22 May 2021

Elite Dangerous: Odyssey

Got the latest DLC for this game and it's a huge upgrade, knocking Star Citizen, still stuck in Alpha after eight years, into a cocked hat.

It's nice to get out of your ship and walk around stations. I'm amazed at just how big my Krait, Coventry Speedboat II, actually is when I walk up to it.

Also, here's my commander, Stephen Hunter, out and about.

See you in the deep black! O7

15 May 2021

Israel destroying the media building

It may well have been the case that Hamas was using that building to store equipment, but it was probably not a good idea for Israel to destroy it, even though they warned everyone to leave. People will be using that as an example of 'Zionist crimes' for years to come.

As for the popular narrative of 'the oppressed becoming the oppressor', there is a certain element of truth to that. If the Palestinians are doing what they are doing because of Israeli actions and a traumatic history, then the reverse is true. Arguably much more so considering the impact of the Holocaust.

13 May 2021

Another round of violence in the Middle East

Hamas needs to stop its rocket attacks permanently. There is no self-defence justification for them whatsoever.

Israel needs to stop further settlement building in the West Bank and should frankly let those families faced with eviction stay.

Both sides should not do things they shouldn't be doing just because of the actions of others and those who seek to excuse terrorism need to examine their moral compasses.

08 May 2021

VE Day 76

On this day, I can think of little more appropriate to do than to quote a well-known poem from 1914.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

Let us work together to build a better world and show that we truly remember them.

05 May 2021

So, that happened (Review: 'Star Trek' 2.23, "The Omega Glory")

There are times when I wonder what drugs the writers were using when they came up with a particular episode. Considering that this is the 1960s we're talking about here, when dropping acid was all the rage, you can certainly get some strange ideas.

But I am struggling to find a suitable drug to explain this one, which was penned by Roddenberry himself.

****

Approaching another planet, the Enterprise finds an abandoned Starfleet vessel. Beaming onboard, they find that the crew have gone... turned into piles of crystals. Warned by the last log entry from the medical officer, they beam down to the planet... discovering the ship's Captain and what may be a fountain of youth.

As well as a war between two civilisations that the Captain is interfering with.

****

This episode was initially planned for the first season, but ordered shelved by NBC as they thought the script was too weak. Roddenberry eventually produced it for the second over their objections.

Some of the initial concepts are OK; the crazy captain, the immunisation effect of a planet, a post-end of civilisation world and the possibility of a fountain of youth. But then things start falling apart pretty quickly.

The regulars get some good material to start off with; Spock is in particular fine form during this episode. Sulu returns after a pretty long absence and is useful here.

Unfortunately, the guest cast let the side down badly; the natives are pretty much poor to a man and the two women in the episode are scantily-clad sex objects with very little dialogue. Alison Bechdel would not be impressed.

We also get multiple Kirk-Fu fights; while very much a part of TOS, it gets more than a bit ridiculous here.

What ultimately massively derails the episode is the revelation that the US Constitution and the Stars and Stripes are objects of worship. Quite how that managed to occur is never adequately explained and the episode truly jumps the shark when Kirk's recitation of the preamble to the former manages to win the way. He does make some good points about how the rights in the US Constitution need to be for everyone, something too often ignored by America's leaders - even its slave-owning Founding Fathers - but the sheer veneration that a human document is held up to here is ridiculous; and sadly, alarmingly mirrored in reality in some parts of that country's politics today.

(Shatner for his part, basically stopped caring at this point and went full ham)

Also, where did they get a copy of the Book of Haggai from the Old Testament?

Finally, while Star Trek often tries to be anti-racist, it doesn't always succeed and in some cases fails quite massively. A quote from Star Trek and History: Race-ing Toward a White Future is worth repeating here:

Like the Federation, the Comms have full command of the English language (although they speak with a homogenized 'Asian' accent). The beginning of the episode thus shows that those with white skin can be uncivilized savages and those with yellow skin can be civilized and rational […] This would be counter to the hegemonic representation of Asians in the United States media; that diverse collective of peoples are consistently constructed in film and television as a menacing 'yellow horde'." Bernardi goes on to say: "'The Omega Glory' is not, however, a counter-hegemonic episode. In fact, the episode not only reveals an unwillingness to be critical of the hegemony of racist representations, but also systematically participates in the stereotyping of Asians. As the story progresses, the Yangs are constructed as noble savages; their cause to annihilate the Comms is established as justified. The Comms, on the other hand, are constructed as brutal and oppressive; their drive to suppress the Yangs is established as totalitarian. This more hegemonic articulation of race is made evident when Kirk and Spock realize the extent to which the Yangs and Comms parallel Earth's civilizations. In this light, the Yangs are no longer savages, but noble warriors fighting for a just and honorable cause. They want to regain the land they lost in a war with the Asiatics. (pp. 57-58)

I think that's a good place to conclude.

****

Conclusion

The general view of this episode is that it's one of the worst episodes of the series. They're generally quite right.

3/10