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Wednesday, September 13, 2017

Opinion: Star Trek The Next Generation Getting More Love Than The New Show

Star Trek Discovery is set to sail on CBS September 24, then it'll head to CBS All Access where it'll be torrented to a high degree and possibly bring families together with parents asking kids how to torrent. Though the Internet's pop sites all had nothing better to do than show off the new theme song this week for Discover, there's been very little promotion for the show. No special events in major cities, no big news. As I'm a huge fan of the show and I've talked to friends and family; no one is truly looking forward to a (sigh) prequel series, based on the new movies, from hack Alex Kurtzman, which had its show-runner leave the series.

What fans still love and is getting an attention a decade+ after being off the air is Star Trek: The Next Generation. Just watching The Orville on Fox, you can see an almost eerie reflection of what the show did for sci-fi. The Orville  is just a modern Star Trek: TNG...with bad jokes.

Other reminders of TNG have just come out, showing the vitality of a series that fans truly adored for attempting to be different and new. And not a prequel.


A Field Guide to the Aliens of Star Trek: The Next Generation
by Zachary Auburn
Retails for $15

This work of meta-fiction- oh yeah, let's go boldly into how strange this book is-is told by an eleven-year-old kid growing up watching Star Trek: TNG and ranking the aliens. And this kids has issues. From the fine folks of Devastator which keeps trying to capture Mad Magazine and Cracked for adults.

The kid's field guide, which starts as a report for school and then a fun activity of learning the computer to a flat out zine seems to be more than just a hobby. There's a progression there, that just makes you sort of grow along with Joshua Champan, who starts off really young and then shortly enough he's in high school. His love of Data,Vulcans and the Borg seems to compliment him with dealing with people at school and his life. It all starts slowly building up speed of a hobby being a release.

Getting from the start to finish though is filled with hilarious jibes at the show. Poor Troi, she was written so poorly  on the show and this kids so "eloquently" points out that she basically is whiny and annoying. And we go through all the different aliens that have been on series with a kid reaching puberty, who isn't that terribly good at writing. He flat out just says what people think after episodes have been analyzed for years, such as, oh that's kind of racist or just poorly done.

Now the covers cute, but in the pages just expect to see the best a young child could throw together in the late 80's and early 90's. It makes it more authentic, but it ain't that pretty.

This is a great addition for a fan of the series to once again ponder why so many aliens just look human. Or really looking at the aliens and saying, "Yeah, those things are ugly."

Book provided by publisher for review purposes.

Treks and the City



Beaming out on iTunes and wherever you get your podcasts comes Treks and the City from comedians Alice Wetterlund and Veronica Osorio. Ecch, I hate the name, but I'm slowly getting into the bizarre talks on TNG
by these two and their great collection of guests, one per episode. So far they've had Paul F. Tompkins, Jay Baruchel and Rhea Buthcer, to name a few.

Alice and Veronica are watching each episode of
Star Trek: TNG, then reviewing it and going into great detail of how bad some parts are written. The first two seasons aren't great, as they themselves point out. Either from Troi being-as pointed out earlier-written so poorly, the hatred of Wesley or just the lack of knowledge of writers on what characters are suppose to do.

So far they've already come up with their on routine mocks of the show such as reminding viewers that Geordi is in constant pain from his visor; the writer's forget to ever address the issue again and calling whatever planet the crew visits, "the downstairs."

The name Treks may come from some heavy feminist view point episodes, but really doesn't capture the random stories mixed in like in the last episode, "Justice," where Veronica talked about getting Dengue fever for real.

There is some funny girl talk, like the girls expaling love by at different ages. Liking Picard as they grow up and became women for his sternness and his hatred of children, while their younger selves might fall for Wesley.

Overall, it's just great covering episodes with them and going over how stupid some parts can be. But they both clearly love the show and love Star Trek and that's what a fan podcast needs to be.



Star Trek TNG: Mirror Broken

Or you can buy it as it comes out

Showing the endurance of the series, we have a comic based on the show, but it one of Star Trek's favorite twisted visions, The Mirror Mirror Universe. Yes, the whole crew is messed up and horrible versions of themselves. 

The limited series sees a buff Capt Picard with an evil beard, not trying to explore the universe, but conquer, that is if he can even get The Enterprise. So far the comic series has just gotten to the point where we slowly meet the Mirror versions of all the crew and have just gotten on-board the Enterprise. It's wonderful to reflect on why we like these characters and seeing them use all their talents for the wrong reasons is just what makes the Mirror Universe so delightful.

So we have all this love for TNG, but as you can feel the vibe online and on social media and even with just fans of Star Trek, Discovery doesn't even have any sort of place. It just sounds like a mess and poorly planned one at that.