5 years and still going

[Engels]

My biggest problem with Katherine Janeway's role is that 80 % of the time, she didn't act like a captain of a starship, but rather more like a WalMart regional manager. Add to that Neelix need for acceptance, the Doctor figuring out how to be human. 7 of 9 figuring out how to be human. Belana Torres figuring out how to not be bitchy all the time, Harry Kim trying to get Laid, all toped off with Chikote (sp) entoning new age pseudo native american bullshit.

The more I think about it, the more Voyager seemed more about socialization of disfunctional people rather than any real adventures in space.

[Ironwood]

OH AND VOYAGER, FUCK VOYAGER.  FUCK KIM.  FUCK PARIS.  FUCK THAT AUDREY HEPBURN IMITATING BITCH.

What did Audrey do?



You mean Katharine:

Yes.  That is, in fact, what I meant.

Bitch.

[Slayerik]

Look, original Star Trek beats the shit out of DS9, no doubt.  Kirk just cruised around the galaxy with his pals Spock and Bones, bitchslapping uppity aliens, banging sluts, and murdering gods.  No shit, if you were a weird alien being or a supercomputer and you had a tribe of primitive people worshipping you, and Kirk showed up, it was time to look the fuck out because he was about to prove some point about the value of independence by ruining your shit.

And DS9 was spotty anyway.  But it's good moments were pretty good, and it was fuckloads better than TNG, which with only rare exception was dry, boring, neutered, politically correct drek.

I couldnt make it through episodes of DS9. TNG wasn't great, but you could at least watch an episode and not go...ummm....I dont know wtf is going on. Riker at least tried to get rowdy once in a while.

And Dax just didn't do it for me. She is good looking, but not sexy IMO.

[Signe]

OH AND VOYAGER, FUCK VOYAGER.  FUCK KIM.  FUCK PARIS.  FUCK THAT AUDREY HEPBURN IMITATING BITCH.

What did Audrey do?



You mean Katharine:

Yes.  That is, in fact, what I meant.

Bitch.

I looked her up.  She played Mrs. Columbo.  There was a whole TV series about Columbo's invisible wife.   

[Roac]

Loved TNG, and I doubt I'll ever get as enthralled with a show as I was this one.  Didn't care for DS9.  Not because it was bad, but because I just couldn't get into it.  Voyager wasn't very good.  Enterprise was decent first couple of seasons, and I quit upon seeing nazi aliens.  Supposedly season 4 was better, but I  just couldn't make myself watch except for the finale (It's ST, I'm oath-bound to do so).

[HaemishM]

DS9 was very good, especially once they got into the Dominion War and shit. TNG was just pablam. Way too snuggly huggly hippie shit and way too much dilithium crystal-fiddling to solve the inane science-techy problem of the week. Voyager had a great excuse to tank all the narrative bullshit that TNG forced upon the series, like the goddamned Prime Directive, and instead pussed out at every opportunity, giving us even more of the crystal-fiddling shit, only with an annoying cast. They all COULD have been interesting characters (except maybe Neelix) but they were all written into cardboard cutouts. The enemies were shit, and adding the Borg just showed what shit the villains were.

As a result, I gave up on the ST franchise, especially after seeing that dreadful Nemesis movie. Picard's Romulan clone? WHAT? ARE YOU EVEN TRYING NOW?

I didn't watch Enterprise because of Nemesis.

[Ironwood]

Let's face it :  When you make Wrath of Khan, you may as well stop with the movies.  Nothing else will come close.

That said, I thought that ALL the Next Generation movies were utter, utter, utter shite.  Especially First Contact.  People should be KILLED for that.

[Slayerik]

Let's face it :  When you make Wrath of Khan, you may as well stop with the movies.  Nothing else will come close.

That said, I thought that ALL the Next Generation movies were utter, utter, utter shite.  Especially First Contact.  People should be KILLED for that.

"There be whales here!"

I must say I enjoyed The Voyage Home, a lighter watch. Khan definetely wins though.

[Merusk]

Khan is great, but I still like Undiscovered Country more than Voyage Home.  VH hasn't held-up over the years nearly as well for me.

[Slayerik]

Khan is great, but I still like Undiscovered Country more than Voyage Home.  VH hasn't held-up over the years nearly as well for me.

Yeah I almost forgot that one, definetely a good flick. I'd rate em about the same. I was probably around the right age to really enjoy VH, so I still remember it fondly.

[Venkman]

Let's face it :  When you make Wrath of Khan, you may as well stop with the movies.  Nothing else will come close.

That said, I thought that ALL the Next Generation movies were utter, utter, utter shite.  Especially First Contact.  People should be KILLED for that.

Agree on Kahn. Were talking about it at work today actually, in the context of character deaths (was asking the trekkie about Trip's death). Every other ST movie was nowhere near it, though I didn't have the problem with First Contact. It wasn't Star Trek but it was a fun movie. I'll generally lean towards "enjoyable" for a movie over authenticity/lore. Like, if Enterprise wasn't actually good programming at all, I might have been able to forgive much that was wrong with it.

Undiscovered Country was ok, but not the best way to end TOS (and please don't get me started on the killing of Kirk in the next one).

[UnSub]

That is a very, very good thing. I don't think you really wanted to subject yourself to such garbage.

Sure I did. "Buffy the Vampire Layer" was hilarious, in a so bad it's good way.

[Drogo]

In my opinion as far as Star Trek movies 2, 4 and 6 were all good, with 2 being the best. I never watched past 6 and always wondered if 8 and 10 were any good.

I loved the original series for its comedy and I really liked TNG. I never got into DS9, Voyager or Enterprise, although I watched a few episodes of each. They just didn't seem to draw me in.

I thought I was done with Sci-Fi until BSG came around and I loved the first two seasons of that. The last season left me feeling a little flat, but they originally did a great job of rehashing that old series.

[DraconianOne]

There were three or four episodes of TNG which were absolutely fantastic - namely any one where they started messing around with reality ("Ship In A Bottle" being about the only one I can remember the name of, the other one with Dr Crusher in a collapsing reality/warp bubble thing). 

They were even better when viewed under the influence of recreational pharmaceuticals of the hallucinogenic type.

DS9 had to introduce a war because it worked well for Babylon 5.  Voyager was outclassed by Red Dwarf (and not that retarded US brutalization of the show).  The fact that Enterprise got 5 seasons and Firefly got 1 just demonstrates that there is a fucking god and he fucking hates us.

[Murgos]

I watched two (I think) episodes of Enterprise and only a handful of Voyager.  I watched every Red Dwarf episode I could.

Obviously, Red Dwarf was the better Sci-Fi show by far which is interesting considering it's budget must have been 1/100th of either of the Star Trek shows.

[Ironwood]

I'm not entirely sure you could actually call Red Dwarf a sci-fi show.

[Murgos]

I'm not entirely sure you could actually call Red Dwarf a sci-fi show.

In that case I would classify the Treks/B5 as drama.  The setting makes the genre in the case of Sci-Fi/fantasy not the content, this was accepted in fiction writing long ago.

[DraconianOne]

I'm not entirely sure you could actually call Red Dwarf a sci-fi show.

Robots, holograms, aliens, spaceships, sentient AI, time-travel, alternate realities, a talking toaster, curry and zero-g football.

Yeah, not sci-fi at all.

[Engels]

I think the point is that in Red Dwarf, sci-fi was merely a vehicle for a comedy, but not really the point itself. It could have just as well been set in WW1, Elizabethan England or any other scenario, much like Black Adder.

[Ironwood]

Indeed.  It's straight comedy, or possibly the horribly misused brother, the Sit-Com.

Sure, it's on a spaceship, but so fucking what ?

Incidentally, this post brought to you by the guy that doesn't count Firefly as Sci-Fi either.


No point in arguing with me.  You'll just get exasperated.

[Murgos]

I think the point is that in Red Dwarf, sci-fi was merely a vehicle for a comedy, but not really the point itself. It could have just as well been set in WW1, Elizabethan England or any other scenario, much like Black Adder.

Much like Star Trek (TOS or TNG) could have been set on a 17th century sailing vessel on a voyage of discovery in the South Pacific?  Sci-fi is always just the vehicle for the story, it's a method of exploring ideas in an idealized framework where you can limit real-world complexities.  Yeah, blasters and light-sabers and X-Wings are cool but the same story can be told with pearl handled 44's, cavalry sabers and horse chases.

[Murgos]

Incidentally, this post brought to you by the guy that doesn't count Firefly as Sci-Fi either.

No point in arguing with me.  You'll just get exasperated.

No, I understand where you are coming from, I just think you are completely wrong.  :-D

[Ironwood]

It's strange.  You're kinda making my point.

Original Star Trek ?  Same as Firefly :  Not so much about the Sci-Fi.

Star Trek Next Gen ?  Totally about the SCi-Fi.

[Ironwood]

No, I understand where you are coming from, I just think you are completely wrong.  :-D

S'ok.  I hear that a lot.

[Murgos]

It's strange.  You're kinda making my point.

Original Star Trek ?  Same as Firefly :  Not so much about the Sci-Fi.

Star Trek Next Gen ?  Totally about the SCi-Fi.

Because we aren't disagreeing in principle just in scope.  I don't believe TNG had any real emphasis on Sci-Fi as a premise, other than as a Deus Ex Machina or outside of a few specific episodes than any other series or movie.  Alien is a horror movie but it's setting was Sci-Fi.  Anything with Sci-Fi trappings is Sci-Fi regardless of how much focus is on the Fi instead of the Sci.

[Ironwood]

In which case you're lumping Sandra Bullock in The 'Net as Sci-Fi.

Omg.  What have you done ?

TNG Totally had emphasis on the Sci-FI.  If you took out the ship, the phasers, the holodeck, the fucking reverse polarity, all that shit;  all you'd be left with was Patrick Stewart.  You simply can't do very many TNG episodes on, as you say, the deck of the Redoubt off France during the Napoleonic wars.  You NEED the phasers and the transporters and Data and Marina Sirtis playing with herself.

On Firefly, not so much.  Hell, the Firefly was just a way to move about between scenes.  Many Episodes of TNG were fucking played out IN THE HOLODECK.

Hmm.

[Venkman]

Here again I'm with Ironwood. "Sci-fi" to me isn't just about the setting and props. You could replace the Enterprise, Phasers and Transporters with a clipper ship, musket and magic. You could do the same with all of the Star Wars stuff. Firefly was an old western, replacing a horse/carriage with a spaceship (the movie did get more sci-fi-ish though). And I loved all of these things, and Fifth Element, and Stargate (the movie), and so on. I just feel they used sci-fi trappings to wrap a conventional story around, repackaging it because that was easier to sell.

I don't have a clear definition for sci-fi in movies, but I do feel it is much easier to go into true sci-fi realms in books. Probably about the demographics. It's cheaper to write a book than make a movie too.

[Roac]

Many Episodes of TNG were fucking played out IN THE HOLODECK.

Dream sequence.  Magic.  Drug sequence.  Shared hallucination.  Flashback/flashforward.  There are numerous ways in which holodeck-esque scenes could be carried out sans sci-fi.  Modern sci-fi is rarely more than fiction which uses the setting as a prop.  Classic sci-fi normally used it to help mask questions about humanity, such as using androids to questoin the meaning or future of humanity.  Aliens can mask questions of racism, culture, etc.  You don't need sci-fi as vehicles for any of this though, and they're all questions which have been explored in plenty of depth long before this was even a genre.  For example, you have a holodeck episode where the people are trapped there, but aren't aware that everything is fake?  Rework of Plato's cave. 

[DraconianOne]

I think the point is that in Red Dwarf, sci-fi was merely a vehicle for a comedy, but not really the point itself. It could have just as well been set in WW1, Elizabethan England or any other scenario, much like Black Adder.

I see where Ironwood and co are coming from and I agree about Firefly - great series but really just a Western in space.  However, I definitely disagree about Red Dwarf.  Yes it's straight (or situational) comedy but the premise is pure sci-fi - a series about the last human alive.  The question they ask, however, is "What if the last human alive was a curry eating, lager drinking, good for nothing waster?"  Red Dwarf might not have been deep and was played mostly for laughs but they did explore alternate/parallel universes, how would people react if they were stripped of one particular emotion, time travel etc. 

You can't tell me that "Terry and June" or "Only Fools and Horses" could have explored similar themes without becoming sci-fi.

[Murgos]

I didn't want to get into the High-Concept Sci-Fi vs. Low stuff as I think it is moot to this discussion because either case implies Sci-Fi as setting.

But yes, I agree that Red Dwarf, even though it was a situation comedy, filmed in front of a live audience, and on a low budget it was still High Concept Sci-Fi.

I never saw Firefly but even if it's 'just a western in space' it is still Sci-Fi.  Because, you know, it's in space.  Where a western would, you know, have to be in the Old West...

[Bunk]

The problem here is that Sci-fi is (or has become) a setting rather than a genre these days. Yet, everyone wants to take anything happening in a sci-fi setting, and claim that it should all be lumbed together as a genre.

I just differentiate the two and ignore everyone else. Settings are things like sci-fi, western, naval, Victorian. Genres are the traditional Drama, Comedy, Horror, etc. Most movies fit in to one of each, which is fine.

To be fair, I am aware that sci-fi used to refer to something different. Essentialy, I though it refered to stories in which the speculative technology and social situations were the main focus of the story. 2001 is traditional sci-fi. Alien is a Horror movie in a sci-fi setting. Very little stuff made these days fits what used to be the "sci-fi genre". I would say Children of Men is one of the few recent examples that does fit it, and theres not a single ray gun or spaceship to be seen.

[cmlancas]

Bicentennial Man would be another good example that I think fits your argument.

[Ironwood]

It doesn't count, since it's lifted word for word from an Asimov Sci-Fi story.

[Bunk]

Well, it fits better than the I Robot movie, which is kind of ironic.   

[cmlancas]

I didn't know it was stolen from Asimov. Sorry.

The point is still valid though, I think :)