given me is the most profound experience. I’m so filled with emotion about what just happened. I hope I never recover from this. I hope I can retain what I feel now. I don’t want to lose it.”
After travelling throughout space for years on a television show, Shatner can now legitimately say that he has visited “the final frontier”.
Shortly after his flight, videos of Shatner’s other passion aside from acting and space resurfaced on social media to celebrate the man’s achievement. You might not know it but Shatner is something of a budding singer and has released several albums, mostly consisting of spoken word covers of songs such as Common People and Space Oddity.
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Possibly his most famous cover occurred at the 1978 Science Fiction Film Awards when he did an oddly beguiling and somewhat surreal rendition of Elton John’s Rocket Man.
Given that he is actually a legitimate ‘Rocket Man’ now, people began to share the performance again in honour of the legendary star.
God speed rocketman @WilliamShatner on the #BlueOrigin #NS18 launch. #StarTrek #Kirk pic.twitter.com/n0uKzcLwOz
— Samuel Payne (@SamuelTPayne) October 13, 2021
God speed rocketman @WilliamShatner on the #BlueOrigin #NS18 launch. #StarTrek #Kirk pic.twitter.com/n0uKzcLwOz
— Samuel Payne (@SamuelTPayne) October 13, 2021
And now, at last, William Shatner truly is the goddamn Rocket Man. pic.twitter.com/QTWCqsFadO
— Super 70s Sports (@Super70sSports) October 13, 2021
You can say anything else you want about @JeffBezos , but sending @WilliamShatner up on @blueorigin was a genius move.
— Pradheep J. Shanker (@Neoavatara) October 13, 2021
The only mistake? Not having Shatner sing Rocketman while he was up there. 🤣🤣🤣https://t.co/aQD7b3MAAF
Eagerly awaiting the first images of William Shatner actually in space set to his version of “Rocketman”… #StarTrek #CaptainKirk #Shatner pic.twitter.com/4hmQIWVg9Q
— Goodwill Hunter (@RJBubik) October 11, 2021
Talk about foreshadowing! And a rocket man you are, @WilliamShatner! 🚀 Congrats on your historic journey to space today!!!! pic.twitter.com/U1e9tUqKen
— Mayim Bialik (@missmayim) October 13, 2021
Congrats to you Mr Shatner. Maybe if you are invited up to space again by Jeff Bezos, you could ask him if he could extend the trip to incorporate a karaoke session.