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Everything posted by Amentep
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Based on wording used (Helel ben Shachar (son of the morning) and his title Hêlêl ben Šāḥar (bringer of dawn) to reference the morning star) hell is probably the planet Venus and I claim my No-Prize. ... ... ... Whaddya mean that only works for Marvel Comics from the 60s and 70s?
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Hundeds Of Rare Sealed Nintendo and Sega Games Discovered In Nebraska Storage Facility
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Why be terrified of things that in no way, shape or means can you effect? Things (not just this, but anything) outside of your control will either happen or it won't, you worrying about it only affects you. Better to put effort in things you can control (preparedness or mitigation at your personal level).
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The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
Reeves has been in a few film and tv properties, but I don't think any of them are definitive portrayals or accounts (and now after nothing much, there's supposed to also be projects from Amazon and HBO as well in development). I'd imagine we might have the 2019 WATCHMEN tv show to thank for bringing him back into the public consciousness in a big way. -
The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
I never considered TOS campy. Low-budget, sure, but campy TV is defined by Batman '66 in my mind (or for a sci-fi equivalent, the 2nd season of Lost in Space) and Star Trek wasn't that. Obviously YMMV. For TNG, Wesley was ill-used but I didn't mind his character on re-watch which surprised me greatly as I thought he was a waste of character-space in the original airings. Perhaps I could tolerate him better in retrospect as I knew there was a finite run for the character. To be honest, and hindsight being 20/20, TNG started the show with too many characters. TOS is Kirk-Spock-McCoy then the reoccurring characters - Scotty and Nurse Chapel then Uhura, Sulu, Chekov, Rand, Riley, with the lions share of episodes being majorly with the main three and then 1 more of those (usually Scotty) having a significant role. TNG had Picard-Riker-Troi-Data to start (the carryover from Phase II's Kirk-Decker-Ilia-Xon) but the remainder of the characters were fighting for story scraps. Worf in Season 1 was superfluous and had no role but to be the Klingon in the background. Worse, I think they realized from a story standpoint they needed an Engineer so badly that they just moved Geordi to that position. Worse for Wesley, he had no real role on the ship such that they had to sort of push him into a role for no good reason, really. Season 5, 6 and 7 have had some really dire episode in my opinion (the block of stories involving children in Season 5 almost put me off continuing they were so, so bad and came so close after one-another). I'd easily watch Season 1 and 2 over rather than the dregs of those three seasons. The better episodes of 5, 6, 7 may be a lot better than the betters of 1 & 2, but the lows are, IMO, less low. What I saw of DS9, it benefitted from having a lot of characters not directly affiliated with Starfleet (IMO) as TNG shows, the producers felt constrained by Starfleet. Voyager always struck me as a mish-mash of characters. I wanted Paris to "disobeys-orders and hotshot pilots" himself in a shuttle into an asteroid though, from the episodes I saw. Enterprise I didn't see much of as my work schedule changed and I didn't get home while it was on. It was on my 'next to watch' after TNG, but I think I'm going to put a short series in between TNG and my re-watch of it. -
The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
I dunno, I think I mentioned how season 5 is high highs and low lows for me and the lows are pretty terrible. And I don't think season 1 & 2 are as bad as most fans think, less high highs I guess but just mediocre lows. But to be fair, Roddenberry was being overruled left and right in season 1 (and sometimes with good reason, from what I've read) so I don't know if he 'had it' really either. I do want to watch DS9 and Voyager, but will probably take break for a little bit since I'm watching Disco and Picard after it. I liked parts of DS9 that I saw before, but not sure what I'll make of it now (I at best saw maybe a third of it, and a lot of it early on). -
The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
I'd have expected a different Udo Kier reaction. -
The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
Eh, IMO, its the Star Wars effect. I think I've mentioned this a few times, but the people currently in control of Star Trek LOVE Star Wars and resultantly seem to want to see feats of sci-fi swashbuckling with a bunch of *pew* *pew* lasers. Go look at interviews with either Abrams or Kurtzman talking about Trek and they'll usually mention being big fans of Star Wars. They don't seem to actually like Star Trek, though. Or at best tolerate it. I think this is why they go through convolutions in story to sideline Starfleet in Discovery and have everyone bristle under the yoke of oppression chain-of-command - because Luke Skywalker and Han Solo didn't need to ask anybody if they could go kick some ass, they just did it. But as I mentioned, the TNG producers didn't like ST either - they hated the idea of Roddenberry's better future because they couldn't see how they could make drama if the characters didn't yell at one another in disagreement or how they could tell stories saddled with some continuity and Starfleet structure and rules (the episode I just watched where the Enterprise command crew want to watch a planet's populace die in service to a gross misunderstanding of the Prime Directive is the most obvious sign they didn't get it). So what we're seeing is the long term effect of having the people who own the show (Paramount/Viacom/CBS) hiring people to make Trek be something it isn't because that something else is 'popular'. There's been some fun along the way, but we're at an echo of an echo of an idea at this point. This is probably why I don't mind 1st season Discovery as some may do - to my mind the toys are already broken, so I can try to enjoy it for what it is good/bad as long as it doesn't bore me. It'll be interesting to see what I think of Season 2, as from all I've read it has less to recommend it than Season 1 for most viewers. Be interested to see Picard as well, since so far IMO the best thing about TNG is its cast. -
The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
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I'm watching it on bluray, but I'm posting screengrabs from youtube. Cause trying to get screengrabs from my bluray is a pain, which is why none of my earlier posts had screengrabs unless I could find one already online from the episode...
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Eh. I think its more **** will be ****, regardless of where you find them. I know a lot of fans who are totally "I'm okay, you're okay" and that to me is real fandom. And I've met a lot of fans who are totally about trying to prove they're more fan than you (or that their fandom is better than yours).
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Space Cobra Episode XII: "Osorubeshi Saishūheiki" aka "The Dreadful Ultimate Weapon" When last we left Cobra, he was himself left flatfooted as he was outsmarted by Sandra, leader of the Snow Gorillas, to the Ultimate Weapon. "Shiny!" All in all, a pretty satisfactory opening adventure, IMO.
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The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
Curiosity. Mind you I'm of the opinion ST went downhill after Roddenberry got booted to the curb (to be fair, maybe a bit before it) and recognize that Paramount has a history of trusting people who hate the concept of Star Trek to run the show (whether the current creators fascination with Star Wars, not Trek, or the TNG show runners hating sci-fi and wishing they were making NYPD BLUE or something). But to be fair, I watched PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE for fun. Trashy stuff can be fun in the right mindset as long as it's not boring. To me Season 1 of Discovery wasn't awful. But full of missed opportunities. -
The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
Meanwhile, I finished season 1 of Discovery. They finally get around to trying to establish a connective tissue with the opening arc with the closing one, but it feels thinly drawn. Lorca was more interesting before he came to the mirror universe and became one dimensional. Sadly none of the mirror universe stuff was needed for the story; they could have ended the series without the diversion to the MU (just have Lorca be in the Georgiou position at the end since they posited him as being on the edge after losing his crew. They ultimately don't need the MU intel they get from the Emperor since Tyler is cooperative, so they really gain nothing from it but three extra episodes or so). Nice to see Clint Howard, though. First season MVPs are Saru, Stamets and Tilly. Culber doesn't get enough screen time, buyt I felt he worked in the thankless "objectionable doctor" role Burnham has some good moments, but I think the character's been weighed down with a cumbersome back story. Emperor Georgia needed a mustache to twirl and Lorca becomes uninteresting once revealed. Ash and L'Rell had interesting roles, even if I don't think they fully made sense of L'Rell's character really. And they never really justify the changes to the Klingons - it just seems to exist to tweak the nose of long term fans. It reminds me in this season a bit like Voyager - a lot of competing ideas thrown together that sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. -
The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
Oh. THAT episode is next. I remember that one. I might...um...skip rewatching it... -
The TV and Streaming Thread: Where is Ricky Gervais when you need him???
Amentep replied to Zoraptor's topic in Way Off-Topic
Okay, in the middle of watching TNG "Homeward" and I just have to say... WTF? Why would the ship doors open for someone who wasn't in the crew? And if it did, why couldn't they change it so it didn't? Why wouldn't they have security watching the door if they couldn't lock the doors? Ugh. Edit: ugh. Finished episode...did anyone working on this episode ever watch a star trek episode before? -
I think WB is planning to release THE BATMAN to HBO Max 45 days after it starts its theatrical run. After the lawsuits around day and date releases, I suspect that the same will be true of the others.
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I think what you'll find is in cases where there is a correlation between poverty and obesity, poverty leads to less choice in food options (resulting in choosing between various cheap, prepackaged or precooked, foods with loads of salt, sugar and fat), as opposed to poverty leading to a scarcity of food.
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The book is about ... 641 pages long. <ba-dum-dum> Thank you, I'll be here all week... ... Seriously though, Michael Crichton's book is about a group of eco-terrorists trying to create a man made tsunami to publicize Climate Change through a faked natural even that they'd tie to Global Warming (and to be fair, many people saw it as a climate denial book and dismissed it). But what Crichton said he was trying to warn against was the politicization of science and conflicts of interest in scientific research that may encourage researchers to ignore data that doesn't support their hypothesis or a political agenda. Further to that, he talked when it came out about an example that already existed - in the 70s there was a big fear regarding an oncoming Ice Age that came about because some news outlets found a small research paper that drew a conclusion on data at the time indicating Earth was cooling and felt it was compelling enough to promote as a thing to fear so viewers would turn in to view the latest information about the disaster headed their way. So when I read an article about a scientist claiming (regardless of whether the claim is true or not) that they were pressured not to report that a variant was 'mild', the book pops in my head as it, as a concept at least, fits the idea of what Crichton feared - scientific data being selectively used to generate fear, and in that fear to generate action towards a theoretical planned goal.
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I sometimes think of Michael Crichton's State of Fear when I read about some of the stuff going on today (and of course, I think State of Fear was misunderstood in its day and dismissed as a Climate Change denier book, when I don't think that was the point Crichton was trying to get at).