Star Trek Part II

(Sorry about the wait, I didn't intend to leave it this long but with the end of "official" Star Trek I thought I should get a move on.)

Edit: Incidentally you'll find part I here

In the past there was a phenomena called fan-fiction (fanfic for short). These are generally written stories created by fans based on the TV programme. Star Trek literature took off during the 1970s. Fans grew weary of the same 79 episodes and two short animated seasons being shown over and over and over again. They wanted to see their favourite or new characters in new adventures.

The tradition of fanfic continues today. It has become even popular thanks to the interweb.

An new variant of this as appeared in the last 10 years. These are known as fan films. Actual films made by Star Trek fans. As prices of digital video recording/editing has dropped they have become more commonplace. Fast interweb connections have enabled the fans to share these films with the masses instead of just a few.

I have seen some of these fan films and the quality varies dramatically. They come in lots of different styles. I didn't have a huge interest to be honest. I then came across by accident an image file of a poster for a new fan film. It was the second in a series of fan films called "New Voyages".

I was intrigued and visited the website. Unlike most of these films, the creators looked to the past. Instead of inventing their own crew on their own super starship they went back to the original series. They wanted to make their own interpretation of the fourth and fifth years of the five year mission. A mission that had only had it's first three years televised.

The first episode was available on the website so I downloaded it. A full length episode I might add, not a five or ten minute show, the full hour, minus advert breaks off course.

I was very impressed. It wasn't an exact copy of the original Trek. They had updated the special effects. Instead of models we have CGI. They had several good quality sets including a large portion of the bridge and a transporter room. They had even managed to obtain the services of several actors who had appeared in Star Trek as cameos.

The first episode did attract a fair bit of criticism from some Trek fans. A lot of them in my opinion weren't justified or forgivable given the production restraints. Considering it was largely a pilot and many shows including Star Trek changed significantly between a pilot and the actual production of regular episodes this is understandable.

This was shown to be the case when the second installment was released and it blew away many of the critics. That is what I shall be discussing in the next part of this series.

Changed Days

I'm setting up a hard drive and writing a blog entry at the same time, on the same computer! It helps pass the time while I'm waiting for 160 GB to partition itself.

Better than in the "old" days when all I could do to pass the time was put the kettle on.

As you can see I have spent most of my time until relatively recently using Windows 98, unfortunately even the second edition wasn't cutting it anymore. Is it unreasonable to expect six years out of an operating system?

I got dragged into the 21st century slowly, but I know there are people out there still happily using 98 and older versions of windows. Well if their hardware lets them they are.

It's a Laugh

I got to thinking about what makes me laugh. It wasn't a total non-sequitur. I was reading one of the recent additions to a site that I visit regularly. James Lileks is a journalist who like myself has a keen interest in nostalgia. His site is full of wonderful pictures of the past - old postcards, matchbooks, magazines, comics, book covers, promotional pamphlets and much more. Even though we are from two different countries, nostalgia seems to have a universal appeal.

What I especially enjoy is the completely different viewpoint he has when describing these images. He, to employ a cliche "thinks outside the box", challenges assumptions often by picking out some minor detail. These may include such things as a figure in the distance, a facial expression or something else mundane or obscure and twists it into something that often has had me in tears of laughter.

So that's what lead me to think about what I find funny or at least part of what makes me laugh.

We all make assumptions. Take a basic statement like "Hugo went into the shop". Picture it in your mind. Okay there isn't a lot to go on, you really can't paint an accurate picture with 5 words so your imagination fills in the blanks using experience and your perceptions of reality.

You've probably assumed that Hugo is a man, Hugo could be a dog, a robot, an alien, a spider or any infinite number of things.

You've probably assumed Hugo went in through the door instead of the window or down stairs.

You've probably assumed Hugo was walking, he may have been crawling or dancing or in a wheelchair.

I've looked at just three of the many assumptions you made. If those assumptions are particularly absurd and especially combined with elements that are normal, I will often find humour in it.

I also find the reverse interesting, we at various times in our life find ourselves in absurd situations and have treated them as normal.

Absurdity by itself isn't that funny. It's difficult for us to picture a completely unreal situation. A good comedian will know how to tie normality into the absurd. They use the normality often using cliches is to give us an understanding and the absurd to make it funny.

A good example is Billy Connolly, his stand up comedy is based around describing mundane situations but his ability to extrapolate those into the insane has his audiences in stitches. A few other good examples of comedy writing employing this technique are Monty Python, The Goons, Douglas Adams and Red Dwarf.

Edited My Profile

Woohoo, exciting stuff.

I like it when you add an interest, music or book etc. how it turns it into a blog search. It seems no matter how strange the hobby, there seem to be plenty of people out there with it listed. Maybe I'll try it again with some really obscure stuff like - vegetable croquet or worm knitting.

Ennui

I think I'm going through a bout of this at the moment. Every time I start a blog entry or start composing a clever reply to some post in one of the forums I visit, I think "What's the point?" or "who cares?". I then delete what I have already written thinking there's no point to writing half an answer.

I'm making a serious creative effort and it's either not going to be read or it's going to be skimmed over with the other posts in the thread. Besides I'm not ever going to write anything that changes the world.

I'm not Karl Marx coming up with some great new political theory and I'm not Albert Einstein with a some great world changing scientific statement, that I thought up, when I was bored one day. I'm just one of the ordinary 6 billion people who has done little of merit and nobody cares what I think.

Yes, I know there is more to blogging than writing stuff just so other people will read it. It is like the mighty tree falling over in the forest, yes it is impressive as it crashes to the ground, but if there is nobody there to watch, it will have little impact on the rest of the world.

There is nobody to blame either. Everyone is on information overload, people simply don't have the time to ponder everything written by people like myself on the net.