In a fight over...
Star Trek v Star Wars you post a picture of Babylon 5 (better than the other two?) but do have it as an option to question one. Are you trolling us?
May the excessive force be with you: Chap cuffed after Star Trek v Star Wars row turns bloody
A bloke was arrested after a shouting match with a pal over Star Wars versus Star Trek led to blood being spilled. Jerome Dewayne Whyte, 23, was collared by Oklahoma police at 6pm on July 1 after he and his roommate argued about the relative merits of the snooty space opera versus the sci-fi merchandizing vehicle turned …
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Monday 10th July 2017 08:58 GMT TRT
Re: Snowy
Absolutely not. It might not have been "serious" in terms of it having a high amusement content, but it was one of the best made SciFi series of all time, taking certain SciFi staples to their peak:
Bio-technology, Quasi-religious oppressive regimes, Sex-slavery, Parallel universes, Robotic/AI presence and use, Assassin class characters, Undead military personnel. I'm probably only scratching the surface of the tropes it carried.
Utterly absorbing and entertaining.
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Monday 10th July 2017 14:52 GMT Wilseus
Re: Snowy
"Just watching B5 again after the death of Jerry Doyle (Garibaldi)."
I watched all of B5 for the first time a couple of years back when they repeated them all on one of those "Ten Quid TV" channels. Might have been Watch, I can't remember. The whole story arc over series 1-4 was awesome, much better in many respects than Star Trek.
I never got into it at the time, I think because I was a student and didn't watch much TV.
I really hope that someday, someone re-renders all the CGI in high def and releases them on Blu ray.
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Monday 10th July 2017 15:18 GMT Drefsab_UK
Re: In a fight over...
For the pilot and seasons 1-3 all special effects were done by Foundation Imaging, The networked Amiga's were only used for the pilot, for the rest they used 12 Pentium PCs and 5 DEC Alpha workstations for 3D rendering and design, and 3 Macs for on-set computer displays
From season four on-wards special effects were brought in-house to Netter Digital Imaging (a subsidiary of the B5's production company). I don't know what hardware they used but they did say like Foundation imaging they did use Lightwave 3D.
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Monday 10th July 2017 14:22 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: In a fight over...
@ciderbuddy; Get a grip, man. Yes, it was trolling- but so obviously so that it's clearly a good natured joke most of us are going to get, like this or this.
No-one's actually insulting Babylon 5, which was a great show. I myself tuned in every week to watch Captain Rogers fight the Cylons. Happy memories...
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Friday 7th July 2017 23:44 GMT David 132
Meh
The Star Wars trilogy was OK, I guess (apart from the one with the wombles). Such a shame they didn't make any more after RoTJ.
I will now simultaneously put my fingers in my ears and don my flameproof suit.
Beer, because it's Friday afternoon and we shouldn't take life too seriously.
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Wednesday 12th July 2017 05:43 GMT LaeMing
Re: No contest
"You have a computer with a shutdown sound? How quaint."
Not as quaint as the 10-15 minutes it takes to boot to a usable state in the morning (Commercial OS, of course: My home Linux box of older hardware boots up from cold - including > equivalent start-up software - in about 28 seconds).
But work pays me to use the tools they provide.
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Monday 10th July 2017 11:15 GMT Sir Runcible Spoon
Re: No contest
Any B7 fans out there need to watch the spoof: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWuTeR7xCU4
Orac saying 'are we there yet' in a plaintive voice gets me every time :) Very much like the time he was interrupted and said 'but what about the game?' even though imminent danger was looming :)
Some of the best (and possibly worst) lines ever written were in B7.
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Saturday 8th July 2017 13:56 GMT h4rm0ny
Re: No contest
I discovered Lexx late at night on Channel 4 many, many years ago. It was the first episode and the moment a computer glitch switched the fates of a wanted terrorist with an assembly of school children who had arrived for an award ceremony, I knew I had to watch all of it. It's on Amazon Prime at the moment so I re-watched it the first couple of episodes. And guess what - the sight of a bunch of smug school children being sentenced to death by lizard still makes me laugh.
Honestly, neither Star Wars (no science), nor Star Treck (awful science) come close to the holy trinity of space nonsense that are Babylon 5, Blake 7 and Lexx.
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Saturday 8th July 2017 01:39 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: No contest
Talk about pissing contests! BSG2 only made it on the air because they pitched it as "just as good" as B5 but with lots more sex sex sex. With sex added they got a decent budget, unlike B5 which limped along on back-of-sofa funds. Talk about oily robotic action series and vehicles for washed up actors! "Hey, let's get Xena! That'll help our ratings!"
You get more with a kind word and a two-by-four and splashy SEX than with just a kind word and a plot.
(Me, bitter? Naah. "So now I take great comfort in the general hostility and unfairness of the universe.")
(Oh, god, I'm defending a ~20 year-old against a ~13 year-old TV series. Well, that's better than defending the first trilogy Gah!)
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Saturday 8th July 2017 07:11 GMT David 132
Re: No contest
Red Dwarf for the win. Smeg all the others.
And its near-cousin, Hyperdrive.
"You have done a bad thing. We are going to re-habilitate you.
Watch the kitten. She does not question authority! Be like the happy kitten!
And look! Another kitten, sitting in a hat! What a lovely world it is where kittens can sit in hats!"
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Tuesday 11th July 2017 14:26 GMT imanidiot
Re: No contest
I prefer Firefly as best Scifi series, which certainly got cancelled before it's time. Stargate SG-1 was good too, SG:Atlantis had its moments but sometimes felt a little too grandiose for it's own good. SG:U started off terrible but worked it's way up to being actually quite good by the time it got cancelled and IMHO should have been given atleast 1 more season.
Star Wars as a series of movies isn't all that terrible, but a little pompous at times and terrible at others. Star Trek introduced a lot of the now standard elements of Scifi but there are many, many terrible, horrible stories/episodes offset against the good ones and the acting is not always that great either imho. A bit like watching old Dr. Who at times. Wobbly sets and all.
Babylon5, DS9, etc I've never even seen, so can't comment.
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Saturday 8th July 2017 08:34 GMT Chris G
Re: Question 3
My exact thought; Star wars; Princess Leia, Star Trek; 7 of 9!
In addition Star Wars was a Hollywood epic from day 1, Trek was a low budget TV series that took its time to win the hearts and minds of its followers, it was cheesy but nevertheless raised issues, asked questions and was, for it's day very multicultural and quite egalitarian. It was closer to real sci-fi, in my opinion SW is more sci-fantasy with the force and hi-tech beings battling with swords, even if they are hi-tech swords.
Oh, I don't much like fluffy cuddly warriors or (the real killer for SW) any franchise that could introduce a JarJarBinks.
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Saturday 8th July 2017 02:54 GMT Haku
Re: Challenge accepted.
Whilst I'm on the subject of TV show mashups, an old picture I made:
haku.co.uk/b3ta/KnightTeamTrek.jpg
"I aint getting in no transporter, fool!"
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Sunday 9th July 2017 00:08 GMT Haku
Re: Challenge accepted.
Hadn't seen that video before, I liked it.
But the possible reality of an actual working transporter is far far scarier than accidentally merging two entities together.
Sleep tight!
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Saturday 8th July 2017 12:42 GMT I Like Heckling
Whilst I actually agree that DS9 was (so far) the best of the Star Trek series... it's still way short of shows like Firefly, Farscape, Babylon 5 and so forth. It's on par with SG1, BSG...
What I'm more interested in is what people think are the 'Worst' shows of the last 30yrs... that's sure to cause a few fisticuffs. :)
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Saturday 8th July 2017 02:25 GMT Haku
"Get a life will you people, I mean, for crying out loud, it's it's just a TV show"
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Saturday 8th July 2017 16:54 GMT Sandtitz
Re: "Get a life will you people, I mean, for crying out loud, it's it's just a TV show"
I'll raise you with roasting of SW nerds.
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Saturday 8th July 2017 02:36 GMT Anonymous Coward
I'm going Luddite and voting for Game of Thrones!
Sure, there is too much sexposition in season 1. And the Sand Snakes bite in a disappointment kind of way.
However:
No Jar-Jar, no Wesley, no stomach-curdling romance between Anakin and Padme, no overwrought Cold War-analogy episodes, no microbes that cause an infection of The Force, no Melvin Belli, no captain always EMPHASIZING the wrong WORDS in a sentence, no whiny Episode IV Luke, no horrifying future of inbred mutant humpback whales (They only brought TWO back to the 23rd century!) no elite galaxy-conquering stormtrooper army getting butt-kicked by the neolithic residents of Build-A-Bear's Moon of Misfit Toys, etc.
If anyone has a problem with this, I am accepting trial-by-combat challengers. (I'll be wearing the snazzy red leather and light chain armor that Oberyn is no longer using!)
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Friday 27th December 2019 05:48 GMT HelpfulJohn
Re: I'm going Luddite and voting for Game of Thrones!
Wesley breaks the One Highest law on yet another alien world.
Wesley is sentenced to death.
Prime Directive compels Picard to accept The One Highest Law.
"But he's my *SONNNNNN!!!!" and "THINK_OF_THE_CHILDREN_well, maybe just THE CHILD!!!", whines the Doc as she fluffs her giant hair while she thrusts forward her frontal airbags so aggressively suggestively that even a blind mole rat on a distant planet would know she was mammalian.
Picard saves annoying, brainless, unthinking Problem yet again by sort of breaching P.D.
Drinks at Captain's Place.
Next week's titanic episode: Wesley gets into trouble ... bathos ensues.
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Friday 27th December 2019 05:38 GMT HelpfulJohn
Re: I'm going Luddite and voting for Game of Thrones!
" ... inbred mutant humpback whales (They only brought TWO back to the 23rd century!) "
Yes, but no one ever said Gracie was pregnant by the other one, that introduces a little genetic diversity. Also, Kirk-time "science" has genetic manipulation and Transporters so Gracie could have a litter of giant, fluffy, winged kittens with thumbs should anyone be bothered to create such a thing.
And, let us not forget, there are literally god-level beings wandering about the Strekian universe by the quadrillion any of whom could have been politely asked to fix the inbreeding issue in any of a thousand magical ways. Kirk made pals with a few, Picard annoyed a couple and even the duck-voiced Janeway got bothered by one. It's quite surprising that "Get-a-god-to-fix-it" wasn't the main trope used for the movies.
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Saturday 8th July 2017 18:16 GMT Anonymous Coward
Show yourselves downvoters.
I just expressed a personal opinion of what I like. I really don't give a flying fuck what you like but I'll defend your right to express it without criticism unless of course it's battlefield earth then I'll tell you to fuck right off back to the seventh church of the mother fuckwit Jehovah's.
On a side note I can't watch ROTJ with the new ending, the ewoks were great and I'm sorry but GL should have left it alone. JJ Binks on the other hand was a twat and came across as a Jamaican frog with aids.
Can you tell I'm a little pissed off?
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Monday 10th July 2017 10:40 GMT Tom 38
Re: The long night has come...
Andromeda is truly the worst written show in history. Each season had a pivot that made no sense in continuity to the previous season, and by the 3rd season they just gave up with continuity all together.
There were only two things that made it remotely watchable was Lexa Doig, and the comedy factor of the writing.
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Monday 10th July 2017 13:25 GMT Vic
Re: The long night has come...
Andromeda gets far too little credit in these threads. It had it's flaws but it was very watchable
Not for me, it wasn't. Every time I put it on, my then-girlfriend would tell me at great length how much she didn't like it.
It was years before I managed to get through an entire episode without having to rewind gert chunks of it...
Vic.
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Sunday 9th July 2017 09:32 GMT Francis Boyle
You missed out the bit where Graham Chapman plays The Doctor so it's you who are wrong. (You can't tell me that's not Jo Grant on the stool.)
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Saturday 8th July 2017 15:47 GMT Destroy All Monsters
What is this ballot?
There isn't even "Alien" (aka "Space Truckers vs. Illegal Immigrants") on it. Space-Pirate based arms-bearing libertarianism is also forgotten. Why even vote? And one cannot even disfigure the ballot. Is this modern democracy!
Completely gratuitous article on voter abstention by someone who actually likes Corbyn: Elections: Absenteeism, Boycotts and the Class Struggle.
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Sunday 9th July 2017 23:09 GMT CentralCoasty
Re: This is the correct order
I am sorry but you have missed the flaming obvious.
WHERE IS "THE BOOK"? How can you have any list like this without it? We quote it, we emulate it, we breath it.... and its not even in your list!
Although I will give you bonus points for Space 1999! I used to love that....
... but am sad that you missed out Joe 90.....
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Monday 10th July 2017 05:13 GMT Meph
Re: 5th Element
I'm not going to get into the "which one is best" pissing contest, for a huge number of reasons, but in terms of Sci-Fi that I've enjoyed, I'd add in two up and coming newbies:
Killjoys (Canadian made series I believe) for snappy one liners and some interesting long term plot arcs
and
The Expanse. It started fairly badly, I'll grant you, but the plot started to develop nicely by the end of the first season. Hopefully season two will be out some time this century.......
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Tuesday 11th July 2017 00:33 GMT I Like Heckling
Re: 5th Element
Good call on Killjoys and The Expanse (the book series is epic sci-fi and book 7 out this Xmas)... The Expanse is more Sci-Fi meets old timey Noir detective genre. If like me you'd read the first couple of books before the series came out, then you'll see how they streamlined the plot a little. but book one didn't end until midway through season 2 and we're only halfway through book 2 at the end of S2... So if you are waiting for season to start, you missed it by several months as it's been and gone and is available in various disreputable places.... don't forget that to err is human but to Arrrrrgggg is piracy. :P
If it was a stasis leak... this is where Rimmer would pop out of the table mumbling about things getting all confusing.
and I'd like to throw in Dark Matter currently it and Killjoys have each just started Season 3.
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Sunday 9th July 2017 08:37 GMT Anonymous Coward
AH!! Sapphire and Steel!!
The only show that made perfect sense - as long as you were stoned.
Back to ST TNG, I always had big issues with the huge effing mistake in the opening Credits; they had the sunlight on the WRONG side Jupiter. Sun clearly on the left, right hand side of the Planet lit up.
Although I suppose it could be worse.
Anyone else notice that (According to Series one of "The 100"), "Gravity" is related to having any air; remove the air from the airlock and you float; pump the air back in, and you sink to the floor - in a rotating space station!!
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Monday 10th July 2017 11:16 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: AH!! Sapphire and Steel!!
> Back to ST TNG, I always had big issues with the huge effing mistake in the opening Credits; they had the sunlight on the WRONG side Jupiter. Sun clearly on the left, right hand side of the Planet lit up.
Obviously the answer is time travel.
Clearly the Xindi went back in time and gave the solar system two suns for the duration of the title and then Captain Archer went back and fixed it.
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Monday 10th July 2017 11:28 GMT Inspector71
Re: Club with only one member
I rewatched the whole series again recently and it holds up really well. OK the Saratoga looks a bit Minecraft but it still looks great. The thread throughout about fear of the other really chimes now with the in-vitros, the AI silicates and even the Chigs.
Icon > Chiggy Von Richthofen
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Monday 10th July 2017 17:41 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Club with only one member
Right, a remake of "Tour of Duty", mashed together with "Top Gun" and "Starship Troopers".
Real logical, train a bunch of people to fly super sophisticated space fighters, then use them as infantry grunts for 90% of the time.
FFS the opening credits contained clones of several ToD credit scenes!!
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Sunday 9th July 2017 16:10 GMT This is my handle
Surprised by the enthusiasm of fellow Trekkers ...
... for what I always call Deep Sh*t Nine, .... they don't "Boldly go ... " anywhere. It kind of ruined it for me. Also, they have money. Both Kirk & Picard pontificate often about the nastiness of societies where money makes the world go 'round, even as Riker goes off to play poker and Paramount kept milking the cash cow that ST became. DS9 might have been a very nice series on it's own but it's a black sheep of the ST family, IMHO.
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Monday 10th July 2017 10:10 GMT Anonymous Coward
Well since if I recall correctly, the Imperial Star Destroyers used 'turbo lasers', and the USS Enterprise shields were supposed to be impervious to lasers, and it has greater manoeuvrability, I would suspect Enterprise could win, but I am unaware of the other weapons the star destroyer has available.
I would find it a fascinating discussion over a few cold ciders!
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Wednesday 19th July 2017 18:23 GMT Tom Paine
Blake's 7
This wasn't my observation, and I'm badly mangling it thru age-related bitflips. But:
Star Trek: Galaxy is ruled by the Federation, a benevolent, democratic association between many species, all living in more-or-less harmony
Blake's 7: Galaxy si ruled by the Federation, a ruthlessly violent authoritarian dictatorship
Star Trek: our heroes are the diverse crew of a spaceship doing a combination of humanitarian and military work. They work together selflessly as a mostly-harmonious team under a brilliant leader.
Blake's 7: our heroes (?) are mostly escaped criminals, with a couple of idealistic freedom fighter types, supposedly to attack the Federation but with plenty of larcenous sidelines and personal agendas. Held together mostly by expediency, the group is shot through with envy, ambition, greed and distrust and suspicion ending in the gradual mental disintegration of a leading character who finally kills the leader in a fit of paranoia.
They both have FTL travel, personal teleportation and rayguns, but the computers in Blake's 7 are way, WAYYYYY cooler than anything I'm aware of in ST.
And at the end of the final scene of the final show of the final series they all die, executed in cold blood, one by one, in horrible slow-motion, leaving only the by now completely insane Avon surrounded by the space Gestapo, holding a sort of ray-gun assault rifle with a telescopic stock. He smiles the maddest smile, the most terrifying and heartstopping expression, slowly begins the raise the gun...
Fade to black...
Sound of blaster shots.
Silence.
Roll credits.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9feQ2sXhu0
Absolutely the greatest ending of a TV series of all time. Has anyone else ever done this? Ever?
Imagine if Star Trek ended with Spock shooting Kirk before the crew are gunned down by Klingons! Only the BBC could dare to do such a thing (and arguably only decades ago; lord knows how it would go down if suggested now.) The disbelief and shock was really pretty gobsmacking. (It was a broadcast at 8pm and had a big family audience!) The sets were wobbly, the spaceship floors were clearly chipboard, some of the acting left a little to be desired and there was *cough* a certain amount of potboiling writing, I concede, but for all that it was always a lot more true to real life and the human condition than Star Trek's airless, airbrushed set pieces and creative writing school committees of writers. Please don't take umbrage, ST fans - I'm not criticising you - it's not your *fault* you haven't seen enough B7 to realise the truth.... ;)
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Tuesday 10th October 2017 18:48 GMT kbutler.toledo
soapy, soapy, soapy ...
They were both detestable in melodrama and impractical in any application of the so-called sciences they tried to apply to their themes.
Mankind goes forth for money, plain and simple. Ask the American Indians, the Aztecs, the peoples of the South Seas, the "Abo's" of Australia.
Get the theme right and the sciences applied right and then ask me again which 'show' was better. I've watched many and most, Firefly comes closest to true theme based on true life, although the science was questionable. The movie Serenity, based on Firefly was bad science as well but closer than almost every other show on motive.
Re-ask the question as: Which is closer to reality? Dystopia or Utopia ...
Biting the hand that feeds IT
