Echoes from the Satellite

 Both Star Trek Discovery and The Mandalorian have returned to our screens in recent weeks. These shows, rightly or wrongly, carry the weight of their respective franchises on their shoulders. Decades of films and TV episodes have created rich mythologies for writers to mine and fans to enjoy. I am a fan of both Star Trek and Star Wars, and I am happy to see them continue. But the two franchises are taking very different paths, and as a viewer and fan, I find myself reacting quite differently to these two approaches.  In this post I'll look at Star Trek Discovery. The next post I'll follow up with my take on The Mandalorian. Star Trek Discovery was a show whose production I followed eagerly. For years I had been hoping that Trek would return to TV, its first, and best, home. Everything I heard about the show ratcheted up my excitement for it. And then it premiered and...I wasn't sure what to think. The main character mutineed and started a war, because her captain didn...

I had been working on a long post about Ripley from Alien , but unfortunately real world work has gotten in the way and I haven't found the time needed to finish it. Instead, about all I can handle today is this: how the heck did the writers of Star Trek Picard think it was a good idea for our dear captain to wind up as an android? Jean-Luc, who had always proclaimed so proudly his humanity, who was so deeply traumatized by being borgi-fied, is fine and happy that he's been reduced to a computer copy plugged into an android body? Hopefully a good chunk of season two will focus on some existential angst over this situation. I mean, is he even actually Jean-Luc Picard any more, or just an AI copy? What is his perception of himself? How do his friends look at him? What is his status in the Federation? It could be good fodder for episodes, but honestly, I can't really see a way that it ends happily. I guess it's obvious that I don't believe this is truly Jean-...

The refit Enterprise for Phase II (Eaglemoss model) Star Trek: Phase II was a TV series that went into preproduction in 1977 but was quickly shut down in favor of making a movie, Star Trek: The Motion Picture ,  instead. But learning about plans for this unproduced show got me wondering: what if it had been made? How would it have been received? And what effect would it have had on the future of Star Trek? Lt. Xon, played by David Gautreaux In Phase II , Spock would have been replaced by a young, full-blooded Vulcan named Xon. This was reportedly due to Leonard Nimoy being either unavailable to play Spock, too expensive, or shut out because Gene Roddenberry was mad at him - take your pick. Could Star Trek succeed without Spock? It's hard for me to imagine the show having as strong a chemistry without him. But maybe Xon would have proven wildly popular. Sure, maybe. From my research, it's apparent that the writers and producers planned to have Xon go on a jour...

Welcome to my little corner of the blogosphere. Yes, I've been here before. Some of you might know me from my days of blogging on comics with my pal Doug over at Bronze Age Babies ( https://bronzeagebabies.blogspot.com/ ). We had a great run for seven years and Doug keeps the BAB alive on Twitter. I can't say enough good things about Doug, He and I continue to stay in touch, and we even will be teaming up again soon. More about that later. Some of you may be here because you are listeners of Planet 8 ( planet8podcast.com ), the twice-monthly podcast that I am a part of with my pals Larry and Bob, where we talk about all things geek. At the time that I write this, we've been doing it for just over two years and have 53 episodes finished, so not too shabby. I also do some tweeting on stuff, mostly science fiction-related, but sometimes music or comics, so that's another outlet. But lately I've been feeling the need to explore some ideas that just can't be ...