February | 2023

Archive for February, 2023

Star Trek Into Darkness 3×02

2023/02/23 in science fiction, serialized
Tags: Crusher, Picard, Riker, Seven of Nine, Star Trek, Star Trek Picard, Titan, Worf

“Medicine isn’t free.” – Star Trek: Picard

Ah yes, who doesn’t remember all the times Kirk, Picard, Sisko, Janeway or Archer delivered something e.g. to a planet and then charged everyone an arm and a leg. :D

Anyways, Dr. Crusher hasn’t spoken to Picard for so long, she doesn’t even know he died a few seasons back. Weird, I don’t remember that their relationship was so bad, that they weren’t even talking to each other. Maybe the show will still explain that? btw: When people die and robots replace them, it raises some interesting questions. It’s good that they have ships that can take people to other planets, because the housing market must be tight when you can just have a potentially immortal robot inherit everything forever. What an interesting conundrum. Maybe that’s why Raffi had to live in a trailer back in Season 1! :P

Also, how is it possible that every other jerk has more powerful ships than the Federation? Where do they get those? They must be so rich in order to afford them. When the Federation with hundreds of planets in it can’t. I suddenly remember Star Trek: Picard Season 1, during which Riker shows up with an entire fleet of “the most powerful ship Starfleet has ever built” and this time they ship out with a “neo constitution class” vessel that’s apparently a weak exploratory vessel. Why would you go from this to that and what became of these super-powerful ships?

When the Titan is being threatened by a criminal and they claim Starfleet has no jurisdiction there, no one thinks about pointing out that neither does a criminal. Why don’t they just let Picard do Picard things.

In the end Picard almost does something Picard would do, but then it’s reduced to being about that guy being maybe his son – so in order for Starfleet to do the right thing and uphold their values (kind of), you better be related to someone important. TNG Picard would have died for whomever, for whatever rando, it wouldn’t have mattered. He only cared about doing the right thing, not who was the recipient. Oh and I don’t remember Dr. Cusher having another kid ~35 years ago, which would have been during the show, right? Wonder if they’ll retcon this happening during the one season she wasn’t on the ship.

I also gotta say, they just have a hard-on on this show for beheadings. When Worf showed up, I thought for a moment it might be Elnor (honest, I don’t even remember what became of him), because he was beheading people left and right and that was Elnor’s signature move (and it even kind of would have made sense since between seasons/offscreen Raffi and Elnor apparently became close), but then that’s how they chose to (re-)introduce Worf. There would have been a thousand better, more Trek-like ways to do it. Just like the rest he looks really good and doesn’t need such silly stunts.

Oh yeah, I wish people would stop writing all villains as bizarre weirdos and that’s why the audience should be afraid of them. I guess it’s alright if Ferengi act this way, but everyone else?

When Dr. Crusher shows up on the bridge in the end, she doesn’t say a single word…

The fenris rangers, Seven belonged to at some point, are shown to be corrupt as well in this ep. How wonderful. The only thing you can trust in this world, is that every place will have grimdark lighting.

In one scene, I swear, Picard installs tech to prevent them from being beamed out of the ship against their will. Later they want to be beamed out and it doesn’t work – obviously because of the tech Picard just installed to prevent this and it takes them some time to realize this. How did this take them any time to figure this out? The audience is way ahead of the characters. This shouldn’t be happening. Why would you write a scene in such a way, that it makes your main characters look stupid? I just don’t get it.

But overall nothing much happens the entire ep. The first one ends with the big bad ship showing up and this whole second ep takes place right in this situation from start to finish.

PS: Saw the weirdest thing, the set with the lights on! They do have them! Incredible!

Star Trek Into Darkness 3×01

2023/02/18 in science fiction, serialized
Tags: Dr. Crusher, Picard, Riker, Seven of Nine, Star Trek, Star Trek Picard

If I was on the set of Star Trek Picard, I would always hold a lantern or a torch maybe. Every room is lit like a long lost/forgotten dungeon in a fantasy RPG.
— nambulous (@nambulous) February 18, 2023

We’ve all been afraid for a while, but the moment has finally come: Star Trek: Picard Season 3 is here. But it’s not all bad – there is light at the end of this tunnel, they said numerous times it would be the final season, so… Yay! I was always a believer in “Better a horrible end than endless horror.”. So why talk about it? Especially since there already are really good reviews of it available?

And it's not just the darkness per se that is so weird, it's that the exact same level of darkness is EVERYWHERE, no matter if they are on Earth, on a ship or some other planet. All have the exact same lighting. Is there a galaxy wide lighting law?
— nambulous (@nambulous) February 18, 2023

The answer obviously is, that clearly no one else is nearly as qualified, since I made 100% Picard PERFECT SCORE on a random quiz I stumbled upon a couple of days back. :P

Impressive, right? :P

But enough of this and let’s finally get into it. The best new character STP added, was clearly Laris. She’s really likeable and the actress is really good too. The worst new character BY FAR, that STP added, is Raffi. So which character does this show get rid of right away and which character does the show keep for more involvement? CORRECT: They immediately do away with Laris (doesn’t look like she will play a major role in this) and shove in Raffi. FUCK YOU VIEWER.

The show is hardly using any new/own/original music this season, instead they decided to completely rely on music from the Nicholas Meyer era or First Contact. This didn’t work for me, since this is only supposed to bring unearned emotions into this. It’s fake. These older/more original Trek outings created these positive emotions and connected them with this music. So if people feel something now, hearing this, they only do because of these other Trek outings and not because of STP itself. This show doesn’t dare to create something on its own, that people will love without needing the good will of all that other stuff. I mean a lot of stuff is trying to manipulate the audience, of course, but it’s so transparent here what they are trying to do and it’s not working and I don’t appreciate the attempt either. Wouldn’t it be supercool, if people who had never even heard of TNG, could watch this and love these characters and this story? Just like it happened for so many people back when TNG was on?

So was this episode really that bad? No, not really, except for some minor problems maybe. But why be negative about it then? Because I’ve seen the first 2 STP seasons. They always start with an okay episode that could go in any direction and then the most horrible/disappointing/frustrating things ever happen. Sure, the Batman & Robin bro is supposedly no longer running the show completely, but the other dude who does it now, co-wrote season 2, so… I would really like to stay positive about it, but it makes me feel stupid, because that’s only possible by completely ignoring the first 2 seasons of this. My brain just doesn’t work this way, I can’t act as if this never existed. My memory just isn’t as bad as this show needs it to be. The best thing I can say about this, is that I hope incessantly to be completely wrong and that they actually managed to give this crew the proper sendoff this time they were denied back when Nemesis came out. Fingers crossed!

For what it’s worth, I liked Riker in this, he actually appeared to be like the character from the show TNG again. Jonathan Frakes definitely is trying and doesn’t just want to phone it in, this much alone makes it better. Dr. Crusher looked really good too, which is why it’s extra weird that they tried to hide her in the dark. She looked awesome, what’s wrong with you people? But she was in it so briefly (she’s in a Star Wars fight against Star Wars aliens in the beginning), that it’s impossible to say how that’s going to go (character-wise).

It’s really off-putting what some parts of some fandoms have become, with them being nothing but “Have you seen this? Do you remember this? Member this??? I member this!!! I recognize this from the TV!!!”. What’s even the point of all this. There is hardly a screen in this show that doesn’t just show objects from previous things, completely out of context and with no purpose to any of it whatsoever. It’s like some weird form of porn that makes me feel uncomfortable. It’s such a weird form of fandom, wanting absolutely nothing else out of a show than just this. None of this works for me or does anything for me. Maybe there was some mild interest in me, wanting to know what became of the Enterprise E, but of course that’s not a question this show has answered (so far).

I don’t even understand how we ended up here. There is so much good TV right now. I just finished watching “Fleishman Is in Trouble” and that show was awesome. I was really engaged all throughout. I never considered a future in which I would get my Star Trek fix from shows like The Boys or For All Mankind, but not from Star Trek.

Whatever the case may be, I’ll just have to do this 9 more times! Yay! :D I’ll be back for 3×02. Probably. I think.

PS: I can’t believe I almost forgot to mention the Fallout music they are playing in the beginning. WTF. Hard flashbacks from the wasteland. And yes I do know Fallout also only used this existing music. But that’s how those songs are known to people like me.

PPS: The phonograph, Picard is using to listen to his records, looks like something he stole from Tron, with its neon lights and all… Modifications like that make stuff never look more futuristic but always more silly.