Insurgent Review
Or, good looking young white people against the world.
As it turns out I have a very good memory for movie plots. I tend to remember films very well and if I don’t just having someone describe a scene or a character is normally enough for me to more or less recall the film in it’s entirety. This stems back to the good old days when my dad would take us to the drive in to see such child friendly films as One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest or Orca the Killer Whale (one might think these films might not be appropriate for kids but I needed something the get me through the 1st grade. My father ladies and gentleman. Dad of the year).
The point is when I see the second in a series normally within about 10 minutes I have placed all the events and characters from the last film and can enjoy (or not enjoy as the case may be) the sequel but as this movie rolled along I found myself lost without a paddle. I could not remember much about the film or any of the characters and while I am not involved in the production of films as a fan of movies a film that has been more or less completely forgotten 12 months after viewing is not a blueprint for success. I’m just saying. Most annoyingly I could not remember the defining moment of Tris’s life in the killing of her friend Will. All I could remember was a really, really bland character jumping into a hole and a crowd of people all wearing the most boring clothes ever.
So I did what I usually do in circumstances like this and read the Divergent review I wrote back in March. After being stunned once again by what an awesome writer I am (my modesty is pretty stunning as well) I was able to piece together most of the plot. Of course the killing of Will I still can’t place and at the time was pretty inconsequential. I’m pretty sure somewhere between the first film and this one they decided to give Tris more of a back story and angst in order to avoid having her be named the least interesting character in cinema history (barely edging out the steering wheel from Driving Miss Daisy, a plank of wood from the dock of On Golden Pond, and any character ever played by Kristin Stewart).
For some reason I seemed to have liked it although I am at a loss as to why. Perhaps in comparison to the rest of the dross masquerading as film in the Young Adult category at the time it was a particularly shiny and appealing carbuncle but all the curses that plague YA films seems to have come home to roost. There was a time when Divergent could have unseated the Hunger Games off my personal throne as the best of the worst but that ship seems to have sailed.
Of course all the problems I had with Divergent have had no resolution and have only gotten worse. Again, why would anyone join any faction other than Dauntless? If you join any other faction why don’t you just spend all day bent over waiting for the inevitable wedgies that are coming your way? SPOILER ALERT They did sort of answer the question of who is this enemy that requires a giant wall and 20% of your population in the military with a big fat nobody but that just opens up more questions than it answers.
BIG SPOILER ALERT Honestly parts of this film seemed OK but the thing that really, really climbs up my ass is the worst sci fi fall back trope cop out ever: when the story gets stuck you just turtle up and claim the whole thing was just some kind of bizarre science experiment. Yep, the same thing that in my opinion ruined Maze Runner and any number of other crappy movies. You see people who don’t understand that science is actually a functional part of science fiction seem to think they can do anything if they later claim the whole thing was a giant Petri dish. The entire city of Chicago and it’s bizarre faction based social experiment that resulted in the death of hundreds of people was all some scientific experiment to produce the Divergents who are supposed to save the world by…doing something?
(Image from our funny t shirt collection)
It’s actually worse than that. So the main plot point is there is a magic box that only a 100% Divergent can open. But the evil boss lady more or less has all the Divergents executed and since Tris is the only 100% Divergent around the whole “science” experiment could have fallen apart when she fell off a train, got a knife stuck in her by one of the Factionless, or been shot in the head by one of the several hundred rounds shot at her by the Dauntless while she was running away. The thing about science experiments is if you set them up to fail and only succeed by the most random happenstance that is pretty much begging for fail. This entire plot could have failed about 800 different times. Also who sets up an experiment to run 200 years? Wouldn’t that time be better spent using 200 10% Divergents then waiting for the one 100%?
What was in the Magic Box, you ask? Only the “Congratulations you’ve survived our science experiment. Now walk outside and see what the rest of the world has for you” message. I seriously wanted to punch someone at that point.
1.5 of 5 Bleh.
Another Brick
So worth seeing? I hate saying this but not really. I had hope for this series at the beginning but rather than refining the film and filtering out the bad the lame parts have grown to clog the plot up like algae in your swimming pool filter. The action is sort of OK but everything that sucks about YA films is now here in spades, like they reviewed the first film and decided they need to add more to make up for the lack in that one. Tris was slightly more interested by being haunted by guilt (plus I liked her with short hair) and the Simulation parts were kind of cool if you dug Pink Floyd’s the Wall but other than that there isn’t much to recommend it. 1.5 of 5 phasers.
The Infamous Dave Inman
A question about replicators from Star Trek
So I have been watching Star Trek DS9 lately and enjoying it in spite of it being a Rick Berman project but something keeps bothering me about it. Like any society that has effectively unlimited resources the Federation doesn’t really use currency. If you ever read any of the Culture books by Iain Banks this will make total sense to you. The use of replicators by the Federation means that anyone can effectively have any food or item they want.
In DS9 we have Quark and his bar. The entire Ferengi race is obsessed with earning gold pressed latinum. I have learned from Memory Alpha that latinum cannot be replicated…because you know, science but Quark uses replicators to create drinks all the time. Yet he is often bemoaning his low margins when he effectively pays nothing for his merchandise. Why would anyone pay Quark to get drunk when they could just replicate 800 gallons of Thunderbird in their room? At one point Quark was very much into the weapons trade and selling them by the thousands but why would anyone buy a thousand phaser rifles when you could just buy one and then replicate them by the gross? For that matter let’s say the Cardassians were about to invade Bajor. In the last hour before they landed couldn’t the Bajorian government send out a message of “Um, everyone on the planet go replicate a rifle and 200 kilos of high explosive. We are sending you the schematics right now.” Often times a Runabout is stranded for lack of a part but has a replicator. Doesn’t that imply some kind of solution?
For that matter what could Quark buy with latinum that he couldn’t just replicate? Sure there is probably some kind of status associated with wealth in Ferengi society but even so shouldn’t you just have a free beer tap pretty much anywhere? The economy of the Star Trek universe bugs me. Actually so do the Ferengi. Any Ferengi heavy episode sucks. Beer image courtesy of the funny t shirt category.
15 Fictional Characters I wish were real life friends of mine: 11 of 15
5. Scotty from Star Trek
I know what you are thinking. I am such a fan boy why would I not choose Kirk or Spock? Well, to be honest Spock is not exactly a barrel of laughs to hang out with and Kirk would score with every chick in the place human or otherwise leaving you walking morosely home alone. Also he seems to be kind of a mean drunk. Scotty, on the other hand, is a party even when he’s not drinking and when he has a few watch out! In short order we could be singing Irish ballads, making inept pick up attempts at hot green girls, and getting into barroom brawls with Klingons. Also never forget that at one point he was almost convicted of being a serial killer and if that isn’t the coolest story to tell chicks at a bar I don’t know what is.
Why would Scotty want to be my friend? Well, I am part Irish and have a deep appreciation of his accent. I’m not much of a drinker myself and would therefore give him the lions share of the Romulan ale. 
Plus while I don’t get drunk a lot I always have a lot of fun watching drunk people stumble along and fall on their face (Alcohol image comes from the funny t shirt category). In my defense I am also really good about making sure my drunk friends get home safe, so Scotty would definitely be in his bunk in one piece.
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Think Like a Man Too Review
I was thinking about number two through most of this film.
Actually, when faced with rom-coms so trite and cliche I often find myself thinking about the movie I one day hope to create with all my fabulous review blog money (amount of money earned from this blog by me to date: -$0.32) which involves a lot of hot girls, fast cars, and machine guns. You can’t see every movie that comes out of the sewage overflow known as Hollywood without picking up a thing or two about what works and what doesn’t (incidentally, any representatives of the sewage overflown known as Hollywood interested in my current project (working title: Hot Girls in Fast Cars with Machine Guns) should contact me immediately).
Let’s talk a minute about Kevin Hart. I don’t have anything against the man. I enjoyed him in Ride Along and generally think he is funny. However ubiquitous does not accurately capture how much we are seeing him in movies these days. He is in freaking everything and yet seems to always play the same character (fast talking egotistical hustler who’s not as smart as he thinks he is). It looks like Hollywood has settled on the go to guy for the African American funny dude but the fact is like Ghost Pepper Sauce a little goes a long way. His one and only character is in serious danger of wearing out its welcome. If, on the off chance you are reading this post Kevin you need to branch out before you get totally type cast. Do a drama. On the other hand this film made a boatload of money so maybe I should just shut up on my career advice.
So this movie managed to bury the needles on both the cliche-o-meter and the crap-o-meter (lots of scatological jokes in this review. Given what I just saw last night I think this is a good example of life imitating art). It was like the producers of the film read every review I have ever written and used a sophisticated computer algorithm to calculate exactly what grinds my gears the most in a bad film and then included every single one of them like a top 10 tribute. Since I have no life let’s go ahead and list most of them, shall we?
A Million Ways to Die in the West Review
Something died on that screen.
I am not feeling good about doing this review. The fact is I love most of Seth McFarlane’s work. Family Guy is awesome and I kind of man-crushed Seth when I reviewed Ted. I even love American Dad (we don’t need to talk about the Cleveland Show). Like a gangster slowly feeling his cement galoshes harden as the movie progressed I had a slow sinking sensation that I was going to have to come home and dump on a guy I really like.
However, honesty is my middle name (unless you are a hot chick, in which case it’s danger. Dave Danger Inman) and I owe it to you, my beloved readers, to tell you my honest opinion and that is this movie kind of falls on its face. There were a few really funny moments but the humor was either amazingly funny or just plain lame with no middle ground. Like a skinny kid and a fat kid on the same teeter totter the massive weight of the lame side kept this film from going anywhere. This issue was not aided at all by the fact that all the best jokes I have seen in about 5,000 trailer showings. Kudos to studio marketing department. I mean that sincerely. They really picked out the best meat for the trailers and left the rest for the carrion (i.e. the audience).
Like I said when I reviewed Ted Seth is really good at writing what are essentially clones of Family Guy but falters when he branches out from his preferred genre. In this film you can almost see him struggling against the restrictions of having to write a story that goes more than 22 minutes and being forced to adhere to some form of continuity. Pacing and editing were serious issues. 117 minutes is an awfully long time to assume you will keep your audience engaged in a comedy. You’re not showing the Lord of the Rings here.
Blended Movie Review
You’ll want to stick your head in a blender after this one.
I like to think of myself as an everyman when it comes to movie reviews. I mean, sure I’m probably smarter and better looking than most of you (or at least so my mother keeps telling me. I just wish single women of appropriate dating age would figure that out) but grew up poor working class and get a real kick out of most low brow humor. My father was the king of the fart jokes (you main glean some insight into the origin of my own sense of humor there). I nearly hurt myself laughing when I saw the first Jackass movie and am willing to see any Shemp- or Curly Joe-less Three Stooges. In my mind there is no better Friday night than drinking beer and doing donuts in the parking lot of the local bowling alley while my friends shoot guns into the air.
Well, maybe not that last part. But the point is when I review a film I find I tend to be more in line with the average American movie goer than some other reviewers. However, when God was handing out senses of humor I got shorted in my ability to enjoy Adam Sandler’s current style of movie humor. It’s weird. I sat in the theater alternately groaning and holding my breath in hopes of passing out into a restful coma while the rest of the theater was laughing their collective asses off.
This movie was pretty mediocre. However it was not as bad as the last Sandler joint I reviewed, Jack and Jill. This film didn’t have me praying for an asteroid to destroy the earth to save future generations the pain and embarrassment of having to see what we were up to in the early teen years. In fact, I hardly prayed for death at all (great sound bite, in case the producers of this film are looking for something for the Blue Ray box art. “I hardly prayed for death at all!” -theNerdBlog). There were some funny moments and there is no denying the humorous chemistry that Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore enjoy. This film actually found a tone and maintained it. Unfortunately the good elements were mixed in (blended, almost) with dumb humor, horrible stereotypes, fake settings, bad cliches, uncomfortable situations, and metronomic predictability into a sewage runoff like mixture.
Godzilla Review
Too much humans, not enough Godzilla.
This whole “fill the screen time with lame humans instead of expensive CGI” is something of an ongoing issue with movies involving really cool giant whatever. Maybe it’s just me. I bitched about this in Transfomers. I bitched about this in Pacific Rim. I even kind of bitched about this in the Avengers. To me it is the curse of Hollywood these days that a film titled “The Super Awesome Nostalgic Icon We All Want to See” will feature about 10 minutes of SANIWAWTS and 140 minutes of some early 20’s douchebag all true nerds learned to hate when he was getting laid in high school and we were playing Car Wars until four in the morning running around doing crap no one cares about.
To be fair to my own opinion any amount of screen time 0< dedicated to Shia LeBeouf is a waste of time, film, and brain cells. Michael Bay I want about 50 minutes of my life wasted on him in the last Transformers movie refunded please.
So it is with this film. The moments with Godzilla or one of the other monsters on the screen were like playing with a kindle of the cutest kittens ever but as soon as the camera switched to a non Godzilla scene the kittens morphed and merged into a 15 year old smelly bloodhound laying on the porch too lazy to do more than breath and fart. SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT BIG SPOILER ALERT DON’T SAY I DIDN’T WARN YOU I had real hope for this film giving me someone to engage with outside of Godzilla when they cast the great Bryan Cranston (and featured him extensively in every single trailer) but his character dies after like 25 minutes, leaving us with hunk-of-the-month Aaron Taylor-Johnson to carry the entire rest of the film on his woefully inadequate acting shoulders (that’s not really fair. He has done some decent work but this film did not give him any kind of depth to sink his teeth into).
So about halfway through the film you realize you care more about Godzilla and the other monsters than any actual human on the screen. This has the net effect of making you resent any time spent watching humans without a giant monster turning them into toe jam. That being said the scenes with monsters were freaking amazing. The one thing this movie did better than any I have seen in a long time is it really made you feel what it would be like to be a human running around while Godzilla stomps through your local Pick N’ Save. More than ever I felt what it must be like to be so insignificant that the monsters don’t even notice you. Normally to feel that insignificant and disregarded I have to go out trying to meet women. Truly effective.
Plus the action was amazing, although they did a lot of it at night and obscured by smoke, clouds, or random debris. I got frustrated a couple times when they were lining up for a major battle only to show it for 10 seconds before cutting to video footage on a newscast. They did however push the PG-13 to a level I found acceptable. There was no shortage of destruction, death, and mayhem. I mean, we aren’t going to a Godzilla film to see him destroy an abandoned tenement block and then sort the wreckage into the worlds largest compost pile. When I think of Godzilla I want to see skyscrapers crumbling on top of thousands of screaming humans. Godzilla is serious business. Of course since 9-11 it is super bad PC karma to show anything destructive happen to New York the go to city for mass destruction is San Francisco. I naturally felt an even closer connection to the action when I saw Godzilla stomp on a bar in Chinatown where I have seen a friend of mine puke on the sidewalk.
Some more spoilers incoming so if that is a problem maybe skip the story recap. Five paragraphs. SPOILER ALERT It starts with two Japanese(ish) scientists of some kind (actually if any of you can figure out what they were will you let me know? Were they paleontologists? Biologists? Geologists? Seems like they were whatever the plot needed at the moment. Ken Watanabe-Inception, the Last Samurai, Batman Begins and Sally Hawkins-Layer Cake, Blue Jasmine, All is Bright) being called in to look at a giant sink hole. They climb inside and discover the massive bones of some gigantic monster. Skip a few miles away to a Japanese nuclear reactor and engineer Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston-Breaking Bad, Argo, Drive) living with his wife Sandra (Juliette Binoche-Dan in Real Life, The English Patient, An Open Heart) and son Ford (CJ Adams-the Odd Life of Timothy Green, Dan in Real Life, Against the Wild). There is some kind of seismic activity that seems to be traveling towards their reactor. Joe sends Sandra into the reactor to do something and she gets cooked when the whole thing melts down.
Skip ahead 15 years and Ford (now Aaron Taylor-Johnson-Kick Ass, Savages, Kick Ass 2) is now a navy lieutenant in charge of bomb disposal and Joe a weird conspiracy nut, convinced that the reactor meltdown that killed his wife had some kind of other cause than just an earthquake. Ford rotates home to be with his wife Elle (Elizabeth Olsen-Silent House, Oldboy, In Secret) and son in San Francisco only to find out his father has been arrested again by the Japanese for trying to sneak into the radioactive quarantine zone. He has to fly to Tokyo to bail Joe out.
Once there he gets sucked into Joes conspiracy world with little effort and together they sneak into their old home to recover some old floppy disks of data. Joe is convinced whatever happened before will happen again. They get arrested and taken to a secret compound where something in the ground is being studied.
Honestly you don’t really need to know a whole lot more. The thing in the ground is a gigantic monster called a M.U.T.O. (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organism) that jumps up and wrecks most everything, including Joe. At that exact moment all the character development and story that had been written into the first 40 minutes of the film more or less flies out the window. The Muto also flies off into the night and wrecks Tokyo. Meanwhile another monster is being tracked and turns out to be Godzilla, somehow tracking the MUTO (?) and rapidly identified by the Japanese scientist as an Alpha predator. They fight and the MUTO flies off towards the US West Coast, followed by Godzilla. It’s mate surfaces in Nevada and wrecks Las Vegas (I found that very amusing. I spend way to much time in Vegas for work to have anything other than contempt for the Strip).
During all this Ford is getting involved mainly by hitching a ride on different military transports without any orders. All the monsters seem to be headed towards San Francisco. The military comes up with a plan to lure them together and nuke them all in one fell swoop (I guess they were short on nukes? Seems the prudent thing to do would have been drop three separate nukes on each of the monsters while they were in the in the middle of the ocean or desert but I guess I’m not Sun Tzu). Because the MUTO puts out an EMP pulse they have to put in a mechanical countdown clock on the nuke. The MUTO steals the nuke (oh, yeah, they eat radiation. No violation of the laws of conservation of mass to see here folks. Move along) to feed it’s clutch of eggs. Ford has to parachute into the heart of San Francisco to disarm the nuke now. Godzilla shows up, kicks ass, and leaves San Francisco a physical wasteland to match the cultural wasteland that the tech yuppies are turning it into.
The stars:
Duh. Godzilla movie, and not the god awful Godzilla 1998. Two stars. When you could finally see him Godzilla was the classic, awesome monster. One star. What action there was was really great. Two stars. Bryan Cranston and the first 40 minutes with him was a really interesting, in depth story with great characters. One star. Amazing CGI and effects. One star. Camera work was superb. One star. The film really made you feel like you were in the movie during the action scenes. The term to use is immersive. One star. In truth a really fun movie experience well worth your time. Three stars. Total: twelve stars.
The black holes:
Our time with Godzilla was limited, and a lot of it was really murky and hard to see. The rest of the film was filled with people who might have just been little Godzillas in rubber human suits. One black hole. SPOILER ALERT Once Joe dies all the time spent trying to get us to engage with the characters was totally wasted. One black hole. SPOILER ALERT Also once Joe dies what was a fairly well written and professional story turned into a lazy mishmash of random crap that only distracted us from what was going on. Can someone tell me the point of the little Japanese kid on the train who appeared from nowhere and ten minutes later disappeared like a rogue Spanish swashbuckler from a heaving bosom romance novel? One black hole. With the exception of Bryan Cranston pretty much every scene involving humans was boring military crap or even more boring exposition. One black hole. SPOILER ALERT While I think Aaron Taylor-Johnson is a talented actor his character was really pointless. He treated the death of his father like the passing of a neighbors pet guinea pig and dropped the very interesting obsession with finding what killed his mother in order to become a very boring military guy. I felt a stronger connection with his wife, who spent most of her time starring at a phone, the Japanese scientist of indeterminate nature who spent most of his time off center looking fretful, and Godzilla who spent most of his time underwater. When the guy in the rubber suit has a stronger connection to the audience than your protagonist you need to look at your writing again. One black hole. 
I know I shouldn’t but I can’t help myself: the “science” in this film makes applying leeches to bleed illness out of you look like a valid medical treatment. (I’m just too big a fan of science to let really bad stuff slide. Science is Awesome image from the funny t shirt category) One black hole. Total: six black holes.
So a total of six stars, a solid score from me. Could it have been better? Absolutely. Should you see it anyway? Absolutely. See it on the biggest screen you can find to maximize the insignificance you will feel as another potential grease stain under Godzilla’s might foot. Date movie? If she’s into it. If not she will (correctly) determine that you are subjecting her to your interests and really don’t care what she wants to see. See it with some dudes, dude. Bathroom break? Any scene sans Godzilla or MUTO is a good candidate. There is a scene where they are all standing around planning on how to detonate a nuke that should work pretty well. Also most of the train business could be missed easily.
Thanks for reading. I’m seeing Million Dollar Arm tonight so let’s see if my love of sports films while hating actual sports has me enjoying this one. I’m also a fan of Indian culture (and by “culture” I really mean “women”) and hope to see some good stuff tonight. Disney doesn’t screw up too often so it should at least be fun. Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu. Post a comment here if you have a thought on this film or my review and email me at [email protected] if you want to ask an off topic question or make a suggestion. Talk to you soon.
“the Infamous” Dave Inman
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 40 Friday’s Child
Another one I actually quite like. I thought the Capellans were pretty cool and the story great. From a social perspective it nicely explored cross cultural negotiations as well as honor and honestly. I also like the idea that bows, having never been invented on Capella, gave Kirk and Spock a distinct advantage (although technically introducing an unknown technology is about as flagrant a violation of the Prime Directive as having the Enterprise lift out of the ocean in plain sight of a primitive species and giving them a brand new god to worship after defiling and robbing their old temple.
However, let’s talk about one of the greatest unacknowledged tools of the the original series: rubber boulders. Yes, these old friends showed up so often it was almost like the Enterprise would seed the transport area with them in order to give Kirk and crew an emergency weapon to hurl or avalanche at their enemies. It’s like whenever they needed something resembling action they would just fall back on the warehouse of rubber boulders and a half dozen PA’s to bowl them down the hill. Sometimes I wish I had a truck full of rubber boulders to have some fun with. They even spoofed it in Galaxy Quest in with the rock monster.
Anyway, like I said I enjoy this episode and would one day like to do some cosplay as a Capellan. My height would work nicely for that and they do have some cool costumes. Of course first I would have to do Ruk from What Are Little Girls Made Of. That would rock (pun intended). Rock image courtesy of the Funny T Shirt category.
“the Infamous” Dave Inman
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 41 The Deadly Years
I’m kind of middle of the line on this one. Not bad, not great. I really liked the Corbomite bluff and it’s always fun to see Checkov used extensively, but the whole Commodore Stocker thing always bugged the hell out of me.
You see, in Balance of Terror it was established that not violating the Neutral Zone was worth any price up to and including the destruction of the ship, but Commodore Stocker, while a base commander with no deep space training, doesn’t seem to be capable of reading regulations and orders or even understanding that his need to shave a few hours off his trip to Starbase 10 could very well commit the Federation to war with the Romulan Empire. I know he was supposed to be a pompous jerk, but this is just annoyingly dumb.
It was also established earlier that the Romulans were pretty much looking for an excuse to go to war. Just because they failed to destroy the Enterprise doesn’t mean that the Praetor and Tal Shiar didn’t at least consider the whole deal an excuse to open a can of whoop ass. It certainly would have warranted a little more concern on the part of Kirk, Spock, and Stocker towards the end of the episode. It just might have behooved the Federation to send some kind of “Sorry our guys are idiots” message or at least a Pick Me Up Bouquet.
Like I said not one of their best. It does seem like whenever something bad or painful but not deadly has to happen to a crewman Chekov is the go to guy. 
Also if you are an advocate of senior rights this one will probably not sit well with you. Even the title “The Deadly Years” could be seen as painfully insensitive. Whatever happened to “the Golden Years”? If someone ever told my mother she was enjoying her Deadly Years I’d koon-ut-kal-if-fee his ass so hard his own parents would feel it. Lord knows I have enough frustrated libido to give me the focus. Feel the bite of my lirpa!
All that being said the squirrel nuts image comes to us from the funny t shirt category. I never said I was sensetive enough to get out of being strangled with an Ahn’woon.
“the Infamous” Dave Inman
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 43 Wolf in the Fold
This episode was not exactly a pillar of women’s liberation. If one could have a real complaint with regards to this show in general it’s that in spite of all it’s attempts at racial issues, anti war, and social problems the sexism and misogyny were rampant and never so much as in this episode. 
Women are pretty much treated as inanimate sex objects and are more or less helpless in the face of masculine dominance (Not to mention brutally murdered en masse. Problem solved image, while not necessarily funny, comes from the Funny T Shirt category. Sorry it was the best misogynist image I could find). One of the worst quotes from Mr. Spock ever came from this one: “women are more easily and more deeply terrified, generating more sheer horror than the male of the species.”
If anything redeeming can be had from this episode it is that if you compare this to any of the TNG shows you can see how greatly the shift in gender parity has progressed. I won’t pretend there aren’t still major issues surrounding this today but in TNG none of this dancing sex slave girl BS would have surfaced. Also for once Kirk wasn’t the focus of the show. It’s nice to see Scotty get his chance at bat.
However, let’s talk about the psycho-tricorder for a minute. So this device records anything that happens to someone for the last 24 hours. Umm, excuse me but wouldn’t that have been the perfect answer to like 85% of the other episodes? Court Martial? Turnabout Intruder? And the Children Shall Lead? The Trouble with Tribbles? Journey to Babel? Mudd’s Women? Space Seed? Dagger of the Mind? Charlie X? The Man Trap? The Conscious of the King? Spock’s Brain? Every one of these episodes could have been solved in short order with the use of the psycho-tricorder. Just strap Kara into one of those and figure out exactly what she did with Spock’s brain. It should have been the most commonly used device after communicators.
Oh, well. I guess sometimes you just invent stuff to keep the episode moving without having to worry about how it will affect future episodes (cough cough kironide cough cough). Also by listing all those episodes I just realized that TOS had some very cool episode titles. Suck it, TNG. Encounter at Farpoint might be the worst title ever.
“the Infamous” Dave Inman
