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Critics Pan Nemesis
Reader NCC1701E submitted a short write-up on the movie:
"First, the executive summary: wait for the video. Now, the Gory Details, in all their splendor. I somehow received an email invitation to an advance screening to the Paramount Theater in Times Square, here in NYC. I had to wait in line for 30 minutes, and there was some confusion in swapping my email print out for a pass. But they didn't even check names against a list; it was basically first-come, first served among those who had been inveigled there through various means. In the end, there were even some empty seats. The movie itself? Basically disappointing. IMHO, the weakest entry yet in the series. Production values and special effects were excellent. And it was great to see the movie in a big theater with Dolby sound. But NEMESIS is little more than a Western type "shoot out" movie. The bad guys attack. The good guys fight back, Then, there's more attacking and more fighting back. Then it happens again. And again. You get the idea. I'm a sucker for the hokey humanism that was the hallmark of Star Trek at its best. There was very little of that on display here. In fact, there was very little in the way of a plot. Just some mildly amusing cutesy scenes, plus some murky musings about the nature vs. nuture debate re: a Picard clone. So I didn't much care for the movie. And judging by the subdued response in the theater, neither did the audience. BTW, NY audiences can be cruel. This one snickered at corny lines that weren't supposed to be funny. The phrase "derisive laughter" leaps to mind. I predict NEMESIS will be a huge box office hit. But long-time fans may be as disappointed as I was."
Can't be any worse than Star Trek XXIV - Scotty passes a stone
That blows the snot out of the old "even episodes good", "odd episodes bad" theorem. Or was that the other way around? I can never remember....
If it's worse than Final Frontier - which, according to official continuity, never happened, it's gotta be pretty bad at that.
Then again, the plot reads like they're merging the "Picard's son" ep of TNG with the plot of Wrath of KHHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNN! So it just might be that bad.
if the answer isn't violence, neither is your silence / freedom of expression doesn't make it alright
. . . and how much is culture.
I think that the general public is kind of tired of Star Trek. Some of the reviews I saw sounded like the same negative comments made about the "First Gen" cast.
We've also had plenty of other sci-fi series to come around - Babylon 5, Farscape, X-files. Maybe Star Trek doesn't hold the same place in people's hearts.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
"The 10th entry in the Star Trek movie franchise ... is the dullest and drabbest of the lot
So I take it that I'm not the only one who has repressed the horrible memory of seeing Star Trek V.
I once shot a man in Reno 'cause they cancelled Firefly.
"It's not even a good two-parter," he sobbed.
There's a rather clear and definable moment where Star Trek's quality suffered a containment breach. The moment Gene Roddenberry died.
The original series was a classic, and he led TNG well. However, after his death Deep Space Nine spun out of control, Voyager was an ugly stepchild from the start, and now Enterprise can't keep its story consistant with the events of the Kirk era that happen 100 years later.
...where it's due damnit.
Gabe from Penny Arcade said this exact paragraph earlier in the week about Equilibrium.
Seriously, citing Gabe on this wouldn't effect the moderation you get, and it's pretty lame to steal words just to karma whore.
Getting diabetes AND salmonella would be a bad weekend.
The critics aren't much impressed with the new Star trek...
Since when have the critics ever been impressed with Star Trek? I take anything a critic says with a grain of salt.
I am a meat popsicle.
Outa steam (or antimatter) for sure. And at 44, I was raised on this stuff, waited on queue for the original movie, tore my hair out when the local tv station pre-empted The Best Of Both Worlds part II for over a month, can't watch Boston Public without expecting you know who to show up with facial hardware, etc. etc... There was a time when the disembarking of a reborn Enterprise to the strains of the main theme could just about bring tears to my eyes, but I honestly can't tease apart the plots of the last few movies. Especially when the strength of the show this crew was on is on a par with the movies, this stuff is beginning to taste too much like a Pokemon or Croc Hunter movie. Ouch, but hey.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
I had the TV on providing background noise last night, and someone called it "As good as the last Star Wars". I laughed to myself wondering if it was an insult to AOTC or not. I guess now I know.
Let me start with something that seems trollish....Reviewers (in general) are full of CRAP. Reviewers hardly ever seem to review a movie in a way that reflects public opinion.
They have thier reputation at stake, and that reputation is among a snobbie group of follow-the-common-review-sentiment. I will not allow a reviewers opinion affect my enjoyment of the movie.
May I also liken a "Movie Critic's" review of a startrek movie to a M$ employee's review of the latest linux kernel. I'm a techie and a trekie and those outside those worlds don't often understand me.
I have great faith in fools; My friends call it self-confidence. Edgar Allan Poe 1809-1845
Ensign... set a course for bargin bin at local video store...
ENGAGE!
Ah, what do the critics know?
:)
It's tough with something like science fiction. If, like most big-name critics, you are slightly suspicious the genre is tricked-up low-brow, then you come in with an attitude that make it harder to enjoy the movie or understand the willingness of those who do like it to view minor deficiencies in, ahem, plot for the larger vision of the film.
I'm sure books and scads of boring dissertations have been written on this question of how the critic is culturally situated.
More to the point, if you really like a scorecard of critics more than the well-argued view of an individual critic you trust (or perhaps just the recommendation of a friend with discriminating tatse), this site continually tallies and links to new reviews. Looks pretty evenly divided at the moment. Check elsewhere for tabulation of all current films.
I am not sure what these reviewers are looking for in a Star Trek movie. It has good special effects and a lot of action and thats what I want to see on the big screen. If you want a bunch of character development you can watch the 10 years of back episodes they show every day on TV. These movies are supposed to be fun. If you would rather see a movie with more depth I am sure they will be churning out another 4 hour Jane Autin novel movie in the near future
Worst. Sig. Ever.
He doesn't like action and shootouts in star trek and pines for the sappy crap that is apparently missing here.
Well that settles it for me, this one might even be better than Wrath according to his description!
Bet he's seen search for spock like 50 times.
No Comment.
There -- now us geeks can go on with our lives.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
I think "panned" is a relative concept here. Rotten Tomatoes gives it a 51% positive rank and concidering the SF-bias in the media, I think it's probably safe to assume this is an entertaining movie for the average Star Trek fan. I'm sorry to see the Next Generation go.
It is BECAUSE they've repressed the memory that they FORGET that V really was the worst Star Trek of all time, arguably in serious competition with bad movies in general.
Leonard Nimoy versus William Shatner as directors -- the choice is logical.
V was so bad it made the fairly forgettable III and VI look epic and skillful. Apparently Shatner did not get to do in the climax of V what he's wanted, and if he had, the movie would have at least been funny.
I just want everyone to quit taking their entertainment so seriously.
Mr. Cranky gave it three bombs! It can't be that bad then :) If it was really bad it would have gotten mushroom cloud - "Proof that Jesus died in vein" :)
h tm l
:) LOL
http://www.mrcranky.com/movies/startreknemesis.
PS - he apparently doesn't like Will Wheaton much
It's a rip alright, but Gabe wrote it, not Tycho.
Either way, he's getting karma for cutting and pasting, but let's give credit where it's due.
Raptor
"Procrastination is great. It gives me a lot more time to do things that I'm never going to do."
You mean Earth would have been in safe mode
--
Seeing is believing; You wouldn't have seen it if you didn't believe it.
But anyways back to Star Trek, here's the thing people, there's one thing to being a fan and there's another to dedicate your lifestyle to it. Fans enjoy watching the films and know the characters and MIGHT own some memorabilia. HOWEVER, if you dress up in star trek outfits, and would consider yourself a Dorn Groupie, then you are no longer a fan, you are obsessed with it all. Fans won't correct if I'm right or wrong about Star Trek facts.
Star Trek may not follow the same plot/storyline as its previous movies, but for a series of movies and television shows this long, wouldn't it be absolutely boring if all they did was rescue disparaged refugees all the time??
I'm going to see it, probably two or three times because this one looks like a story builder where you can get more into the movie and there's not just unexplainable things (IE: Q) that can just make things unexplainable acceptable. New aliens, new weapons, and new characters will make this one a good edition to the Star Trek series.
Lastly, what the hell did you expect from a movie called Nemesis (enemy of equal power), them to go hug and kiss? NO! there gunna fight because that's what they do.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
Hey, if the movie stinks, it's largely the fault of people who say "oh well, I know the plot stinks, but I'll go and see it anyway." The only thing Hollyweird really comprehends is money... if people keep flocking to the theaters to watch computer generated explosions, well, by golly, Hollywood will keep delivering more of the same.
If you want the quality of stories to improve, tell it to Hollywood in the language they understand. If the writing stinks, and you KNOW in advance that it stinks, don't bother with the theater, DVD, or merchandise.
And in the end... it... it... well, it won't make a bit of a difference. Sadly, the bulk of the population is quite happy with Things Blowing Up.
Moron movies are for a moron populace. Find a better use for your time.
that's funny, The New York Times gave it a pretty good review this morning. When I read it on my way to work I was ready to cringe.
:)
I'm goin' tonight.
Triv
Wow, are you in denial! You sound like one of those "fans" who think just because something has been branded with a franchise name, it can do no wrong.
You probably still defend Star Wars Episode I and II as "pretty good movies" when they were simply AWFUL. The most recent Austin Powers movie was sad and simply un-funny, although I am sure die-hard fans will say they liked it.
I don't get the devotion to things like this. I guess if people live through lives and events that are not their own, they get offended and embarassed when those things turn out to be disappointing.
Yes, they are only movies - but why can't everyone see that? Why cling to the illusion that something is better than it really was, simply because you hope and wish it to be so? Jeez, if you don't care what a reviewer says, and are going to go see a movie anyway, then why take so much stock in the reviewer? In my opinion, reviewers are sometimes nicer than they should be, instead of what you suggest. Every review of AoTC gave some praise to it, but I just didn't see it. I would put it up there with some of the most overhyped movies of all time (including Episode I). Stop clinging to your illusions and come back to reality. Why the hostility towards a reviewer when you haven't even seen the movie yet yourself? All you have on your side of the argument is that the person must have a hang up about Star Trek? Physician, heal thyself.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
I mean, we still have Star Trek V: The Final Frontier on DVD and VHS. People, if you really want to see the worst of the series (this from a die hard Trekkie) watch Star Trek V, you'll want to shoot yer eye out!
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
I always liked the first Star Trek, you know, the REAL Star Trek. With distinct, individual characters who had distinct, individual personalities. Bones screaming at Spock that he wasn't a doctor, he was an ocean sponge and Spock death gripping him to the floor.
Now here's the experiment: take any of the scripts from any of the subsequent rip... err... sequels and pick a line. Now read the sentence to your friend and see if they can guess which character said it. They won't be able to figure it out which character it is 90% of the time. Why? All the lines are the same between the characters, there is no significant distinctions, personalities, or flavors to the characters.
If you do that with an ORIGINAL Star Trek script, you can't help but pick out "Dammit Captain I'm a doctor not a floor wax!" goes with Bones!
Forget "it's good science fiction" -- without good characters you have nothing. Before you get mad at my post, try the experiment yourself during your next drinking party. If you pick the wrong character, you take a drink...
The baby's fine -- please stop sending business cards.
PICARD: Good God! We're caught in a temporal quake caused by Nemesis' evil mind powers! We'll be torn to pieces for sure! It's curtains for us! Will, can you think of anything that might save us?
RIKER: I'm so goddamned drunk I can't even see straight. Give me another gin and tonic.
PICARD: Make it so. Mr. LaForge, do you have any ideas?
GEORDI: Well, we just might be able to decouple the iambic pentameter from the refrombulatory cryo-units in order to cause a temporonucleic disturbance that just might break us free.
PICARD: Good god, Geordi, that's the craziest goddamned idea I've ever heard! No, strike that. Pure genius! Capital! Do you think we can actually make it work?
RIKER: Gin and tonic, God damn it!
GEORDI: I don't see that we have a choice, Captain. We have to try.
PICARD: Make it so. Mr. Worf, please accompany Mr. LaForge to Engineering in order to try out that crazy idea of his. And make sure to shut the watertight doors so that the water doesn't spill over the top of the bulkhead at E deck.
WORF: Roger.
WESLEY: I sure hope that this works, captain!
TROI: The fuck are *you* doing here?
[ Worf and LaForge leave bridge ]
PICARD: Data, what do you calculate our odds are at getting out of this situation alive?
DATA: I'm afraid they don't look good, Captain. The computer is claiming that they are only 5% or so.
PICARD: Jesus jumpin' Christ! I told you we should have upgraded to Mandrake 12.0.
RIKER: Who do I have to blow to get a gin and tonic around here?!?
GEORDI (on tricorder): Captain, I think we've done it! If you yell "Warp one, ENGAGE" right now, we will escape from Nemesis with approximately 0.01 seconds to spare!
PICARD: Holy moly! What are the odds? Helm, warp one, ENGAGE!
[ Enterprise zooms off. ]
[ Credits roll ]
Straight from the desk of Brannon Braga.
here. For example,
Fearsome death rays strike the Enterprise, and what happens? Sparks fly out from the ceiling and the crew gets bounced around in their seats like passengers on the No. 36 bus. This far in the future they wouldn't have sparks because they wouldn't have electricity, because in a world where you can beam matter--beam it, mind you--from here to there, power obviously no longer lives in the wall and travels through wires.
It's the little things that you don't really realize (until someone points them out to you) that put you off a movie.
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until Wesley Crusher's scene was cut.
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
Woah - hold on there Captain. Let's see. The Original Star Trek (OST) was written in 1965 and spoon-fed to NBC as a "wagon train to the stars", which means NBC viewed it as a futuristic western; and westerns dominated that era's television programming (hence the incredible number of bare-knuckled fist fights). OST was episodic and disjunct, with many writers doing as they pleased with the characters within a very gray scope (see Whitfield and Roddenberry, The Making of Star Trek, Bantam Books). In fact, they were making it all up as they went along, especially when it came to matters of science.
Then the Star Trek franchise happens quite by accident, so that all subsequent efforts are placed very carefully under the control of the Great Overseer of the Grand Story Line. In fact, all of Star Trek goes through a single office, including books, movies, and television shows to keep the product, well, pure. Now, trying to take what was in the OST and blend it into what is makes for no easy task. In fact, there of those of us who would be happy if OST were basically ignored, except for a few basic concepts and events.
I could go on, but I've already revealed the extent of my Star Trek Geekdom.
"Stop whining!" - Arnold, as Mr. Kimble
I mean, come on, its Star Trek. Its SUPPOSED to be above the average idiot reviewers head. If it got a GOOD review I'd be surprised! But isnt that what we love about it?? I mean, have you all ever watched some of the episodes (early TNG, like, pre Yar dieing), they are horrible (the acting, special effects) when compared to the later episodes, but by god every time TNN does a marathon I'm right there watching them because for all the campiness and whatnot, the show is DAMN GOOD and the pinnacle of GEEKINESS. I've spent more than one rainy day watching my columbia house ST:TNG VHS collection. I love Star Trek. I love the Next Gen cast. I wouldnt replace any of them. But I dont expect it to have a story line to rival LOTR or something, nor do I expect the actors to be given praise for their performances. Its a campy sci-fi flick, with over used plot devices and over used character templates. And I wouldnt have it any other way.
This is my sig. Its pathetic.
Must be good! Besides, what makes them think a western style shoot em up isn't what we want.
I think his cameo was shopped out because the film was over 3 hours, and that now he merely appears -- no lines.
;-) Although how much does an "extra" -- or whatever a star who doesn't talk is called -- get paid, anyway? I guess CleverNickName can tell us.
That, or they didn't want to pay him.
I think one of the things people are reacting to here is, given how
funny and clever Galaxy Quest was (and how positively audiences
reacted to it), people were sort of expecting the Trek powers that be
to get a clue, and they obviously didn't.
You ought to see the final final cut. It's much better, IMHO. Not the best ST movie, but better than V and Insurrection.
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
...they're not bombarding me with messages like "Most Action Packed Movie of the Year!"
I have never been a fan of the original series or Voyager/DS9/Enterprise. I could hardly be called a Trekker or Trekkie or whatever. But I do love The Next Generations seasons 3 through 7, and in my opinion, that show ranks as one of the top ten of the past 20 years.
What worked so well with TNG was a blend of an ensemble cast and fantastic writing. The viewer cared about the relationships between the characters -- Geordi and Data forging a friendship despite the latter's inability to love, Jean-Luc's unwielding stoicism in the face of his crew's attempts to humanize him. Furthermore, the scripts were just great -- they came up with interesting ideas and stuck to a space trek, rather than try to create some sort of epic battle of good vs. evil and sprinkle in one-liners. Who didn't cringe in Insurrection when Data said, "Saddle up. Lock and load?" He didn't say those sorts of things in the TV series because each episode was (as much as can be expected) consistent and well planned. Data's role was that of artificial life desperately trying to grow in a manner impossible. That, in itself, is epic.
These movies continually attempt to appeal to a broader audience and insist on childish humour instead of intellectual wit. The result is a frustrating mix of my favorite cast and crew with a pedantic, immature script.
Finally, the TV series worked well because it was only an hour long and there were 20-25 episodes a season. With that format, you can devote an entire episode to Worf hurting his back or Geordi turning invisible (twice). Each character could be featured for an entire episode, such that at the end of seven years we had a closeness with each. These movies clear emphasize Data and Picard, and the rest are sadly shoved to the background.
I already have my ticket for Nemesis which I'll be watching in about six hours and I'm excited. I suspect there will be plenty to be disappointed about, but I still care about these characters and will watch them until they stop making movies. But in retrospect, it would have been so much better to have a few more years of the TV series than these movies. And as for critics -- well, they assured me that Attack of the Clones was good. And I have died a little each day since wasting that eight bucks.
Well you are clearly laying out flamebait, because anyone who's watched the Voyage Home IV knows it was a very good movie. "Vhich vay to the nuclear wessels?"
And you must have missed where Spock pinched the punk with the boom box?
Seriously man, if you are going to dis the best trek movie of the TOS crew, you should watch it.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
But if it's not entertaining, it's not really "entertainment", is it?
mstyne: real name, no gimmicks
Well, it can't be that bad, the "Reserve your copy" on Amazon.com gives it five stars!
Well, reviews be damned, I'm seeing it tomorrow. However, it occurs to me they've opened up another continuity hole with Worf. At the end of DS9, Worf was appointed Federation ambassador to the Klingon Empire. Now he's back on board the Enterprise.
I saw a brief red-carpet interview with Michael Dorn (who plays Worf) who said, "You know, they never addressed that..."
Which makes me wonder...
The worst in my book was The Voyage Home.
You were looking for hard sci-fi in a Trek movie?
Isn't that like looking for filet mignon at McDonalds?
</joke>
Check www.mrqe.com, it gets 50-75% ratings for the most part...
General criticism seems to be it's an hour of boring build-up and then an uncharacteristically action-oriented 2nd hour. But I always thought Trek needed more action anyway.
I'm going tonight, what the hell?
Check out RottenTomatoes
Overall it's getting a 53% positive rating. However, the so-called "cream of the crop" reviewers are 88% positive.
"And like that
What really bugs me is that with hundreds of great SF (and fantasy) novels that have never been made into films, folks spend hundreds of millions making terrible scripts into films. Sure, making Lord of the Rings into a film is a no brainer -- we had to wait fifty years for that?!
Just off the top of my head (and everyone will have their own ideas):
Note: I'm picking big, generally violent, splashy stories that would turn into the kind of movies that Hollywood likes, and not subtle stuff. Most of the books have franchise potential (i.e. they're part of long series).
Isaac Asimov's "Foundation"
Iain Banks's "Excession"
Greg Bear's "Eon"
David Brin's "Startide Rising"
C.J. Cherryh's "Downbelow Station"
Arthur C. Clarke's "Earthlight"
Gordon R. Dickson's "Tactics of Mistake"
William Gibson's "Neuromancer"
Ursula K. Le Guin's "The Dispossessed"
Cordwainer Smith's "Norstrilia"
Neil Stephenson's "The Diamond Age" (or get Spielberg to do "Cryptonomicon" since he has this WWII bug)
Jack Vance's "To Live Forever"
Walter Jon Williams's "Aristoi"
I won't even bother listing fantasy series that could be made into movies once they've finished making every posthumous exhumation of Tolkein's crap into movies (I foresee five films based on the Silmarillion and then there's the volumes and volumes of junk published by his son...)
On a side note: why is it that Philip K. Dick's most obscure novels and short stories that are often boring or make no sense do get made into films? And generally they're stories about someone who is totally passive and runs away at every sign of trouble who ends up being played by Arnold Schwarzenegger... Maybe the screenwriters see a kindred spirit or something. Or maybe the rights were cheap.
If we're going to make Dick's books into movies, what about:
"Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said"
"A Scanner Darkly"
Maybe Pixar can make "Ubik"...
More than once I've seen a movie get clobbered by the critics, and when I went to see it in spite of the criticism, I've found a movie I really enjoy. Its especially funny to watch a critic blast a movie early in the year, see it do really well at the box office, and find the critic quietly adding the movie to his top ten list at the end of the year.
Years ago, I learned that its better to form your own opinion than to simply borrow someone else's second-hand.
The (television) trailer tells you all you need to know - There were zero slow plot point shots in it. That means that the movie will have no plot, it'll just be a collection of action sequences.
I just wish the acting on babylon 5 (outside of a couple of characters; the only people on that damn show who could act were jurasik and katsulas. That way I could wish for and look forward to a real movie. Instead they made all that made for TV shit.
In the end I don't think anything could be worse than the search for spock, though. I watched that again a few weeks ago and it has transformed from an epic dramatic quest to complete cheese factor as I transformed from a child to an adult. Well, that god movie... I blocked that out.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Nitwit, huh? Well, let's see. Considering what I have read about said comments, that they were posted a few days ago on some other website that *I* must not be cool enough to frequent, I suppose in your mind I am a nitwit. But considering the source of the comment came from some anonymous egomaniac, I think I'll survive the shame. For your own sake I hope someday you wake up and realize that there is something outside of the internet and these little worlds that you think you are a part of.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Anyone who says this is the worst forgot the even rule.
Star Treks I, III, V, VII and IX were all awful. They were odd numbered.
Star Treks II, IV, VI and VIII were good. Some not great, but worth watching.
X is even, so it follows the second line. And we all know statistics don't lie!
Human nature is the same everywhere; the modes only are different. -- Earl of Chesterfield
You can't make a Star Trek movie that you guys will like. Nothing will ever live up to the stuff you saw as a kid. I bet if Star Trek II: TWOK would come out today you guys would pan it. First, most of us have not seen the movie yet. Most of the "real" reviews have not come out yet. It has not even had the chance to speak for itself and you guys are panning it and that's not being very fair. Personally, I rather believe/hope that this will be another rock em sock em trek movie like First Contact was. I rather liked that one. Insurrection was bad also. Also, saying that one is not a true Sci-Fi fan because they have not read Asimov, Heinlein, Bear, Benford, Brin, Adams, Niven, Pournelle and others is not fair either. I am also tired of seeing Sci Fi be over ridden by the fantasy stuff. Fantasy may have come from Sci-Fi or Sci-Fi from Fantasy but Fantasy type books are different, to me, to not be Sci-Fi. I like seing shows that take place on starships and I like Star Wars. Just because it does not stand up to the image you have built up from Star War over the years does not mean that other folks with better expectations won't like it. It's just like the Linux zealots who don't care about making their programs easy to use for others because they think that their way is better. If they made a trek movie that sounded like it was wrote by these supposed better writers, noone else would go see it!
Gorkman
...the Fetish Frontier. These are the voyages of the Latexship Boobyprize.
Only in slashdot are posts of solidarity modded at -1 Redundant, while posts of antagonism are modded as -1 Flamebait.
What does God need with a starship?
I was at a preview screening at Toronto's Paramount theater. Nemesis is not a great movie, but it's not bad.
There are at least 3 parts to this movie that are outright stupid. The whole audience actually laughed out loud at times. Other than that, it's a decent movie. I just don't think it lives up to the series. I'd rather have spent my 2 hours watching a couple TNG episodes instead.
The global economy is a great thing until you feel it locally.
You were looking for hard sci-fi in a Trek movie? Isn't that like looking for filet mignon at McDonalds?
Exactly. More precisely, it's like looking for filet mignon and a nice salice salentino at McDonalds.
The idea behind Trek is that it's supposed to be fun. You want hard SF, or at least serious SF, look to Solaris (no, not that Solaris, Tarkovsky's Solaris), 2001, or Alien (maybe Pitch Black; though a lot of it smelled like warmed over Ridley Scott, it did have a good idea behind it and some very interesting performances). If the SF you want is filet mingon, remember that Trek is junk food. Filling, but lacking in sophistication.
I'd like to nominate Olaf Stapledon for "Star Maker" (which wasn't even meant to be scifi when he wrote it) for it's depth and vision, John Brunner for "Stand on Zanzibar" (cyberpunk in the 1950s - eat your heart out William Gibson), and James Blish for "Cities in Flight" (weak ending but the anti-humanist tone throughout is chillingly plausible).
Plus: Doyle? Good writing? He was a total hack. Entertaining, and inspiring, possibly. But good? No. Not a lot of human truth in Sherlock Holmes. If you want classical period detectives, try Agatha Christie's Miss Marple. Top notch scary old bag.
Pity this post is totally off-topic. But don't mod it down 'cos I'm paying for yesterday's refusal to endorse the herd view that St. DVD-Jon should be given the keys to the city of Hollywood.
One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors - Plato
Sure there was some expansion here and there, but in general the feelings for the characters never changed. Checkov never really "rose through the ranks" like Wesley did
I believe that in "the Undiscovered Country", cheesy as it was, Sulu did get a captaincy (sp?). Checkoff... well he probably never made it 'cause he couldn't pass his written test:
Desired Rank: Keptain Experience: Starships and Nuclear Wessels
A book.
It is more productive to voice thoughtful opinions (reply) than to judge (moderate) others.
that think this is the last trek movie, I cought an interview with Brent Spiner on MTV last night. He stated that if this movie didn't make money, it would be the last. If it does, then they will be back yet again. Just thought I would state that.
Here are the IMDB ratings for all 10 movies.
It's the worst even-numbered movie ever released,
but it still beats all of the odd-numbered movies. Note that the even/odd rule still applies.
#10 Nemesis: 6.5 (based on 52 votes)
#9 Insurrection 6.3
#8 First Contact 7.2
#7 Generations 6.1
#6 Undiscovered Country 6.8
#5 The Final Frontier 4.7
#4 The Voyage Home 7.0
#3 Search for Spock 6.1
#2 Wrath of Khan 7.5
#1 The Motionless Picture 5.7
Doug Moen.
I have written a truly remarkable program which this sig is too small to contain.
Well, at least for me.
--
If I actually could spell I'd have spelled it right in the first place.
I always hated hearing someone call themselves a Star Wars or Star Trek geek and then I ask them "Have you read Asimov, Heinlein, Bear, Benford, Brin, Adams, Niven, Pournelle?" And the answer was invariably "Huh?". Sad. So much more out there.
I first read this book while in sixth grade (and from then onward it set my whole standard by which to judge all other scifi), and have always wished it would be made into a big-dollar Hollywood movie production. Now I'm not so sure about that wish... maybe it will be best that this wonderful story never get ruined for me. I'm not so sure any actor could ever portray the Gulliver Foyle I picture in my mind.
Remember where we parked.
Ahh, the classics.
I don't even have your number.
Computer, on.
So, you can think Generations was "the last movie of the old generation", but we'll all laugh and point at you.
Laugh and point and mod me up, apparently.
But from what other reviewers have pointed out, Nemesis might be good after all. So this is probably all moot.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Wow, are you in denial! You sound like one of those "fans" who think just because something has been branded with a franchise name, it can do no wrong.
Well, first, the piece you responded to was actually written by someone else about Equilibrium (as has already been pointed out). If you read it that way, a lot of your criticizms are invalid.
However, the "denial" think I think is a load of crap. I'm not a Star Wars fan. I haven't seen Episode 1. I just recently saw Episode 2 on DVD, and despite the fact that the writing sucked and Anakin and Natalie did piss-poor acting jobs, the movie was still entertaining.
Same with Austin Powers -- I thought that the first one was funny, the 2nd and 3rd were both more of the same with some new stuff added in. They were both still entertaining.
I didn't enjoy them because of some stupid devotion to a brand. I just thought that they were an ok way to spend 90 minutes.
Yes, they are only movies - but why can't everyone see that?
Do you see that? It's just a goddamn movie. If you don't find them entertaining, don't watch. If other people do like them, it doesn't make them any better or worse than you. I like in-line skating, but I don't like rock climbing. Do you see me calling rock climbers delusional fools?
Stop clinging to your illusions and come back to reality.
Take your own advice. Different people like different things. Maybe you're just so jaded (for whatever reason) that you refuse to let yourself like such lowly entertainment. I say too bad to you. If you expect every book to be Great Expectations and every movie to be Casa Blanca (sp?), you're gonna be disappointed. Besides, an occasional mindless diversion never hurt anybody.
--Jeremy
Jesus was a liberal
C'mon, folks... How much could you really expect from a movie with a trailer in which the Big Villain says something as campy as "Set a course for Earth. Kill everything." I darn near spewed a mouthful of fizzy when I heard that!
;-)
;-)
The thing with 'Star Trek' movies and books can be summed up in three words; 'Paramount Loves Formula.' Of course 'Nemesis' has no plot. It's not supposed to. It's filler. Fluff. Packing material for mental gaps. Mind-candy. All ka-blooey and no GUI.
Anyway... That's NOT to say it wouldn't be something worth watching. It probably will be, on the order of "It's so bad, it's fun." See it on a matinee, so it's less $$ out-of-pocket, be prepared not to take it at all seriously, and it'll be a good way to blow a couple of hours.
For added fun, gang up on it in MST3K mode with your seat neighbors. Whether said neighbors are friends or family is up to you to decide.
Where the heck are Joel (or Mike), Crow, and Servo when we need them?
Bruce Lane, KC7GR,
Blue Feather Technologies
Except for 3, The Search for Spock was loads better than I, V, or generations.
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
Unfortunately the really good hard sci-fi Gibsons Neuromancer is one of my fav's never gets the budget that the "soft-core" sci-fi gets. What we need is a Jackson-esque director to tackle a Solaris, something from Gibson, et al and really do it well, not blockbuster hollywood tripe, but 2001/LOTR well. Keeping it true to the origional form instead of prying it into the hollywood mold of instant gratification. City of Lost Children!
(B) + (D) + (B) + (D) = (K) + (&)
Careful. DS9 was probably the best series of all of them. It had a direction to go, it did so, and the fans were satisfied. Unfortunately, the people who didn't/couldn't keep up with it were the ones that were burned. So I can see why you say that about DS9.
And here I diverge to off-topic...
I watched every episode of every Star Trek series and I found DS9 to be the least satisfying. It was Days Of Our Lives In Space. The characters were, by and large, not satisfying and spent most of the show in a morose funk -- especially Sisko. The only character that I felt had any depth was Garak -- and he was not a primary character. Colm Meaney was wasted in his role as Miles O'Brien. His mysterious disappearing wife Keiko added nothing to the show and left one wondering what kind of marriage he had.
DS9 was a post-war-pissing-contest between the Cardassians and Bajorans -- with religious mysticism thrown in for bad measure. It was simply boring, with the crew helpless to do anything while sitting around on the station. The being-stuck-on-a-space-station is why the Defiant was added to DS9.
I want something uplifting. I like travelling with the proudest crew on the Federation's flagship. I want to see a captain and crew that make first contact and wrestle with ethical decisions that define our humanity. I'm not interested in seeing someone sitting around fondling a baseball while grieving over his dead wife for seven years.
but i agree with Ebert. Que the pigs flying and the snowball rolling through helll, but i'm serious.
Your points to counter his seem resigned to accept bad movie physics or design as _OK_ purely for the visual experience. Are you a Mac user by chance?
Look, I think Star Trek has a serious case of the NASA's. It's still mainly stuck in the 60's. As our civilization progresses so too much our seers. And movies are a direct result of our very human imagination. I see bits and pieces of stuff where i go "cool" and think about it all night. Think about how it could work, how it would work, what would be required to make it work. Stuff like the helmets in Red Planet (and to a lesser extent Lost in Space). We're better off looking to a Bond movie to see a fortune telling of far out technology then Star Trek.
As for plot, yeah, well i think it's obvious. I can't help them there. They should just rehash one of the seeds of literature. Like War of the Roses or some other pillar. Because they don't have the talent to spin one on their own.
-malakai
-Malakai
A Dragon Lives in my Garage
Right concept. Wrong man. Gene L. Coon was what made the original Star Trek shine.
The Roddenbury years of Next Gen are utter garbage.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
If I might suggest: From The Restaurant at the End of the Universe "Do people want fire which can be fitted nasally?"
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Let me get this straight .. you honestly believe that a statement like "At present rates of hunting, humpback whales will become extinct in the next 50 years" is an "over-the-top environmentalist message?" You're kidding, right? If you don't care about the whales, that's your business, but the whole humpback sub-plot was not about the crew of the Enterprise chaining themselves to trees or railing about the evil of "multinational corporate polluters." There's a world of difference between conservation and radical, over-the-top (as you say) environmentalism.
If you didn't like The Voyage Home, then that's fine, but try to keep your criticism credible.
We're going down, in a spiral to the ground
I had no idea they'd made that many Star Trek movies. I stopped watching around #3.
Yep. I've seen five movies in the theatres in the last two years. I'll bee seeing only one more this year: The Two Towers. I won't be seeing Nemesis as I do not feel the need to throw my money away to see third-rate bilge.
Most movies these days are garbage because, as you said, people don;t seem to want good movies. All critisisms of movies are refuted with a "Dude, get a life! It's just a movie!". These people who put up with the constant flow of "XXX", "Charie's Angels", "Batman And Robin", etc... are the ones responcible for the total lack of worthwhile movies out there.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
Critics have opposite opinions because, on the whole, the movie going public has become less and less intelligent. Dumb people like dumb movies. There are some real dumb critics out there, but I'd say most are more intelligent than your average movie watcher.
I also think that critics get more cynical as time goes on, adding to their hatred of a lot of movies.
I haven't seen Nemesis yet, but I'm holding out hope it'll be better than Insurrection. Can't be too hard, right?
Personally, the books I love I hope never get touched by Hollywood. I'll never forgive Hollywood for "Starship Troopers."
However, yes, "The Stars My Destination," is one of the best SF books ever. I put Bester's other famous work, "The Demolished Man," as even better, though. The prose just grips you and absolutely will not let you put the book down. It's also a story that depends on the medium and would never survive the silver screen transition. Ben Reich is a great character, a truly magnificent predator among men.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Careful. DS9 was probably the best series of all of them. ...but wasn't that the series that revolved around the premise where the so-called space heroes were sitting still in space, waiting for something to come along and kick their asses?
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
Good is good, bad is bad
Nunbers don't count (people do);
My working comspiracy is: Wednesday releases good, Friday releases bad.
It works like this:
If they figure that a movie is gonna get rave reviews they release it on a Wednesday so that the word of mouth can build and give good first-weekend results.
If they figure that the ads are better than the movie, they'll give it all the PR they can and release it on a Friday. That way, people won't find out just how bad it is until Monday. This way, they get the best possible first weekend numbers.
Since nemesis was released on a Friday, I suggested that my friends wait for the reviews before going to see it.
OS Software is like love: The best way to make it grow is to give it away.
I think if you're a member of the SAG, they have to pay you scale at a minimum; there are probably different scale rates for mute roles versus lines. Extras don't get paid scale, they get paid a lot less (like around minimum wage). But IANAA. Maybe CleverNickName can correct that (it's not specific to ST:N).
at last, a voice of reason...
It's not that I'm Anti-American - I'm Pro-Freedom
Please consider making an automatic monthly recurring donation to the EFF
Actually, I love lowly entertainment. What I absolutely hate is the way things are marketed and sold (at least here in the US). I wish people would wake up and make up their own minds, instead of just believing what the marketing people want them to believe. I think things like movies, music, etc (entertainment) should stand on their own merit. Too many times, they don't. It is either a huge marketing "buzz", or loyal devoted fans who drive something.
I hate seeing commercials for movies where there are all these quotes from paid endorsers, trying to push it as "the best XXXXX movie of the year". Now I didn't see Scooby Doo, but I think it is safe to say that it was a badddd movie. Yet, I hear it being referred to as a "blockbuster hit". Everything is a "hit" nowadays. What the hell is going on?
OK, so I didn't get the troll in the original comments (sue me), but what was said in it was certainly believable. There are people who feel that way. The guy gives an honest review of the movie, and gets slammed as a non-fan.
I don't mean to insult people for their opinions on things, if you REALLY thought Attack of the Clones was a good movie, I don't care. (in my head I will think you are a fool, but I wouldn't say that.) But when people jump from bandwagon to bandwagon, simply because they cannot think for themselves, because they are suckered into all the marketing and hype, it pisses me off. And I don't know why. But it does. The people who don't have a genuine opinion stand out when you try to discuss anything with them. They usually get very defensive and pissy, without being able to back up their opinion. I like discussing things, like movies and music, and I can have heated discussions about things without getting upset. People who blindly follow something can't seem to do that, they can't "turn off" their devotion and objectively look at what they are devoted to. I think that applies to a lot of people in a lot of different scenarios - from movies, to music, to religion, to Operating Systems.
To illustrate my point, why do people line up for hours, if not days, to see a movie on opening night? I honestly do not understand it. Why do people go see a movie 10 or 12 times in the theater? I find it hard to believe that they are seriously that moved by mere entertainment. I simply don't understand it, and nobody I know has been able to explain it to me. I am really looking forward to the new X-Men movie, and the Matrix Reloaded, but I am not about to take off work and go camp outside a theater to see it on opening night. I am a huge Simpsons fan, but I would never go to a Simpsons convention.
Maybe it is just me, I don't know. I feel like it is. I feel like I am so inundated with advertisements that if I don't fall in line I will be shunned by the cool populace who has seen the light. If I don't latch onto what is popular, I will be missing out on the best life has to offer. What sucks is when something is genuine, and it gets all twisted and popular. I honestly fear this will happen to Linux. It happened to geekdom. It happened to Star Wars. It probably happened to Star Trek (I don't know, I have never seen a ST movie, and am not a fan). It seems to happen to everything. Yeah, you were right, I am jaded. I think I became that way when my eyes were opened. Now I can't close them.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
The revised theorem: odd numbered moves are bad, even numbered moves are good, movies that are even multiples of 5 are bad.
The "even multiples of 5" thing is too complex. How about "ending in 0" or "multiples of 10"? Ending in "0" is easier I think.
MORTAR COMBAT!
You are welcome to your opinion, of course, but keep in mind that Star Trek IV was the first really sucessful Star Trek film with the general public. It has the best adjusted-for-inflation box office success for any Star Trek film. It was the film that was sucessful enough that it became possible to make Star Trek: The Next Generation.
- Sam
The secret to enjoying Slashdot is to realize that it should not be taken too seriously.
Why in hell did they get Baird to do this one? Frakes did a pretty bang up job with First Contact. Insurrection, was relatively watchable to me at least, being not THE worst film in the series. I think Nemesis would have been a great opportunity for Frakes to refine himself as a Trek director, learning from mistakes of Insurrection and building on what he did well with First Contact. Instead we get the guy who directed US Marshals, a movie which had very forgettable direction at BEST. And people are wondering why this one came together badly? People complain about the plot. Well, Frakes took the old overused Trek staple of TIME TRAVEL and managed to turn it into a real gem of a film. I'm sure he could have put an interesting spin on this one. Anyway, I'll still check this out in the theaters for the whole experience, for better or worse.
"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
-Hoban Washburn
ST1 - $370m
ST2 - $194m
ST3 - $159m
ST4 - $225m
ST5 - $104m
ST6 - $127m
ST7 - $147m
ST8 - $174m
ST9 - $131m
(all figures in adjusted 2002 dollars, worldwide gross)
The only problem with Rotten Tomatoes is the low statistics problem - First Contact, Insurrection, all only had 30-50 people reviewing it, and the addition of a few bad reviews can completely tank the rating.
Nemesis has currently dipped to 47%, but the problem is that all of the bad reviews are terrifically biased against it. I can't find one example of a real problem with the film.
I even found one review that basically said "Well, I think the plot of the movie is dumb, but all the actors were really good", gave it three stars, and it still got a "Rotten" rating. What the hell?
Short & sweet: There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Read the reviews, don't generalize. If it seems biased, it probably is.
Oh my goodness, if we don't save the humpback whale, the Earth is going to become uninhabitable by humans!
Are you suggesting that environmentalists actually believe this? That some freaky alien ship is going to come to Earth and kill us all if the whales disappear? I'm not an environmentalist by any stretch of the imagination, but I know that a lot of them have some pretty fringe beliefs, and I don't believe I have ever heard this particular theory put forth.
Hey, dude? It's only a movie. Lighten up.
We're going down, in a spiral to the ground
Everybody knows that alien energy beams aren't for vaporizing oceans: they're for anal probing. If species loss continues at its current rate, in 30 years nobody will be able to sit down. The ironic thing is that increased vaseline use will probably just accelerate the species loss...
-- ;-)
Kuro5hin.org: where the good times never end.
After having just seen it, I can tell you he is still in the movie. He's not doing anything special -- he's a guest at a reception, sitting among the rest of the bridge crew. Wil Wheaton is also listed in the closing credits of the movie. There are no small parts, right?
Get off my lawn.
"You get the easy missions Jean Luc."
Sure Janeway... "Now tell me Kathryn, how many lights do you see?"
"THERE ARE FOUR LIGHTS!"
/^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
> Too bad, as is my frequent lament, the fiction section at my uni's multi-floor library could be stacked on the space left over on my desk RIGHT NOW.
Of course it could. The good parts of it, at least. It's the Internet terminal, that allows you to surf to the Gutenberg Project site and get hold of some rousing good fiction. Give it a shot. You can even download most of the works and carry them around to read off your palmtop (you do have a palmtop, right?!?).
Virg
Don't be too sad. They woefully screwed up Dune the first time out, but the remake (done over six hours, not two) did a much better job of it. Perhaps the SciFi channel will get hold of this one, too.
Virg
... and time travel;
jokes;
nuclear wessels;
kidney drugs;
invention of transparent aluminum;
Earth;
Killer [probe from another galaxy];
And you only notice the whales?
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
As the only film critic on earth who reads Slashdot regularly (not including Slashdot staffers, of course), here's my review of Nemesis.
And yes, it is worse than Solaris
Oh, and the official word from Trekkies who haven't seen the movie yet is that it is awesome and I am an idiot who is "going to hell" for panning a Star Trek movie, per my hate mail.
Cheers.
filmcritic.com - Movie reviews on Internet time
2001 counts _only_ if you accept Clarke's statement that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Those monoliths were magic, pure and simple, not hard science.
Weren't monoliths supposed to be von Neumann machines? They aren't supposed to be magic, per se. Is it real hard SF in the sense that say "Mission of Gravity" is? Depends. Ever wonder how they get to other star systems in Hal Clement's book? Clarke's Third Law.
The closest thing I've seen to genuine hard SF is Cowboy Beebop. And the Gate spoils it's "hardness."
Some (not all) of the requirements to makes something hard SF:
I am going to make this as spoiler free as humanly possible, but for some who take things to an extreme, turn back now.
That being said, I will go on.
The movie is 2h 10minutes long, I really liked what I'd say was the 80-90 minutes of the film. Finally a villian who could act, and one with a *mean* side. I expected the film to really drive his point home [bad pun... once you see the film], but it seems that all the good writing, acting, and SFX were *totally* blown out the airlock in the final minutes of the film. Suddenly everything was rushed, and it ended, without even any suspense. It's like they were doing a live impromptu taping, and suddenly the teleprompters stopped working, and they rolled credits.
I am normally very hard with regard to film. So often character development has given way to "crap that blows up", and in this movie, I was tricked... It started out so well, only to let me down in the end.
Sigh. At least I didn't want my money/time back
Blocklevel: Practical Information Architecture
Ok, why am I +3 funny and the person whose joke I'm responding to is a plain old 2? Is "smelled like warmed over Ridley Scott" and "salice salentinio" really worth 3 mod points? (which I'll probably lose for this OT posting).
Whatever. There's more shitty SciFi published in book form every year than in film form. Sure, there's also more good SciFi published every year in book than movie form, but it's still like looking for a needle in a haystack. With movies, there's less needles, but the haystack is a lot smaller.
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
"I'm a sucker for the hokey humanism that was the hallmark of Star Trek at its best. There was very little of that on display here."
Well, shoot! That's enough to make me go see it right there, because that's precisly the problem with Enterprise! They've turned Star Trek into the touchy-feely UN of space. That humanitarism must be why Wrath of Kahn remains the best Trek movie to this day. Sorry, but hokey humanitarism wasn't the core of the original series. It was Kirk with a phaser in one hand and a green wench in the other. Oh how far we've strayed...
On that note, lets destroy ANOTHER Enterprise for the next movie, shall we? That never gets old. *sigh*
You need a FREE iPod Nano
I never really looked at Trek as being science fiction. It's an opportunity to comment on big-system politics and other social institutions, in a world sufficiently removed from this one that you don't have to worry about anyone protesting your network or studio.
Kirk could get away with kissing Uhura because it's just damned difficult to take something like that seriously when there's a Russian at the helm and guy with pointy ears in the near vicinity. It never would have happened on a sitcom first.
The politics thing is especially true in later seasons of DS9, when things changed from "The enemy is evil" to "The enemy is just like you, only you just don't realize that yet."
Or that episode where Bashir (how embarassed am I that I remember these character names of a show I havn't seen in years) has to deal with Dax getting a new symbiot? (Or was Dax the symbiot? Whatever, new body, different gender.) There's a like the person/like the body + like the person/like the gender + homosexual issues metaphor all rolled up into one.
There are plenty of people out there exposed to messages like that through Star Trek who would never get them any other way.
paintball
To me, Star Trek is all about learning more and more about the fictional universe they have created, but with ST10, the audience knows nothing more about the Star Trek universe when it ends than when it began.
If "The Mummy" was good, then the Roger Corman flick "Humanoids from the Deep" was a masterpiece.
The only thing 'Humanoids' was missing that's present in similar modern films is the tentacles.
I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
Absolutely. I've tried to explain this to actual Trek fans who loved the movie, and failed miserably. "But... but they don't have a queen!" Heck, Q himself said it best in TNG 2x16, "Q Who":
You can't outrun them. You can't destroy them. If you damage them the essence of what they are still remains. They regenerate and keep coming. Eventually you will weaken, your reserves will be gone. They are relentless.
And while I'm at it, from the same episode, same character, maybe the best quote of the whole series:
If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go home and crawl under you bed. It's not safe out here. It's wondrous. With treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But it's not for the timid.
In my little world, the story of the Borg ended with "Descent". Nope, nothing after that. "First Contact" never bloody happened.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Um.. by now, I think it's expected that the movies screw up the series continuity. Remember the borg queen who was "always there" in the flashbacks, but not in Best of Both Worlds? Data's emotion chip that was "damaged beyond repair" and then suddenly salvageable? Scotty thinking Kirk was still alive when he was rescued by the Enterprise D, even though Kirk gets dead good? Yeaahh.....
Are there are reviews by NON-fans of the whole Trek thing? The only thing that attracts me about Nemesis is that I hear that it is about as non-Trek as you can get in the franchise. I'd like to know what someone who doesn't want to see Yet Another Trek Movie thinks. I'm sick of the preachiness of Star Trek and would like some Sci Fi that is a little bit innovative.
Does anyone remember a sci-fi short story from the 70s called "Common Denominator" or something like that? It had excellent descriptions of ship-to-ship combat in space, used rocket propelled missles, some sort of nasty beetle creatures were the enemies. I can't remember exactly what the story was called or who wrote it, but I think it would make an excellent flick. There is just something very tired and "blah" about the whole Star Trek thing that makes me crave something new...
perl -e 'print $i=pack(c5, (41*2), sqrt(7056), (unpack(c,H)-2), oct(115), 10)'
HELOOOOO COMPUTER!
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
I'm not an expert, but I can look stuff up
Here is Bulfinch's description of Hades (Tartarus? Elysium?), and Lowell's poetic rendition of the rivers five:
Wow.
If I remember, the Greek sense of Hades and Pluto were very different from Hell and the Devil. Unlike the Devil, Pluto was just one of the gang with the other gods, even if he was kind of the depressing uncle at the reunions. He made deals with the other gods, with Hercules, with his wife, with Orpheus, and so on. Moreover, the Elysian fields ("Heaven") were right next door.
*
Would be funny if you could beam people out of hell.
Perhaps I'm uncharitable, but I'd be doing quite the opposite.
No teleportation
Better tell IBM that. They've been working on quantum teleportation for a couple decades. They have had the theory down for a while...the application is what is killing them.
You'd probably like David Weber. The way he handles starship design and combat is absolutely phenomenal. Trek can't even compare to the amount of thought this man puts into his fiction. And the fact that he uses different physics in every series is pretty damn cool in and of itself. I mean, that alone alters every aspect of how your ship and characters interact with the universe around them.
Don't go in looking for the Star Trek "UN of space" philosophy though. I'd almost consider him the Tom Clancy of spacial warfare, except his novels are much better written.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
*** WARNING MAYBE SPOILER, NOT SURE ***
:-)
But I went to see it, worried that it would be another disappointment, and was pleasantly surprised.
While it wasn't the ever morale, ever boring flics that you see with the TNG. It has some great moments and overall is a great sci-fi action flick... NOT a hard sci-fi or moral tale though...
The storyline is straightforward, and almost a cookie-cutter replica of ST II, TWoK. 'cept this time since there was no really good adversary from the series for picard (That is still alive) they use something just as useful... picard himself.
For some reason though, it seems that the guys who wrote the reviews, either watched only half the movie and left, watched the wrong movie, or went to the movie with the attitude that it is a bad ST movie and thus will suck. Their reviews have no content at all as to all of the good features of the movie, and the content they do have refers to what I would consider is the _only_ bad features of the movie, or I disagree that it's a bad thing... ie. Referring to the dim lighting, for God's sake, is something I've read in first year English essays by people who didn't pay any attention to the movie. ugh. Get better reviewers/reviews people.
Anywayz... I had a roommate who is definitely _not_ a trekkie that I dragged kicking and screaming to this one, and he really enjoyed it. "It's actually a pretty decent action film" is a direct quote from him, and this is the guy who gets violently mad when we watch star trek in the house... so if nothing else that should say something.
Well, personally I really liked this movie, and I recommend it as an action film to anyone who is interested. Not very deep, but exciting and fun.
~ kjrose
Speaking of bad-mouthing, Wheaton alleges credibly that he has been getting a continual string of abuse from The Trek Powers That Be (Rick Berman). See WW's blog for the latest jab, dated 12/9/02. It spoils the illusion of one big happy Trek family (I've heard similar stories about Harve Bennett, but it's hard to say -- character assassination seems to be a Hollywood hobby). Oh WTF I'll just quote it. (Note that this slight comes on the heels of numerous others, each petty and vindictive.)
I took a look at some Nemesis reviews today on Yahoo to see if it was any good. One summed it up amusingly well that "while every even numbered movie is usually better than the odd ones, every fifth movie is a load of crap."
Alot of others felt that this movie is running out of plot lines, and it's getting old.
Instead, I found a great alternative. You can pass on Star Trek and go find Equilibrium. It doesn't look like it's in wide release, which is odd because it looks like it cost alot to produce. It has the best member ratings of any movies on Yahoo's current board (4.5 out of 5 - average is 3.1), and even better ratings than the sleeper hit My Big Fat Greek Wedding (3.8). The plot (it has one!) goes into a "what if" futuristic scenario about a world without feeling (reminds me of Gattaca), but has great action shots reminiscent of the Matrix that rivals John Wu's bullet-flying glass-breaking work. The critics don't like it much, perhaps too much action for them, but it's definately not a run-of-the-mill shoot-em-up.
-ez
Why was the kid so pissed at earth anyway? It would seem he should be pissed at Romulus for sending him to work in the mines and such... What the hell did Earth ever do to him?
What was his hangup at being touched by a female?
Why did the green guys follow him when he was a prickly scrawny human and they were big and bad?
They were bred for war. Why were they such bad shots?
Why couldnt warf hit the barn?
That seemed to be some pretty decent method for tracking andriod parts from pretty far away. Why couldnt have that been used before to track Data?
Why was Warf whinging like a little girl at his hange over? Why wasnt he busy being pissed at Riker for taking his woman?
What the hell is it to Picard if his officers dont want to get publicly naked, at what could only be described as a personal event? (maybe he has some other issues....)
Why all the anoying closup shots?
When Troy tells Picard she has 'been violated' why didnt he look with suspision to Riker like anyone else would have reacted?
Picard tried to kill everyone with self destruct becouse the situation just got really bad, they all live. Instead of having a party and celebrating life, they go on about a peice of hardware(Data) that was lost.
These people just are not normal damnit! They all need help.
I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
Entertainment is one of the few things that's worth taking seriously.
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
Thanks. It's been over a year since Slashdot last made me spit beer out my nose.
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
If there was a serious point to the movie, it was that if we don't change our ways, species like whales will become extinct, and the Earth will be a poorer place for it. That point is on target.
The alien probe threatening to destroy the Earth was just standard space opera (like the probe in Star Trek: The Movie that went on a similar sort of rampage because it wanted to become one with its creator (or some such)).
BAH (Score:-1, Interesting)
;)
by Romothecus (553103) on Fri Dec 13, '02 11:46 AM (#4881307)
I feel there are some inherent problems with movie criticism. The problem is that most people who review things are the very people who seem to have the most hang ups about that thing. This makes their reviews worthless to the rest of us who simply enjoy watching movies or reading books. So Mr. Moviereviewerman, you think Nemesis had a "derivative, punch-the-keyboard plot." You think it was "crude, but occasionally laugh-out-loud funny, merely for its sheer ridiculousness." You think that a movie like Nemesis is just too far below your standards. Well I bet you twenty bucks you have a painting in your house that you bought because it matched your couch, how pedestrian.
[ Reply to This ]
Moderation Totals: Flamebait=1, Redundant=1, Insightful=1, Interesting=2, Funny=1, Overrated=5, Underrated=1, Total=12.
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Yeah, but can Gabe snag 12 mod points in one post, and *still* get a '-1 Interesting' ?
I think not.
(Whether the critics think it sucks or not, I'll still see the movie - rental or theatre.)
Seriously, if you're finding dozens of great SciFi books, could you recommend some of them to me? I can't find anything decent on the shelves these days. Maybe I'm looking wrong, or I'm just too picky, or something, but it's really bleak over here.
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
AC, go watch the movie, and then come back with your head hung in shame.
You P'Tak!
And no I didn't look up that Klingon, so if the spelling is wrong, I don't want to hear about it!
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Please.
I thought the movie got better as time went on, and the only uncomfortable spot was Data singing.
How bloody long have we been waiting for Picard to "drive" home his point?
This movie delivers in a big way like no other has.
I give it 9.5/10 for Trek, and 9/10 for any movie.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
I just got back from the movie, (ideed wallowing in nerdiness by composing this review in bed, on a Dual Booting Sony Viao, running Linux over a wireless connection, through an IPTABLES based router, across another connection, and through my Office T1 line.)
Do not believe the bad hype. The movie has a good bit of soul. Indeed, it does ask some very real questions about humanity.
You feel for the villian at times.
The story tellers lead you down dark corridors. When you don't think the protagonists are going to be able to get out they find a way through brainpower and force of will. The director really keeps you in the dark about where the story is going. When you arrive, you feel like you have been on a rollar coaster.
There is a shock at the end. I can't tell you what, but you will not see it coming, I assure you.
Now, go out, give Paramount some of your hard earned dollars, and come back to tell me how I got it all wrong.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
Exiting the movie theater:
Wow! I can't believe Picard is Data's father!*
You rock Star Trek! But you ain't getting any more money till the DVD is out [or maybe in the cheap theatre]. Well... Maybe one more time at a $10 theater.
*Simpsons joke for the uninformed.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Hey, Shatner's death was the only thing I liked about ST:V!!! I wouldn't paid $6 to see that, except it wasn't painful enough. Worse, it wasn't Shatner's death but Captain Kirk's. I don't remember the incident, but there was nothing anyone could do to ruin Generations, anymore than you can ruin an omelette after it's burned to a crisp.
Now, I imagine some authoritative-sound AC could post Wil's approximate salary and it would never be traced back to Wil. Right Wil?
I seriously don't care how much he made, it's just interesting to speculate. And I would like to see what a typical contract looks like, what odd clauses it might have, like the stuff they post on The Smoking Gun.
This movie was simply a re-make of the Wraith of Khan. Data sacrifices the good of the few for the many, but his consciousness isn't completely "lost".
Star Trek: Nemesis is like Mission Impossible 2... It's a decent movie. They just gave it the wrong name. Other than the fact that they used characters from STNG... the feel of the movie is completely different from the TV show. And if you pay attention to the technology...it's more akin to what we have now..than any future. A 4-Wheel Offroad vehicle. The tools Crusher uses in sick bay... The pop up computer panel in Picard's office...
It's all 20th/21st Century Tech. Even the computer displays look like stuff out of the recent Star Trek video games. Maybe it's just me...but it doesn't feel like "Star Trek." The mood is dark, and the main characters seem way to jovial...
Decent story. Wrong name.
When the gothic font reared its head, I feared I had been cast into Diablo: The Movie somehow. Then the reversed letters and it was all about Toys 'R Us. It just went steadily downhill from there.
Rick Berman must be found and shot.
Why bother.
The dichotomy really is that TOS, TOS, and Voyager are all PLOT-driven. DS9 is CHARACTER-driven. This makes them appeal to completely different audiences, both of whom generally think that the other's guy's taste sucks.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
This is a fun discussion, but you've clearly got the upper hand. I'm not too pedantic about language because I don't know that much about it. I know the basics such as nouns and verbs, subjects and predicates, but when it comes to any advanced elements of grammar or syntax, I'm lost. (I just learned the proper spelling for `grammar' a few months ago. It looks really bad to misspell that word.)
Thanks for that Calvin and Hobbes link, that's a cool site. I like Calvin's sentence because it shows a certain playfullness that's very endearing to me. To turn the noun "verb" into a verb in a sentence about verbing is truly beautiful (IMHO). You're probably already familiar with The Jargon File, but just in case you're not, you may want to check out this, this, this, this, and this. (I'm going for an award for Most Gratuitous Linking To ESR's Site. :-) )
As much as I like word play, I'm not always very good at it. I can't tell if your quotation at the end is simply saying, "apathy is bad", or if it's grammatically incorrect in some amusing and subtle way.
Furry cows moo and decompress.
When I was doing bits and extras (1985-1990ish) the going rate for non-union extras was $35/day plus one meal; overtime pay was 1.5x for over 8 hours, 2x for over 10 hours (I believe that's per CA state law, tho it was often violated by not giving us the 2x rate after 10 hrs). Some shows paid only $30 base. I'd expect the pay scale has only gone up in parallel with minimum wage. Studios are nothing if not cheap.
:) but back then, IIRC if you got two speaking roles (then defined as 5 or more words) you had to join SAG before you could work a union show again. SAG/SEG members were not supposed to do nonunion extras work, but it happened all the time anyway, because it was the most-steady work. If you watch the extras carefully, you'll see the same faces over and over! The regular crowd is really quite small -- when I was in the business, I'd guess fewer than 500 who worked all the time, and maybe 200 who did extras for a living. Most newbies didn't stick more than a few months. It's not hard work, but the long hours are draining.
At the time, union extras (maybe 10% of the available work as it depends on the show being contracted that way, or being made in a union-only zone like NYC) made $100/day +OT. At the time, SAG minimum was $700/day +OT. SAG has since eaten SEG (the extras union) and I've heard the union extras pay scale has since gone up relative to SAG scale, but I don't have numbers handy.
Don't know what the rules are now (I'm "retired" so I don't care
BTW, the added cost of NYC being a union-only region is why many shows that are set in NYC and nominally "shot on location" are actually shot in Pittsburgh, outside of the union-required radius. Studios will do anything to carve a few bucks off the bottom of the pile, and extras budget is typically cash (no accounting required, so much of it disappears into various pockets). Universal was so bad about this, that I got to where I would not knowingly work a Universal shoot.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Which reminds me... Does anybody have some cannon on what exactly happens to Wesley after TNG?
I don't want knowledge. I want certainty. - Law, David Bowie
Dude, that is the most heinous spelling of Chakotay ever. It is, however, much, much more satisfying than the real one.
The best part of seeing Nemesis was not the dune buggy chase. If 600 years from now that is the best design they can come up with it is very sad. Why use energy weapons when they always miss? Why jump into the shuttle when they just had to se it down 20 ft closer? I could go on about all the scenes but many did not make sense. I have come to the conclusion that the best thing I seen last night was the previews for Dare Devil, 25th hour and National Security. They look good but then again they always put the good parts in the previews. I guess thats why the previews are the best part.
Today's vices may be tomorrow's virtues.
A SAG/Star Trek story I think I read in Koenig's book -- the scene in ST IV where Chekov is asking passers-by "Excuse me, where are the nukelear wessels?" originally called for him to stop real strangers. I guess they hoped no one would say anything. But the woman with the digs who replies, "I think they're over in Alameda" did, and turned out to be an aspiring actress. Nimoy loved it, so they did some sort of complicated hustle to get her into SAG after the fact.
Nimoy:
There's also a tale at http://mario.lapam.mo.it/films/st4.htm about how a child actor botched a scene and robbed Takei of his one big scene.
Yeah, some NYC friends saw Stone and "The Old Man" (as we knew the first DA) lunching in MHT. Seemed kind of funny somehow; such sight sare familiar in Hollywood, where we used to having everything come from.
:)
Speaking of which, I visited Korea the last time I was in So. Cal. -- the Malibu ranch, now a park, where M*A*S*H is taped.
Law & Order causes parking headaches in NYC? As opposed to "normal" parking there?
Sorry Anonymous troll, you aren't going to get me to divulge any personal info just to prove that I don't live oniline. Nice try though, but the term "get a life" was pretty played out 5 years ago, and it isn't old enough to be cool again. You'll have to live vicariously through someone else.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
it's a good thing they backed up their Data
But... but... that's my POINT.
Hugh was on a survey ship that was too far to communicate with the rest of the collective. There were only 5 of them. 5. I doubt 5 is enough to fully function as a whole collective So the only way to function in small units (as you're going to have to from time to time) is to have a "surrogate collective". Something which allows them to function, which Hugh clearly wasn't able to do alone.
In Hugh's case, it could've been an advanced computer in the ship itself. It's a survey mission, it doesn't need to have the whole quick thinking and rapid response of the full collective. But in the sphere's case, they needed the full intentions of the collective, so they needed something which was able to carry the whole collective mind.
Anyway I'm not saying this is why they did it, at all. My point is that it's possible to have both a distributed mind - a collective consciousness - AND a queen-type being.
The Queen in First Contact said it, though I'm misquoting:
"You imply a difference where there is none."
When I first watched the movie, I thought the probe wasn't being destructful on purpose, just dim-witted. It didn't stop to think about the side effects of its broadcast.
"Hello, can you guys here me? Hm, I must not be broadcasting loud enough. CAN YOU HERE ME NOW? HELLO? HEY, WHERE IS EVERYBODY? HELLO?"
> I thought the acting was abismal in the second one.
Well, it was second rate, perhaps (William Hurt actually did a good job keeping Leto close to the book) but it was not worse than (and in some places was much better than) the first film, with the notable exception that nobody could play Feyd better than Sting. Add the better production, and the fact that the extra time meant that one didn't need to know the book deeply to understand what the hell was going on, and you can get to "much better job" with only a little kindness.
Virg
[laughing] Well, I used to live in the deep south, according to the Dukes of Hazzard :) The track they used for the rural car chases was just a few miles up the road, in Soledad Canyon. One of the drivers must have lived in Canyon Country as one of the several "General Lee" vehicles was routinely parked right down the street.
:)
.. http://home.earthlink.net/~rividh/asylum/rogue.htm :)
Since I've already driven off the road, silly car story: all action shows use a certain amount of stock footage. Knight Rider used the same fender shot til I was sick of it, not to mention you could see a broken piece of chrome flapping in the wind. So I wrote 'em about it, pointing out the damaged part. Funny how it was never used again.
BTW, for a laugh, see me "hijacking" Airwolf
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
I'd have preferred SAG wages too :) And MTM Productions still owes me $18 -- got stiffed on OT the last time I worked one of their shows. With a lot of studios, it was a constant battle to get what you were fairly owed. Most extras were afraid to say anything, lest they "never work again". Not me, I'd speak up -- and miraculously, sometimes that got conditions changed for the better. And guess what -- it never once cost me a job.
I haven't seen Law & Order in a long time (can't get the NBC channel over the air due to crap reception) tho it kinda lost me when Michael Moriarty left anyway. Still, it was unique in its day, and had great atmosphere.
Gagme and Rapeme.. er, Cagney and Lacey (as renamed by its crew!) was shot in L.A., exteriors mostly in Koreatown and interiors in the world's most beat-up old studio, kinda south of Burbank. Good show to work, if you ignored the stars.
The "complicated hustle" you mention is actually the way it's usually done. I forget the slang term for when it happens on the set, but every so often a director decides they want THAT face to say something, and congrats, you just bought a SAG membership, with any non-scale pay terms negotiated on the spot. Nimoy is a good director, and I'm sure he exercised sound judgment in ST-IV's case.
Normally productions don't use "real people" in street scenes, because it causes so many retakes and because of legal liability issues. Watch talking-head-on-the-sidewalk scenes, and you'll often see the same troupe of extras trudging back and forth several times, maybe having changed hat or coat at one end of the trip so they look different.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Well, the good news is that I don't seem to be looking wrong. I also don't seem to be too picky. Sadly, I'm up to date on every author you suggested, with the exception of Donaldson. Maybe it's time to get over my wariness of him...
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
To the poster who thought that Pitch Black was nothing more than a horror movie: it combines two classic sf stories, "Nightfall" and "Alien." Both are effectively hard SF. "Nightfall" is the classic hard SF story - just imagine a planet in a multiple-star system that only has night every once in a great while (a few millennia in the story; much less time in Pitch Black). What would night mean to the inhabitants? "Alien" is based upon the simple premise of an alien predator which incubates inside a human host. A few incongruities, certainly, but pretty hard SF really (the main problems are explaining how the alien can get that big with the little amount of food it has had a chance to eat, and with how fast exactly the Nostromo travels - while they have sleep compartments, one gets the idea that normally they traveled rather faster than c).
Some don't like Tarkovsy's film. Those who say they don't like it often point to the relative lack of special effects. This tells me that they probably like action flicks rather than more avant garde films. Lem's dislike of it is based on his own (understandable and forgivable) prejudice in favor of his own story against the changes Tarkovsky made (and Lem's story is better than the film, though not by much); most other people's prejudices are based upon their unwillingness to sit through a film in subtitles with no real special effects and with rather auterish camera work. It is in its way as important a film to SF as 2001. And if you don't like 2001, then I can't help you.
Now to k-0s question:
OK, here are some things I never understood, maybe you can answer them for me. What did the creatures eat/drink for seven years?
Two possibilities: 1. they hibernated, living off the food they ate the last eclipse; 2. there's a whole other ecology underground that we don't get to see.
If the former is true, they must eat a hell of a lot each eclipse cycle. Imagine that they eat five or six times their normal weight in the course of a few days (that was eclipse period I thought was being implied). Of course, now that the planet is deserted (the creatures' population probably exploded until they ate themselves out of a habitat), most of their eating is now probably cannibalism, except for the occassional interstellar snack. So their population, which until they wiped out the planet's ecosystem had increased geometrically, will now continue to decrease geometrically until they go extinct.
I think of them as some kind of predatory alien cicadas; cicadas have a long underground development cycle, effectively a many years hibernation, and live a very, very short active adult life.
Why did the eclipse take so long when the time leading to the eclipse didn't take that long at all?
Guess I'm not sure what this means. The time leading to the eclipse? Do you mean the time from when they look up and realize that the eclipse is coming until the eclipse starts, or the time from partial to full eclipse? If the former, they just didn't pay attention to the celestial mechanics of their situation. If the latter, the planet is imagined as having a pretty clear (and thin) atmosphere, so the terminator would be pretty dramatic.
If it is a desert planet and there were no/zero/zip clouds in the sky up to and during the eclipse, then why did it start raining at the end?
There's water in the atmosphere, that's why the dew collectors and precipitators at the encampment work. The temperature must have dropped quite dramatically during the eclipse (which was total over the whole hemisphere of the moon, if the model is correct), below even the rather low dew point of a "desert" moon, causing the water eventually to precipitate out of the atmosphere. That's the idea, anyway. I'm sure having it rain was a decision on their part based upon the assumption that the temp would drop dramatically; the finding of the water precipiptators at the encampment may have been meant to foreshadow the rain storm. It does rain even in deserts occassionally; just not often (and every 7 years or 22 months or years or however long the period between eclipses is in Pitch Black is a long stretch between rains).
Anyway, that's how I explained it to myself when I saw it. Realistic enough for "willing suspension of disbelief," anyway, and pretty much hard SF.