Some More Trek Reviews!
Jun. 13th, 2009 11:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skywaterblueThis time, with the added perspective of my fourteen year old brother, who has never seen much of the latter-day franchise.
Wow, this episode was a snooze fest. It features a story for Beverly Crusher, in which she becomes attached to an amnesiac patient who has healing powers. Also, Geordi is bad with women, which is apparently uh, something that healing powers can fix, so he does. That weirded us both out, because it doesn't get reset at the end. And I know better, about Geordi and the womens.
And Miles O'Brien dislocates his shoulder for the first time!
Later, it turns out amnesiac John Doe is a mutant with higher evolutionary powers than the race he's from, and they are hunting him because they fear him. (No, really. They use almost the exact phrase as 'humans who hate and fear us.')
My Brother: It's okay, Xavier will help him.
Me: See, this is a generation gap here. He was Picard before he was Xavier!
We also made a lot of regeneration jokes, as John Doe's magical healing powers come in the form of golden sparkles he shoots out of his body. Natch.
My brother doesn't think very much of Riker, which wounds me, because the whole episode hinges on you caring about Riker's emotional state.
The Enterprise is dispatched to investigate a case of the Borg entering Federation space. The Federation has only just met them and is not at all prepared, but they've sent Lt Commander Shelby, a young go-getter who is their best expert on the Borg. She also has her eye on Riker's job, because Starfleet wants to promote Riker to Captain of his own ship.
However, Riker doesn't want to go. Meanwhile, Picard is eager to push him out of the nest. It's a surprisingly effective frame for the episode, given that the baddies don't show up until the midway point, and when they do, the drama is not in how powerful they are. It's in their theft of Picard, and how Riker is going to have to face his issue in the worst way possible.
This didn't work at all for my brother as suspenseful, by the way. There's just no way to replicate a nineteen eighties television experience, where things like that just DID NOT happen to the lead of the show. Especially not since he has the foreknowledge that the Borg are going to be recurring baddies for the rest of time.
I'm hoping he'll start to get into the characters more by Family, which is the next disk.
Paramount has helpfully packaged TOS season two with The Trouble with Tribbles, More Tribbles More Troubles, and Trials and Tribble-ations all on one disk. Naturally, we really enjoyed Trouble with Tribbles. I'm glad, since my dad really hates that episode. (He doesn't like any just comedy episodes of Trek.)
More Tribles More Troubles: "This isn't as bad as I thought it would be."
"No, man, the animated Star Trek gets a really bad wrap."
But the best thing EVER was "Trials and Tribble-ations". I had to pause it a couple of times to explain character backstory like Jadzia Dax's many lives and her love for Klingons. He thought it was the best Forrest Gump paste-in job he'd ever seen and laughed in all the right places. About halfway through, right after Jadzia admits she's totally had Bones, he turned to me and said, "This is the only episode of DS9 I have seen, but I already know: this is the best series."
... I am not too sad to admit I welled up and cried. My brother, everyone, baby fan with good taste.
Based on his sheer love for "Trials and Tribble-ations", we watched "Take Me Out to the Holosuite", which he also adored. He giggled, because Sisko gets the Christopher Pike medal of Valor. "I get all the jokes now!" Indeed, indeed he does. :D
Unfortunately, he doesn't yet know all the 24th Century alien species. There was a lot of 'she's a Bajoran' - he finds the Bajoran nosejob to be very convincing, apparently.
My brother is a really big fan of Worf. This is how you know that even though my brother and I seem to share the same taste in TV a lot of the time (we hate Rose Tyler and Sam Seaborne) we are not complete carbon copies. (He still refuses to watch the black and white Doctor Who episodes, and I think they are the best ones.) There was a lot of "Death to the Opposition!"
However, there was a REALLY creepy moment when the Federation anthem plays and he said, "OH, the Federation has a fake anthem!" Creepy as in looking in a mirror creepy.
I accidentally spoiled him for Bashir's genetic engineering, though, which: woe. That's a good reveal. But based on his extreme love for DS9 already, I am sure that a complete rewatch is in due course.
Wow, this episode was a snooze fest. It features a story for Beverly Crusher, in which she becomes attached to an amnesiac patient who has healing powers. Also, Geordi is bad with women, which is apparently uh, something that healing powers can fix, so he does. That weirded us both out, because it doesn't get reset at the end. And I know better, about Geordi and the womens.
And Miles O'Brien dislocates his shoulder for the first time!
Later, it turns out amnesiac John Doe is a mutant with higher evolutionary powers than the race he's from, and they are hunting him because they fear him. (No, really. They use almost the exact phrase as 'humans who hate and fear us.')
My Brother: It's okay, Xavier will help him.
Me: See, this is a generation gap here. He was Picard before he was Xavier!
We also made a lot of regeneration jokes, as John Doe's magical healing powers come in the form of golden sparkles he shoots out of his body. Natch.
My brother doesn't think very much of Riker, which wounds me, because the whole episode hinges on you caring about Riker's emotional state.
The Enterprise is dispatched to investigate a case of the Borg entering Federation space. The Federation has only just met them and is not at all prepared, but they've sent Lt Commander Shelby, a young go-getter who is their best expert on the Borg. She also has her eye on Riker's job, because Starfleet wants to promote Riker to Captain of his own ship.
However, Riker doesn't want to go. Meanwhile, Picard is eager to push him out of the nest. It's a surprisingly effective frame for the episode, given that the baddies don't show up until the midway point, and when they do, the drama is not in how powerful they are. It's in their theft of Picard, and how Riker is going to have to face his issue in the worst way possible.
This didn't work at all for my brother as suspenseful, by the way. There's just no way to replicate a nineteen eighties television experience, where things like that just DID NOT happen to the lead of the show. Especially not since he has the foreknowledge that the Borg are going to be recurring baddies for the rest of time.
I'm hoping he'll start to get into the characters more by Family, which is the next disk.
Paramount has helpfully packaged TOS season two with The Trouble with Tribbles, More Tribbles More Troubles, and Trials and Tribble-ations all on one disk. Naturally, we really enjoyed Trouble with Tribbles. I'm glad, since my dad really hates that episode. (He doesn't like any just comedy episodes of Trek.)
More Tribles More Troubles: "This isn't as bad as I thought it would be."
"No, man, the animated Star Trek gets a really bad wrap."
But the best thing EVER was "Trials and Tribble-ations". I had to pause it a couple of times to explain character backstory like Jadzia Dax's many lives and her love for Klingons. He thought it was the best Forrest Gump paste-in job he'd ever seen and laughed in all the right places. About halfway through, right after Jadzia admits she's totally had Bones, he turned to me and said, "This is the only episode of DS9 I have seen, but I already know: this is the best series."
... I am not too sad to admit I welled up and cried. My brother, everyone, baby fan with good taste.
Based on his sheer love for "Trials and Tribble-ations", we watched "Take Me Out to the Holosuite", which he also adored. He giggled, because Sisko gets the Christopher Pike medal of Valor. "I get all the jokes now!" Indeed, indeed he does. :D
Unfortunately, he doesn't yet know all the 24th Century alien species. There was a lot of 'she's a Bajoran' - he finds the Bajoran nosejob to be very convincing, apparently.
My brother is a really big fan of Worf. This is how you know that even though my brother and I seem to share the same taste in TV a lot of the time (we hate Rose Tyler and Sam Seaborne) we are not complete carbon copies. (He still refuses to watch the black and white Doctor Who episodes, and I think they are the best ones.) There was a lot of "Death to the Opposition!"
However, there was a REALLY creepy moment when the Federation anthem plays and he said, "OH, the Federation has a fake anthem!" Creepy as in looking in a mirror creepy.
I accidentally spoiled him for Bashir's genetic engineering, though, which: woe. That's a good reveal. But based on his extreme love for DS9 already, I am sure that a complete rewatch is in due course.
no subject
Date: 2009-06-15 07:56 am (UTC)