Star Trek

Faux Klingons

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I just heard about this through last Sunday’s ‘Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!‘ show (which I just found out is available as a podcast, since I never manage to remember to turn on the actual radio), and I think this might be the best Iraq War analogy I’ve heard yet:

One Minute Speech by Rep. David Wu, D-Oregon, 1st District, Portland:

Mr. Speaker,

Four years ago, this administration took America to war in Iraq without adequate evidence. Since that time, this administration hasn’t listened to the American people, it hasn’t listened to our professional military, and it certainly hasn’t listened to this congress.

You know, it’s said of a prominent businessman in downtown Portland that he never listened to anybody, and that if he was ever drawn in a cartoon, he would be drawn without ears. Now, this President has listened to some people: the so-called ‘Vulcans’ in the White House, the ideologues. But you know, unlike the Vulcans of Star Trek, who made their decisions based on logic and fact, these guys make it on ideology. These aren’t Vulcans! There are Klingons in the White House!

But unlike the real Klingons of Star Trek, these Klingons have never fought a battle of their own. Don’t let faux Klingons send real Americans to war. It’s wrong.

So. Very. Awesome. I love this.

Apparently, there’s a book out called Rise of the Vulcans focusing on Bush’s core advisors, who have dubbed themselves “Vulcans” after the Roman god of War. Wu just took the Vulcan thing and ran with it. In entirely the wrong direction.

Pop Culture Disconnect

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This week in my History 101 class (covering everything up to 1500), we’re looking at Ghengis Khan, Kublai Khan, and the Mongols. The professor spent a few minutes talking about the Mongol’s invasion techniques, which were simple but could be fairly ruthless: if armies surrendered they’d be treated fairly well; if they fought, they’d often be razed to the ground and completely destroyed. After summarizing this, he commented, “really, they were pretty close to the Borg.”

I chuckled, and there was a moment of quiet while he took a sip of his tea. Then one of the girls in the class slightly timidly asked, “…what’s ‘the borg’?”

Sigh. I’m getting old.

Trekommendations?

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Yes. Horrible title. Bad blogger. No donut.

Still.

As much as I enjoy Trek, I’ve never really explored the literary Trek work terribly much over the years. As it stands, my entire Trek book collection spans all of twenty volumes, only a few of which are novels.

So — any recommendations from others out there who might have explored more of the printed Trek universe? I’m always up for more additions to my “to read” stack….

Retkhan

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Khan Noonien Singh, long one of the most famous and most loved villains in the Star Trek universe, has over time presented some (extraordinarily geeky) issues to fans who know his story.

Namely, the Eugenics Wars of the 1990’s. According to Star Trek canon as established in the original series episode ‘Space Seed‘…

From 1992 to 1996, Khan was absolute ruler of more than one-quarter of Earth’s population, including regions of Asia the Middle East.

In the mid 1990s, [Khan and other genetically engineered] Augment tyrants began warring amongst themselves. Other nations joined to force them from power in a series of struggles that became known as the Eugenics Wars. Eventually, most of the tyrants were defeated and their territory re-captured, but up to 90 “supermen” were never accounted for.

Khan escaped the wars and their consequences along with 84 followers who swore to live and die at his command. He saw his best option in a risky, self-imposed exile. In 1996, he took control of a DY-100-class interplanetary sleeper ship he christened SS Botany Bay, named for the site of the Australian penal colony. Set on a course outbound from the solar system, but with no apparent destination in mind, Khan and his people remained in suspended animation for Botany Bay’s (nearly) 300-year sublight journey.

Of course, when this was all dreamed up in the 1960’s, no-one knew that Trek would survive until the mid-’90’s, let alone grow into the phenomenon that it did. Once the ’90’s rolled around, though…well, yes, as fans, we are perfectly aware that Trek is fiction. It’s just more fun when we can find ways to make the Trek universe and our universe overlap. When Trek takes place tens or hundreds of years in the future, that’s easy. Once we get to a point where we’ve moved solidly into the decades referenced in Trek with no sign of genetically engineered supermen or Eugenics Wars…well, that’s when things start to get creative.

A couple of years ago, I picked up two Trek novels by Greg Cox: The Eugenics Wars: The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh, Volume I and Volume II. Cox does an incredible job of retconning (that is, ‘retroactive continuity‘: “…the adding of new information to ‘historical’ material, or deliberately changing previously established facts in a work of serial fiction. The change itself is referred to as a ‘retcon’, and the act of writing and publishing a retcon is called ‘retconning’.”) as he merges the established Trek universe with the known recent history of the real world.

In Cox’s version of history, many of the perceived minor skirmishes and events around the world during the ’90’s, from middle-eastern conflicts to terrorist incidents were actually the public result of conflicts between the supermen as they battled with each other behind the scenes. It’s done quite well, and nicely filled in the details of Khan’s life on Earth up to his exile on the Botany Bay.

Hundreds of years later, of course, the Enterprise discovers the Botany Bay drifting in space and has their first encounter with Khan, culminating with Khan and his crew being marooned on Ceti Alpha V. Then, eighteen years later, Khan is rediscovered and eventually killed during the events of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

While long recognized as one of the best (if not the single best) Trek film, Khan left a number of unanswered questions regarding Trek continuity:

  1. Why did the Reliant not recognize that Ceti Alpha VI had exploded and that they were actually orbiting Ceti Alpha V?
  2. Why did nobody realize they were in the same system that Khan had been marooned in?
  3. Why had Khan never been checked up on, as Kirk had promised to do at the end of ‘Space Seed’?
  4. How could Khan recognize Chekov (and vice versa) when Koenig wasn’t on the show until the season after ‘Space Seed’ was filmed?
  5. What happened during Khan’s years on Ceti Alpha V?

Yesterday while on lunch and browsing the bookstore shelves, I noticed that Cox had a new Khan book out, To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh, in which he explores the eighteen years between ‘Space Seed’ and The Wrath of Khan. I’ve only read the first chapter so far, but Cox is continuing to display his ability to construct believable retcons. The majority of the book is concerned with the last of the above posed questions, telling the story of Khan’s years in exile. The first chapter, though, in addition to setting up the framing story of Kirk, Spock, McCoy and Sulu returning to Ceti Alpha V to investigate and assuage Kirk’s guilt over the deaths of his crewmen, family, and ship during the events of the second, third, and fourth Trek films, also quickly and concisely answers the first three questions.

Cox even comes up with an explanation for the fourth — though he did fail to use Koenig’s “Chekov kept Khan waiting in the restroom” idea.

Khan’s long been Trek’s best villain, and Greg Cox is doing a bang-up job of filling in the holes outside of established canon. It’s well worth picking up his books if you’re in the mood for a little Trek-based fun.

(Incidentally, consider ‘retkahn’ or ‘retkahnning’ to be my proposal for Greg Cox’s ability to flesh out Khan’s story. The word amuses me, and neither seems to show up in Google yet [retkhan, retkhanning], which actually surprised me a bit.)

On that whole TV thing…

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Most people who’ve known me for a while are aware that I’m not much of a fan of television — and actually haven’t really watched television in a long, long time. Seeing as how a couple people commented on my watching Lost, I thought it might be worth addressing this. :)

I’m really not sure when exactly I got sick of TV, but my best guess would be sometime around 1992/1993 or so I decided that it just wasn’t worth my time. Most programs didn’t have enough intelligence to keep my interest, and even when I did sit down to watch something, the insipid and insultingly stupid commercials would drive me up the wall. So I quit.

In the intervening years I’ve seen bit and pieces of shows here and there, generally when I’ve been over at friends houses. For the most part, though, I’ve relied mostly on recommendations from friends as to what shows were actually worth watching…and then I’d wait for the DVDs to start coming out. Thanks to DVD, over the last few years I’ve seen (for the first time) all of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, the first four seasons of The X-Files, and the first four seasons of The West Wing.

More recently, adding BitTorrent to my repertoire has allowed me to keep up with more recent shows. I first saw Firefly this way, I’ve been keeping up with Battlestar Galactica, Gray’s Anatomy got a few trial weeks, and I’ll soon be watching the first three episodes of Surface to see if it’s worth keeping an eye on.

So I’m not really entirely against television as a whole — in a very general sort of way, yes, I think that TV is primarily a waste of time, and most people (especially children) would be far better off finding better ways to spend their time — but I’m not entirely opposed to finding specific shows that are better written, more intelligent and/or more entertaining than most.

I’d have been quite happy sticking with BitTorrent and watching things at least a day or two behind most of the rest of the world, too, except for two things: Prairie, and Lost.

Prairie, while sharing many of my views on the majority of the shows on TV these days, has never been quite as militant about her anti-TV views as I have been over the past few years. She’s had a few shows that she’s been enjoying keeping up with, with her top three being ER, Desperate Housewives, and Lost. All during last year, she’d occasionally drop tidbits of what was going on in that week’s episode of Lost to me…and then, after getting me to admit that it sounded interesting, and determined to get me hooked, she picked up the Season 1 DVD set when it came out.

We spent the next week powering our way through all of Season 1 — and she won. I’m hooked. So, Wednesday nights are now “Lost Night” for us. Admittedly, I still grit my teeth during most of the commercials (and even the ones that are cute once or twice get extremely grating the twentieth or fiftieth time they show up), but I’m quite enjoying watching the show itself.

So I’m still primarily anti-TV, and am far happier spending my free hours either fiddling with projects on my computer, wandering around town with my camera, or getting together with friends whenever possible. For one hour each Wednesday night, though, I’ll be joining the majority of America in setting back, grabbing some munchies, and keeping up with this week’s adventures on the boob tube.

(Oh, and while I’m just not interested enough in a hospital soap opera to get sucked into ER, she just might get me hooked on Desperate Housewives if I’m not careful. The last two episodes have been pretty entertaining, I must admit….)

The Sesame Street Theme…in Klingon

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Original:

Sunny day
Sweepin’ the clouds away
On my way
to where the air is sweet.
Can you tell me how to get,
how to get to Sesame Street?

Klingon:

pem Hov jaj.
Haw’choHnIS ‘eng ‘ej Haj.
ghoch vIghaj;
‘ej pa’ muDmo’ jIbel.
chay’ Sesame He vIghoS?
SIbI’ jIHvaD ‘e’ yIDel.

Translation of the Klingon:

A day of the daytime star.
The clouds are compelled to commence fleeing, and are filled with dread.
I have a destination;
and there, because of the atmosphere, I am pleased.
Describe to me immediately
how to go to Sesame Street.

And there’s two more verses at the original location. This is so wonderful!

(via MeFi)

Top 12 Things A Klingon Programmer Would Say

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  1. Specifications are for the weak and timid!
  2. This machine is a piece of GAGH! I need dual processors if I am to do battle with this code!
  3. You cannot really appreciate Dilbert unless you’ve read it in the original Klingon.
  4. Indentation?! — I will show you how to indent when I indent your skull!
  5. What is this talk of ‘release’? Klingons do not make software ‘releases’. Our software ‘escapes’ leaving a bloody trail of designers and quality assurance people in its wake.
  6. Klingon function calls do not have ‘parameters’ — they have ‘arguments’ — and they ALWAYS WIN THEM.
  7. Debugging? Klingons do not debug. Our software does not coddle the weak.
  8. I have challenged the entire quality assurance team to a Bat-Leth contest. They will not concern us again.
  9. A TRUE Klingon Warrior does not comment his code!
  10. By filing this SCR you have challenged the honor of my family. Prepare to die!
  11. You question the worthiness of my code? I should kill you where you stand!
  12. Our users will know fear and cower before our software. Ship it! Ship it, and let them flee like the dogs they are!

Seeing as how old school programmers think like Klingon programmers, I believe that it can be reasonably assumed that all old programmers are Klingon.

(Found on /.)

Enterprise No More

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It’s sad, really — for a show meant to continue the fine tradition of boldly going where no man has gone before (or no one, in the more politically-correct TNG era), all Enterprise managed to do was boldly go where no Trek series had gone before.

Straight into the tank.

I started watching Enterprise when it debuted, gave up midway through the first season (when I discovered that first-season TNG was a far better show), then ignored it until I started hearing rumors that this last season was actually watchable. I’ve been using bittorrent to watch season four, and while it’s admittedly better than the first season…well, really, it doesn’t take much to be better than the first season.

Tonight I finished things off, watching the end of the two-part arc following the derailment of the first effort at laying the foundation for the future United Federation of Planets, then following that up with the final episode of Enterprise.

(SPOILERS follow, if you care.)

First things first: while the two episodes immediately preceding the finale were decent — though I’d hesitate to collectively rate them any better than that (individually, the first half was definitely the better of the two) — the single biggest thing that stuck in my mind after watching them?

It’s really hard to take the leader of Earth’s government seriously when you’re expecting him to at any moment suddenly morph into a giant demon snake and start munching delegates right and left.

Samuels

Nothing against actor Harry Groener, of course, but his role as Sunnydale’s Mayor Wilkins in Buffy has been so indelibly burned into my brain that it was all I could do to keep from giggling when he first appeared on screen.

As for Enterprise’s finale episode…meh. I’d say a big “meh,” except that “meh” is such an apathetic term of disgust that give it any sort of emphasis is rather oxymoronic.

First off, it wasn’t really an Enterprise episode, but rather a TNG episode with a lot of Holodeck re-enactments of events set at the end of Enterprise’s 10-year mission (six years after the last actual episodes we saw) and around the signing of the accord that forms the alliance that would eventually grow into the UFP. While it’s kind of nice to see Riker and Troi walking the corridors of NCC-1701-D again…it just doesn’t feel right as an end to this series. Rather, it comes off as last, final, desperate ploy by the Powers that Be to do anything possible to drag a few more viewers to the show.

Secondly, the TNG-era framing story for this episode is set during the events of the seventh season TNG epsiode The Pegasus. Without meaning any disrespect to either Marina Sirtis or Jonathan Frakes, it’s been around eleven years since The Pegasus was filmed, and while they’re both aging well, they’re not exactly identical to their appearance a decade ago. I could even have forgiven that for the sake of the story (though it would have been easier if the overall story was better), but apparently the makeup artists didn’t even bother to reference The Pegasus for this Enterprise episode.

Here we have a screencap (actually a composite of two screencaps) from The Pegasus:

TNG Troi and Riker

And here we have a screencap from These are the Voyages…:

ENT Troi and Riker

Minor things like the ten years of aging aren’t really terribly obvious. Marina’s face has thinned out a bit, and they’re both slightly heavier than they were during TNG’s run, but that’s not really that big of a deal. Amusingly, though, it means that Troi is actually curvier now than she was at the time (compare the shadows underneath her bust, for example), and I remember how much grumbling there was about her being little more than Trek’s version of T&A (that being Tits and an Accent). Of course, 7 of 9 and T’Pol were far more blatant about appealing to the teenage male demographic that way, but back in the TNG days, poor Troi got a lot of ribbing about being little more than eye candy.

More blatantly, though, is that the hairstyle is just wrong for both of them. Apparently when they’re not busy dealing with intragalactic incidents, the crew of NCC-1701-D spent all their free time in the hair salon. Troi is sporting a straighter, more natural hairstyle far closer to what she had in the movies than the heavily permed style of the original show, while Riker’s hair is less slicked back and comes complete with a Superman-style forelock falling across his forehead.

Nitpicking? Sure, and I’ll freely admit it. But if they’re going to not just pander to the old TNG fans by bringing back Troi and Riker, but actually place their framing story within an already existing episode, you’d think they could take a few minutes to pop the DVD in and do their best to match the actors appearances.

But then, given Enterprise’s notorious disregard for Trek canon, I suppose that this wasn’t really that much of a surprise.

Anyway. Continuing on.

Bringing Shran back for the rescue of his daughter seemed to serve two purposes only: to bring back one of the few interesting characters Enterprise has produced (and to give Jeffrey Combs — a fan favorite, and quite deservedly so, in my opinion, I’ve enjoyed all of the characters he’s played — one last star turn); and to come up with an excuse to waste half the hour on pointless “action”.

Oh, and to set up Trip’s demise…which, amazingly enough, actually comes across as even more pointless than Kirk’s death in ‘Generations’. At least when Kirk died he was trying to save his career the galaxy from a madman. Trip died so that Archer wouldn’t miss a speech. Oooh. Quite the noble sacrifice, that.

And speaking of the speech — we don’t even see it! We finally get to the historic moment when the charter establishing the alliance between Earth, Vulcan, Andoria, and Tellar Prime, Archer strides to the stage to make what we’re told is a historic speech…and Riker tells the Holodeck to “end program” and he and Troi stride out onto the corridors of the Enterprise D.

Meh.

Other random observations before I end this little rant…

  1. I’m sorry, Quantum Leap fans, but Bakula has never impressed me. Truth to tell, his intentional overacting and chewing of the scenery in the Mirror Universe episodes of a few weeks ago doesn’t really seem that different to me than his normal portrayal of Captain Archer. Plus, considering that he just senselessly lost one of his closest friends, his face never lost the bemused little “I can’t believe I’m getting paid for this tripe” smirk after Trip’s death. Does he have other expressions?

  2. What was T’Pol doing after Archer hugged her? I could understand her being a little uncomfortable with this sudden show of affection, but…she just kind of wobbles. She holds her right hand out at an odd angle, and gives a slight, unsteady sway from the hips up. It’s really, really odd.

  3. Did nobody on the NX-01 ever get promoted or change their jobs in the slightest over the ten years that the ship was in service? When the show opened Mayweather was at the helm, Sato was at the communications station, Reed was doing whatever he does…and ten years later, they’re all in exactly the same place (well, okay, Trip moved to Engineering…then died). No advancement? No promotions? How incredibly boring. The crew of the Enterprise-D at least showed a little motivation, changed things up, and actually grew over time. As far as this last episode shows, the crew of the NX-01 was depressingly static.

  4. Wasn’t anyone curious or concerned about how the bad guys who everyone thought were limited to Warp 2 — Shran even mentions that his shuttle should be able to easily outrun them at Warp 4 — were somehow able to catch up to a top-of-the-line Starfleet ship running at Warp 7, engage it in battle, and board it without any real trouble at all?

Meh.

I wish the head of Earth’s government had turned into a giant demon snake and started munching on people. Right during the signing ceremony. Start with Archer, then finish off the rest of the Enterprise crew (except for Sato, who’s more than welcome to run around in her skimpy lingerie from the Mirror Universe episode as much as she likes…especially in my apartment) before Buffy magically transports a few hundred years into the future thanks to the help of Willow and a mysterious amulet that Giles found hidden underneath the school’s library, slays the demon, and tosses a few bad puns over her shoulder on her way back to Sunnydale.

At least that would have been a finale worth watching.