Series: Star Trek: TNG
Episode: 6.06 True Q (11/02/1992)
Rating: 4/5
Redshirt Status: 0/3/38
Notable Guest Stars:
Olivia d’Abo (Amanda Rogers) – d’Abo might be recognized as Karen Arnold, the character she played for seven years on the Wonder Years. Which oddly enough, I don’t think I’ve watched other then clips. Might have to do that one of these days.
John de Lancie (Q) – He’s back, back again. Still causing trouble, still judging humanity.
Review:
Continue reading “The Rewatch 205: True Q”
Series: Star Trek: TNG
Episode: 6.03 Man of the People (10/5/92)
Rating: 4/5
Redshirt Status: 1/1/36 (resurrections tally 2)
Notable Guest Stars:
Chip Luca (Ves Alkar)- Luca is a reoccuring Star Trek Actor, with one of his final roles being on ENT. He also appears in Voyager.
George D. Wallace (Simmons) – As well as being a WWII vetran, Wallace starred in Broadway plays and musicals. He also appeared in Gunsmoke and other popular westerns.
Lucy Boryer (Janeway)- She is best known for her time on Doogie Howser, MD.
Review:
Well, it didn’t take long before I had an episode I disliked. To be fair to this episode, it was made quickly as a fill gap solution when the next episode had to be delayed, so perhaps it didn’t have the time to be developed.
I’m just tired of storylines where women are victims of subservice. There are three women in this episode who are victimized by Alkar. He forces his will on these women. I understand that this is supposed to be a new take on the Dorian Gray story, but it comes off as another form of rape. These women loose their autonomy, their minds, and their lives.
My uncomfortablness with how they went about this is also enforced by the fact that Alkar victimizes only women. He had a male attendant, but somehow, Ihe’s not to be seen when Alkar needs a emotional bag holder. It wouldn’t make it much better (it would still seem a bit like a rape analogy) but it wouldn’t seem so targeted at women.
That being said, Marina Sirtis did an excellent job with what she was given. Its also interesting to compare her aging make-ups to her actual person now. She certainly has aged better then they would allow for. But then so did Picard in “The Inner Light.”
Basically 90s aging make-up was not quite accurate. But that’s okay.
Interesting Notes:
Pros
Cons:
Screencap via CygnusX1.net
Series: Star Trek: TNG
Episode: 5.17 Outcast (2/17/1992)
Rating: 3.5/5
Redshirt Status: 0/1/35
Notable Guest Stars:
Callen White (Krite) – White has appeared with various roles in several Soap Operas, including The Young and the Restless, The Bold and the Beautiful and Loving.
Megan Cole (Noor)- Cole had a reoccuring role on ER as Dr. Upton during the second season of the show. She will also appear on DS9 as a separate character.
Melinda Culea (Soren) – Culea is most known for her role as Amy Allen in the A-Team. She is currently focusing on her work as an author and illustrator.
Review:
CONTENT WARNING: Contains discussions of Conversion Therapy.
Continue reading “The Rewatch 191: The Outcast”
Series: Star Trek: TNG
Episode: 5.16 Ethics (2/17/1992)
Rating: 3/5
Redshirt Status: 0/1/35
Notable Guest Stars:
Caroline Kava (Toby Russell)- Kava is not only an actress but a playwright. She has written and or adapted several plays for off-Broadway performance.
Review:
CONTENT WARNING: This review, due to the episode, contains references to Assisted Suicide/ Suicidal thoughts.
Continue reading “The Rewatch 190: Ethics”Yesterday I stumbled upon the reality that the movie Overboard is being remade. Now, I was never a huge fan of the film, it was okay and I’d watch it if it happened to be on. I have friends who are much bigger fans. But I always figured it was one of those movies that had been left alone. Till Yesterday.
It made me wonder at what point does a movie get to ‘remakable’ status? Is there a time limit? A quality level? Perhaps nothing at all (and I’m starting to think this is the reality.)
They made the first Spiderman movie with Toby McGuire in it in 2002. Since then, they have made 2 sequels, rebooted it, made a sequel to that one and rebooted it again. All in 16 years. At least with the latest guy, its because the ownership changed hands therefore contracts were different.
But seriously. 16 years, 6 movies (8 if you include Captian America: Civil War and the upcoming Avengers movie), 3 actors. That is roughly a new Spiderman movie every 2-3 years and only a few are actually connected to each other. Toby McQuire came out with one in 2002. 2004, and 2007. Andrew Garfield got 2012 and 2014. Tom Holland got 2017 (with 2016 (CA:CW) and 2018 (Avengers: Infinty Wars) as honorable mentions).
Seems a lot. (Although I wish Tom Holland luck with the role. He seems like a sweetheart.)
It makes the Star Trek reboot look like they took way too long (almost 50 years).
Of course there is Star Wars, creatively sourced as a continuation rather than a reboot. They are using the same basic plots so I find the last series to be generally less impressive than the other two (yes, I’m a freak who loves the Prequels. Not as much as the original trilogy, but I do love them). I don’t want to watch The Original Trilogy with Anakin 2.0
The Mummy was recently remade, though I did not see this version due to an aversion of all things Tom Cruise. Plus the Brendan Fraser Trio was a big part of my middle school years. I don’t want to ruin them with whatever this new one is. Which doesn’t appear to be anything like the 1932 original, or the Fraser 1999 remake. So I’m not sure if it’s so much a remake as its “Hey, we got the rights to this film franchise and a budget, want to film?” type deal.
There are times I adore remakes. It just seems that recently the board has been pretty flooded with remakes and reboots and sequels. And some of them run pretty close together. I can understand a remake/reboot if enough time as passed (King Kong, Godzilla and Star Trek for example). Book adaptations happen all time (Look up the many many many versions of Pride and Prejudice. I did once. I think there were thirty some at the time). I just don’t get why I’m getting remakes/reboots of films that have been released since I was in high school. Sure, its been over a decade but barely and still within memory.
At the very least a decade should be the minimum amount of time unless the movie was awful (ex. The Incredible Hulk movies. We don’t talk about the Incredible Hulk movies).
I remember reading somewhere that someone had boiled down the general narratives of the world to about 6 storylines. And that everything basically followed one of them. But there are a million ways to be creative with a prompt. Just look at any writing group and ask them their responses to a prompt. You are bound to get a bunch of variety even with the same building blocks.
So I don’t think its a hard task to find something out there that is creative, even if its something old. At least something not made in the last decade. At the rate we are going, The day I turn 40, Harry Potter will be releasing its remake of A Deathly Hallows.
That being said…I’m probably going to be watching the new Overboard. If only because the fact they genderswapped it sounds intriguing.
I believe I wrote about this before, but it was just a recent rant in my mind that needed to come out. What are your thoughts on the matter?
EDIT NOTES: This post was made several years ago on Bubblews, a site that is no longer online. I found it while cleaning out some folders on my google drive, and decided to repost it, with some minor grammatical corrections. According to my file, I wrote this on October 9, 2014, 11:55 AM. I plan on eventually reading the novel, and rewatching the movie to see if my views still hold true. Also this post doesn’t focus on GWTW portrayal of slavery, which is at times very awkward because of its avoidance of the reality. This just focuses on their main plot around Scarlet.
On Sunday, I saw Gone With the Wind in Theaters. It was a great experience, although I hate to tell the movie people that 5 minutes is not enough to allow people to get to the bathroom and/or go to the concession stand to refill their drinks. Should have been fifteen, but that is not the point of this post. Continue reading “Scarlet O’Hara (Bubblews Repost)”
I’ve often read arguments about how either electronic books are better than physical copies or the opposite. People get quite passionate about their books, and I don’t blame them. Personally I tend to live in the middle ground, where e-books on my Kindle and my bookshelf full of paperbacks and hardbacks are living contently together.
I’ve tended to have more E-books Books lately because I wanted to read something right away, or move on to a sequel but didn’t have the time to get the paperback. Occasionally it was simply because I don’t have the room…at the moment. I’m the type of person who has stacks of books everywhere. Some are read, some aren’t. I always plan on reading them, but I also have the OOOH SHINEY feeling when it comes to my books.
Physical books are an expeirance. Perhaps it is because I trained to be in a field where paper is part of communication, but having the physical book in hand is great. The feel of the paper, the neat lines of ink. The Book Covers and Dustjackets. It appeals to the senses with touch, and the contrast between the ink and paper. It has a smell, different as it ages. A used book store smells different than a new book store. The ones with collectable and hard to find ones have a smell all of their own too. So picking up a paperback is a experience that involves all your senses. Used books have a history too, so in a sense you are sharing it with someone else.
That’s not to say I don’t like my e-books. They are good too. They fed my need to consume a story. They are easier to read when traveling because you don’t have the weight of all those books. They last longer because they don’t get affected by the environment. Well, within reason. Killing your e-reader will affect them. They can be interactive, with many e-readers now having a way to share quotes and notes from your readings to your friends on social media. It can make its own expeirance.
So I think in the end, the argument is a silly one. They are all books, waiting for us to morph into the story, and find enjoyment. There are so many adventures out there to enjoy, don’t waste time fighting over how you got there.
What do you think?
I’ve started to hate the term “Millennial.” It is so often used to disparage those it puts in the group (and it depends on who you talk to who exactly is included). More often than not I read articles about how millennials are disconnected, selfish, have a poor work ethic, are poor parents and poor spouses, and want everything for nothing and want to live off our parents like parasites.
Ok, I haven’t seen anyone use the word parasite but the intention goes in that direction. Rarely do I come across a message about generations that is positive about Millenials. The only one that comes readily to mind is an article I read once about how Millenials, due to growing up with computers, are able to multitask more efficiently, thus making it look like they are doing less work then they are actually doing. I wish I could find that article again to link, but I think it was based on a Mike Rowe comment, although I can’t confirm that.
Millennials, also known as Gen Y, range in age depending on what article you are reading. In general it appears the generation includes those born between 1980 and 2000. Which, if you think about it, is quite a big group. The oldest members of the generation are around 36 years old, the youngest are 16-17 years old. Some websites include more years, making it range from early forties to early teens. So there is a wide arrange of life steps in there. Teenagers, by virtue of their age and inexperience in life still have a lot to learn about living as adults.
Now, this is not to say that there aren’t people within this age group who fit the criteria, but it largely seems to be a media assumption that the whole generation is like that. And on the other side of the coin, there are many who also use the term to lament all the troubles that are put on Millennials. While I agree with some (especially in regards to economics) some are in my opinion just reactionary to being called Lazy all the time.
After all, you get told often enough that you aren’t worth anything, that you are just lazy and aren’t contributing to society you are going to start to believe it and feel like what’s the point.
So maybe we should stop saying how horrible Millenials are, and start trying to point them in directions in which they can become a larger part of the decision-making, and being in control of their own futures. For now its in the hands of the baby boomers who seem to believe we are just TV-addicted people living in our parents homes out of nothing better to do.
There is alot to be said about mind over matter, and these continuing articles about our laziness, being disconnected, not having worthwhile relationships etc basically are telling Millenials there is nothing good about a fairly large group of people. A group that one day will be the generation holding the power positions. Maybe trying to understand how they might work differently than older generations, might react differently to different situations might improve the poor opinion that the older media (and occasionally millenials themselves) have of the a generation that includes 20 years worth of people.
So in summary: Stop generalizing the generation. Stop looking at how horrible you think they are, Media, and start thinking about the possible good in them.
Of course, being devils advocate and making clickbait articles makes you the money, doesn’t it?
I wish Male-focused Marketing would stop renaming things. They make it sound like men need to be told that its manly to be able to enjoy thigns. It drives me nuts, even more so when I get an unnecessarily gendered product geared for women Like Bic for Her . Its a pen. I don’t need to say Lady or be in pastel to know I can use it. But do read the customer reviews, they make its existance almost worth it.
But lately I keep seeing things that have prefixes added on to them to make them more palatable to men. Bronuts (That would be donuts, which I’m pretty sure I saw men eating long before someone thought to make money making it bro), Brogurt (that article annoys me on several levels beyond the brogurt name),Man bun, Man braids, and most recently Man Perm.
Its a freaking Perm. Learn to enjoy what you enjoy and not let it effect how you few your gender expression. If you want to braid your hair, go ahead and do it. If you want to eat healthy and get a yogurt, go ahead and do so. But please don’t do so because somehow adding “Bro” or “Man” to it suddenly makes it socially acceptable to be seen doing.
I also find it hard to believe, going back to brogurt category, that people think women wouldn’t like bigger containers of yogurt. So I feel no threat to my femininity to go out and purchase something that says bro- or Man as part of the title.
Mainly I think this is an excuse to charge people more money, and fed on social norms to do it.
But seriously, stop calling things “Man-” just to take a thing done all the time and make it more suitable because you are a guy. Its a braid, a perm or a donut. Enjoy it.
There is way too much unecessarily gendered products out there. And I feel marketing has just continued to push gender seperation to get us to pay more just because it makes you believe that something is more feminine (the so called woman’s tax on bathroom and personal products) or masculine (the urge to rename ordinary items to make it more palatable to men).
On a happier note, there is a bronut I will happily consider, and that is Bronuts a company that makes donut holes that was founded by a pair of brothers (so the name actually makes sense and has less to do with who eats them as much as who made them).
Also I learned not to click on the Urban Dictionary links because sometimes there are completely different answers on the page and some of them I really wish I could unsee and also makes me detest the terms .
Deadpool was rated R. It is rightfully so rated. It earns its rating with aplomb and is happy about it. However parents across the nation seemed baffled about a Superhero movie being R, choose to ignore it and then took their young children (and by young I mean under the age of 13) to see a movie clearly not meant for them.
The odd part of this is how much Deadpool marketing, as well as fans familiar with the comics went out of their way to try and inform parents that this movie was marketed towards adults, has always been for adults, and that it might not be something you want to bring your child to see.
Yet I sat behind a boy who couldn’t have been more then ten, and he wasn’t the only child there. Continue reading “Deadpool and his Friend, Rating R”
Sokorra Lewis 