After months of nail-biting, I must say that I've been immensely pleased with The Big Homecoming. In some ways I've felt a bit disappointed, but I think that's mainly because such an anticipated event has a slim chance of really fulfilling all our expectations.
One of the things I loved was seeing all of Moya's crew interacting with Human culture (for real). Yeah, "aliens on Earth" has been done to death in the past sixty years or so, but it was still fun, and somewhat original. I mean, how many aliens start watching "Sesame Street" to practice their language skills? Of course it was a contrivance that they landed on Halloween, but the "trick-or-treat" gags were fun too. Especially Rygel scaring the kids to get their candy. ("Crichton, how illegal is this dren? I must have more!")
In general I get annoyed every time the media starts hyping the attacks of September 11, but in this case I think that it was handled perfectly, and the story would have actually have been hurt if it wasn't mentioned. I think that the questions raised are quite pointed -- how much more paranoid ("security-conscious") have we become since then? How can we approach global cooperation, faced with unthinkable alien attacks from beyond, when there are still nut-jobs running around here? I've always loved the movie "Contact" for its eerie depiction of society's reaction to contact with alien life; "Farscape" lacked the grandeur that that movie had, but that was mainly because it was a television show rather than a movie. I still think it was quite impressive and thought-provoking, to consider how to handle the situation.
The scariest thing is that the G-men were probably right, from a certain point of view. By sharing these amazing technologies with every country on Earth, how can we make sure that people like Osama bin Laden don't get their hands on things like pulse pistols and hetch drives? Would our petty, local conflicts merely spill into nearby space and create more trouble?
On a more mundane note, I thought that it was quite silly how that green-spy-alien was portrayed -- perhaps it was deliberate, but it got too much into the realm of "green-eyed monsters" for my taste. And I'm getting quite peeved by the repeated use of Grayza's "lucky charms" -- it's getting far too blatant and too frequent.
At any rate, I'm a bit surprised that they seem to have ended the "return to Earth" storyline so quickly; the preview for next week seems to indicate that they're back to business as usual with random wanderings in the Uncharted Territories. (Oh, sorry, it's Tormented Space now...)
Posted by Vogon Poet (Member # 393) on :
Oh, yeah, that's right, in the UK we're now an ep ahead of you. . . BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAH!
Don't worry, they'll soon preempt it with darts, or snooker, or Scrabble live from Reykyavik. Then we'll be back to square one.
Two words about the next ep: Red Dwarf. You'll see what I mean. 8)
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
quote:Originally posted by MinutiaeMan: The scariest thing is that the G-men were probably right, from a certain point of view. By sharing these amazing technologies with every country on Earth, how can we make sure that people like Osama bin Laden don't get their hands on things like pulse pistols and hetch drives? Would our petty, local conflicts merely spill into nearby space and create more trouble?
Well quite simple. The idea of a "Prime Directive" is a sound one. It would prevent things like that. Stop planets who hadn't matured enough to join the galactic community.
In Babylon 5, Earth was probably still too young to reach into space, but that was a result of Centauri involving themselves in a pre-space-going civilisation.
I guess the Vulcans in Trek/Enterprise were doing the right thing. Imagine having a broken civilisation like the Earth of 2063 let loose on Space?
Maybe that's what happened in the Mirror, Mirror Universe. They kicked the Vulcans out.
Posted by CaptainMike (Member # 709) on :
BTW, the shocking implication of the last round of the Shatnerverse novels was that the Mirror Universe was created shortly after First Contact when Cochrane regained his memories of the events, which were erased in the proper timeline.. apparently a 1701-E from a different future went back, and their interference allowed the timeline to diverge so that even though they came back, the Federation never existed. Kind of like how Janeway still existed here after her timeline was aborted. or something. Well anyway, in the mirror universe there was part of the moon named Lake Riker instead of Lake Armstrong in our reckoning. and the Vulcans were enslaved.
\i have a headache.. why am i talking about this? oh well.. i wonder if the crew of NX-01 will find the mirror universe. bonus!
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
Would totally ruin continuity - but it could be quite interesting! Hoshi in skimpy uniform!! Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
That totally contradicts "Dark Mirror." CONTINUITY VIOLATION! KILL! KILL! KILL!
Posted by CaptainMike (Member # 709) on :
none of Duane's books fit in continuity now..
and all of Shatner's ghostwriters' books try to fall into current Mirror continuity.. that is, Dark Mirror was invalidated not by other novels, but by DS9 season 2's "Crossover"
Posted by Vogon Poet (Member # 393) on :
"Dark Mirror" was always the way I'd have preferred any Mirror Universe stories to go - I didn't like the DS9 crossovers at all, it was just used in obvious ways: "Oh, look! So-and-so is a goody in 'our' universe, but in the Mirror Universe is a baddie, a lesbian and has a goatee!" I haven't read the last Shatnerverse yet, none of the local libraries seem to have it and I'm damned if I'm going to pay to read it. But the whole divergence-of-the-timeline thing was already being signposted, Lake Riker had already been mentioned and was a dead giveaway.
Posted by CaptainMike (Member # 709) on :
By the way, "Dark Mirror" is still possible, its just that it happened in a different Mirror Universe.
The best part of the last Shatnerverse novel is that all of the MU crews, Intendant Picard, the duplicate 1701-E, Commandant Riker and Emporer Tiberius were sent packing, not to bother us again hopefully.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
How the hell did this topic get from "Farscape" to Shatner's version of the mirror universe???
Posted by CaptainMike (Member # 709) on :
scroll up lazy one!
BTW, what is Farscape?
Posted by Reverend (Member # 335) on :
Something that's far more entertaining than the Shatner novels.
Posted by The_Tom (Member # 38) on :
That description doesn't really narrow it down too much, y'know.
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
quote:Intendant Picard[/QB]
That's scary. Picard in leather like Kira! LOL!
Why would a Terran be an intendant? Kira was high up because Bajor was a power in the Alliance.
Klingons, Cardassians, Bajorans (which also lends more creedance to the idea that Klingon Space is closer to Cardassian Space than the Romulans are.
Look at the symbol - it has elements of the Bajoran, Klingon and Cardassian logos. The wings makeup the Bajorn symbol.
Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :
OK, back on topic...
Scorpius is working with Grayza. This whole thing's a massive setup to get the wormhole tech. Gotta be. They both want the tech, and they both know Crichton's the only way to get it. There's no other reason for Grayza to have chased Crichton like this, and I don't think the writers would make her totally two-dimensional, as she's appeared thus far. How else did Scorpy survive his latest death?
I pity Bracca. Two masters, and neither is who they appear.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
That's a fascinating theory, Omega!
However, I don't think that Grayza is really working with Scorpy -- because we saw a few scenes where there was no one from Moya present, and yet Grayza was still acting like Scorpy's enemy. Especially the part in the first two-parter of the season, where she was withholding Scorpy's coolant rods.
The whole point is that Braca is in league with Scorpy still -- and I actually suspected that from the very moment that he shot Scorpy in the back and we realized that he'd survived... I figured that that whole pulse blast had to have been staged, especially since he'd been shot in the back, and yet sparks had emerged from his front (which gave the impression of the pulse blast shooting right through his body). Scorpy's allusions to a "mole" on Grayza's command carrier cinched it for me.
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Hoshi in skimpy uniform!! ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)