Star Trek Fandom

I consider myself a life long Star Trek fan. That being said I do not love everything Star Trek. I’ve had issues with almost every Trek series. Some things are minor some are big. But take what you like and leave the rest. 

Just like a sports franchise that you are a fan of: some times are good, some times are bad but you remain a fan nevertheless. 

We as Star Trek fans need to quit hating on one another. Remember that everyone has their own opinions and sometimes those opinions may be radically different from yours. Let’s stop the hate and accept our differences of opinion. 

Live long and prosper 

Social Media Shenanigans

Some days it feels like your arguing with a wall...

I made a New Years resolution this year not to engage against people on social media, especially when their arguments are illogical or just plain stupid. But today again I got into a argument with someone on a FB Star Trek group. Here is his brilliant plan to make good Star Trek and my response to his drivel. I edited out his name for this blog post. 

The initial post from some random guy, who is also a Star Trek fan...:

And my first response:

And it continues:

Final thoughts:

I understand this guys anger with the mediocre Star Trek that CBS is currently producing. But seriously someone making their Trek without CBS approval and attempting to make a profit from it is akin to drug trafficking. It is literally an illegal activity, and you better believe CBS would most definitely use private investigators and their lawyer team to prosecute anyone using their intellectual property. 

This is a goofy post and I guess I’m a goof by indulging this other goof. But I guess I did get a blog post out of it...

Rest In Peace

Today I learned on Facebook a local man passed away from cancer. He was well known on the convention scene for his remote control realistic R2D2 and other remote control creations. His R2 was life sized, moved and had all the authentic sounds and lights. I’m wondering if it was his R2 we met in 2012 at the Edmonton Toy Show. My daughter was 5 at the time and she thought she got to meet the real R2; to her that R2 was a celebrity. The guy running the R2 kept his distance and maintained the illusion she was interacting with a real droid. She still remembers that encounter. 

If it was Henry I say “Thank you” 

Me and R2 in Calgary 2011. Unfortunately I could not find the picture I took with my daughter Shelby and R2.

This & That

I recently joined a Facebook fan group for Anson Mount. 

———————

And a few more memes I found on social media:

This & That

New episode of The Pop Culture Pub Podcast available now!!

——————————

Watching the Chris Claremont documentary and I realized I didn’t mention him in our comics episode of The Pop Culture Pub Podcast. And I considered him my favourite writer before I discovered Peter David!...

And finally:

Covid19 & Accountability

I’ve heard this current situation in the world is being referred to as a war. Like all wars when this one is over I’m hoping the country that started it is held accountable. Reparations need to be paid to the families who lost loved ones during this war by the country that started it. 

And it seems Covid19 started in ‘wet markets’. These markets are found in certain parts of the world where wild and exotic animals are butchered and their meat and sold for human consumption. Some of these animals include bats, rats, snakes, pangolins, turtles,fish and badgers. It should be noted that some of these animals butchered at the wet markets are still ALIVE while being butchered! It is believed Covid19 started in bats, transferred to a pangolin, then that infected pangolin was consumed by a human. The virus then spread from that human to other humans. 

Because of the grotesque nature of these ‘wet markets’ I’ve decided not to post pictures of them here. If you are curious I suggest Google with caution, it’s gross. The unsanitary and horrific conditions found at these markets no doubt contributed to this global pandemic. 

These markets need to be closed. And the country of origin needs to be held accountable and reparations paid to the families of loved ones whom died during this “war”.  

I purposely refrained from naming the country of origin because it seems lately if you do call them out you are labeled a ‘racist’. It’s not an issue of race it’s an issue of FACT. This country needs to be held accountable with repercussions. Things need to change there and in that part of the world in regards to the ‘wet markets’. 

I’m not a fan of Trump but sometimes he’s not wrong...

PSA part 2

A follow up to my original PSA from today: 

Public Service Announcement

Because this happened today! People really need to think first before posting on social media. When someone passes away it must be remembered that they have a family, and maybe they do not know yet that their loved on has died. 

A break at the pumps has a price...

I saw this post on Facebook:

My response: 

I live in Alberta. I myself am not involved in the oil and gas industry but I have friends and family who are. I see people losing jobs, homes, etc. I see reports of food banks running short on food due to increased demands. These are hard times and yes gasoline is cheap but remember these awesome prices at the pumps also have a human price attached to it. 

Anyway that’s my two cents. Peace . 

1,2,3,4 I declare a meme war!

Some meme's I either invented or came across for your enjoyment or criticism.

 

 

 

 

 

___________________________________________________________________________

 

And finally a new logo for 'The Pop Culture Pub Podcast' that I designed for the Facebook group (below)

 

 

 

 and the logo for the podcast itself.

 

 

What makes Star Trek

 

What I consider the fundamentals of any Star Trek series: 

• a positive vision of the future for humanity (not a dystopian future)
• To quote Gene Roddenberry: “In the future there will be no hunger, there will be no greed and every child will know how to read”. (Greed is seen by others like the Feringi, the Orion Syndicate, etc)
• Star Trek needs to be a show the whole family can watch together. It might even generate some insightful family discussions. 
• Violence can be referenced but not seen. Certainly no murder or violent acts will be undertaken by Starfleet officers. 
• Profanity is in the past. Humanity (particularly Starfleet officers) speak with respect, even when in disagreement 
• There is alway a fundamental respect for all life. 
• “To explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no one has gone before”
• Try to respect and work with established continuity 

Some of my issues with Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Picard is that Alex Kurtzman and company tend to ignore the fundamentals of Star Trek listed above. 

My main issues with modern Star Trek are:

• It’s too dark. The entire look of modern Trek is poorly lit, dark and brooding. DS9 wasn’t even this dark and it had previously been known as the ‘dark’ Trek. 
• Children cannot and should not watch modern Star Trek. It is unwatchable for children due to the profanity, violence and sexual innuendos (brother-sister duo Narek and Narissa. The sexual tension was very implied. I actually thought they were going to kiss on the STP finale). Trek used to be a family show, now the lowest rating might be 13+. 
• Countless lense flares. Why do we need so many lense flares? I guess they think it gives the show a cinematic feel...I just find them annoying to see
• the unnecessary use of profanity. Trek never needed it’s characters to be dropping f-bombs or ‘shit’ or ‘asshole’ in their lines. (Yes Data did say “oh shit” in ST:Generations and Kirk said “Double damn ass on you” in ST4. Those were rare exceptions done for comedic effect. They were not the norm)
• Violence. The opening scene of episode 5 of STP was more like a scene from a “Saw” movie than that of a Star Trek production. It was done for shock & awe, a cheap gimmick not the standard in past Trek. (Again there were a few very rare exceptions like Commander Remicks death scene in the TNG episode ‘Conspiracy’). 
• Ignoring continuity established in previous Star Trek shows (Data had a human brother? Spock had a human foster sister? Why do Klingons look like orcs from ‘Lord of the Rings’?)
• Ignoring their own continuity, sometimes between episodes. (In STP Agnes straight up murders Bruce Maddox, she is later told by Picard she will be arrested yet by the end of the season she’s NOT arrested. Another example: STP Ep9 they establish that androids can always tell when someone is lying. Agnes passes the lie test, but then in Ep10 it turns out she WAS lying after all ...?? Also the ‘Zhat Vash’ was a super secret romulan sect of the Tal’Shiar no one heard about as established in STP ep2. But by the end of season one it seems everyone knows about them...)
• New Trek seems to be borrowing concepts from other established sci-fi franchises. Examples: tardigrades, flesh and blood synthetics (Battlestar Galactica), a distant future where a single starship needs to rebuild a Federation-like organization (Andromeda), space Vegas (STP Ep5: Blade Runner), etc. 
• Unrealistic science/technobabble (Rick Sternbach’s technobabble lines from TNG/DS9/VOY, which were based on real life power engineering, have now been replaced with lines like “Crypto Kung Fu” in STP)
• MacGuffins to help get characters out of situations (time crystals, tardigrades/spore drive, a device that can fix or do anything with the power of imagination...)
• Mary Sue characters (Michael Burnham is a Mary Sue. She literally committed mutiny on DSC’s first episode which started a war with the Klingons and got her Captain killed & eaten, not to mention thousands of others killed. Then at the end of the season she is awarded a medal and her Starfleet commission is reinstated. She literally can do anything and all is forgiven)
• Bad writing. Star Trek used to be a show where each episode had a beginning, middle, climax and conclusion; with the exception of the occasional 2-part episode. Even DS9 with its long story arcs still followed this format while at the same time having their over arching storylines. Modern Trek has episodes with no conclusion, long drawn out narratives and long storylines that flow at a snails pace or jarringly fast. Example: on season 1 of STP it took Admiral Picard until the end of episode 3 to actually embark on his mission. Then everything was hurriedly concluded in the last 2 episodes. And as a result of a hurried conclusion certain plot points were missed such as: Seven and Raffi getting romantic? Agnes has gotten away with murder? Why was the Data consciousness reveal not revealed prior to the end of the final episode? Rios tried to blow up Soji with a bomb but all is forgiven? Why would Starfleet end the ban on synths after they literally tried to end all humanoid life in the galaxy? Also if these all powerful ancient synths were summoned wouldn’t they still come anyway despite Soji destroying the portal transmitter? (I could go on but I’ll stop here)

 

To be clear my issues with modern Star Trek DO NOT include the following:

• Gay characters. I fully support the LGBT community and I applaud modern Trek for having gay characters on the shows. This is something Gene Roddenberry wanted to do with TOS and TNG but was denied by the higher ups at the time. 
• Diversity. Star Trek has always been diverse but for some reason Modern Star Trek defenders (Drekkies) claim that anyone who doesn’t like their DSC or STP hate diversity. It’s always been there folks, it’s always made Star Trek special and I applaud modern Trek for continuing this tradition. 

 

 

 

But I think another huge problem with modern Star Trek is how it’s delivered. DSC & STP are available for viewing if you pay for CBS All Access (thankfully Star Trek is still free on tv in Canada. But I do pay a satellite bill so it’s not completely free). With new Trek they want more subscribers for CBS All Access so they need to create buzz to attract new viewers whom would not buy into this just for Star Trek; they need previously non-Star Trek fans to subscribe. So what better way to attract new or ‘modern’ viewers than creating some buzz:

“They say ‘fuck’ on Star Trek now!”

“They literally ripped a guys eye out of his head! He was screaming and everything! It’s like watching’Saw’!”

“Klingons look like orcs now! Scary as hell!”

So they are trying to create buzz to create interest and in turn create new customers for their streaming platform. Problem is by ignoring the fundamentals of what makes Star Trek so special they are alienating a large number of their previous fan base. So in an effort to attract new customers they are losing customers. But are they attracting enough new viewers to make losing established fans a viable business practice? It doesn’t seem so in my view, established Trek fans are checking out and not as many checking in. 

Bottom line is this: I’m not against trying new things with Star Trek, but if it’s too radically different from previous Trek you are going to divide the fan base. And that’s what is happening now and it’s not good. Fans are fighting, “new” viewers are not coming to new Trek in great numbers and Star Trek is suffering as a result. 

Star Trek had a winning formula which is why it previously lasted 28 television seasons (TOS/TNG/DS9/VOY/ENT). 

If it’s not broken don’t fix it! 

And in a world filled with fighting, disease, hopelessness and so on; we could use a little ‘positive vision of the future’ to aspire to.