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I really hate Seth MacFarlane, but he at least gets it.
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Feb 24, 2017 19:18
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This is worse than that time Kahless gave me a Yridian salmon helmet!
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Feb 24, 2017 19:19
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Hot Dog Day #82 posted:There is a rich history of celebrities show-horning themselves into Star Trek, just ask the Ensign Rivers: And of course the Excelsior communications officer who wakes up Sulu: 
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Feb 24, 2017 19:23
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Pacra posted:Wait why is farscape good again I forget : [ How far did you get in Farscape?
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Feb 24, 2017 19:23
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Eh. Seth MacFarlane is bad. I want to keep him as far away from Trek as possible. I'm 30 now. I was like 12 or 13 when Family Guy premiered. I kind of wished I wasn't one of those teenagers who re-enabled him after it was cancelled with those DVD sales.
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Feb 24, 2017 19:40
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Obligatory, "Well he did produce Cosmos"
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Feb 24, 2017 19:50
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Powered Descent posted:And of course the Excelsior communications officer who wakes up Sulu: Didn't he get that bit because he's a huge Trek nerd and his mom was the casting director on VI?
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Feb 24, 2017 19:50
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Lowen SoDium posted:I kind of wish he had helmed the `09 reboots instead of Abraham's, but I have no clue is he is even capable of doing anything remotely serious. How busy is the old Futurama production crew these days? 
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Feb 24, 2017 22:37
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I'm watching DS9's Soldiers of the Empire. Worf has just started singing and the rest of the Klingon crew rolling their eyes at this is hilarious.
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Feb 24, 2017 22:44
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Lowen SoDium posted:Seth MacFarlane is one of the few creative types I have heard talk about Star Trek that made me think they actually understood it. Fair play to MacFarlane, he was largely responsible for the recent Cosmos series (along with, weirdly enough, Brannon Braga), so I feel like he might have done well with the Trek Reboot
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Feb 24, 2017 22:55
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At this point I have far more respect for McFarlane's work than I do the writers of the Simpsons.
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Feb 24, 2017 23:03
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dont even fink about it posted:At this point I have far more respect for McFarlane's work than I do the writers of the Simpsons. The Star Trek episode of family guy was better than most of the stuff that came out of voyager!
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Feb 24, 2017 23:19
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American Dad is one of my favourite TV shows. It is far above Family Guy's level of humour, and the superior show by miles.
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Feb 24, 2017 23:23
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I am really behind on the other sci-fi series going on right now; is The Expanse that good? The premise sounds really great but part of me is worried it'll end up being another BSG-ish clone that essentially uses space as a gimmick to tell the usual boring stories. Also, on a Star-Trek-related note, I finally watched all of 'Turnabout Intruder', which was nowhere near as bad as I thought it might be in terms of *watchable television* (Shatner mugging and over-acting for all he's worth is always pretty amusing) but it was also about a dozen times more horrifyingly misogynistic and sexist than I thought it'd be, too. That said the same episode could probably be produced today without much uproar. But the weird thing is I can't figure out whether Benicia colony has really lovely primitive medical facilities (like Spock says in Turnabout Intruder when woman-possessed-shatner is trying to exile Kirk theree) or if they have "the best possible care" like McCoy says batshit insane Lenore Karidian gets at the end of that episode. it is an INCONSISTENCY, I tell you, and I won't have it.
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Feb 24, 2017 23:30
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The_Doctor posted:American Dad is one of my favourite TV shows. It is far above Family Guy's level of humour, and the superior show by miles. From what I understand, MacFarlane isn't super involved with the creative side of American Dad aside from the voice work, and hasn't been since the early seasons.
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Feb 24, 2017 23:39
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Pakled posted:From what I understand, MacFarlane isn't super involved with the creative side of American Dad aside from the voice work, and hasn't been since the early seasons.
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Feb 24, 2017 23:41
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Pacra posted:Wait why is farscape good again I forget : [ It's a well-written show with weird, likable characters and a really good main story beginning from mid-season one through the end of the series.
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Feb 24, 2017 23:44
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kaworu posted:I am really behind on the other sci-fi series going on right now; is The Expanse that good? The premise sounds really great but part of me is worried it'll end up being another BSG-ish clone that essentially uses space as a gimmick to tell the usual boring stories. I ended up checking the spoilers for the book series The Expanse is based off of for precisely this reason, our fears were unfounded friend
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Feb 24, 2017 23:47
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kaworu posted:I am really behind on the other sci-fi series going on right now; is The Expanse that good? The premise sounds really great but part of me is worried it'll end up being another BSG-ish clone that essentially uses space as a gimmick to tell the usual boring stories. It's based on good books with good long term consistent plots. You don't have to worry about a writer's strike and them making up the plot as they go along then painting them selves into a corner and shouting "god did it, the end!". It's also not artificial drama and tension turned up to 11 every second, the characters have time to breathe and even crack jokes and the drama makes sense they didn't just decide everyone's a broken insane person because that's gritty. It's also gritty looking because it's realistic and takes design cues from actual space stuff, not because they wanted a 70's aircraft carrier in space with WWII dogfights. Other than "the sets often look cramped and dirty" expanse and BSG have nothing in common.
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Feb 24, 2017 23:49
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Echo Chamber posted:Also, there's A Million Ways to Die in the West, which embodies MacFarlane's creative capacity way more than most works associated with his name. Does that explain why it's so lovely?
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Feb 25, 2017 00:11
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The_Doctor posted:I'm watching DS9's Soldiers of the Empire. Worf has just started singing and the rest of the Klingon crew rolling their eyes at this is hilarious. The "conclusion" to that ship and its crew is easily one of my favorite episodes of DS9.
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Feb 25, 2017 01:19
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Oh I'm sure I'll get there soon. 
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Feb 25, 2017 01:26
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Number_6 posted:I want to like The Expanse; it looks expensive and it seems like someone put a lot of effort into it. But I find all the characters (and drat there are so many) boring and the show overall just lacks dramatic sizzle. it doesn't have the zany frantic feel of Farscape, or the heroic monologues of shows like BSG or B5. The Expanse has fewer regulars than Farscape, BSG, or B5 and no more recurring characters than those shows or most Treks. It's really not that that big a cast, they're just more spread out at first. It's definitely a show from a different generation/mindset of scifi writing than most of the classic space operas though. Very focused on worldbuilding and continuity. You can tell it started out as a book/vidjagame setting because the universe really feels like a big sandbox designed for people to play in and it's all in service of one evolving story line. You'll get your franticness, sizzle, and monologues by the end of the first season, but it's much more of a slow burn and in general the big moments are more subdued and less theatrical than old school space opera. I find it refreshing, but have had a hard time getting other people into it. Maybe you just like episodic scifi better? kaworu posted:I am really behind on the other sci-fi series going on right now; is The Expanse that good? The premise sounds really great but part of me is worried it'll end up being another BSG-ish clone that essentially uses space as a gimmick to tell the usual boring stories. The Expanse is good and arguably closer to "hard" scifi than pretty much anything else to ever be on TV. It's set exclusively in the solar system with no FTL, no magical artificial gravity, and no forehead aliens. They sort of handwave their fancy fusion drives and there's just a little bit of ~space magic~ in the mix, but it's still far more realistic and scientific than even the more grounded parts of BSG or what have you. Some of the elements are traditional noire/cyberpunk genre fare with crooked cops and scheming politicians and unethical corporations and stuff, but it all fits into and serves the setting and space travel and its constraints and possibilities are at the core of the story. quote:Also, on a Star-Trek-related note, I finally watched all of 'Turnabout Intruder', which was nowhere near as bad as I thought it might be in terms of *watchable television* (Shatner mugging and over-acting for all he's worth is always pretty amusing) but it was also about a dozen times more horrifyingly misogynistic and sexist than I thought it'd be, too. That said the same episode could probably be produced today without much uproar. Lol, just lol if you actually pay attention to the names of planets/colonies/starbases in TOS or expect them to have consistent features. I just mentally categorize them into [setting/plot device/handwave] and move on. Also agreed re: Turnabout Intruder's weird watchability. The premise is sexist trash, but the actors are hilarious to watch and I've always been impressed by the way the female guest star just nails Shatner's mannerisms.
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Feb 25, 2017 02:42
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Duckbag posted:
Also The Martian is canon.
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Feb 25, 2017 02:47
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Are there any mirror universe Voyager episodes?
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Feb 25, 2017 03:05
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Nah, but Living Witness is close enough.
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Feb 25, 2017 03:10
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Re TOS's third season. I think that these episodes are the main reason TOS gets its reputation for being cheesy and formulaic. They didn't have much budget and there was obvious creative exhaustion, so most of the season is reused sets, planets of hats, space magic, and nubile space babes. It's really a shameful step back from the creative peaks of the first two seasons. I watched it straight through last year and it was just exasperating to see the same elements over and over with lots of weird lighting and camera angles and hammy acting thrown in as a weak attempt to disguise its saminess. That said, it's not all bad. Enterprise Incident, Tholian Web, and Spectre of the Gun are all legit great episodes. Day of the Dove, Plato's Stepchildren, Let This Be Your Last Battlefield, and Mark of Gideon are classic Trek morality plays that still have a lot of resonance today, even if they have some flaws. Spock's Brain, The Paradise Syndrome, Is there in Truth No Beauty, For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky (great title), The Way to Eden, The Savage Curtain, and Turnabout Intruder are all bad episodes, but they're so loving crazy and weird that they're worth a watch anyway. Some people like Elaan of Troyius, but it depends on a high tolerance for Taming of the Shrew IN SPACE. All Our Yesterdays is mediocre, but it has my personal favorite space babe in the whole series. The girl in The Cloud Minders is also gorgeous, but it's still mostly crap. Least watchable episodes IMO are And the Children Shall Lead, That Which Survives, Lights of Zetar, Wink of an Eye, The Empath (lowest budget episode, hooray!), Requiem for Methuseleh, and Whom Gods Destroy (where GARTH OF IZAR comes from). Unless you're a completionist, just skip them.
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Feb 25, 2017 03:22
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Drink-Mix Man posted:Obligatory, "Well he did produce Cosmos" A very dumbed-down and unimaginative Cosmos, sure. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad a major network in 2014 aired an educational science program in prime time. But people still fondly remember and rewatch the original while the 2014 Cosmos has been all but forgotten. It never lived up to its potential.
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Feb 25, 2017 03:30
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Duckbag posted:The Expanse has fewer regulars than Farscape, BSG, or B5 and no more recurring characters than those shows or most Treks. It's really not that that big a cast, they're just more spread out at first. It's definitely a show from a different generation/mindset of scifi writing than most of the classic space operas though. Very focused on worldbuilding and continuity. You can tell it started out as a book/vidjagame setting because the universe really feels like a big sandbox designed for people to play in and it's all in service of one evolving story line. You'll get your franticness, sizzle, and monologues by the end of the first season, but it's much more of a slow burn and in general the big moments are more subdued and less theatrical than old school space opera. I find it refreshing, but have had a hard time getting other people into it. Weren't the books based on a long-running RPG campaign the authors had played in?
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Feb 25, 2017 03:48
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Farmer Crack-rear end posted:Weren't the books based on a long-running RPG campaign the authors had played in? Big Mean Jerk posted:A very dumbed-down and unimaginative Cosmos, sure. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad a major network in 2014 aired an educational science program in prime time. But people still fondly remember and rewatch the original while the 2014 Cosmos has been all but forgotten. It never lived up to its potential. I'm still pissed that they did the thing where they cut from celestial bodies orbiting each other to electrons orbiting nuclei because that plays into hack new age stoner "woah everything is like cosmic viberations, man" synchornicity/music of the spheres bullshit. Electrons don't really "orbit" as such, and the effect has nothing to do with gravity. Equating the two is just bad science. That kind of sloppy style over substance approach can be seen throughout the series and I think really holds it back.
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Feb 25, 2017 04:13
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Powered Descent posted:And of course the Excelsior communications officer who wakes up Sulu: Let's not forget the officer in Star Trek IV who realized that the Whale Probe did, in fact, have The Beat: 
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Feb 25, 2017 04:19
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Cosmos v2 had the guy blow up his eyes and "we'll pay you in fish books" so it was way more awesome than Sagan and his turtlenecks.
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Feb 25, 2017 05:15
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Sash! posted:Cosmos v2 had the guy blow up his eyes and "we'll pay you in fish books" so it was way more awesome than Sagan and his turtlenecks. Yes, but Fox DMCA'd every funny "MY EYES" video that came out.
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Feb 25, 2017 05:18
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The new Cosmos had a weird kind of "Internet atheist" vibe to it which I didn't really like.
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Feb 25, 2017 05:34
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Timby posted:Didn't he get that bit because he's a huge Trek nerd and his mom was the casting director on VI? Possibly but Christian Slater was a pretty big deal in 1991. After Gleaming the Cube and Pump Up the Volume he was a bona fide stare.
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Feb 25, 2017 05:45
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Pwnstar posted:The new Cosmos had a weird kind of "Internet atheist" vibe to it which I didn't really like. Science itself seems to have an atheist vibe to it.
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Feb 25, 2017 05:51
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Cojawfee posted:Science itself seems to have an atheist vibe to it. I haven't seen the new Cosmos but "internet atheist" is very different from just plain old "atheist."
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Feb 25, 2017 05:55
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Duckbag posted:I'm still pissed that they did the thing where they cut from celestial bodies orbiting each other to electrons orbiting nuclei because that plays into hack new age stoner "woah everything is like cosmic viberations, man" synchornicity/music of the spheres bullshit. Electrons don't really "orbit" as such, and the effect has nothing to do with gravity. Equating the two is just bad science. That kind of sloppy style over substance approach can be seen throughout the series and I think really holds it back.
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Feb 25, 2017 05:59
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Pakled posted:I haven't seen the new Cosmos but "internet atheist" is very different from just plain old "atheist." I don't particularly remember everything about the new cosmos to know what he means by internet atheist vibes, but it seems pretty normal to me. It just goes a step farther than the first cosmos did, and it was pretty atheist for the time it was made. Duckbag posted:I'm still pissed that they did the thing where they cut from celestial bodies orbiting each other to electrons orbiting nuclei because that plays into hack new age stoner "woah everything is like cosmic viberations, man" synchornicity/music of the spheres bullshit. Electrons don't really "orbit" as such, and the effect has nothing to do with gravity. Equating the two is just bad science. That kind of sloppy style over substance approach can be seen throughout the series and I think really holds it back. Are you mad about the title sequence? They explain what electrons are in the show.
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Feb 25, 2017 06:01
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It's a vague term I guess but to me internet atheist is something like angry and condescending about religious beliefs. I don't remember much of anything it had to say about any religion.
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Feb 25, 2017 06:31
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