justingeist

Nite, I have only negative things to say about Threshold... I decided to watch the premier because I heard it was kinda OK (per NYT) and Carla Gugino is pretty damn hot. First I was horrified to see BB's name in the opening credits. Anyone who watched the recent decline of Trek understands why. The main Carla Gugino character....what is she, like, Fox Mulder with a vagina. Three geeks backing her up....that wasn't ripped off....I'll just call them Byers, Langley, and Frohicke until I start to remember their names. Fractals, Chaos Theory, higher dimensions.....I would have been impressed about 8 years ago to see these concepts worked into a TV show, but not now. Maybe they'll reference String Theory in episode 2, that would be awsome! I think Brannon Braga wanted to kill Star Trek, and Brent Spiner helped him do it, so the medical nerd role is Brent's reward. I'll probably watch next week, but I think I'll cut myself off there out of respect to Chris Carter.

TNG....don't know the title....story involves retrieiving Scotty from transporter after 80 years in the pattern buffer....and a Dyson Sphere. Requiescat in Pacem, James Doohan.

For everyone who doesn't subscribe to The New Republic, here is a spoof of Enterprise posted on their website: STAR TREK'S LAST EPISODE. Final Frontier by Gregg Easterbrook Only at TNR Online | Post date 05.10.05 On Friday night, UPN will broadcast the finale of "Star Trek Enterprise." After five series totaling 624 hours worth of television, plus 10 theatrical-release movies, the Star Trek universe is closing for business. Of course, in sci-fi no one ever stays dead! But officially at least, as of Friday, Star Trek will be over. On an exclusive basis, TNR Online has obtained the script of the last episode, titled "The Finale Frontier." * Enterprise is seen coursing along at warp speed, blurry stars in the distance. Alarms sound. MAYWEATHER. Sir, in the incredible vastness of the galaxy, which is 1018 kilometers across and 99.999999 percent void, we have once again found ourselves directly in the path of another ship. ARCHER. Red alert. (Huge, ominous spaceship is shown approaching.) SATO. They're broadcasting a coded warning. It translates as, "We're on patrol in this sector, you got a problem with that?" REED. They're firing! (Ship shakes. Everyone is thrown from side to side, electrical fires break out.) ARCHER. How come whenever a Star Trek ship is hit on the outside, electrical fires start on the bridge, all the way inside? MAYWEATHER. Weapons are offline. Warp engines are inoperative. ARCHER. Everything's failed already! Usually this doesn't happen until after the first commercial break. And where's T'Pol? T'POL. (Rushes in.) Sorry. I had to finish spraying my outfit on. ARCHER. (To intercom.) Archer to engineering. Trip, I need power! TUCKER. The EPS conduit injector relays are inverted! The plasma confinement chamber has gone hypercritical! I'll need to decompensate the neutrino flux generators and reinitialize the photonic transduction bypass coils! (He pushes two buttons.) Okay, power is restored. MAYWEATHER. Hull breech on deck eight. ARCHER. Compensate! T'POL. One would think that a twenty-second-century faster-than-light starship would be designed such that, if the hull were about to shatter, the captain would not have to say, "Compensate." One would think automatic systems would compensate. ARCHER. Not if the captains' union has any say in the matter. SATO. They're hailing us. ALIEN. I am Proconsul Drek of the Nylons. You have violated Nylon space. I must destroy you--unless you let me board your ship and perform the traditional Nylon wrist-slapping ceremony. ARCHER. He's a sinister, hostile alien whom we know absolutely nothing about. Let him board. PROCOUNSEL DREK. I'd also like to bring samples of the fine cosmetics I sell as part of a multilevel marketing deal with the Gorn. You can make 10,000 credits a month in your spare time! Suddenly a mysterious figure materializes in a swirl of energy at the center of the bridge. REED. Security alert! MYSTERIOUS FIGURE. Don't shoot! I am Claudia-James abdul-Wasserstein-Singh, a Star Trek producer from the year 2063. I've traveled backward in time to warn you not to cancel "Star Trek Enterprise." T'POL. The Vulcan Science Directorate has determined that time travel is impossible. ABDUL-WASSERSTEIN-SINGH. Without time travel we would have run out of plots years ago! Listen, here is my warning. In the year 2063, the last independently produced holographic show is "Star Trek: the Nth Generation." But if your Star Trek is cancelled, then mine will cease to exist, and Rupert Murdoch will take over all of television! SATO. Murdoch's still alive? ABDUL-WASSERSTEIN-SINGH. You don't know about the Mandatory Cloning Act of 2016 because it hasn't happened yet. In my era, Murdoch's Fox Mega-Net has taken over everything. Star Trek shows are the last holdouts of liberty and idealism in entertainment. You've got to keep "Star Trek Enterprise" from being cancelled. ARCHER. Wait, if we don't alter the timeline by saving the show, wouldn't you cease to exist? ABDUL-WASSERSTEIN-SINGH. (Body begins to fade.) Oh no! It's happening! I'm ceasing to exist! Jonathan Archer, you must save the future! (Vanishes.) INTERCOM. Proconsul Drek of the Nylons just beamed aboard. MAYWEATHER. I've lost helm control! Someone's taken over the ship! INTERCOM. This is Security. As soon as Drek came on board he pushed a bunch of buttons real fast, and he's taken over the ship. (Pause.) He's also got some nice eye creams for sale at reasonable prices. ARCHER. How come every alien who boards this ship can instantly take it over just by pushing a bunch of buttons on any console? T'POL. Perhaps he looked at the brochure, Helpful Hints for Seizing Starfleet Vessels, that's on the rack in the reception lobby. ARCHER. Here's what we'll do. We'll organize an incredibly dangerous away mission in which our shuttlepod flies directly into a trap. As captain and the only irreplaceable person on board, I, of course, will lead the away mission. But I'll take along a crewmember who's never been seen in any previous episode. That guy will get killed, then you can mount a rescue mission for me that includes lots of kickboxing and small-arms fire. T'POL. Excellent plan, captain. MAYWEATHER. Drek is putting us on a new course, for the Formaggio Nebula. REED. No ship has ever returned from the Formaggio Nebula! It's sort of a galactic fondue pot of doom. ARCHER. T'Pol, get down to Engineering and help Trip take back control of the ship. You'll have to re-route the synchronic amplifiers, interphase the tachyon coupling buffers, and reverse the polarity on the impulse manifolds. T'POL. Yes captain! Scene shifts to Engineering. TUCKER. So the ship is about to be destroyed again. That makes it time for some emotionally charged romantic banter. T'POL. Commander, if you and I are to complete the telepathic spiritual link, we must first engage in the ancient Vulcan mating ritual known as pon pornn. Literally this means "hot S&M." The ritual lasts many hours. TUCKER. We'd better start right away, before they cancel the show! (They hurry to T'Pol's cabin.) Scene shifts back to bridge. ARCHER. Target all weapons! Fire! REED. Fire at what? ARCHER. Whatever. I just really like to say, "Fire!" It's my best line. MAYWEATHER. Captain, a temporal anomaly is forming directly in front of the ship. Several large starcruisers are emerging. SATO. Their call signs are NCC-1701--the Enterprise of Captain James Kirk. And NCC-1701D--the Enterprise of Captain Jean-Luc Picard. And NCC-74656--the Voyager of Captain Katherine Janeway. And NX-74205--the Defiant of Captain Benjamin Sisko. ARCHER. All the ships of all the other shows are converging on this point! It's got to have something to do with syndication rights. SECURITY. Captains Kirk, Sisko, Janeway, and Picard have just beamed aboard, along with Spock, Data, Worf, Tuvok, Jadzia, Seven of Nine, Yeoman Janice, and a really annoying Ferengi. ARCHER. Kirk! I'll never get a word in edgewise. (To intercom.) Have the captains and Spock meet me in my quarters. Tell the others it's an emergency--they need to crawl through long, cramped, narrow tubes and push a bunch of buttons. They'll know what to do. REED. Why are all the important buttons on Starfleet ships at the end of long, cramped, narrow tubes? ARCHER. To protect us from takeover by claustrophobic aliens! Scene shifts to Archer's quarters. KIRK. This is about the human dream, the dream of tomorrow coming after today, the dream of standing atop a hill built of dreams and shouting for all to hear that we are what we dreamed we could become when we began to dream. Do you understand what I'm trying to say? ALL OTHERS. No. PICARD. We are here because there is a threat to the cosmos itself. At the beginning of the very first Star Trek show, the narrator split an infinitive. The split infinitive has since become unstable in a parallel universe and threatens to become an infinitely split infinitive. If this happens, reality as we know it will disappear in a blur of special effects. ARCHER. What can we do? SISKO. Someone must travel backward in time and prevent the narrator of the first Star Trek episode from saying, "To boldly go where no man has gone before." He must say instead, "Boldly to go where no man has gone before." Only then can the cosmos be preserved. ARCHER. But if we alter the timeline, there could be unintended changes in the course of history! SPOCK. Logically, we have no choice. And I say "logically" because whenever I say this, people assume I must be right. Scene shifts to the bridge. ARCHER. It was very brave of that crewman we'd never seen in any previous episode to volunteer to travel backward in time and prevent the split infinitive. SPOCK. According to my calculations, the timeline should be changing--right now. (Everything shimmers for a moment.) ARCHER. The infinitely split infinitive, is it gone? SPOCK. (Looking at tricorder.) Yes. The mission was a success. Elevator door opens and T'Pol enters, dressed only in a string bikini and spike heels. ARCHER. Wow T'Pol, you look fabulous in that swimsuit! But what's the special occasion? T'POL. Special occasion? I do not know what you mean. All attractive Vulcan females are forbidden to wear anything but string bikinis and spike heels. This has been Vulcan law for centuries. MAYWEATHER. Captain, I'm scanning the logs. She's right, she's never worn anything but a bikini on the ship. SPOCK. This must be a consequence of altering the timeline. History was subtly changed in some way that caused Vulcan females to adopt highly provocative dress. MAYWEATHER. Captain, that's not all that's changed. "Star Trek Enterprise" is now the number-one rated television show in the United States! T'Pol's scenes are extremely popular with the 18-to-34 male demographic that advertisers want to reach. SPOCK. Logically, considering her figure and your ratings problems, it is amazing the producers did not disrobe this actress long ago. After all, it's science fiction. You can assume anything you want about what standards of dress and norms of personal appearance might be in the future. The original Star Treks of the 1960s had all the women in micro-mini skirts. Apparently to save the show, what you needed was to rediscover its roots. ARCHER. We did it! The franchise is rescued--the Star Trek voyages can continue! KIRK. I'm disappointed I did not get to engage in a fist fight to save the universe. JANEWAY. All we need now is a great closing line. Something about adventure, indomitable spirit, and the endless quest for the unknown. SISKO. I'll do the final line! (Clears throat.) Thataway, Mr. Mayweather (gestures outward), and don't look back. PICARD. I'll do the final line! (Clears throat.) Full power, Rudolph. Up, up, and away! JANEWAY. I'll do the final line! (Clears throat.) Happy trails to you, until we meet again! ARCHER. I'll do the final line! (Clears throat.) Out there, my friends, out there among the stars, are unlimited residuals! T'POL. There's just one thing I don't understand. ARCHER. Just one thing? T'POL. The Star Trek producer from the future ceased to exist. Doesn't this mean that we failed to save the show, and this had already happened from the standpoint of the future? KIRK. (Oblivious.) I'll do the final line! (Clears throat.) Now it is time to boldly go... ALL OTHERS. No! SPOCK. (Looks at tricorder.) The infinitely split infinitive has finished forming. The Star Trek universe will now disappear. (Makes the Vulcan hand gesture.) Live long, and perspire. (Everything disappears in a blur of special effects.) End of series. Tune in next fall for the premiere of the new show, "Star Trek: CSI." Gregg Easterbrook is a senior editor at TNR and a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution.

Mild T&A has been a part of Trek since the beginning, thanks to Gene Rodenberry. I hope I'm not the only person on the forum who has seen the Gene Rodenberry-directed soft-core film Pretty Maids All in a Row. Raise your hands, Rock Hudson fans!

Harbinger introduces us to the Sphere builders, which will come up quite a bit in the last few episodes of the arc. You should NOT skip this episode if you're goal is to put together the essential episodes in the Xindi arc. I thought of a couple more which are iffy. 3X05 Impulse doesn't have much to do with Xindi, but it is referenced a lot in later episodes and is part of T'Pol's character development. 3X08 Twilight is an alternate timeline episode, so it is not crucial to the story per se, but it does tell us what the Xindi would do if Enterprise fails its mission. I think it would be a mistake to miss these. I don't really understand the original question though. Does your ISP charge for bandwith by the GB or something? Don't you pay a monthly fee for unlimited web access?

Isaac Asimov has a lot more out there that is worth reading. But I don't know how much is available in other languages. If anything, you should be able to find a few of his Robot books, such as the Caves of Steel and the Naked Sun. I think there are ultimately 6 or 7 Foundation Books, 5 Robot novels, 3 Galactive Empire novels, and the Gods Themselves which tie together in a very interesting way. Nemesis is a good stand-alone novel by Asimov. Look for Timescape by Gregory Benford. It will explain why Star Trek's treatment of Time is way out of step with modern cosmology.

It may not seem like it, but every episode from season 3 has some bearing on the Xindi arc except 3X09 North Star. I think this episode should be called "Hell Comes to Scagg Town" instead, but that's just me. You could potentially skip 3X06 Exile. It was really a terrible episode, and basically all you need to know is that an alien with telepathic powers tried to seduce Hoshi because she has a rare mind. Yada yada yada Hoshi didn't want to be his soul mate, she threatened to break his precious Faberge egg, and he gave her the location of a Xindi base for wasting her time. Even 3X10 Similitude and 3X12 Chosen Realm, which barely involve any Xindi action, fill in bits about Trip and T'Pol and about the Spheres. But if you really really really wanted to cut some episodes then these could go. But Similitude is a really good stand-alone episode. It actually explores an interesting science fiction concept, which has been rare with Enterprise, and does so with a sense of tragedy.

I know an obese Mennonite woman who looooves SG-1. Richard Dean Anderson gets her wetter than Jesus Christ himself. SG-1 might very well be a good sci-fi show, but I can not watch lest my mind be drawn into unwanted thoughts regarding the sublimated sexual urges of a fat, homely Pennsylvania Dutch lady. I just thought you might like to know that, ssarbyug50.

The dude's name is actually Erik Jendresen. You'll find some credits on IMdB, probably also with author search on Amazon books. He still seems like a nobody. You can't trust Berman, Braga, &c. to do anything right. Even picking a writer. I hope they don't let Jonathan Frakes direct again. Furthermore, I am sick of time travel on Trek. After all the pointless eps of Voyager & Enterprise where something happens in an alternate timeline which is eventually averted thus saving "our" timeline, I will throw feces at the movie screen like a goddamn ape if I have to deal with that in the next movie. Three sucky movies in a row is beyond the pale.

I'm really not worthy of the rank of ensign. I should be a yeoman. And I deserve to be demoted to crewman for suggesting Tasha Yar....try not to vomit, cuz it gets worse....and Guinan with her hundreds of years of experience....after all, she and Picard had a very special relationship....

Since every other chick who's not hideous has been mentioned.... What about that chick from Doogie Howser, M.D., who was into Giordi? You know, the one Giordi finally hooks up with after that glowing dude magically gave him a set of balls. And how about the engineering chick who wouldn't shut up and spilled her coffee all over Capt. Picard's unitard? And the chick who thought Data was the perfect man-bot..... And the Beijoran ensign on TNG who was in the shooting the moon plasma explosion scandal with W*s Cr***r at the Academy, and was eventually sent to her death among Kardassians by Picard in that junior officers episode..... And my personal choice: The Vulcan medical officer from the episode where the terminally ill Dr. Graves dowloads his consciousness into Data. Great eyebrows!