I had a most startling dream. You were trying to to tell me something.

I was gonna write some deeply insightful plea for continued exploration of space on the anniversary of Apollo, but instead let me just lament that I didn't make it to Trek in the Park this weekend and don't look to have the time next weekend as we're off to the coast to go camping.

I've read mostly good reviews for Atomic Theater's live reenactment of the Star Trek episode "Amok Time" with only one dissenting jerk bitching that Portland "tries to hard too be weird." It's not that Portland is trying too hard, it's that the rest of y'alls cities aren't trying hard enough. Put your backs into it guys!

For the record: I'm pro-space. To be more precise I'm pro-manned exploration of space. They're all sorts of reasons for this but mostly it stems from my humanism. I believe that man needs challenges (science/ exploration) or he makes up challenges of his own to occupy his time (war.)

One of the most deeply moving things I've ever read was a piece Carl Sagan wrote in Parade magazine during the height of the cold war. He passionately laid out the case for a joint mission to mars with the then USSR. I would like to see the same industry we apply to fighting wars to feeding the people on this planet, curing all of the horrible diseases that plague us, saving the environment and exploring the unknown instead. That's the dream that makes me smile.

Here are some wonderful stories of where people were on the date we landed on the moon written by famous science fiction writers. What humans imagine they can eventually do. Let's do a little more imagining of a world that looks like Star Trek and a little less blowing shit up.

Dean

Also- RIP Walter Cronkite.

Dammit Spock I'm a doctor not a physicist!

I'm going to write up a short, spoiler-free review of "Star Trek" which my oldest and I were lucky enough to see yesterday at a local critic's screening.

Let's tackle the two big questions right out of the gate. Was the movie any good and was the movie true to the Trek universe that's built up over the last forty years?

The answer to the first question from myself and my daughter is an empathetic "hell yeah, this movie rocks!" This is everything a summer movie should be (action, humor) and more. That "more" is actually character development and personal stakes for each of the principles, which is a rarity is big studio pictures these days.

It was almost shocking to see these real dramatic stakes in a film like this, where Paramount studios has so much riding on the revival of this golden franchise. The safer road would have been to ignore the characters and hope you can fake out the audience by drowning the film in action. To his credit that's not the road JJ Abrams takes here. I've read chatter on movie boards that compare this movie to last summer's "Iron Man" to that extent. It does sort of have that Iron Man vibe where it's a lot "meatier" of a film than you expect.

As to whether the movie is true to the Trek universe, well, you're just going to have to decide for yourself. This is not the Battlestar Galactica-style re-imagining/ reboot of Star Trek that people have been talking about. It's difficult to describe what this is, but it's more along the lines of some sort of surreal dream featuring characters those of us who loved the original Trek are probably a little more than a little familiar with than we should be.

A friend who I love recently shared his dread that this movie would be bad to the feeling he got from "Phantom Menace." After seeing this film I'd say this was a light years better film but I do think there is something that can be gleaned from comparing the two franchises. One of the worst sins of many that Lucas committed with the prequel triology in my estimation was that he took a universe that was as expansive as your imagination, full of limitless possibility and shrunk it down to only a few planets and a few characters who implausibly crossed paths again and again. Lucas made his fictional universe smaller.

The thing I love about this movie is it takes the Star Trek universe, a universe which had become calcified over the last couple of decades, and expands it once again. The stories that can take place after this film are as limitless as the imagination. I love Trek, but Trek canon is choking the universe to death. JJ Abrams and his writers have revived Gene Roddenberry's Trek so that it can breathe again.

And make no mistake about it - Gene Roddenberry's spirit is intertwined through this movie. His optimism, his characters, his humanism and his vision of a future where we can solve problems through sheer force of will are all here. The body may look different but the heart is the same.



Foremost among these are the relationship between Chris Pine's Captain Kirk and Zachary Quinto's Spock. Getting this relationship right was probably the most difficult challenge Abrams and company faced. Besides the original show there have been thousands of books, short stories and even slash fiction written about this friendship.



I'm happy to say that they don't only get this relationship right but every other character from the classic series. I expected to like Simon Pegg's Scotty going into the film but was surprised at how much I also enjoyed Anton Yelchin's Chekov and Karl Urban's McCoy (the latter seemed to be channelling DeForest Kelley.) Leanord Nimoy is wonderful, of course.

My biggest criticism of the movie: I hate the new interiors of the new Enterprise. The bridge is ridiculous, especially the touch screen wall computers behind the Captain's chair. It's not a good thing that the bridge reminds me of "Galaxy Quest," even though that movie in itself is wonderful.

Most of all I despise the new engine room with all it's pipes, cooling tanks and gauges. Tell me if you don't feel like they shot these scenes in a brewery. There's a horrible low-budget film called "Space Mutiny" which Mystery Science Theater tore apart a few years back that utilized an abandoned factory doubling as the engine room of a big ship in space. I couldn't get that movie out of my head every time they showed the engine room.

One other minor problem I had with the film was the score. It was probably better than average for an action movie but one thing it didn't do was utilize all of that wonderful music written for the original series by Alexander Courage and other composers. How cool would it have been if that fight music from the show worked it's way into a fist fight, or the weird Vulcan tune played when they showed that planet? The theme music from the series isn't the only memorable tune.

But in the end these are minor quibbles because Abrams gets the characters so right. I can forgive a goofy looking engine room set if it's got a believable Scotty standing in it yelling "I'm giv'n it all she's got, captain!" I can't wait to see this movie again and hope that sequels will be coming. Star Trek is back. It's been away too long.

But, Aquaman, you cannot marry a woman without gills. You're from two different worlds... Oh, I've wasted my life.

I was going to post this over at Atomic Romance but I don't think it would be appropriate to bump the somewhat somber post Swiney put up this morning. Head over there if you have a second and let him know you're thinking about him and his sick son.

Just a reminder that tomorrow is Free Comic Book Day. If you have a comic shop in your neighborhood they're most likely participating. It means exactly what it says: they're giving away a bunch of free comics created specifically for this yearly event.

If you have kids who like comics even a little bit I'd encourage you to participate in this. You can't beat the price and it's a lot of fun. Many shops have local artists come out to talk about their work and sign autographs.

I'm going going to be hitting a couple of shops myself but only after my oldest daughter and I watch the special screening of Star Trek I won tickets for last week. I don't mean to rub it in but I get to see the movie before everyone else except Steve, who already saw a screener and said it was good.

When I get to Free Comic Book Day I'm going to grab an issue of this free book...



Doesn't that look fun?

So, to sum up-- keep Swinebread in your thoughts, go to Free Comic Book Day by any means necessary and I'm seeing Star Trek before the rest of you rubes, not that I'm bragging about it or anything. This will be absolutely the last you'll hear from me on Star Trek other than the little review I'll write up this weekend which will be no tribble at all.

Sorry.

Live long and prosper.

Sorry.

Dean

Certainly, in the topsy-turvy world of heavy rock, having a good solid piece of wood in your hand is often useful.

Okay, I'll come out and say it even though it may force Randal to bitch-slap me into tomorrow: I don't like death metal very much.

Even though I feel cut a pretty broad swath of musical interest, I just can't get into death metal no matter how hard I try. I'd like to believe that at it's heart this stems from the fact that I'm really not that angry of a person. I guess it comes down to different strokes, or in this case different guttural screaming, for different folks. One man's amazing shredding on the guitar is another man's bleeding ears.

So you'll understand my dilemma when I heard that a local radio station was having a promotion to win a pair of tickets to a an advanced screening of the new Star Trek movie that I've been itching to see with the only catch being you had to sit through a free concert by the Klingon death metal band Stovokor.

These guys--

Since it was literally just a few blocks from my workplace I decided to swallow hard and head off to the concert. So I tossed on an a red shirt after work and bopped up to the show.

I'm really glad I did. A persistent theme in my life has been me fighting through my reluctance to do something to be rewarded by finding out I enjoyed the hell out of whatever that thing was. This stretches from listening to new types of music, to trying new foods to sex.

I'm not saying I'm now a death metal fan but there was something about these guys loopy personalities and their on stage Klingon characters (which they never break) that was incredibly appealling. The guys in this band were having fun and this came through in the music, as angry and guttural as it sounded to those of us who don't speak Klingon. Yes; they sing every song in Klingon.

There was also something great about watching a room full of people in Star Trek costumes head-banging in time to the Klingon musical assault taking place up on stage. There was a Trek highlight reel playing behind them that showed scenes all the way from the original show to the movies spoofs from shows like Robot Chicken.

In between songs the band members would mock the crowd, promising us that we would have the honor of working in the mines once the Klingons took over the planet. A guy behind me shouting something about Praxis (an inside Trek comment) and the band immediately went into a faux memorial thing.

Bottom line: I had a great time last night. Stovokor is a fun band well worth seeing if you get the chance. Here's a couple of pix I took with the cell phone. Sorry they're a bit blurry.

UPDATE- Wil in the comments has another take on last night's show as well as some fantastic photos he took of the band.

(The tickets to the movie? Yep. I got 'em. I'm seeing it a week before it opens. Moohahaha!)

Kirk! Kirk, you're still alive, my old friend.

As a fan of Shatner era Star Trek and someone who is excited to see the pending remake by J.J. Abrams and someone who dreams of owning a franchise of the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema I have to say I'm jealous as hell at what happened last night in Austin.

Fans were invited to a screening of what many consider to be the best Trek film- "Star Trek II The Wrath of Khan." They were told they would also get to see ten minutes of the new film.

Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman who wrote the new movie get up to introduce Khan and the movie starts. About 10 minutes in while Kirk is waxing poetic about getting old, scratches start to appear in the image, the image burns through and the house lights come up.

A guy in trench coat and hat walks up on stage and it turns out to be Leonard Nimoy in disguise. He introduces the new movie on the unsuspecting fans, who then get to see the whole damned things. Lucky bastards.

For the record- reaction to the film seems to be almost universally positive. I can't wait to see this thing.

I think you're right. I will have a drink.

During an evening of real joy (and some drinking) in our house last night I sat down and wrote the following post. I was planning on posting the recipe for the drink I'd assembled, which is why I took the pictures. I just wasn't planning on doing it while still under the influence of that drink.

Rather than clean it up I thought I'd share it in it's raw form.

____________________________________________________

As of Sunday Ms. Wormer and I will have been married 17 years. That's 16.9 years of wedded bliss to those of you keeping score.

For shits and gigglles I thought it would be fun if we shared a drink from the now defunct Vegas "Star Trek the Experience" called a "Warp Core Breach." Here's a pic of said drink:



We had a kickass time in Vegas a couple of years ago drinking those and flipping the Ferengi and Klingon guys that walked through Quark's bar shit, questioning their masculinity and some such.

but the Star Trek Experience is no more and finding the ingredients to this drink turned out to be more problematic than I thought it would.

(Berfore I type anymore I think it's a good idea to say that at this point I'm very, very drunk. A wise man said"never post drunk." I kicked the shit out of that man.)

Eventually I vfound the recipe for the drink at a website where the guy swore up and down he'd abartended at Quark's. Consider this my version of "cooking with Dr. Monkerstein."

Here's the ingredients:

White rum
Dark rum
Bacardi Limon
pice rum (cpt. morgans or some such) 151 rum- doesn matter. It's all good.
Dekuyper Lucious Rasberry Rush.
Dry ice.
orange juice, pineapple juice, cranberry juice.


Get a big bowl and mix 6 parts white rum, 4 parts limon rum, 2 parts dark rum, 2 parts spice rum and 2 parts spice rum. Then add two parts Dekuptypr rasberry rush and 1 part 151.

Then mix equal parts pineapple, cranberry and orange juice into the rink. Pour over ice and add a bit of dry ice so it bubbles.

(dry ice)



(Tghe reason I'm babbling incoherently at the momemnt. Finished drink.)

Anyhoo tomorrow we're going to dim sum to celebrate our anniversayr. I really do love her, you know.

Live long and prosper.
Dean

Logic is little tweeting bird chirping in meadow. Logic is wreath of pretty flowers that smell bad.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Go Animate just added a flash feature where you can make a Star Trek cartoon. Here's what I threw together trying to include as many of my blogger friends as I could.

The tool is pretty cool but it won't let you add anything that looks like a swear word ("class" or "ubermilf".) Do you have any idea how hard it is to do a Randal Graves character without swearing?

Also- I didn't have time to add everybody but a big Valentine's Day hug to everybody. Oh, Snabalus- you were going to be Chief Engineer Montgomery Snabby but I didn't do an engine room scene. Maybe if I continue the story...

GoAnimate.com: Blogger Trek


Like it? Create your own at GoAnimate.com. It's free and fun!

No. No, you can't get away. From hell's heart, I stab at thee. For hate's sake, I spit my last breath at thee.

Farewell to Ricardo Montalban who leaves at the age of 88.

He was one of those old-school actors who conveyed gravity just by the timber of his voice. I hope they find him a nice casket lined with fine, Corinthean leather.

The men from Vulcan treat their women strangely. At least, people say that.

R.I.P. to Star Trek's Majel Barrett-Roddenberry (Nurse Chapel) who died yesterday from Leukemia. She'd had something to do with practically every Star Trek incarnation, including the new movie in which she was to be the voice of the Enterprise's computer.

Trek will never be the same without her.

Change is the essential process of all existence.

I've mentioned many times on this blog that I'm a Trekkie - a fan of the original Star Trek television show. I've loved Trek since I was a kid, but really didn't grow to appreciate it until I got older. At some point I realized that my politics and the liberal, Kennedyesque politics of the show segued.

I've often wondered if that television show, along with my progressive Catholic upbringing, actually shaped the basis of the political beliefs I've taken into adulthood. If not then they at least had some influence.

To me Star Trek doesn't just represent sci-fi action, technobabble and the occasional bad acting. There's an optimism that runs through Trek, at least the Trek inspired directly by Gene Roddenberry if not the later television series(*), that presents us a picture of the future in which the superficial is immaterial.

I've been thinking about this as the reverberations of Proposition 8 continue to move through our political landscape. One doesn't need to believe that man will be able to dematerialize one place and appear somewhere else or fly through space in giant ships named after famous nautical vessels to believe that progress is inevitable. The future will be better for all of us regardless of race, religious belief, gender, sexual orientation or whatever else separates us.

Just to highlight my point I'd like to share a few quotes highlighting the "vision" of Star Trek. Here's an old interview with Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry given shortly before he died--

"As you know, one of the joys of Star Trek, for me, has been the variety of our fans. When I go to conventions and I see people of all sizes and shapes and abilities, and when I see people with nerve disorders that can’t really sit properly and so on, I still know what’s in their mind. They are saying, “In a better world, I can do anything. I’ll be there in a better world. In a better world, they will not laugh at me or look down their nose at me.”

I used to speak at colleges a lot because it was what kept me alive and paid the mortgage in the days when Star Trek was considered a gigantic failure. I have met some of these people. I remember one night someone called me over and said, “Can you possibly talk to this man?” And here was a fellow with some kind of nerve disorder who had an electronic box, he couldn’t speak, and by hitting the box, he could make halfway intelligible sounds. He could only make grunting-like noises. And finally I began to understand what he was saying and he was asking me why I did a certain thing in a certain show, and why I had invented somebody who had something of his disorder. I said to him, “Someday when we become wise, we won’t look at those things. We will look at communication and knowledge, etc.” And I saw his hand rise up with great determination and he said loudly and clearly, “Yes!!” Those are the high moments in my life."

Here's a bit of a speech Gene's son Rod Roddenberry gave this week--

“The idea of tolerance of something I’ve heard about for a long time,” Roddenberry said. “I’ve always had a problem with that word.

“Star Trek was so far beyond tolerance. I feel like I’m talking to the choir. It goes to acceptance. Enjoying the fact that there are different ideas.

“The different ideas that we all have are what makes life interesting. ...Don’t be afraid of different beliefs. Go up to that person and have an intelligent conversation with them. That’s how we’ll evolve into the Star Trek future.”

Finally here's bit of wonderful speech actor Wil Wheaton gave a couple of years ago as Gene Roddenberry was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in Seattle--

"Like all great science fiction, it held up a mirror and showed us our failings and triumphs – not by beating us over the head with a message, but by making that message easy enough to discover for those who cared to see it. Star Trek dared to do this during an incredibly turbulent time, when it was risky to even acknowledge that the mirror existed, much less hold it up on network television.

It has been more than forty years since Kirk and Spock first boldly went where no man has gone before, and twenty years since Picard and some kid boldly went where no one has gone before.

Today, many of us still dream of living in the Utopian world Gene envisioned, where we play in holodecks, beam ourselves to work, and embrace the crazy notion that race, gender, religion, and sexual orientation are differences to be celebrated and learned from, not feared and destroyed."

Roddenberry wasn't blind. He knew the world was an ugly place. In the interview linked above he was asked if he had any heroes. Here's part of his response--

But I have less of that collection of heroes than an overwhelming affection for humanity. I think the human race is just a fascinating creature. I think we are so wonderful they should build statues to us. (Laughter) The things we are able to do are just marvelous. I know that humans, even today, capture and torture people and commit war and all of that. But that’s because they are still children and children are violent. But I refuse to think any other way about the human race but that they are beautiful children. They will, in the end, persevere.

Isn't that a wonderful way to think of humanity?

(* including some of the movies. Some of my friends are worried about the new film because of the young actors, JJ Abrams, etc. Is long as it has Roddenberry's sense of optimism I'm in.)

People are being duplicated. And once it happens to you, you're part of this... thing. It almost happened to me!

Pics from the new Trek movie. Finally.

Nerd stuff to follow...

I'm liking Sylar/ Spock.

Not sure what to think of the new bridge.

McCoy is standing like McCoy did on the show. Cool.

I'm sweating like a bridegroom.

As a fan of Star Trek and an admirer of George Takei in particular (he has a very interesting life story and always speaks his mind) I just wanted to say how happy I am for him on his wedding this week to his longtime partner Brad Altman.

I'm going to risk conflating real life with fiction here but I think that in this case it will be okay since Takei has never run away from his association with Trek, in fact he's always spoke of it proudly. Star Trek means cardboard sets and bad acting to a good portion of the population and I won't argue that. I readily admit it's cheesy to it's core.

But Star Trek - specifically the future imagined by Gene Rodenberry some forty years ago now - has also always presented a kind of society that I as a progressive wished we lived in. There is no racism, sexism or prejudice against homosexuals in that fictional future. Takei understood what Trek represented from the start which is why he didn't try and run away from the show like Shatner and Nimoy did.

So congratulations Mr. Takei on your wedding. In the larger sense it was a step towards a better, more equatable society. For that I thank you.

(Takei with spouse Altman, Maid of Honor Nichelle Nichols and Best Man Walter Koenig)

I checked the engines. The warp drive, that's a hopeless pile of junk.

He warned them he couldn't push the engines any harder but they "dinna listen."

Scotty's atoms scattered in spaceship explosion.

If only he'd saved himself by putting himself in an endless transporter loop with pattern enhancers so there'd be no signal degradation...

Ahem.

(bop myself on head to end nerd loop)

How about that Brett Favre coming out of retirement?

What you want is irrelevant, what you have chosen is at hand.

R.I.P. Randy Pausch.

You got me with the head fake in your last lecture. What a legacy to leave your kids!

One of Pausch's dreams was to be Captain Kirk. As the next best JJ Abrams gave him a small part in the Star Trek movie coming out next year. I'll be the strange guy in the theater cheering by myself when he comes on screen.

They're asking if we want to beam up.

Warning somewhat nerdy, Star Trek themed post to follow--

As a fan of the old show I would be remiss if I didn't point out we lost a bunch of people dedicated to that great series just in the last week.

Joseph Pevney directed many of the best episodes of the original series including what is considered the best episode by most fans: "The City on the Edge of Forever." He also directed my personal favorite episode: "The Trouble with Tribbles."

In an odd coincidence I used to know his son, and regularly peppered him for any memories he had of his dad's work on the series. He had a funny story about William Shatner coming over to his house in a convertible corvette with his two dobermans. Shatners dobermans would just sit perfectly still in the backseat of that car while he met with Pevney.

Robert Justman was a producer on both Star Trek and Star Trek the Next Generation. His son said of all the Trek related deaths last week "There seems to be a big 'Star Trek' convention and everyone is going," he said. "Everyone is getting beamed up."

Finally I would say the biggest/ saddest loss is the death of composer Alexander Courage. Courage wrote the iconic theme song to the original series. He is also the victim of one of the cheapest acts of Gene Rodenberry's tenure on the show as Rodenberry effectively stole half the royalties for the song by writing lyrics.



Goodbye to all. It sounds like they lived long, and prospered.

Listen, you hear it? - - Carpe - - hear it? - - Carpe, carpe diem, seize the day boys, make your lives extraordinary.

If you knew you had six months to live and could give one speech summing-up your life and communicating your values to your kids what would you say? Would you talk about your regrets? Your grudges? Your accomplishments? Your childhood dreams?

This was the question 46 year old Carnegie Mellon computer science professor Randy Pausch was faced with and his answer is nothing short of inspirational.

I've linked the speech below but I'd like to warn you - it's almost two hours long. If you have the time it's well worth watching. You can skip the introductions by the first two people until you get to Randy.

(For the record I became aware of this story because J.J. Abrams just helped Randy accomplish one of his childhood dreams by giving him a small part in the Star Trek film shooting now. )

Randy Pausch's Farewell Speech.

I saw it! It's alive! It's huge!

Okay-

Star Trek Trailer - Short and sweet. Some people actually booed. Not a good sign for Abrams. He's going to have an uphill battle bringing respectability back to the franchise. Not worth the price of admission. However...

Cloverfield (No Spoilers) - The best two words I can think of to describe this movie are "fucking fun." It's been a long time since I've had this good of a time at the movies. I've tried to stay away from too much information as far as the flick is concerned by I did read a review that described it as a "roller coaster ride." I think that's a perfect way to describe the movie. Periods of tension interupted by terror.

It's also the perfect antidote to the bloody schlockfests that pretty much define horror these days. Not much blood but plenty of scares.

(Oh, and the monster wasn't the Stay-Puft man.)

J.J. Abrams - well done, sir.

They'd be no tribble at all.

Scenes you'd forgotten (or wish you had) Part 4: Scotty is One Sick Puppy.

In the classic Star Trek episode "The Trouble With Tribbles" Captain Kirk returns to the bridge at the end of the episode to find all the cute, furry tribbles are gone.

As the rest of the crew evade Kirk's inquiries into what happened to the tribbles Scotty finally admits that he beamed the "whole kit n'kaboodle" over to the Klingon Engine Room right before the Klingons take-off.

Captain Kirk, or should I say "Captain Jerk," and the rest of the bridge crew have a HUGE laugh at this without anyone stopping to ask what will happen to a bunch of furry, defenseless critters sent onto a ship crewed by the most murderously vicious aliens in the galaxy who happen, by the way, to hate cute, cuddly tribbles most of all.

I'll tell you what happened. The Klingons went on a murderous bender. They slaughtered the tribbles en masse. They ate the Tribbles alive, played Klingon foosball with them and generally made a huge mess composed of blood, tribble bits and fur.

Scotty's no hero. He's the man responsible for the Tribblecaust.

(A Klingon Engineer "cleans-up" a Tribble)

That sounded terrible! The tenor section was weak.

If you're a fan of the band Nerf Herder you've probably seen this video or heard this song. If not - enjoy!

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

Okay, so McCoy has been cast and it looks like the rumors about Scotty had been premature. I'm actually pretty surprised/ happy about who they got for the parts.

That's right: Simon Pegg and Karl Urban.