Seaquest UEO Commander Cream Fatigue Uniform identification Help

adamzx

New Member
Hey everyone, I purchased this Seaquest uniform last year and there are a few strange tabs and a name written on the pants that has me a little confused as to who actually worn this costume in the show.

So here is the costume as I received from intergalactic trading company and I was wrapped when I received it.

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It was listed as a screen worn Commander Jonathan Ford (Don Franklin) costume which consisted of a cream coloured fatigue skirt, cream coloured pants a black undershirt and a black canvas belt. A auction tab confirmed this minus the screen worn boots. It also came with a polaroid photo of Don Franklin wearing the costume of set to further prove its authenticity.

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I did my research prior to purchasing the costume and the first thing I noticed about the costume was the polaroid photo that came with the costume was of a season 1 costume. After comparing the photo and the cream coloured shirt jacket I noticed a slight difference in the upper neck section of the shirt. The polaroid photo indicated an upper button which my shirt did not have. After re-watching all 3 season of Seaquest, I discovered the shirt jacket I have, was used in the 2nd season.

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This is also confirmed with the fact the black canvas belt was only used in the 2nd season. The 1st season had brown leather belts and the 3rd season had cream canvas belts.

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Because this was a season 2 costume the black undershirt was not fitting the season 2 style of the costume which was surpose to be a white undershirt. Though there was an auction tag on the undershirt stating "Don Franklin Season 2" I later discovered this was probably used in another season 2 episode titled Blindside.

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There there is the pants. This is the most puzzling part of this costume for me. First up its a size 32-34 which I think is a little big for an actor like Don Franklin but the name Vargus has been written onto the inside of the pants. As you all would know they write the name of the actor the costume is for so during the filming of the show and this is what worries me as if it was a authentic Don Franklin costume it should have FORD written instead of Vargus. There was also an auction tag on the costume which has "Comm Vargus" scribbled out which is another worrying sign.

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There was also an auction tag attached to the pants as well.

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Though I was a little worried I may had been sold a possible none Don Franklin worn costume, I rewatched the entire show again looking for a commander Vargus reference to help me location the possiblity who actually might have worn this costume but I was unable to find any reference to a character named Vargus, so I have just assumed the Vargus name was a mistake and that's why it was scribbled out of the auction tag.

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Funny enough I have just watched a season 3 episode where I have found the Commander Vargus character reference I didn't notice last year. It looks like an extra played the part of a shocked Commander CVargus on a underwater station that gets attacked and destroyed. Unfortunately the scene for this character only goes for few seconds and I cant get a detailed shot of the character to see anything to compare it with my costume. That's him in the middle of the shot here.

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So do you guys think? Has this costume been incorrectly put together? Is the fact the pants have the name Vargus mean they couldn't have been worn by Don Franklin? are there any Seaquest fans out there that know what size shirt Don Franklin wore, so I can confirm if the shirt is in his size or not?

Any help would be appreciated guys.
 
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If this show was anything like Trek, here's what happened: The actor playing Vargus was approximately Don Ford's size, so for his 2 seconds of screen time they went to the "Don Ford" bay in the costume warehouse and pulled pieces from that area for Vargus to wear (I'll bet Vargus is wearing a black T shirt under that uniform!). When the costume was returned to the "Don Ford" area of the warehouse after his scenes it was left as Vargus wore it, a montage of Ford pieces and was sold that way when they cleaned out the warehouse. As I said, I have seen Trek costumes re-used in this way and then left assembled as the costume was last used. And since Vargus was seen in season 3, it would make sense that it happened this way. The only question mark is the pants since there is no Ford tag in them they could have been pulled from an extras costume as Ford's pants may have not fit the actor playing Vargus, but the whole thing would have been returned to the Don Ford area of the warehouse after use.......

Or, in a second scenario, the auction house was trying to assemble a complete uniform and threw in a pair of Vargus pants to, as they saw it, "complete" the Ford uniform. IAW did this on some trek pieces when they auctioned the Trek warehouses.

Does the jacket have any tags in it?
 
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If this show was anything like Trek, here's what happened: The actor playing Vargus was approximately Don Ford's size, so for his 2 seconds of screen time they went to the "Don Ford" bay in the costume warehouse and pulled pieces from that area for Vargus to wear (I'll bet Vargus is wearing a black T shirt under that uniform!). When the costume was returned to the "Don Ford" area of the warehouse after his scenes it was left as Vargus wore it, a montage of Ford pieces and was sold that way when they cleaned out the warehouse. As I said, I have seen Trek costumes re-used in this way and then left assembled as the costume was last used. And since Vargus was seen in season 3, it would make sense that it happened this way. The only question mark is the pants since there is no Ford tag in them they could have been pulled from an extras costume as Ford's pants may have not fit the actor playing Vargus, but the whole thing would have been returned to the Don Ford area of the warehouse after use.......

Or, in a second scenario, the auction house was trying to assemble a complete uniform and threw in a pair of Vargus pants to, as they saw it, "complete" the Ford uniform. IAW did this on some trek pieces when they auctioned the Trek warehouses.

Does the jacket have any tags in it?

Thank you for replying to my thread propguy, very interesting I didn't consider the possibility they might reuse costume and it makes sense, and this would explain a few things if I could confirm it but that would be next to impossible.

As requested I have had a thorough look over the jacket and all I was able to find was CRC W. marked on the bottom of the jacket. Never noticed that before today, but I have no idea what that means.

Also I don't know if this matters, but I noticed on the back of the auction tag on the jacket it has a Disney price tag stuck on it which I thought was abit odd considering it was a universal production.
 
Also I don't know if this matters, but I noticed on the back of the auction tag on the jacket it has a Disney price tag stuck on it which I thought was abit odd considering it was a universal production.

Interesting; I have an original series Star Trek script (a Desilu/Paramount production) that I purchased at a Bill Shatner charity auction and it came with a Walt Disney Attractions certificate of authenticity!! Somehow it made it's way into the Disney system, they authenticated it and then it was either given or sold for use in Shatner's charity auction. I have no idea how that happened, but the certificate indicates that Disney will "refund the full purchase price paid" if the piece turns out to be a fake.

Interestingly enough I had all the Trek stars sign the script and when the script was examined by one of the guest stars and as I had him sign it he indicated that not only was it real but it was an early version of the script as his character's name was different that it was in the final draft (he also signed it and wrote both names under his signature [Bobby Allison aka Tongo Rad] which was very cool of him to do)!

So your piece may have been in Disney's possession at one point!
 
Well it certainly looks that way by the sounds of it. I cant exactly make out the markings on the price tag but it looks like " Something Disney con" so that might mean Disney convention I dunno.

I appreciate all the info propguy.
 
I have the perfect example of what probably happened to your costume from the world of Trek! Recently there was a Kahless costume on ebay that was used by the actor who portrayed Kahless in the Next Generation; When they needed a Klingon costume for Quark in DS9 they pulled the Kahless and altered it for Armin Shimmerman to wear as Quark. Apparently the original belt was lost over time so they gave Armin another Klingon belt to wear with the costume. The costume was then put back into the Next Generation area of the warehouse until sold by Christie's in the trek auction. Even though it was left in the configuration as worn by Armin, it was auctioned as the Kahless costume (also worn by Armin as Quark)!!!!
 
Thank you very much propguy. I have accepted that both don franklin and the extra who played vargus both wore this costume thanks to your explanation of what probably happened. Thank you again for everything u have suggested to me. You are a legend.
 
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