Lynch's Spoiler Review: "Disaster"
Timothy W. Lynch
episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
spoiled for them are advised to depart.
You *must* be kidding.
Er...exactly whose idea was this story? And can we please bar them from the
Paramount lot?
Well...it wasn't quite THAT bad--but good gods, it wasn't good. More after a
synopsis:
The Enterprise is between missions and is struck by a quantum filament,
trapping everyone more or less where they are, killing intraship
communications, and knocking out primary life support and the warp engines.
Picard, trapped in a turbolift with three elementary school children, is
injured when the lift first falls. Meanwhile, on the bridge, the three
relevant characters are O'Brien, Ensign Ro, and Troi, who as the senior
officer is placed in command. In Ten-Forward, Worf is left to take care of
the wounded (and a very pregnant Keiko O'Brien) while Riker and Data head
through a crawlway to try to get to Engineering. Finally, Bev and Geordi are
trapped in a shuttle bay--and a plasma fire is spewing radiation into the bay,
threatening both the people and some canisters of chemicals, which are likely
to explode.
Riker and Data end up with their retreat cut off by a coolant leak and their
advance stopped by a huge current arc. Data volunteers to use his
(non-conducting) body to block the circuit, claiming that his head will
survive and can be detached for use in Engineering. Riker, having no other
options, approves. While Picard tries to get the children working together to
get them all out of the lift, Ro manages to power up the Engineering console
and finds that the warp containment field is slowly failing, which will
eventually lead to the entire ship exploding.
Once the lift's hatch is open (and the children refuse to leave the injured
Picard behind), the group begins working on ways to leave and climb up to an
open deck. Meanwhile, Bev and Geordi decide the only way to both keep the
chemicals safe and put out the plasma fire is to depressurize the shuttle bay.
And, as if things weren't bad enough, Keiko suddenly goes into labor.
While Troi decides not to follow Ro's advice (namely, to separate the saucer
and get the hell away from the warp engines, assuming there's no one left
alive in the drive section) and sends enough power down to Engineering so that
anyone there can at least realize there's a problem, Picard and the children
leave the lift (just in time, as its emergency clamps fail and it falls) and
begin climbing to a door that will open. Bev and Geordi depressurize the bay,
putting out the fire, and Bev manages to repressurize it just in time.
Riker and Data's head reach Engineering and manage to restore the containment
field just before it collapses, Picard and the kids make it to an open deck,
and a very inexperienced Worf manages to successfully deliver Keiko's
daughter. Later, once everything is running smoothly again, the children give
Picard a commemorative plaque to thank him for all his help.
That's it, folks. That's all she wrote. Now, for some rantings:
My opinion can mostly be summarized by the following two thoughts I had early
in the show:
1) "Didn't Battlestar Galactica have an episode a lot like this?"
2) "My God, Battlestar Galactica did it better, too."
And no, that's not meant to be high praise. :-)
I don't know who decided they wanted to put the Enterprise into a Towering
Inferno/Poseidon Adventure/insert your disaster movie here scenario, but it
wasn't particularly well thought out--either the premise or the execution.
Here, off the top of my head, are a number of objections:
--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressurize
the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which is
supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
--There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
thousand people?
--Data, who by his own statements has pores and chemical nutrients running
through his body, is completely nonconducting? Puh-leeze.
--Data's head is completely self-contained? Soong was one weird puppy.
--Data appears to have access to the information about the containment field,
yet doesn't notice initially that the damn thing's failing?
--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
--An electric shock can screw up the containment fields? This is not a ship
on which I would want to serve.
--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
minutes?
I could go on, but I think you get the picture. Virtually nothing about this
plot held together in any way.
What's more, many of the performances didn't attract me overmuch. Stewart's
was watchable (it rarely is anything else), but far from magnificent.
Michelle Forbes was probably the strong point this time (one of the show's few
bright points was that Ro *hasn't* lost her combative edge, although that was
blunted by her apologizing at the end when her advice was completely on the
ball and warranted). Dorn's was awful (or rather, the main thing about his
acting that impressed me this time through was that he managed to keep a
straight face through the whole thing!). (Actually, the other reasonably good
performance came from Erika Flores, the girl who played Marissa. The other
two kids were a total loss, but she's got potential.)
Speaking of Michael Dorn...my own notes for the synopsis simply said towards
the end, "Keiko gives birth after Worf has a lot of lame one-liners." "You
may now give birth," indeed. I could swallow that coming from Data, just.
But not Worf--let's be serious here. "This is not a good time, Keiko"--that's
bad sitcom talk, not drama (or even humor). Worf's problems with the delivery
were all right, but they were handled miserably. This is probably the biggest
slap in the face of Worf's characterization since "Qpid".
(Even the FX had problems--the shuttle bay depressurization looked miserable,
as did the "shaking" FX when the lift finally fell. They've done so much
better...)
However, it wasn't a complete loss. There were two sequences which had me
interested, if amused. The first was Bev trying to coax Geordi into singing
Gilbert & Sullivan in public. It's a bit silly, but it is *completely,
completely* in line with Bev's past actions, and I found it hilarious. The
second was Troi's parting shot to Riker: "I don't think I'm cut out to be
Captain. First officer, maybe--I understand there aren't many
qualifications." OUCH. Very enjoyable. :-)
If you're reading this before seeing the show, I suggest you watch this in a
"Mystery Science Theater 3000" style--mock it mercilessly and take no
prisoners whatsoever. I and those watching with me decided to do that early
on, and it worked nicely. Some examples:
(as Worf is left in charge of the injured): "Klingons EAT their wounded."
(Keiko explaining that not all births are as easy as the simulation Worf
worked): "For example, this one's an Alien [TM] baby--rrrrragggghh!"
(The kids refuse to leave Picard behind): "This is mutiny, Mr. Queeg!" [said
in as much of a Red Dwarf-Holly-like voice as possible]
(Picard and the kids finally make it onto a deck): "Whoops, another quake.
Back down you go!"
And so it goes.
This is something you can probably have fun with if you realize immediately
that it's a complete no-brainer and treat it accordingly, but if you try to
take it seriously you'll be hideously disappointed. Be warned.
So, the numbers:
Plot: 1. Old, tired and ridden with holes--and those are its good points.
Plot Handling: 1. It didn't flow all that well either.
Characterization: 4. Mostly unspectacular, and occasionally downright bad.
TOTAL: 2. Not good, folks. Not good.
NEXT WEEK:
Wesley vs. the Addictive Game from Hell. We shall see...
Tim Lynch (Cornell's first Astronomy B.A.; one of many Caltech grad students)
BITNET: tlynch@citjuliet
INTERNET: tly...@juliet.caltech.edu
UUCP: ...!ucbvax!tlynch%juliet.ca...@hamlet.caltech.edu
"Liddell, he is your future king. Does your arrogance extend that far?"
"My arrogance, sir, extends just as far as my conscience demands."
--"Chariots of Fire"
--
Copyright 1991, Timothy W. Lynch. All rights reserved, but feel free to ask...
Paul J. Schinder
>WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
C'mon, Tim, this is the ship without circuit breakers or switches.
This was designed by the same organization as the TOS Enterprise, and
how many times did we see someone waltz into auxiliary control and
take that ship over. I can't remember a single time on a Federation
ship (once on a Klingon ship) where a manual override *worked*, and
damn few times (and I can't recall at all any specific episodes) that
they were even mentioned. And this is the ship with touch screens all
over it, and if there's any one clear indication that the Federation
is a civilization in an advanced state of decay, the use of touch
screens is it :-) In short, the Enterprise shows every indication of
being a ship that is too dependent on the computer being functional.
>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressurize
>the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which is
>supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
As I mentioned before, this bugged me too. The fact that every
console and circuit that they had to use just happened to work was a
little much to take. The writers should have the sense to use a
manual control.
>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
>fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
She's a Starfleet officer in the same sense that Hawkeye Pierce was an
Army captain.
>--Data, who by his own statements has pores and chemical nutrients running
>through his body, is completely nonconducting? Puh-leeze.
Of course, if he were completely non-conducting, why was he affected by
the current at all?
>--Data appears to have access to the information about the containment field,
>yet doesn't notice initially that the damn thing's failing?
Bugged me too. Worf had a tricorder, so they might have noticed this
beforehand from 10-Forward
>Wesley vs. the Addictive Game from Hell. We shall see...
Or as others have put it "Wesley vs. Nintendo".
>Tim Lynch (Cornell's first Astronomy B.A.; one of many Caltech grad students)
--
--------
Paul J. Schinder
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center/Dept. of Astronomy, Cornell University
schi...@leprss.gsfc.nasa.gov
Jose Gonzalez
>
>You *must* be kidding.
Actually, they were. That was the point.
>
>Well...it wasn't quite THAT bad--but good gods, it wasn't good. More after a
>synopsis:
It wasn't THAT bad? You gave it a 2. A 2! Seems to me that would be
bottom of te barrel in your book. It was at the opposite end of the spectrum
for me.
>
*SPOILERS*
I accidentally deleted your comments about Picard and children. Anyway, the
only time he is uncomfortable with them is right after the accident. They are
the ones who were uncomfortable with him. He was already winning them over
before the accident. "Very commendable," indeed.
>
>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
>fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
She was simply clarifying it for herself. I would want to know *exactly* what
was going to happen too.
>
>--There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
>thousand people?
A little late to be lodging this complaint, don't you think? I imagine it's
quite large.
>
>
>--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
>who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
>minutes?
Obviously, they didn't notice her. Understandable, considering the ship had
just been rocked. I don't think they ignored her.
>
>the end, "Keiko gives birth after Worf has a lot of lame one-liners." "You
>may now give birth," indeed. I could swallow that coming from Data, just.
>But not Worf--let's be serious here. "This is not a good time, Keiko"--that's
>bad sitcom talk, not drama (or even humor). Worf's problems with the delivery
>were all right, but they were handled miserably. This is probably the biggest
>slap in the face of Worf's characterization since "Qpid".
It may be bad sitcom, but it's hilarious Worf. And Dorn has been playing
Worf noticing different since "Redemption" and this fit in with that.
>
>The second was Troi's parting shot to Riker: "I don't think I'm cut out to be
>Captain. First officer, maybe--I understand there aren't many
>qualifications." OUCH. Very enjoyable. :-)
I saw the last line coming from a mile away, with both "Aye, sirs", but it was
still great. I was hoping Troi would follow it up with "See what I mean?"
>
>This is something you can probably have fun with if you realize immediately
>that it's a complete no-brainer and treat it accordingly, but if you try to
>take it seriously you'll be hideously disappointed. Be warned.
I was taking it completely for fun at the beginning and I still managed to
get into it. The comedy evolved naturally and was not forced. And I had
several belly laughs in this episode, the biggest being when Riker sticks
Data in the wrong port. And if you want to see how humanized Worf has
become, check him in out in the first scene in Ten Forward. Standing behind
Miles and Keiko, he straightens his sash like we would straighten a tie.
>
>So, the numbers:
>
>Plot: 1. Old, tired and ridden with holes--and those are its good points.
>Plot Handling: 1. It didn't flow all that well either.
>Characterization: 4. Mostly unspectacular, and occasionally downright bad.
>
>TOTAL: 2. Not good, folks. Not good.
Again, a 2? A 2?!? I gave it a 9.5. Good, folks. Good.
Guess you didn't see the Spock promo either. Too Bad. (':
--
Jose Gonzalez
"It's not safe out here. It's wonderous, with treasures
to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But it's
not for the timid." - Q in "Q Who"
Michael Scott Shappe
job...grumble grumble....
tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
I'm only going to comment where I disagree, and then only on specific points.
Tim and I are miles apart in our opinions of the characterizations in this
episode *or* its potential redeeming social value, so I'm not going to
even bother...just read my review (once I get it posted...DAMN the
Batcomptuer anyway)...
>1) "Didn't Battlestar Galactica have an episode a lot like this?"
>2) "My God, Battlestar Galactica did it better, too."
Yes and maybe.
>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
Um...what were you thinking of that wasn't already being used in the show, pray
tell?
>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressurize
>the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which is
>supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
Um, FIRST of all, that WAS NOT THE SHUTTLE BAY...it was a CARGO BAY. And yes,
some of the Cargo Bays have doors like that--go back and read the Tech Manual.
The giveaway is that Shuttle Bays don't have Cargo Transporters in the
middle of them...
>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
>fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
Hawkeye Pierce was a US Army officer, but he wouldn't have had a clue either.
A more apt analogy would be Sidney Friedman, the psychiatrist. (For the
heathens in the audience, those are both M*A*S*H references).
>There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
>thousand people?
It doesn't matter if there were 20--they still couldn't get to ANY of them.
(However, yes, there is only one).
>--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
>around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
>on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
Again, that was NOT a shuttle bay, but a cargo bay.
>TOTAL: 2. Not good, folks. Not good.
Oof. It certainly wasn't THAT bad!
MSS
--
Making Terra a better place by babbling randomly
James K. Huggins
|WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
|episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
|spoiled for them are advised to depart.
|You *must* be kidding.
|Er...exactly whose idea was this story? And can we please bar them from the
|Paramount lot?
|
|Well...it wasn't quite THAT bad--but good gods, it wasn't good.
subplots which (with the exception of the Main Bridge and Riker/Data
plots) didn't interact. It left a sort of disjointed feeling.
Lots of detail errors which you've pointed out came to mind as well,
so I won't comment further, but ...
|--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
|ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
|fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
Well -- remember that Troi couldn't even recognize hydrogen in
"Night Terrors" until Data identified it for her. She may have a grasp
of the command essentials but none of the technical knowledge.
(Or at least little use for it -- she may have received rudimentary
training at the Academy, but lack of use caused atrophy.)
But I'm not going to defend this too strongly ...
|--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
|around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
|on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
Not necessarily too bad -- if the chemicals were just "recently" unloaded
there awaiting transfer to a more secure part of the ship. (What was
Geordi doing in the opening act? It might have been something along
those lines...)
|(Actually, the other reasonably good
|performance came from Erika Flores, the girl who played Marissa. The other
|two kids were a total loss, but she's got potential.)
Actually -- I think that kind of made sense -- girls maturing a little
faster than boys, y'know ...
|Speaking of Michael Dorn...my own notes for the synopsis simply said towards
|the end, "Keiko gives birth after Worf has a lot of lame one-liners." "You
|may now give birth," indeed. I could swallow that coming from Data, just.
|But not Worf--let's be serious here. "This is not a good time, Keiko"--that's
|bad sitcom talk, not drama (or even humor). Worf's problems with the delivery
|were all right, but they were handled miserably. This is probably the biggest
|slap in the face of Worf's characterization since "Qpid".
Well, I think we've also heard lines like that from other characters
in weird situations (Just saw a M*A*S*H rerun last week where Hawkeye and
Radar have to deliver a baby on a bus, and Radar gives a lot of the
same lines...). And the concept of a Klingon medic is rather odd.
Combined with the fact that the only human birth he's ever witnessed
was a computer simulation -- it almost makes sense. Yes, entirely
predictable, but still kind of funny.
|TOTAL: 2. Not good, folks. Not good.
Where does this rank on the bottom-10 list? I don't think it's really
as bad as some of the others you've rated that low ...
Jim Huggins
Jeff Sicherman
>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>Er...exactly whose idea was this story? And can we please bar them from the
>Paramount lot?
Does their name go before or after yours ? :-)
>Well...it wasn't quite THAT bad--but good gods, it wasn't good. More after a
>synopsis:
[ deleted ]
>
>That's it, folks. That's all she wrote. Now, for some rantings:
>
>My opinion can mostly be summarized by the following two thoughts I had early
>in the show:
>
>1) "Didn't Battlestar Galactica have an episode a lot like this?"
>2) "My God, Battlestar Galactica did it better, too."
>
>And no, that's not meant to be high praise. :-)
>
>I don't know who decided they wanted to put the Enterprise into a Towering
>Inferno/Poseidon Adventure/insert your disaster movie here scenario, but it
>wasn't particularly well thought out--either the premise or the execution.
>Here, off the top of my head, are a number of objections:
>
Your confusion and disappointment is understandable. You obviously don't
realize that this was not really a produced episode. They took scenes from
other scripts that they didn't have time for an threw them together into a
single episode. That way they didn't have to pay for a whole new script.
They obviously were working to hard and long on the Spock epsiode and spent
too much money on it to do a real story.
>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
Not true. It's just that the backups were designed by AT&T and the crew
members to man it were at starbase taking training on how to cope with such
disasters (those who don't understand this should see comp.dcom.telecom or
get away from your terminals occasionally and read a newspaper).
>
>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressurize
>the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which is
>supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
>
>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
>fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
As daft as the plot requires. Actually, her rank is probably like that of
medical personnel in the military: honorary in that it befits their education
and satisfies pay grade requirements. However, in the military, that rank does
not qualify them for operational command because they lack the proper training.
Rank does not guarantee autority and command responsibility.
>
>--There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
>thousand people?
Wait a second, I though Geordi and Beverly were in another sick bay :-)
>--Data, who by his own statements has pores and chemical nutrients running
>through his body, is completely nonconducting? Puh-leeze.
It is true that he is non-conducting from a canon perspective. After all, we
have only seen him *playing* musical instruments so far.
>
>--Data's head is completely self-contained? Soong was one weird puppy.
Well at least this answers the Data and emotion issue. It *is* possible for
Data to lose his head over someone.
>
>--Data appears to have access to the information about the containment field,
>yet doesn't notice initially that the damn thing's failing?
>
>--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
>around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
>on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
>
>--An electric shock can screw up the containment fields? This is not a ship
>on which I would want to serve.
Please submit your starship design. And keep it under 500 billion dollars
per unit, there's a Federation-wide recession ...
>
>--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
>who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
>minutes?
It's the responsibility of lieutenants and all lower ranking personnel to
moan or otherwise indicate that they need assitance. High ranking officers
can't be expected to waste their time just looking for peons who *may* need
help. If they don't indicate so, it's assumed they dont need help ... one way
or another.
>
>I could go on, but I think you get the picture. Virtually nothing about this
>plot held together in any way.
This was explained above.
>
>What's more, many of the performances didn't attract me overmuch. Stewart's
>was watchable (it rarely is anything else), but far from magnificent.
>Michelle Forbes was probably the strong point this time (one of the show's few
>bright points was that Ro *hasn't* lost her combative edge, although that was
>blunted by her apologizing at the end when her advice was completely on the
>ball and warranted). Dorn's was awful (or rather, the main thing about his
>acting that impressed me this time through was that he managed to keep a
>straight face through the whole thing!). (Actually, the other reasonably good
>performance came from Erika Flores, the girl who played Marissa. The other
>two kids were a total loss, but she's got potential.)
Ah, Wesley's replacement ! Apparently Paramount has discovered that
ST:TNG's demographics reach down even further, agewise, than we had suspected.
Or perhaps they are planning to spin off a Saturday morning version ...
>
>Speaking of Michael Dorn...my own notes for the synopsis simply said towards
>the end, "Keiko gives birth after Worf has a lot of lame one-liners." "You
>may now give birth," indeed. I could swallow that coming from Data, just.
>But not Worf--let's be serious here. "This is not a good time, Keiko"--that's
>bad sitcom talk, not drama (or even humor). Worf's problems with the delivery
>were all right, but they were handled miserably. This is probably the biggest
>slap in the face of Worf's characterization since "Qpid".
Hmmm, is the next Tim Lynch spoiler review for "Lisa gives Birth" ? ( A real
next generation) We'll see how you react to this situation.
>
>(Even the FX had problems--the shuttle bay depressurization looked miserable,
>as did the "shaking" FX when the lift finally fell. They've done so much
>better...)
>
>However, it wasn't a complete loss. There were two sequences which had me
>interested, if amused. The first was Bev trying to coax Geordi into singing
>Gilbert & Sullivan in public.
don't give up your PBS gig, Levar ...
> It's a bit silly, but it is *completely,
>completely* in line with Bev's past actions, and I found it hilarious. The
>second was Troi's parting shot to Riker: "I don't think I'm cut out to be
>Captain. First officer, maybe--I understand there aren't many
>qualifications." OUCH. Very enjoyable. :-)
>
>If you're reading this before seeing the show, I suggest you watch this in a
>"Mystery Science Theater 3000" style--mock it mercilessly and take no
>prisoners whatsoever. I and those watching with me decided to do that early
>on, and it worked nicely. Some examples:
>
>(as Worf is left in charge of the injured): "Klingons EAT their wounded."
>
>(Keiko explaining that not all births are as easy as the simulation Worf
>worked): "For example, this one's an Alien [TM] baby--rrrrragggghh!"
>
>(The kids refuse to leave Picard behind): "This is mutiny, Mr. Queeg!" [said
>in as much of a Red Dwarf-Holly-like voice as possible]
>
>(Picard and the kids finally make it onto a deck): "Whoops, another quake.
>Back down you go!"
>
>And so it goes.
>
Well, now we know why Tim hasn't had any ST episodes on TV ....
>This is something you can probably have fun with if you realize immediately
>that it's a complete no-brainer and treat it accordingly, but if you try to
>take it seriously you'll be hideously disappointed. Be warned.
Actually, it's best to follow Data's lead and leave your brain behind and
send your body into the kitchen for a snack.
Smiley
:)WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
:)episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
:)spoiled for them are advised to depart.
:)You *must* be kidding.
:)Er...exactly whose idea was this story? And can we please bar them from the
:)Paramount lot?
Hmm... I'd rather take them out *to* a bar. :)
:)My opinion can mostly be summarized by the following two thoughts I had early
:)in the show:
:)1) "Didn't Battlestar Galactica have an episode a lot like this?"
:)2) "My God, Battlestar Galactica did it better, too."
Don't know, didn't ever watch that show, but it must have been a really
good episode to be better, IMHO :)
:)Here, off the top of my head, are a number of objections:
:)--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
:)or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
:)emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
Well... I don't know how well a manual backup or override would work if
they're having power problems, since they'd have to be power operated
still. Not everytying can be prepared for...
:)--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressurize
:)the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which is
:)supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
Okay... this one I can give to ya. Hey! Just thought of another explanation!
If there's a sudden loss of pressure, maybe the entire control pannel would
get sucked out, and therefore they'd need another place to put the
repressurization controls! (Really big :)
:)--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
:)ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
:)fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
Well, she's gone after Riker, hasn't she? :)
It's possible that her training has centered around being a counslor, not
being an officer, and that her rank is given to her for her understanding
of people, not for techincal items on board ship. I'm sure the ship's biologist
would have just as much a lack of understanding.
:)--There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
:)thousand people?
It's a really, really BIG sickbay... :)
Seriously, we haven't ever been led to believe there's been more than
one before where they may have been one needed, so this isn't any different.
:)--Data's head is completely self-contained? Soong was one weird puppy.
So what's so bad about that one?
:)--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
:)around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
:)on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
Well, there are other shuttle bays. I'm sure they were there for a temporary
storage. After all, shuttle bays are pretty big.
:)--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
:)who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
:)minutes?
Umm... not sure what you mean, here, but I think the assumption was that
she was dead. Not much purpose at looking at her, unless O'Brien was
starting to get some kinky thoughts... :)
:)What's more, many of the performances didn't attract me overmuch. Stewart's
:)was watchable (it rarely is anything else), but far from magnificent.
ACH? I think he demonstrated his uncomforablity turning into trying to
lead these kids rather well.
:)ball and warranted). Dorn's was awful (or rather, the main thing about his
:)acting that impressed me this time through was that he managed to keep a
:)straight face through the whole thing!). (Actually, the other reasonably good
Now, I know you didn't like his lines, but that doesn't mean he acted poorly.
I found him quite believable as a warrior who suddenly has to try and be in
a tender, caring situation, and totally out of place.
:)So, the numbers:
:)Plot: 1. Old, tired and ridden with holes--and those are its good points.
:)Plot Handling: 1. It didn't flow all that well either.
:)Characterization: 4. Mostly unspectacular, and occasionally downright bad.
:)TOTAL: 2. Not good, folks. Not good.
OUCH! I don't think I've ever seen such a difference of opinion on r.a.s!
This is gonna be an interesting week, for sure! :)
-Josh Laff :)
--
_______________________________________________________________________________
"Do you know how much damage it would | Josh Laff: e-mail to: |
do to the bulldozer if I simply just | smi...@uiuc.edu | # #
let it run over you?" |smi...@gnu.ai.mit.edu____| _ _
"No. How much?" |_____________________| | |#\_____/#|
"None at all." | (217) 384-6227 | \#######/
Timothy W. Lynch
>tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>I'm only going to comment where I disagree, and then only on specific points.
>Tim and I are miles apart in our opinions of the characterizations in this
>episode *or* its potential redeeming social value, so I'm not going to
>even bother...
It has tremendous value--as something to jeer at. That alone makes it far
more watchable than things like "Qpid" or "The Royale", where even laughing at
it doesn't help. I thought this was a miserable show, but I still had a great
time watching it. :-)
>>1) "Didn't Battlestar Galactica have an episode a lot like this?"
>>2) "My God, Battlestar Galactica did it better, too."
And "Fire in Space" is not one of BG's better offerings, IMHO...
>>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
>Um...what were you thinking of that wasn't already being used in the show,
>pray tell?
How about a f***ing Big Red Button [TM] on each bulkhead to release it?
There's clearly power running to them--they managed to CLOSE, after all. These
are "things meant to be used in case of emergency", and yet they seemed to
*cause* more emergencies than they prevented. Stupid, stupid idea.
>>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressur-
>>ize the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which
>>is supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
>Um, FIRST of all, that WAS NOT THE SHUTTLE BAY...it was a CARGO BAY.
Fine. The objection still holds.
>>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter contain-
>>ment fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
>Hawkeye Pierce was a US Army officer, but he wouldn't have had a clue either.
I disagree. Hawkeye wouldn't know how to fix an X-ray machine or somethng, but
he'd bloody well know what the hell happens if the camp gets shelled, which
IMO is a far more apt analogy.
>>There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
>>thousand people?
>It doesn't matter if there were 20--they still couldn't get to ANY of them.
That wasn't made clear--it seemed that sickbay was cut off, not 10-Forward.
Tim Lynch
Timothy W. Lynch
>In article <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
Spoilers for "Disaster"...
>>You *must* be kidding.
>Actually, they were. That was the point.
They didn't exactly say so, did they? Most of the plots looked like they were
meant to be taken seriously.
>>Well...it wasn't quite THAT bad--but good gods, it wasn't good. More after a
>It wasn't THAT bad? You gave it a 2. A 2! Seems to me that would be
>bottom of te barrel in your book.
Nope. Close, but I've given several 1's (and one 0--one guess :-) ) in my
time.
>>--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
>>who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
>>minutes?
>Obviously, they didn't notice her.
Ensign whatshisname was thrown to the ground right NEXT to her. I don't
buy it.
[on Worf's inane lines]
>It may be bad sitcom, but it's hilarious Worf.
Not to me it isn't. As I've said elsewhere, this particular plot is "Qpid"
all over again, albeit a bit better.
>The comedy evolved naturally and was not forced.
Darwin would disagree. :-) I found it all extremely forced.
>And I had
>several belly laughs in this episode, the biggest being when Riker sticks
>Data in the wrong port.
Ptui. That was about my least favorite "joke" of the whole show. Data the
Walking Mugging Machine--no thank you.
>Guess you didn't see the Spock promo either. Too Bad. (':
No, I didn't--and I was looking for it, since I'd heard others had seen it.
Growlf.
Tim Lynch
Timothy W. Lynch
>In <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
Spoilers for "Disaster":
>>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
>C'mon, Tim, this is the ship without circuit breakers or switches.
[etc.]
So you're justifying this idiocy by invoking past ones? I don't consider that
a valid defense. :-)
>>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter contain-
>>ment fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
>She's a Starfleet officer in the same sense that Hawkeye Pierce was an
>Army captain.
See my reply to Mike Shappe for any appropriate MASH parallels. It is
completely unbelievable that Troi doesn't know basic emergency situations.
Tim Lynch
Ivan A. Gonzales
>wom...@eng.umd.edu (Jose Gonzalez) writes:
>
>>The comedy evolved naturally and was not forced.
>
>Darwin would disagree. :-) I found it all extremely forced.
>
>>And I had
>>several belly laughs in this episode, the biggest being when Riker sticks
>>Data in the wrong port.
>
>Ptui. That was about my least favorite "joke" of the whole show. Data the
>Walking Mugging Machine--no thank you.
Ptui right back at ya. Hmmmm... Maybe one loses his sense sense of humor
after 20? Noooo...my brother loved it and he's over twenty. Maybe
(net)gods can't appreciate a good joke? Noooo...Q's a God and he can crack
a joke with the best of them. Of course...Q's not married... (^: (^: (^:
Timothy W. Lynch
>In article <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>|WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>|episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>|spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>|Well...it wasn't quite THAT bad--but good gods, it wasn't good.
>I suppose ... perhaps the biggest problem was that we had five different
>subplots which (with the exception of the Main Bridge and Riker/Data
>plots) didn't interact. It left a sort of disjointed feeling.
Two things could have helped this a lot: narrowing it down to 2, at most 3,
little disaster subplots rather than five; and putting an extra week's thought
into patching all the plot holes. Those two together would have easily brought
this up to at least a 5 or 6.
>|--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>|ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter contain-
>>ment fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
>Well -- remember that Troi couldn't even recognize hydrogen in
>"Night Terrors" until Data identified it for her. She may have a grasp
>of the command essentials but none of the technical knowledge.
Saying "if we lose containment, the ship blows up" doesn't seem a hugely
technical point. And she didn't realize she was in charge, she didn't move to
help the injured Lt. until it was far too late, etc. A milder version of this
would have worked, but Troi was too clueless for me to swallow.
>But I'm not going to defend this too strongly ...
Oh, good. :-)
>|--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
>|around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
>|on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
>Not necessarily too bad -- if the chemicals were just "recently" unloaded
>there awaiting transfer to a more secure part of the ship.
Okay--between this and Mike Shappe's point that it's not a shuttle bay but a
cargo bay, I'm satisfied with this one.
>|(Actually, the other reasonably good
>|performance came from Erika Flores, the girl who played Marissa. The other
>|two kids were a total loss, but she's got potential.)
>Actually -- I think that kind of made sense -- girls maturing a little
>faster than boys, y'know ...
Agreed [glug].
>Where does this rank on the bottom-10 list? I don't think it's really
>as bad as some of the others you've rated that low ...
I think it's objectively that bad, but in the right frame of mind it's a lot
more fun to watch. It probably isn't even on the bottom-10 list; it's
definitely not on the bottom-five...
Tim Lynch
Horowitz, Irwin Kenneth
In article <1991Oct24.1...@beach.csulb.edu>, sich...@beach.csulb.edu (Jeff Sicherman) writes...
> Hmmm, is the next Tim Lynch spoiler review for "Lisa gives Birth" ? ( A real
>next generation) We'll see how you react to this situation.
>
I turned to Lisa and informed her that this was what she had to look forward
to...the above summary line clearly showed her response! :-)
Oh, and while I'm discussing watching "Disaster" last night at Tim's apartment,
I'd just like to point out that I was most distressed with our local station
for NOT showing the promo for "Unification" at all during the telecast.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Irwin Horowitz |"Suppose they went nowhere?"-McCoy
Astronomy Department |"Then this will be your big chance
California Institute of Technology | to get away from it all!"-Kirk
ir...@iago.caltech.edu | from STII:TWOK
i...@deimos.caltech.edu |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Timothy W. Lynch
Spoilers for "Disaster"...
>:)--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>:)or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>:)emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
>Well... I don't know how well a manual backup or override would work if
>they're having power problems, since they'd have to be power operated
>still. Not everytying can be prepared for...
There was enough power to CLOSE the bulkheads--there should be enough power
to release them if, say, a large button on said bulkhead were pressed.
>:)--Data's head is completely self-contained? Soong was one weird puppy.
>So what's so bad about that one?
I was going to say "is yours?", but I've just realized that "Datalore" would
seem to show this as plausible. I don't like it, but I'll swallow it.
>:)--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
>:)who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
>:)minutes?
>Umm... not sure what you mean, here, but I think the assumption was that
>she was dead.
I mean that they got up and walked around for two minutes, and then suddenly
"realized" that there's this BLEEDING CREWMEMBER on the floor. Blindness
taken to a bit of an extreme.
>:)What's more, many of the performances didn't attract me overmuch. Stewart's
>:)was watchable (it rarely is anything else), but far from magnificent.
>ACH? I think he demonstrated his uncomforablity turning into trying to
>lead these kids rather well.
It was very watchable--but it seemed below par for him. Nothing new about it.
>:)ball and warranted). Dorn's was awful (or rather, the main thing about his
>:)acting that impressed me this time through was that he managed to keep a
>:)straight face through the whole thing!).
>Now, I know you didn't like his lines, but that doesn't mean he acted poorly.
Correct. It doesn't. His lines were not the basis for that comment.
Tim Lynch
Paul J. Schinder
>schi...@gsfc.nasa.gov (Paul J. Schinder) writes:
>>In <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>Spoilers for "Disaster":
>>>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>>>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>>>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
>>C'mon, Tim, this is the ship without circuit breakers or switches.
>[etc.]
>So you're justifying this idiocy by invoking past ones? I don't consider that
>a valid defense. :-)
No, simply saying that every piece of canon evidence we've been given
shows that Star Fleet couldn't put together a well designed ship if
their lives depended on it. So when you say "the Enterprise is not
well designed", I simply reply "Yes, of course it isn't. We've seen
*that* in numerous episodes".
>>>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>>>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter contain-
>>>ment fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
>>She's a Starfleet officer in the same sense that Hawkeye Pierce was an
>>Army captain.
>See my reply to Mike Shappe for any appropriate MASH parallels. It is
>completely unbelievable that Troi doesn't know basic emergency situations.
Less than convincing. Sure, Hawkeye knows enough to take cover when
being shelled; he can probably even tell the difference between
incoming and outgoing fire. But do you think he knows the procedure
for moving the 4077 under fire? Troi's lack of knowlege didn't strike
me as that outlandish, considering that she's a specialist rather than
a line officer.
>Tim Lynch
Dennis Plafcan
stun.
I was at a Star Trek convention in Plano, Texas on October 19.
There was a Hollywood representative who was there to bring the
convention goers up-to-date on the latest SF, Horror, Adventure,
and Fantasy movie productions, including Star Trek. He said that
after several screenings of ST6 hosted by Paramount, a decision,
based on crowd response at the screenings, was made to film ST7.
He went on to say that the end of ST6 was reworked to make this
possible.
Nichelle Nichols, however, won't be back as Uhura if there is an ST7
with the old cast. She has other things to do.
The rep also said that there was some probability that ST7 will be
a Next Generation movie. NG movies will certainly be shot afterwards.
One last item, the rep said, that while the general release date for
ST6 is still December 13, the world premier had been moved to
December 6.
====================================================================
Dennis Plafcan |
exu...@exu.ericsson.se | "Too much LDS"
|
====================================================================
Timothy W. Lynch
>In <1991Oct24.1...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>schi...@gsfc.nasa.gov (Paul J. Schinder) writes:
>>>In <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>Spoilers for "Disaster":
>>>>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>>>>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter contain-
>>>>ment fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
>>>She's a Starfleet officer in the same sense that Hawkeye Pierce was an
>>>Army captain.
>>See my reply to Mike Shappe for any appropriate MASH parallels. It is
>>completely unbelievable that Troi doesn't know basic emergency situations.
>Less than convincing. Sure, Hawkeye knows enough to take cover when
>being shelled; he can probably even tell the difference between
>incoming and outgoing fire. But do you think he knows the procedure
>for moving the 4077 under fire?
At least some of it--yes, I do. He's not that stupid. *Everyone*, particlarly
those in some position of authority, should know emergency procedures. Troi
didn't appear to know *any*, from ship problems to dealing with the wounded.
That simply doesn't work for me.
Her being clueless about starship operations is fine to an extent--but this
seemed so global as to boggle my mind.
Tim Lynch
Chengi Jimmy Kuo
>In article <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>|WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>|episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>|spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>|--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>|ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
>|fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
>Well -- remember that Troi couldn't even recognize hydrogen in
>"Night Terrors" until Data identified it for her. She may have a grasp
>of the command essentials but none of the technical knowledge.
>(Or at least little use for it -- she may have received rudimentary
>training at the Academy, but lack of use caused atrophy.)
I'm starting to think she was hired specifically for her job and given a
rank commensurate with the position OR she got through StarFleet Academy
like this:
"Professor, I sense lechery, wanton sexual desire! And directed at me!
And at those twins over there also!... Oh, I am going to get an A on this
course, aren't I?"
Jimmy Kuo
--
cj...@locus.com
"The correct answer to an either/or question is both!"
Paul J. Schinder
In <91297.235...@psuvm.psu.edu> KEL...@psuvm.psu.edu writes:
>In article <1991Oct24....@eng.umd.edu>, wom...@eng.umd.edu (Jose
>Gonzalez) says:
>>>--There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
>>>thousand people?
>>A little late to be lodging this complaint, don't you think? I imagine it's
>>quite large.
>Hey, it's rather like a town with a thousand people having one hospital.
>So what's wrong with that?
The Enterprise is a warship, and it's usually on its own. It's a
little suprising that they have only one sickbay, since if the sickbay
gets trashed in the early going of a battle, how will they deal with
all the battle casualties?
>Kurt Ludwick
>------------
KEL...@psuvm.psu.edu
>I accidentally deleted your comments about Picard and children. Anyway, the
>only time he is uncomfortable with them is right after the accident. They are
>the ones who were uncomfortable with him. He was already winning them over
>before the accident. "Very commendable," indeed.
They were **CRYING**!! How well could he have been doing???
>>--There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
>>thousand people?
>A little late to be lodging this complaint, don't you think? I imagine it's
>quite large.
Hey, it's rather like a town with a thousand people having one hospital.
So what's wrong with that?
>>TOTAL: 2. Not good, folks. Not good.
>Again, a 2? A 2?!? I gave it a 9.5. Good, folks. Good.
A 9.5?!? I give it a *10*! No review, it wast just one hell of an episode!
Kurt Ludwick
------------
AMID Rudy
>
>
>A 9.5?!? I give it a *10*! No review, it wast just one hell of an episode!
>
A 10 is a bit much. An 8 is appropriate. I like this one. What can I say,
lots of action. \:-)
I can start nitpicking, but I rather not. Still it's a good episode.
---
Rudy Amid // "One Philosophy: Star Trek!"
am...@ecf.toronto.edu \X/ "It's fine if it works."
University of Toronto, Canada "Qapla'!"
"Boos, cars, truffles. Violence, religion, justice, and death." -PSB
J. Kurt Tappe
>wom...@eng.umd.edu (Jose Gonzalez) writes:
(spoilers)
>>And I had several belly laughs in this episode, the biggest being when
>>Riker sticks Data in the wrong port.
>Ptui. That was about my least favorite "joke" of the whole show. Data the
>Walking Mugging Machine--no thank you.
I don't understand your objection, Tim. What is a "walking mugging machine"?
Why is it not believable that Riker could make a bad connection??
>>Guess you didn't see the Spock promo either. Too Bad. (':
>No, I didn't--and I was looking for it, since I'd heard others had seen it.
>Growlf.
Here in Philly we get TNG on Saturday evening, so we just got Disaster here.
They didn't show the SPOCK promo here either. They DID have a Gene R.
memorial spot just before the show though, so I won't complain too loudly.
>Tim Lynch
Kurt
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
|| Kurt Tappe (215) 363-9485 || With. Without. And who'll ||
|| 184 W. Valley Hill Rd. (home) || deny it's what the fighting's ||
|| Malvern, PA 19355-2214 458-5000 || all about? - Pink Floyd ||
|| (work) --------------------------------||
|| tap...@infonode.ingr.com OR jkt...@psuvm.psu.edu QLink: KurtTappe ||
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Bill Wilson
More trouble with the starboard power couplings... bleah...
Also why is the cargo bay connected directly to outside space? Isn't most cargo in and out done via the cargo transporter? I guess there's some reason...
Why didn't the little dealy from "Up the Long Ladder" come on and put out the fire?
Despite these flaws, the show itself was pretty well done. Overall, B or B-.
--- Telegard v2.5k Standard
* Origin: ULTRA-Z (303)797-3805 (1:104/329.0)
--
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Bill Wilson - via Swashnet node 23:303/1
UUCP: ...!scicom!nemsis!1!104!329.0!Bill.Wilson
INTERNET: Bill Wil...@nemsis.FIDONET.ORG
Timothy W. Lynch
>tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>wom...@eng.umd.edu (Jose Gonzalez) writes:
>(spoilers)
>>>And I had several belly laughs in this episode, the biggest being when
>>>Riker sticks Data in the wrong port.
>>Ptui. That was about my least favorite "joke" of the whole show. Data the
>>Walking Mugging Machine--no thank you.
>I don't understand your objection, Tim. What is a "walking mugging machine"?
"Mugging"==loosely defined as lots of silly facial contortions designed purely
to get lots of yuks. See "Jerry Lewis". :-)
I loathe it.
>Why is it not believable that Riker could make a bad connection??
The bad connection is believable--the execution of the whole thing was
monstrous.
Tim Lynch
KEL...@psuvm.psu.edu
(Paul J. Schinder) says:
>>Hey, it's rather like a town with a thousand people having one hospital.
>>So what's wrong with that?
>The Enterprise is a warship, and it's usually on its own. It's a
>little suprising that they have only one sickbay, since if the sickbay
>gets trashed in the early going of a battle, how will they deal with
>all the battle casualties?
Well, first of all, I assume the sickbay is really big.
Secondly, it's my understanding that Sickbay is in the middle of the ship;
that is, it's the most heavily shielded area.
So, it'll be the last place to get trashed.
Not like the engines, which *have* to be on the outside, and thus vulnerable.
Kurt Ludwick
------------
KEL...@psuvm.psu.edu
>>Again, a 2? A 2?!? I gave it a 9.5. Good, folks. Good.
>A 9.5?!? I give it a *10*! No review, it wast just one hell of an episode!
..Um, in retrospect, I've changed my mind.
9.5 *is* about right. It wasn't perfect, just really damned good.
Kurt Ludwick
------------
Hanging my head in shame...
Gym Z. Quirk
>WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
Lighten up a little, Tim. (But not that much...;-)
>Er...exactly whose idea was this story? And can we please bar them from the
>Paramount lot?
Or give them a crash course in Treknology? ;-)
>Well...it wasn't quite THAT bad--but good gods, it wasn't good. More after a
>synopsis:
>[Synop deleted. If you havn't seen it by now, you're taking Gene's
departure *much* too seriously. ;-) ]
>My opinion can mostly be summarized by the following two thoughts I had early
>in the show:
>
>1) "Didn't Battlestar Galactica have an episode a lot like this?"
Yep..."Fire in Space".
>2) "My God, Battlestar Galactica did it better, too."
Eh...I think they did about the same. ;-)
>And no, that's not meant to be high praise. :-)
Not here either...
>I don't know who decided they wanted to put the Enterprise into a Towering
>Inferno/Poseidon Adventure/insert your disaster movie here scenario, but it
>wasn't particularly well thought out--either the premise or the execution.
>Here, off the top of my head, are a number of objections:
>
>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
One of the reasons behind my complaints about the damn ship being too
#^#$%#@$%!@!! computerized...;-)
>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressurize
>the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which is
>supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
Maybe the computers were so screwed up that they couldn't call up that
function on that particular console...Nah!
>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
>fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
"Damnit...I'm a Counselor! Not a physicist!" ;-)
>--There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
>thousand people?
I've always wondered about that...of course, it could be that the
forward section was cut off from all of the major medical
facilities...still, not particularly well thought out...
>--Data, who by his own statements has pores and chemical nutrients running
>through his body, is completely nonconducting? Puh-leeze.
>
>--Data's head is completely self-contained? Soong was one weird puppy.
Besides, wasn't there a (possibly non-canon) source which would have
Data's primary memroy located in his torso? It would probably be much
better protected there...
(Of course, my memory never has been what it used to be...;-)
>--Data appears to have access to the information about the containment field,
>yet doesn't notice initially that the damn thing's failing?
Er...maybe he can't function at 100% when he only has his head to work
with...;-)
>--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
>around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
>on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
I was under the impression that it was a cargo bay with an exterior
loading hatch...
>--An electric shock can screw up the containment fields? This is not a ship
>on which I would want to serve.
Well, what do you expect when you "reverse the polarity"? Either
something goes completely wrong, or it's how you fix it...;-)
>--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
>who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
>minutes?
O'Brien did check her pulse. I assume that he announced her death
while we were dealing with another plot thread...
>I could go on, but I think you get the picture. Virtually nothing about this
>plot held together in any way.
Well, time for my pet complaints...
Why diddn't Geordi (a.k.a. "The Human Tricorder") notice the buildup
of heat in the wall before Bev did?
Picard's "Climbing song" went on about two verses too long...at least
it wasn't "Row, row, row your boat"...;-)
>What's more, many of the performances didn't attract me overmuch. Stewart's
>was watchable (it rarely is anything else), but far from magnificent.
>Michelle Forbes was probably the strong point this time (one of the show's few
>bright points was that Ro *hasn't* lost her combative edge, although that was
>blunted by her apologizing at the end when her advice was completely on the
>ball and warranted). Dorn's was awful (or rather, the main thing about his
>acting that impressed me this time through was that he managed to keep a
>straight face through the whole thing!). (Actually, the other reasonably good
>performance came from Erika Flores, the girl who played Marissa. The other
>two kids were a total loss, but she's got potential.)
>
>Speaking of Michael Dorn...my own notes for the synopsis simply said towards
>the end, "Keiko gives birth after Worf has a lot of lame one-liners." "You
>may now give birth," indeed. I could swallow that coming from Data, just.
>But not Worf--let's be serious here. "This is not a good time, Keiko"--that's
>bad sitcom talk, not drama (or even humor). Worf's problems with the delivery
>were all right, but they were handled miserably. This is probably the biggest
>slap in the face of Worf's characterization since "Qpid".
Hmmm...maybe if we swapped Worf for Data...Guess not. Worf just
wouldn't have his head chopped off...;-)
>(Even the FX had problems--the shuttle bay depressurization looked miserable,
>as did the "shaking" FX when the lift finally fell. They've done so much
>better...)
And the "Exposure to Vacuum" procedures were contrary to what I've
read in other SF. If don't hold your breath in vacuum unless you want
to rupture your lungs...
Besides, isn't the time limit on the order of 90 sec if you
hyperventilate before depreassurize?
>However, it wasn't a complete loss. There were two sequences which had me
>interested, if amused. The first was Bev trying to coax Geordi into singing
>Gilbert & Sullivan in public. It's a bit silly, but it is *completely,
>completely* in line with Bev's past actions, and I found it hilarious.
To each his own...I found it painfull to watch.
>The second was Troi's parting shot to Riker: "I don't think I'm cut out
>to be Captain. First officer, maybe--I understand there aren't many
>qualifications." OUCH. Very enjoyable. :-)
One of her best lines to date...pitty about that...:-/
>And so it goes.
>
>This is something you can probably have fun with if you realize immediately
>that it's a complete no-brainer and treat it accordingly, but if you try to
>take it seriously you'll be hideously disappointed. Be warned.
Heh...yeah...I guess you're right about that.
>So, the numbers:
>
>Plot: 1. Old, tired and ridden with holes--and those are its good points.
Hmmm...I thought a '1' would be for "Little, if any recognizable
plot". I'll give it a 4...
>Plot Handling: 1. It didn't flow all that well either.
I'm not quite as critical. Call it a 3...
>Characterization: 4. Mostly unspectacular, and occasionally downright bad.
Ok...though I do think they did a decent job with Troi (excepting the
"Matter plus anitmatter? What does that do?" boner...) call it a 5.
>TOTAL: 2. Not good, folks. Not good.
Eh...my average is a 4...bump to a 5 as harmless mind candy. ;-)
>NEXT WEEK:
>Wesley vs. the Addictive Game from Hell. We shall see...
He's baaaack...
>Tim Lynch (Cornell's first Astronomy B.A.; one of many Caltech grad students)
>--
>Copyright 1991, Timothy W. Lynch. All rights reserved, but feel free to ask...
--
Capt. Gym Z. Quirk (Known to some as Taki Kogoma) tko...@triton.unm.edu
Nervous observer of the "Grand Startrek reorg" of Oct '91
R.I.P Gene Roddenberry. I may not have agreed with everything you
said, but you will be missed...
Charles Lin
Just curious. I missed the first few minutes of the show, but was there
ever an explanation of why the communicators weren't working?
--
______ __ __ ___ ____
/ ____ \ | | |__| | \ | | Charles Lin
| / \_| | | __ | \| | e-mail: cl...@eng.umd.edu
| | | | | | | |\ |
| | _ | | |__| |__| \___| University of Maryland
| \____/ | | |____ "I hate big sigs." -- Moo
\______/ \_______|
Timothy W. Lynch
>In article <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>>--Data's head is completely self-contained? Soong was one weird puppy.
>Besides, wasn't there a (possibly non-canon) source which would have
>Data's primary memroy located in his torso? It would probably be much
>better protected there...
That's not something I've heard, but whatever. Actually, given Lore's various
pieces in "Datalore", there may be evidence that Data's head is self-contained
like that, so I may have to withdraw this point.
>>--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
>>around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
>>on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
>I was under the impression that it was a cargo bay with an exterior
>loading hatch...
So it was. Mea culpa.
>>--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
>>who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
>>minutes?
>O'Brien did check her pulse.
Yes---two or three minutes after the rest of them had all gotten up, walked
around a bit, shot the breeze...
>I assume that he announced her death
>while we were dealing with another plot thread...
No, she was clearly mentioned as dead. Which leads to another question--where
did the body go? They didn't trip over her in later scenes--is she sitting
under Picard's ready room desk, or something? :-)
>Well, time for my pet complaints...
And a new one from me as well...
>Why diddn't Geordi (a.k.a. "The Human Tricorder") notice the buildup
>of heat in the wall before Bev did?
Valid point.
And about communications being completely cut off...the little combadges have
internal power sources, as evidenced by the fact that they work for away teams
to talk to each other when the Enterprise is nowhere in sight. And unless
technology has regressed since TOS's time, we know communicators can be used
on the ship without using ship's power ("Mirror, Mirror"). So communications
shouldn't have gone out like that either.
Tim Lynch (Cornell's first Astronomy B.A.; one of many Caltech grad students)
BITNET: tlynch@citjuliet
INTERNET: tly...@juliet.caltech.edu
UUCP: ...!ucbvax!tlynch%juliet.ca...@hamlet.caltech.edu
"Liddell, he is your future king. Does your arrogance extend that far?"
"My arrogance, sir, extends just as far as my conscience demands."
--"Chariots of Fire"
benj...@ducvax.auburn.edu
in the middle of a battle, and there is only one sickbay, then who are the
unlucky stiffs who get stuck without one?
David Benjamin
Atsushi Kanamori
>dhar...@chinet.chi.il.us (Dan Hartung) writes:
>>tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>>WARNING: Here be "Disaster" spoilers:
>>
>>>Er...exactly whose idea was this story? And can we please bar them from the
>>>Paramount lot?
>>>
>Listen. I'm sick of all these people just saying "BAD BAD BAD".
Actually, only a few people are slamming the show --- it's just that one
of them generates a lion's share of the postings :-)
Seriously, I've been reading post after post about this show and the
majority opinion seems to be "not Great but not bad either. Entertaining."
David Pipgras
disagree with you... The story was more or less badly put together,
granted... but here are a few of my thoughts on it:
The Enterprise totally knocked without power....I had a hard time
swallowing that, since there _should_ have been a hell of a lot of backups
and emergency power relays in her.
Troi not knowing any command orders or situations, well, that was partly
beliveable. I think this is becuase of two reasons: the first is the she is
, more or less a Doctor, and the rank of Lt. Cmndr was probably honorary -
even though she did graduate starfleet academey. She probably graduated
from the medical dept with a brief class or two on command. Second, she has
not had her "chance" at command in a show...well, at least it is over...
Ensign Ro. I like here. TNG needs a woman (and you will fogive this) with
balls enough to tell the Captain what she thinks... Dr. Pulaski did this,
but more out of wanting to do what she wanted over what was necessary.
Troi has no right to have a seat on the bridge....a new counselor would be
nice, or at least, put her into a uniform while she is on the bridge....
I was neat to see how the doors worked from the other side of the Turbo
Shaft. That made the episode at least worth watching....
The whole Data joke was just that. Badly done. Not on Brent Spiner's or
Frakes park, but on the writing...take his head to engineering...sheesh..
The last stint with the "you have the bridge number one" was also a dud.
I think Picard would have sent the kid down the turbo lift if she really
said that, not to mention that the kid at least should have know that the
captain was not going to leave her the bridge....
The kids and picard in the turbolift was there to get Picard to accept
childern as able people, and not just as a liability. Personally, I would
have whiped out my trusty hand phaser and told 'em either to quick bady
faking crying, or stun them. ;)
Also, Worf's lines were rather bad...."You bore that well" aack!! Should
have had Worf telling him how bad it was going to hurt, how painful it
would be....
Dave
UUCP: .. !crash!pro-freedom!pip
ARPA: crash!pro-freedom!p...@nosc.mil
INET: p...@pro-freedom.cts.com
Dave Schaumann
>In article <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>>You *must* be kidding.
>
>Lighten up a little, Tim. (But not that much...;-)
Well, I liked it. Not classic or anything, but above average -- say B- or B.
>>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
>
>One of the reasons behind my complaints about the damn ship being too
>#^#$%#@$%!@!! computerized...;-)
>
>>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressurize
>>the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which is
>>supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
>
>Maybe the computers were so screwed up that they couldn't call up that
>function on that particular console...Nah!
Yah. This continues Trek's fine tradition of showing little or no
understanding of the nature of automated equipment. The LaForge/Crusher
sub-plot was the weakest of the 5, IMHO.
>>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
>>fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
>
>"Damnit...I'm a Counselor! Not a physicist!" ;-)
Haven't you ever had your brain just turn off for a moment in a tense
situation? I think we can chalk this question up to temporary brain-deadness
due to stress on the Counselor's part.
>Why diddn't Geordi (a.k.a. "The Human Tricorder") notice the buildup
>of heat in the wall before Bev did?
I wondered about this, too. In "Heart of Glory", Geordi says that he routinely
"filters out" information from his visor that he's not immediately interested
in. It's reasonable that he simply wasn't paying attention to the IR spectrum
just then.
>Picard's "Climbing song" went on about two verses too long...at least
>it wasn't "Row, row, row your boat"...;-)
Well, maybe one verse. I was thinking just before he proposed it that he
should get them singing. I just wish they could've come up with a more
appropriate climbing song then "Friare Jac" (however it's spelled).
My overall feeling of the show:
The sub-plots on the bridge, in the turbo-lift, and in 10-forward were
the best (sorry, Tim -- I thought Worf was great; much better than in
"Qpid"). B to B+ material here.
The Riker/Data plot was OK, but seemed to get the short-shrift in development
time. As I said earlier, the LaForge/Crusher plot was the weakest, C
Material at best.
Which works out to B-, as I said.
--
The last word in this .sig is wrong.
Kyle Jones
> > Maybe the computers were so screwed up that they couldn't call up that
> > function on that particular console...Nah!
>
> Yah. This continues Trek's fine tradition of showing little or no
> understanding of the nature of automated equipment. The LaForge/Crusher
> sub-plot was the weakest of the 5, IMHO.
I dunno, I thought the Riker/Data subplot was worse. A
half-million amps? Yeeg, at the voltages required to produce
those arcs effects I think Data should have be vaporized in an
instant, head and all. If not when he fell the arcs should have
resumed, leaving Riker is no better shape.
Dan Hartung
>hug...@z.eecs.umich.edu (James K. Huggins) writes:
>
>>I suppose ... perhaps the biggest problem was that we had five different
>>subplots which (with the exception of the Main Bridge and Riker/Data
>>plots) didn't interact. It left a sort of disjointed feeling.
>
>Two things could have helped this a lot: narrowing it down to 2, at most 3,
>little disaster subplots rather than five; and putting an extra week's thought
>into patching all the plot holes. Those two together would have easily brought
>this up to at least a 5 or 6.
But the whole point was what happens in a disaster. Yes, it's a tv-movie
cliche (or more accurately, their stock-in-trade). But it's also what
HAPPENS in an unexpected disaster. People aren't where they should
be, they can't communicate with each other, there are all sorts of
little stories.
I've been reading up on Chernobyl, so this hit home with me perhaps.
>Saying "if we lose containment, the ship blows up" doesn't seem a hugely
>technical point. And she didn't realize she was in charge, she didn't move to
>help the injured Lt. until it was far too late, etc. A milder version of this
>would have worked, but Troi was too clueless for me to swallow.
I agree, it was odd that nobody moved to check on the wounded Lt. du Jour.
But Troi's soliciting precise information on her options from more
technically knowledgeable officers seemed appropriate. I didn't feel
that she was so much *lost* as *torn*. It's easy to offer advice, it's
much much harder to have to take two valid but contradictory positions
and choose between them. It really makes a difference when you're in
charge.
>I think it's objectively that bad, but in the right frame of mind it's a lot
>more fun to watch. It probably isn't even on the bottom-10 list; it's
>definitely not on the bottom-five...
I thought it was rather good, on the whole. Nice character set pieces,
some black humor, and for once some attention to the real dangers that
lay around on the ship.
--
MOST DISTURBING FOLLOW-UP NEWS STORY: | Dan Hartung
"K-9 units are being used to search | dhar...@chinet.chi.il.us
for the body's still-missing arm." | Birch Grove Software
Biden: "Is it possible, Ms. Berry, that there is life on other planets?"
Dan Hartung
>Er...exactly whose idea was this story? And can we please bar them from the
>Paramount lot?
>
>synopsis:
I disagree strongly. It wasn't GREAT, but it certainly wasn't bad.
>1) "Didn't Battlestar Galactica have an episode a lot like this?"
>2) "My God, Battlestar Galactica did it better, too."
I only vaguely remember that episode.
>--The Enterprise is so poorly designed that there aren't any *manual backups
>or overrides* for the many different "failsafe devices to be used in case of
>emergency" situations? Yeah, right.
I dunno. Usually there's an exchange like, "Captain! Losing starboard
control!" "Can you compensate, Mr. Data?" "Yes, sir. Compensating."
Ooooooh. Or "Shield failure imminent..." but they never seem to do
so. It was nice to see what might happen in a pretty-bad-case scenario.
>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressurize
>the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which is
>supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
OK, but it made sense to me that the air controls are by the door (probably
dupe buttons on the other side), and not in the middle of the bay....
After all, who would be crazy enough to be in the bay while evacuating it?!
;-)
>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter containment
>fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
As I stated in another post, she was eliciting info on options from more
knowledgeable officers who deal with tech matters.
>--There's only ONE sickbay in a ship this large with a complement of over a
>thousand people?
I always thought (canon alert!) from the original "blueprints" that there
was one in each hull. For Riker's purposes the only accessible one,
wasn't. But you're right, that seems a stretch. Still, the idea was
showing a makeshift sickbay, and that happens in real life all the time,
so I accepted it for dramatic purposes.
>--Data, who by his own statements has pores and chemical nutrients running
>through his body, is completely nonconducting? Puh-leeze.
Yup. I thought his head was going to be taken off FIRST.
>--Data's head is completely self-contained? Soong was one weird puppy.
Yup. What's the rest for -- fashion statements?
>--Data appears to have access to the information about the containment field,
>yet doesn't notice initially that the damn thing's failing?
I thought he was surmising. Still, it was a little too neat.
>--So, lots of chemicals that are unstable around radiation are just sitting
>around in the shuttle bay, where shuttle engines and tractor beams are active
>on a consistent basis. Good planning there, guys.
I got the impression that's what Geordi was working on.
>--An electric shock can screw up the containment fields? This is not a ship
>on which I would want to serve.
Well, a big enough shock would screw up just about anything....
>--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
>who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
>minutes?
Right. I was saying, "She's DYING! At least check if it's over!"
>What's more, many of the performances didn't attract me overmuch. Stewart's
>was watchable (it rarely is anything else), but far from magnificent.
>Michelle Forbes was probably the strong point this time (one of the show's few
>bright points was that Ro *hasn't* lost her combative edge, although that was
>blunted by her apologizing at the end when her advice was completely on the
>ball and warranted). Dorn's was awful (or rather, the main thing about his
>acting that impressed me this time through was that he managed to keep a
>straight face through the whole thing!). (Actually, the other reasonably good
>performance came from Erika Flores, the girl who played Marissa. The other
>two kids were a total loss, but she's got potential.)
Well, I thought everybody did a superb job except perhaps Riker, who didn't
have much to do a good job with. #1: it was GREAT to see Bev doing something
besides ministrations. #2: Picard & the kids was a learning experience for
him that was shown, not told -- when he was wrong, he found out right away!
#3: same as you said about Ro, combative and consistent [I had just seen
"Arsenal of Freedom", where that engineer who bugs Geordi takes wildly
varying positions, leave, stay, whatever, just to be a counterpoint to
Geordi]. #4: nice to see Worf trying to be nurturing; #5: Troi was given
a chance to see what it's like to be "counselled" -- making decisions
really is hard.
>Speaking of Michael Dorn...my own notes for the synopsis simply said towards
>the end, "Keiko gives birth after Worf has a lot of lame one-liners." "You
>may now give birth," indeed. I could swallow that coming from Data, just.
But it makes sense for a Klingon -- get these silly birth things over with,
there's a battle on! Perhaps Klingon women just pop 'em out...
>were all right, but they were handled miserably. This is probably the biggest
>slap in the face of Worf's characterization since "Qpid".
I also thought that was funny. Go figure!
>interested, if amused. The first was Bev trying to coax Geordi into singing
>Gilbert & Sullivan in public. It's a bit silly, but it is *completely,
>completely* in line with Bev's past actions, and I found it hilarious. The
Yeah -- I love G&S....
>If you're reading this before seeing the show, I suggest you watch this in a
>"Mystery Science Theater 3000" style--mock it mercilessly and take no
>prisoners whatsoever. I and those watching with me decided to do that early
>on, and it worked nicely. Some examples:
I felt the same way ... sort of. In short, it's a fun ep to make jokes
about, but my jokes are loving ones....!
>(Keiko explaining that not all births are as easy as the simulation Worf
>worked): "For example, this one's an Alien [TM] baby--rrrrragggghh!"
>
>(The kids refuse to leave Picard behind): "This is mutiny, Mr. Queeg!" [said
>in as much of a Red Dwarf-Holly-like voice as possible]
>
>(Picard and the kids finally make it onto a deck): "Whoops, another quake.
>Back down you go!"
See, I agree. All these are funny! But I still enjoyed the episode....
Dan Hartung
In article <swcdx4=@lynx.unm.edu> tko...@triton.unm.edu (Gym Z. Quirk) writes:
>
>Well, time for my pet complaints...
>
>Why diddn't Geordi (a.k.a. "The Human Tricorder") notice the buildup
>of heat in the wall before Bev did?
Good call! Can't believe I missed it myself.
>Picard's "Climbing song" went on about two verses too long...at least
>it wasn't "Row, row, row your boat"...;-)
But it was nicely done having us watch them all climb upward. Still,
logically, after the lift fell, why didn't they start going DOWN?
As for the song, *I* wanted to hear "The Laughing Vulcan and his Dog"!!!
>>(Even the FX had problems--the shuttle bay depressurization looked miserable,
>>as did the "shaking" FX when the lift finally fell. They've done so much
>>better...)
>
>And the "Exposure to Vacuum" procedures were contrary to what I've
>read in other SF. If don't hold your breath in vacuum unless you want
>to rupture your lungs...
>
>Besides, isn't the time limit on the order of 90 sec if you
>hyperventilate before depreassurize?
This has been discussed to, um, death over in sci.space. Somebody
wanta dig up the FAQ?
Tony Bruno
"
But I LIKED this episode.
I saw last week's trailers and almost vomited. "Yep," I thought, "Irwin Allen
meets the Enterprise." it was with little enthuisiasm that the Saturday Four
sat in the Bruno Abode to watch this week's episode.
We ended up agreeing on a "B" grade (or, for the Lynch scale, an 8.)
Why? The humor came from the characters and was not forced. Yes, that goes
for Worf's "You may now give birth," as well. Everybody -- with the
exception of Data, who was badly abused in this episode -- was within
character the entire story. We four had a very good time indeed.
As for complaints:
"Well, Counselor Troi is the senior officer on deck..." Yes, and completely
unfit for command. Hell, they had an Ensign as OOD. Why oh WHY did O'brien
insist on her taking charge? More to the point, why did Troi ACCEPT the
command? Dumb, dumb, dumb.
Funny, though; After a bit, it didn't bother me. Troi was incompetent,
came across as imcompetent, but still tried to do something. She was
scared, and well out of her league, but I enjoyed her performance.
It also provided a nice contrast to see her tentative decisions mirrored
against Riker (A.K.A. MICHELIN MAN) strong command initiative.
Picard's subplot was entertaining, and the kids were much more interesting
than Wesly ever was. Enough said.
The cargo bay sub-plot was a loss. Yawn.
Ten-forward - and the birth of Cliche O'Brien - managed to be funny.
"You bore that well," was the best line in the show.
As usual, all shipboard procedures were ridiculous. I agree with
Tim wholeheartedly; that is one ship you could NOT get me aboard.
It's too damned easy to munge up.
Need I say that the science was horrific? I didn't think so.
It was agreed by the Saturday Four that the characters actually saved the
show from dying. It wasn't a great episode...but it certainly wasn't the
worst.
Grade: B
Number: 8
Tony Bruno ud118950@ndsuvm1 " 'My Country right or wrong' is like
Communications specialist saying 'My Mother drunk or sober.' "
University of North Dakota -- G. K. Chesterton
(701)-772-2599
Timothy W. Lynch
>>>WARNING: Here be "Disaster" spoilers (opinions only, no details)
>Listen. I'm sick of all these people just saying "BAD BAD BAD".
>You have to think about $ for a moment.
["they needed a cheap story" justification deleted for brevity]
That's fine, Steve. But realizing that this was a necessary story and
saying that therefore it's automatically wonderful are two different things.
"The Drumhead" was also made on a very tight budget due to cost overruns--it
was also one of the best pieces TNG's ever done, in my opinion. (I also
don't believe "Disaster" was as cheap as you say, given some FX sequences
like the plasma fire and Data's head.)
Money is an issue unto itself--it doesn't mean that I or anyone else has to
automatically forgive them because "they needed something cheap".
Tim Lynch
Timothy W. Lynch
>>WARNING: Here be "Disaster" spoilers:
>>1) "Didn't Battlestar Galactica have an episode a lot like this?"
>>2) "My God, Battlestar Galactica did it better, too."
>I only vaguely remember that episode.
Count yer blessings. :-)
>>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressur-
>>ize the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which
>>is supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
>OK, but it made sense to me that the air controls are by the door (probably
>dupe buttons on the other side), and not in the middle of the bay....
>After all, who would be crazy enough to be in the bay while evacuating it?!
>;-)
That's fine for intentional depressurizations, but what about the lunatic who
takes a phaser to a bulkhead there? You need to have as many redundancies as
you can for that kind of emergency, and this apparently had none.
>>--Troi is a Starfleet officer, yet doesn't appear to know anything about
>>ANY emergency procedure, including "what happens if the antimatter contain-
>>ment fails"? Just how daft IS this woman?
>As I stated in another post, she was eliciting info on options from more
>knowledgeable officers who deal with tech matters.
Getting information on options is fine--not realizing the result of something
as basic as containment failure is not.
>Well, I thought everybody did a superb job except perhaps Riker, who didn't
>have much to do a good job with.
I don't think *anybody* was given much to do a good job with, which is most
of the problem. Some of them (Keiko, Ro, Bev) did fairly good jobs with what
they had. Some of them (Picard, etc.) did passable ones. Some of them (Worf)
did absolutely miserable ones.
>#1: it was GREAT to see Bev doing something
>besides ministrations.
Pity none of it was believable except for the Gilbert 'n' Sullivan bit. :-)
>#2: Picard & the kids was a learning experience for
>him that was shown, not told -- when he was wrong, he found out right away!
But he clearly had to forget all his old lessons for this to be necessary in
the first place.
>#3: same as you said about Ro, combative and consistent [I had just seen
>"Arsenal of Freedom", where that engineer who bugs Geordi takes wildly
>varying positions, leave, stay, whatever, just to be a counterpoint to
>Geordi].
:-)
>#4: nice to see Worf trying to be nurturing;
I can't agree here.
>#5: Troi was given
>a chance to see what it's like to be "counselled" -- making decisions
>really is hard.
Nor here. Both are interesting things to try to do, but my lord, they could
have picked better situations in which to do them.
>>If you're reading this before seeing the show, I suggest you watch this in a
>>"Mystery Science Theater 3000" style--mock it mercilessly and take no
>>prisoners whatsoever. I and those watching with me decided to do that early
>>on, and it worked nicely. Some examples:
>I felt the same way ... sort of. In short, it's a fun ep to make jokes
>about, but my jokes are loving ones....!
I've made jokes about the show sometimes that were done all in good fun--
but this one didn't deserve that. Just relentless heckling. :-) (But the
heckling itself is definitely part of the entertainment.)
Tim Lynch
Hades
>jal4...@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Smiley) writes:
>>tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>Spoilers for "Disaster"...
>
>>Well... I don't know how well a manual backup or override would work if
>>they're having power problems, since they'd have to be power operated
>>still. Not everytying can be prepared for...
>There was enough power to CLOSE the bulkheads--there should be enough power
>to release them if, say, a large button on said bulkhead were pressed.
Perhaps it was the power that was keeping the bulkheads open, and when
it was cut they automatically closed to seal off the entryways. This was
the first thing that occured to me, very analagous to magnetic fire doors
that are installed in all of the dorms on campus here.
--
-Hades (aka. The Hustler) | "What's his problem?" "Well, aside from being
Brian V. Hughes | stupid, he had a table dropped on him."
Mac Database Administrator | "Oh, is Godot here?" --Psmith (Phil Phoglio)
Dartmouth Medical School | -Internet: ha...@Coos.Dartmouth.Edu
Hades
>Here be "Disaster" spoilers:
>
>In article <swcdx4=@lynx.unm.edu> tko...@triton.unm.edu (Gym Z. Quirk) writes:
>>
>>Well, time for my pet complaints...
>>
>>Why diddn't Geordi (a.k.a. "The Human Tricorder") notice the buildup
>>of heat in the wall before Bev did?
>Good call! Can't believe I missed it myself.
This was pointed out by one of my friends while we were wathcing
Disaster for the second time, and the reasoning that I came up with
(however much weight it may or may not carry) is that Geordi does not scan
all of the spectrums that he is capable of seeing all at the same time, ti
would be too much information to processess, so this time he happened to no
be looking at the IR/Heat spectrum.
Michael Rawdon
Spoilers...
> Just curious. I missed the first few minutes of the show, but was there
>ever an explanation of why the communicators weren't working?
Substantial static interference caused by "plot device waves", which are
usually generated by inanimate objects known as "television scripters".
--
Michael Rawdon raw...@cabrales.cs.wisc.edu
University of Wisconsin Computer Sciences Department, Madison, WI
"Beauty... survives."
- James T. Kirk, "That Which Survives"
Michael Rawdon
>I don't know Tim, after finally seeing this one, I kinda have to agree and
>disagree with you... The story was more or less badly put together,
>granted... but here are a few of my thoughts on it:
>The Enterprise totally knocked without power....I had a hard time
>swallowing that, since there _should_ have been a hell of a lot of backups
>and emergency power relays in her.
When Troi asked Ro to scan the warp drives, I half expected Ro to respond,
"sensors indicate the warp drives are currently about half a light year
behind the saucer section." :-)
Now that I think of it, the concept of a "quantum filament" is fundamentally
the same as the molecule-thick sword in some Larry Niven stories. It's a
miracle the Enterprise survived intact.
>Troi not knowing any command orders or situations, well, that was partly
>beliveable. I think this is becuase of two reasons: the first is the she is
>, more or less a Doctor, and the rank of Lt. Cmndr was probably honorary -
>even though she did graduate starfleet academey. She probably graduated
>from the medical dept with a brief class or two on command. Second, she has
>not had her "chance" at command in a show...well, at least it is over...
More likely, neither Ro nor (more importantly) O'Brien would have let her do
anything really stupid, but Troi is probably better suited for commanding
*people* than either of them. Also, while she was nominally the commander,
it appeared that they were managing things as more of a triumvirate.
>Ensign Ro. I like here. TNG needs a woman (and you will fogive this) with
>balls enough to tell the Captain what she thinks... Dr. Pulaski did this,
>but more out of wanting to do what she wanted over what was necessary.
It would be nice if Ro had anything resembling depth of complexity, though.
>The whole Data joke was just that. Badly done. Not on Brent Spiner's or
>Frakes park, but on the writing...take his head to engineering...sheesh..
I'm sure Stephen Dennison has a thing or two to say about that, but I'll try
to beat him to it:
Data truly proved himself to be qualified to be a Starfleet office, head and
shoulders above the rest. He wasn't just trying to get ahead, either.
Neither he nor Riker had their heads buried in the sand. Data did seem a
little detached in engineering, though.
(Thanks to Bloom County for half of those puns. :-)
Michael Rawdon
>In article <1991Oct24.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>Besides, wasn't there a (possibly non-canon) source which would have
>Data's primary memroy located in his torso? It would probably be much
>better protected there...
Haven't you people ever heard of data caches? :-)
>(Of course, my memory never has been what it used to be...;-)
And my precognetive powers aren't what they're going to be. Your point? :-)
John Grohol
Jose>>>And I had several belly laughs in this episode, the biggest being when
Jose>>>Riker sticks Data in the wrong port.
Tim>>Ptui. That was about my least favorite "joke" of the whole show. Data the
Tim>>Walking Mugging Machine--no thank you.
Kurt>I don't understand your objection, Tim. What is a "walking mugging machine"?
Kurt>Why is it not believable that Riker could make a bad connection??
One of my biggest problems with this episode was its typical
Star Trek LAME-O ENDING!... As much as I didn't know how darned
incompetent Troi really was until this episode, I also didn't
realize how technically advanced Riker is with neural electron pathways,
even with a talking instructor there to help you...
That's doesn't make it believable, that Riker could connect
Data to that one important pathway in a matter of seconds,
considering his expertise in the matter... We're talking miniature
circuits here... We're talking surgeon-hands here... We're talking
delicate and precise... We ain't talking Riker in _any_ broad sense
of these definitions here!
Ahhh, she should've blown... That would show Troi what an idiot
she was... Waiting until the 15% before giving the disengage command?
Do you REALLY want to be that close to a matter-antimatter explosion,
Troi?? Geez....
--
"My place is of the sun :: John M. Grohol
and this place is of the dark :: Center for Psych. Studies
I do not feel the romance :: Nova University
I do not catch the spark." - Indigo Girls :: gro...@novavax.nova.edu
John Grohol
> >
> > Yah. This continues Trek's fine tradition of showing little or no
> > understanding of the nature of automated equipment. The LaForge/Crusher
> > sub-plot was the weakest of the 5, IMHO.
>I dunno, I thought the Riker/Data subplot was worse. A
>half-million amps? Yeeg, at the voltages required to produce
>those arcs effects I think Data should have be vaporized in an
>instant, head and all. If not when he fell the arcs should have
>resumed, leaving Riker is no better shape.
I'm sure I had a problem with both.
First... Assuming that lack of oxygen puts out a plasma fire
(gee, this was a creative twist, eh folks?), and that by flooding
the cargo bay and releasing the oxygen, wouldn't this have just
put the fire out where one could see it?? I mean, Geordi was clearly
saying that this fire is being fed by the energy core (or some such
nonsense)... Unless you suffocate the entire SOURCE of the flame,
all you would've succeeded doing is to temporarily put out the
flame right there... (since there was no way to cut the oxygen
to the source of the flame). This may be just my misunderstanding,
but Geordi was making it sound like this fire was too big for
a simple FIRE EXTINGUISHER filled with chemicals. Oh gee, couldn't
have a few of those sitting around, now could we??
As for my problem with Data/Riker, see previous post of Riker's
amazing surgery skills all of a sudden...
gag
Roger M. Wilcox
>WARNING: This article contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>episode, "Disaster". Those not wanting the "disaster" of having the plot
>spoiled for them are advised to depart.
>
>Inferno/Poseidon Adventure/insert your disaster movie here scenario, but it
_EARTHQUAKE_. Absolutely, positively, unquestionably, undeniably, the movie
_Earthquake_. (In sensurround.) Considering how much the ship shook when it
hit that quantum filament, and that a second filament came along and gave them
an "after-shock", there can hardly be any doubt as to which disaster movie they
were basing it on.
>--Troi, O'Brien, and Ensign Etcetera don't think to look at the lieutenant
>who's lying there BLEEDING in the middle of the bridge for a couple of
>minutes?
Oh, they think to look at her, all right. It's just that she was dead.
They could tell because the make-up department had given her that one-side-
of-her-face-is-bloody-and-burned look which has always been the TNG signal
that somebody's dead.
But seriously, folks, it did seem a bit odd that the Mighty Enterprise could
be so critically wounded by one lousy quantum filament (okay, two lousy
filaments) when it's supposedly able to withstand direct hits from all sorts
of 24th-century weapons even *without* its shields up! (Not that such direct
hits wouldn't cause hull breaches and things like that, but it's not like
the whole power and communications network would suddenly fail!)
One nit-pick which I'm sorry Mr. Lynch's article DIDN'T pick up was that
after Geordi and everly had let all the air out of the cargo bay, we could
STILL HEAR THEIR FOOTSTEPS as they walked over to the air-repressurizer
doo-hickey on the other side of the room. Were we really hearing SOUND
(gasp!), or was this just some more of that Treknological "subspace noise"
that explains away all the holes in the laws of physics?
And come on, thirty seconds before they pass out from asphyxiation? I
can hold my BREATH longer than that!
On the whole, though, the episode doesn't come anywhere near such best-of-
the-worst candidates as "The Child" or "Wesley Kisses an Alien."
--
Jeff Boeing / Roger M. Wilcox cbcs...@ma.secs.csun.edu
-------------------------------------------------------------------
"It is forbidden to interfere with the development of less
sophisticated cultures" -- the Prime Directive, more or less
Felan shena Thoron'edras
>First... Assuming that lack of oxygen puts out a plasma fire
>(gee, this was a creative twist, eh folks?), and that by flooding
>the cargo bay and releasing the oxygen, wouldn't this have just
>put the fire out where one could see it?? I mean, Geordi was clearly
>saying that this fire is being fed by the energy core (or some such
>nonsense)... Unless you suffocate the entire SOURCE of the flame,
>all you would've succeeded doing is to temporarily put out the
>flame right there... (since there was no way to cut the oxygen
>to the source of the flame). This may be just my misunderstanding,
>but Geordi was making it sound like this fire was too big for
>a simple FIRE EXTINGUISHER filled with chemicals. Oh gee, couldn't
>have a few of those sitting around, now could we??
Well, they always taught me in school that there are three things a fire
needs to continue burning:
1. Oxygen
2. Fuel
3. Heat
To _stop_ a fire from burning, you have to remove one of the three, which
of course is what Geordie did. Now, it would seem logical to me that,
after the fire was exposed to vacuum, getting rid of the oxygen, it would
have lost enough heat to not start on fire again the next time. Of
course, we're talking about things over my head, I don't do science much...
Felan shena Thoron'edras
"Go not unto the Elves for counsel, for they will say both yea and nay."
"Now is _not_ a good time, Keiko!" - Worf, "Disaster"
"Variety is the spice of life, and I don't want to die." - Scott Borst
00jdb...@bsu-ucs.uucp
had in a long time.
But I have noticed the show is getting more and more domestic but I'm sure
ratings are going up.
Hmmmmm, A family Sci-Fi Show. Interesting concept.
I have another question. I think Worf did actaully witness a birth because
I think Riker or Picard called for Security when Troi was having her 'baby'
But then again it really wasn't a real birth with pains and screaming and
sweat unlike Disaster.
"Congratulations. YOu have now reached full dialation."
Face it Trekkies, TNG is becoming a family shows. Normal non-geeky people
unlike me will be showing up at conventions and it will become a world
wide thing if not universal. And now that Mr. Star Trek died last week
well there's no one to really keep it the traditional Nerd show.
Don't know what to say guys.
Star Trek TNG is the only show I watch on televison.
Will it get better or worse?
-Sherlock Holmes
(James D. Becktel)
Roger Chaplin
Seems to me that space has become a rather dangerous place through which
to travel since the days of TOS. Remember back then, they just pointed
the ship where they wanted to go, turned on the juice to engines, and
after enought time they arrived at their destination without incident.
Now, we have worm holes, quantum threads (?), and other anomolous regions
of space, such as that one which caused portions of the ship to dissappear,
trapping a crew member between decks (remember that one? yech!).
So I ask, what's happened to space?
BTW, my wife noticed a long time ago that it was strange for a ship with
that many people to have only one doctor and what appears to be a tiny
sick bay. She also noticed that there never seem to be any ordinary joe
crew members in sick bay - only the main characters.
(Eat your hearts out - how many of you have spice which enjoy
watching Star Trek with them?)
--
Roger Chaplin / Instruments Division Engineering / "Though I'd been lost now I
cha...@keinstr.uucp / CI$: 76307,3506 / felt I was found when He
#include <disclaimer.h> / looked at me with His
#include "disclaimer.h" /* cover all bases */ / forgiving eyes." - Michael Card
Bill Wilson
--- Telegard v2.5k Standard
* Origin: ULTRA-Z (303)797-3805 (1:104/329.0)
--
****************************************************************
This Message reflects the views of the sender and are not
necessarily the views of the Sysops of Nemesis :)
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Bill Wilson - via Fidonet node 1:104/215
Bill Wilson - via Swashnet node 23:303/1
UUCP: ...!scicom!nemsis!1!104!329.0!Bill.Wilson
INTERNET: Bill Wil...@nemsis.FIDONET.ORG
Michael Rawdon
>Who says the Enterprise is a warship? I don't think ANYBODY says the
>Enterprise is a warship. The only time the Enterprise was a warship was on
>"Yesterday's Enterprise". Although they've done some fighting in their day,
>battle isn't something they areintended for...
It most certainly IS something they are intended for! The Enterprise is part
of Starfleet, which is clearly the military arm of the Federation (although
equally clearly it is not ONLY the military arm). Starfleet accomplishes
the military objectives necessary for Federation security, as we saw in both
"Redemption II" and "The Best Of Both Worlds", among other episodes.
Furthermore, the Enterprise-D is armed to the proverbial teeth (see "The
Best Of Both Worlds", again), and most definitely IS intended to engage in
battle to defend itself and the Federation. "The Neutral Zone" mentions
that the Enterprise is the best ship Starfleet has to field against the
Romulans, and several times it has served as the first line of defense
against potential or actual invaders. It is both capable of and intended to
(if necessary) wage war, and in that sense the Enterprise is without a doubt
in my mind a "warship".
War does not need to be its primary mission for it to be a warship.
--
Michael Rawdon raw...@cabrales.cs.wisc.edu
University of Wisconsin Computer Sciences Department, Madison, WI
"It is a fool's prerogative to utter truths that no one else will speak."
- Dream, "A Midsummer Night's Dream"
Stephanie da Silva
> But then again it really wasn't a real birth with pains and screaming and
> sweat unlike Disaster.
All labors are different. While Keiko's was not a typical one, it was
still possible.
I never screamed when I was in labor. Like Keiko, my sister-in-law also
had a very short labor period -- it's called a precipitous labor. By the
time she got to the hospital, she was already fully dilated.
--
Stephanie da Silva Taronga Park * Houston, Texas
ari...@taronga.com 568-0480 568-1032
(site of future Foxglove quote)
Dan Hartung
>
>that many people to have only one doctor and what appears to be a tiny
>sick bay. She also noticed that there never seem to be any ordinary joe
>crew members in sick bay - only the main characters.
I think we can safely assume there is one sickbay for the saucer, and
one for the drive section.
As for the "ordinary joes" ... there is a female assistant who is seen
quite often, and a male assistant who is seen sometimes as well, and
there have been "populated sickbay" scenes from time to time.
Back on TOS, it was McCoy & Chapel, and mostly just McCoy!
Nigel Tzeng
>>Please forgive if details are sketchy, but it's late . . .
>>
>>BTW, my wife noticed a long time ago that it was strange for a ship with
>>that many people to have only one doctor and what appears to be a tiny
>>sick bay. She also noticed that there never seem to be any ordinary joe
>>crew members in sick bay - only the main characters.
>I think we can safely assume there is one sickbay for the saucer, and
>one for the drive section.
>As for the "ordinary joes" ... there is a female assistant who is seen
>quite often, and a male assistant who is seen sometimes as well, and
>there have been "populated sickbay" scenes from time to time.
>Back on TOS, it was McCoy & Chapel, and mostly just McCoy!
There's a lot of "real world" reasons not to show a lot of stuff we
can assume is there...set costs and the expense of paying for extras...
especially extras with lines. Which is why you might thing the
engineering crew is made up of a bunch of mutes ;-). One of the few times you
see engineering people talk is in the episode with broccoli.
Mostly Geordi gives a command and they nod and walk off. There were a
few scenes with the med crew not having lines when they should have
said something to acknowledge commands too. But that's a way to keep
costs down which is ducky by me.
These things register as interesting trivia but don't interfere with
the enjoyment of the show. I can even live with bridge crew being
sent in when a bunch of red shirts would be prefered ;-). Somebody's
got to do it and why pay for all the extras or worse more regular
characters? I'd prefer more regular character but their budget is
probably pretty strained anyway.
ST:TNG may have holes you could drive a Borg through but some Drek is
better than no Drek at all. ;-).
Nigel
Ron Jarrell
>The Enterprise is a warship, and it's usually on its own. It's a
>little suprising that they have only one sickbay, since if the sickbay
>gets trashed in the early going of a battle, how will they deal with
>all the battle casualties?
Well, they have provisions for that.. Sternbach and Okuda point out to
prospective writers in the tech manual that damn near half the ship
can become a sick bay if they need to; all the vip quarters and
guest quarters have medical systems hook ups and conversion kits
stored, and the two smaller shuttle bays have "hospital modules" that
can be deployed if need be. If there's enough power they can
deploy full-blown sickbays in the holodecks, and there are first aid
kits stored in the walls almost every place you can turn around.
With minimal effort you can spread a thin layer of wounded over almost
every square inch of the ship :-).
Sick bay is just a large (covers most of a deck) area that allows them
to handle special treatements, and the typical low-density traffic
they see.
--
Ron Jarrell
Virginia Tech Computing Center
jar...@vtserf.cc.vt.edu
Bill Wilson
s... birthing setups are not exactly identical. Klingons use pain-sticks... :-)
There's nothing wrong with removing Data's head, really. WHY was it removed, is my question? He was working well enough to instruct Riker on removing his head and attaching it to... some thing on some panel. Why couldn't Riker simply pick up (or pull, or whateveR) and haul data over to the panel without worrying about taking off his head?
I think the main problems here are that, as with QPic*[Dd, the characterization are N NOT off but EXAGGERATED instead. Troi's even dumber than usual, Data's even more self-sacrificing than usual, Geordi is as... well... I guess introverted? but not really than usual... Picard is more awkward than usual, Worf is even more serious, etc...
Bill Wilson
>ever an explanation of why the communicators weren't working?
The TNG communicators are patched through the ship's comm-system. This allows tracking of a specific individual, and allows you to wear them on your shirt, where potential enemies might not realize they are actually some type of device and might not take them away. I like the TOS ones better, though, they don't break down as often... and they work WITHOUT the computer...
Michael Rawdon
>> Just curious. I missed the first few minutes of the show, but was there
>>ever an explanation of why the communicators weren't working?
>The TNG communicators are patched through the ship's comm-system. This
>allows tracking of a specific individual, and allows you to wear them on your
>shirt, where potential enemies might not realize they are actually some type
>of device and might not take them away.
Um, do I recall incorrectly, or did the crewmembers on the planet at the
beginning of "Silicon Avatar" not use communicators once or twice? The
Enterprise was nowhere near the area then.
--
Michael Rawdon raw...@cabrales.cs.wisc.edu
University of Wisconsin Computer Sciences Department, Madison, WI
Stephen Dennison's life is a sine wave, and we're all trying to get the
amplitude up.
(We'd try to get the frequency down, too, except you can't go below zero!)
(Sorry, Stephen. :-)
John T. whelan
dhar...@chinet.chi.il.us (Dan Hartung) writes:
>In article <swcdx4=@lynx.unm.edu> tko...@triton.unm.edu (Gym Z. Quirk) writes:
>>And the "Exposure to Vacuum" procedures were contrary to what I've
>>read in other SF. If don't hold your breath in vacuum unless you want
>>to rupture your lungs...
>>
>>Besides, isn't the time limit on the order of 90 sec if you
>>hyperventilate before depreassurize?
Someone pointed this out while I was watching. Unfortunately,
he chose to point it out repeatedly, during the scene. Got really
annoying, particularly since what he "knew" was based on other SF.
Anyway, how much actual experimental evidence is there about this?
>This has been discussed to, um, death over in sci.space. Somebody
>wanta dig up the FAQ?
Yeah, some factual info would be nice.
John Whelan
John T. whelan
>dhar...@chinet.chi.il.us (Dan Hartung) writes:
>>tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>>WARNING: Here be "Disaster" spoilers:
>>>--There is only ONE place in the entire shuttle bay where one can repressur-
>>>ize the bay? Even if true, it's also NOT the main console in the bay, which
>>>is supposed to be multipurposeful? Yep. Sure.
>>OK, but it made sense to me that the air controls are by the door (probably
>>dupe buttons on the other side), and not in the middle of the bay....
>>After all, who would be crazy enough to be in the bay while evacuating it?!
>>;-)
>That's fine for intentional depressurizations, but what about the lunatic who
>takes a phaser to a bulkhead there? You need to have as many redundancies as
>you can for that kind of emergency, and this apparently had none.
Also, the controls to _de_pressurize _were_ in the middle of
the room. Seems a little ssa-backwards to me. (If they'd just had
the repressurization controls on the central panel be out of
order. Silly writers.
>>Well, I thought everybody did a superb job except perhaps Riker, who didn't
>>have much to do a good job with.
>I don't think *anybody* was given much to do a good job with, which is most
>of the problem. Some of them (Keiko, Ro, Bev) did fairly good jobs with what
>they had. Some of them (Picard, etc.) did passable ones. Some of them (Worf)
>did absolutely miserable ones.
>>#1: it was GREAT to see Bev doing something
>>besides ministrations.
>Pity none of it was believable except for the Gilbert 'n' Sullivan bit. :-)
I was expecting her to try to get him to dance; "Data's Day"
seems to have given the Hoofing Healer (:-)) the dancing bug again.
>>#2: Picard & the kids was a learning experience for
>>him that was shown, not told -- when he was wrong, he found out right away!
>But he clearly had to forget all his old lessons for this to be necessary in
>the first place.
Agreed. Why are you the only one who seems to have noticed
this? How many times is TNG going to have people learn the same
things? (If I had a dollar for everyone who said "That's accurate,
Picard doesn't know how to deal with children", I wouldn't be worried
about California residency. :-))
John T. whelan
>In article <1991Oct27....@bsu-ucs.uucp>, 00jdb...@bsu-ucs.uucp writes:
[about "The Child"]
>> But then again it really wasn't a real birth with pains and screaming and
>> sweat unlike Disaster.
>All labors are different. While Keiko's was not a typical one, it was
>still possible.
>I never screamed when I was in labor. Like Keiko, my sister-in-law also
>had a very short labor period -- it's called a precipitous labor.
Which brings up the question: Is anyone going to be pregnant
for more than an episode on TNG?
John Whelan
"Paris ... desperately needs a Wegmans or two"
-- Angus Grieve-Smith
John T. whelan
>tap...@infonode.ingr.com (J. Kurt Tappe) writes:
>>tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>>wom...@eng.umd.edu (Jose Gonzalez) writes:
>>(spoilers)
>>>>And I had several belly laughs in this episode, the biggest being when
>>>>Riker sticks Data in the wrong port.
>>>Ptui. That was about my least favorite "joke" of the whole show. Data the
>>>Walking Mugging Machine--no thank you.
>>I don't understand your objection, Tim. What is a "walking mugging machine"?
>"Mugging"==loosely defined as lots of silly facial contortions designed purely
>to get lots of yuks. See "Jerry Lewis". :-)
>I loathe it.
You didn't like "Young Frankenstein" too much, then? This
scene struck me as being just like the "Put the candle back!" scene
from YF, which was hilarious.
I'm thinking of switching my major to Psychology and doing a
thesis on your sense of humor, Tim. :-) You, who love Warner Brothers
cartoons, grumble at almost any lowbrow humor that shows up on TNG.
Now, I also thought "Qpid" was drek. (I agree that the characters
were abused there, and most of the people who thought it was hilarious
were non-trekkies who didn't cringe at the way they were being
treated.) In "Disaster", though, although some people (like Worf)
acted silly, it was silliness which was IMHO in character. Seems to
me that when you care about a character, you don't like to laugh _at_
that character, even when she or he isn't behaving abnormally.
Which means that you probably did like "Young Frankenstein",
since you had nothing invested in the characters.
Then again, maybe there's something wrong with me, since lots
of people who liked this also like Qpid.
John Whelan
Someone who's recently seen "Young Frankenstein"
(does it show?) :-)
Timothy W. Lynch
>tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>tap...@infonode.ingr.com (J. Kurt Tappe) writes:
>>>tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>>>wom...@eng.umd.edu (Jose Gonzalez) writes:
>>>(spoilers)
>>>>>And I had several belly laughs in this episode, the biggest being when
>>>>>Riker sticks Data in the wrong port.
>>>>Ptui. That was about my least favorite "joke" of the whole show. Data the
>>>>Walking Mugging Machine--no thank you.
>>>I don't understand your objection, Tim. What is a "walking mugging machine"?
>>"Mugging"==loosely defined as lots of silly facial contortions designed
>>purely to get lots of yuks. See "Jerry Lewis". :-)
>>I loathe it.
> You didn't like "Young Frankenstein" too much, then? This
>scene struck me as being just like the "Put the candle back!" scene
>from YF, which was hilarious.
The two are miles apart. YF was hilarious for about a zillion reasons--this
tried to be, and failed. (Among other things, despite his substantial talent,
Brent Spiner does NOT have the talent for physical comedy that Gene Wilder
does, and probably never will. Wilder's a once-a-century find in that
regard.)
(YF also had a *reason* for Froderick's face being all scrunched up at the
time--this didn't.)
> I'm thinking of switching my major to Psychology and doing a
>thesis on your sense of humor, Tim. :-) You, who love Warner Brothers
>cartoons, grumble at almost any lowbrow humor that shows up on TNG.
Yep. Warner Brothers ain't lowbrow. :-)
>Now, I also thought "Qpid" was drek. (I agree that the characters
>were abused there, and most of the people who thought it was hilarious
>were non-trekkies who didn't cringe at the way they were being
>treated.) In "Disaster", though, although some people (like Worf)
>acted silly, it was silliness which was IMHO in character.
That's the point of divergence. I *didn't* think any of the humor here was
in character, and that's a major factor.
>Seems to
>me that when you care about a character, you don't like to laugh _at_
>that character, even when she or he isn't behaving abnormally.
Oh, I don't know about that. To some extent, it could be true, but I care a
lot about Picard, yet like seeing him get punctured occasionally (like the
"he didn't remember you, sir" bit in "The Game"). And I like Riker some of
the time, but had no problems laughing when he got trussed up by his ankles
in "The Survivors". :-)
Tim Lynch (Cornell's first Astronomy B.A.; one of many Caltech grad students)
BITNET: tlynch@citjuliet
INTERNET: tly...@juliet.caltech.edu
UUCP: ...!ucbvax!tlynch%juliet.ca...@hamlet.caltech.edu
"Liddell, he is your future king. Does your arrogance extend that far?"
"My arrogance, sir, extends just as far as my conscience demands."
--"Chariots of Fire"