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Old Type 40

@old-type-40 / old-type-40.tumblr.com

Whovian, Sherlockian, and just a geek in general.
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[ID: 5 gifs from season 3, episode 5 “second skin” from the tv series “star trek: deep space nine”, the gifs show kira nerys and tekeny ghemor.

1st gif: the camera shows legate ghemor from the front, waist up and kira from the back. "one more thing before i leave. can i give you some fatherly advice?" he asks her.

2nd gif: the camera cuts to show kira from the front, chest up while legate ghemor is shown from the back. "for old times' sake." he insists, gesturing with his hands. kira laughs and tells him, "of course."

3rd, 4th gif: the camera shows legate ghemor from the chest up. he speaks in a serious tone, "that garak fellow who helped you, who helped us, don't trust him, nerys, ever. he's a dangerous man, and he'd betray you and all of your friends in an instant if he thought it would help him."

5th gif: the camera shows kira from the front, shoulders up. she is nodding slightly, and tells legate ghemor "i'll keep my eye on him." /end ID]

Trek from the very beginning has offered powerful commentary about prejudice and the fear, anger, and hate associated with it. And the recent episode was very much in keeping with the Trek tradition of commentary on these issues.

But what occurred to me after watching this episode was an important truth about fear, anger, and hate and how both Una and Spock are victims of prejudice because of these attitudes.

The Earth suffered a devastating war because of tyrants who were created via genetic engineering. Vulcan civilization was almost destroyed because of wars and conflicts due to passionate emotions. As a result, Earth (and later the Federation) banned genetic engineering of people. And on Vulcan, there is a strong cultural taboo against emotion. (BTW, the case could be made that the puritanical prohibition against emotion in Vulcan society is both illogical and driven by fear but that's a whole other story.)

Having fear, anger, and hate of something which is abstract is difficult. Having fear, anger, and hate against people is far too easy. Una testified on how Illyrians were subjected to prejudice and threats of violence when she was young. It's because the Illyrians were the easy personification of something citizens of the Federation were taught to fear and hate.

Spock, being part human, is the personification of the Vulcan fear of emotion. And he was subject to bullying and prejudice throughout his youth. Growing up facing prejudice in such a rigidly puritanical society is why Spock spent so much of his life having difficulty about his identity and how he should handle emotions.

In our current times, blue collar jobs have been disappearing from industrialized countries due largely to automation. This fear of job loss was featured in the TOS epsiode The Ultimate Computer. But directing fear, anger, and hate against something abstract is not easy. By the 80s, media figures, pundits, and politicians were personifying the fear of job loss via Asians. The anti-trade rhetoric at that time contributed to the murder of Vincent Chin (whose killers were prosecuted but never punished). And plenty of media figures, pundits, and politicians across the political spectrum have been pushing anti-trade rhetoric since 2008 even though I'm certain a good number of them know this inspires racism against Asian Americans and immigrants. (There's a good reason why anti-trade beliefs have been embraced historically by racist and nationalist ass hats.)

And in recent years, vile and opportunistic media figures, pundits, and politicians have sought to personify people's fear of social change via the LGBTQ community.

Don't fall for these things. Don't be similar to the humans or Vulcans who directed prejudice at Una and Spock because they were the personifications of what those people feared.

Apparently, this scene in Generations exists solely for one reason: to entice Bill Shatner into doing the movie.

The writers were literally like “hey cool guy, we know you love horses and we really really need you to be happy so we added a beautiful scene of you and Patrick riding horses. No, it has nothing to do with the plot. How does that sound?”

And Shatner was pleased but he wanted to use his own horses. No big deal, right?

Well, he made Paramount RENT his own horses from him.

Absolute outstanding move, Shatman.

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When Kirk finishes his ride, realizing it's not real, and sees "Antonia" the made-up "in between TMP and TWOK" love interest?

That was going to be Edith Keeler.

They wrote that Kirk's Nexus love interest was Edith Keeler and Paramount said no, that no one would understand the significance.

🙄

But a random made-up for the movie only character was better?!

Seeing Kirk see Edith Keeler again would have been amazing. And a true temptation to stay. And a hard slap of reality realizing it has to be fake.

Sigh.

Yeah, it was an incredibly stupid move by the Paramount execs to shoot down having Joan Collins reprise her role as Edith Keeler.

But whenever the horse riding scene comes up, I will always remind the fandom that Shatner and Stewart are wearing women's stockings as Shatner said that it prevents chafing.

Garry Marshall was filming the Michelle Pfeiffer/Al Pacino romance Frankie and Johnny in the same studio as Star Trek VI. He decided to take advantage of this fact when a key shot relied on Al Pacino’s complete surprise upon opening a door and seeing who was on the other side. Marshall asked Nicholas Meyer if he could borrow his two leads for a few minutes and had them waiting on the other side of the door, in full costume.

Pacino, of course, delivered.

Article transcript:

BEHIND THE SCREENS

Enterprising ‘lovebirds’ stop Al Pacino dead in his tracks!

SEX: THE FINAL FRONTIER! Filming a scene from the new movie “Frankie and Johnny,” Al Pacino was supposed to catch screen girlfriend Michelle Pfeiffer making love to another guy – but when he burst through the bedroom door, he found CAPTAIN KIRK and MR. SPOCK locked in a mock embrace!! Pacino’s eyes popped out as if he’d been stunned by a phaser when William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy – dressed in their Enterprise uniforms – said together: “OOPS! BEAM US UP, SCOTTY, I THINK WE’RE ON THE WRONG SET!”. As cast and crew guffawed, Pacino realized that it was a gag and began laughing so hysterically he almost collapsed! Shatner and Nimoy, who had been shooting “Star Trek VI” on a nearby soundstage, were talked into the prank by “Frankie” director Garry Marshall.

I'm enjoying SNW for the most part. But like others in the Trek fandom, I wish the show runners hadn't retconned the Gorn as the big threat. And it occurred to me the other night that the Kzinti might have made the perfect antagonists to match our current time. Let me explain.

Star Trek from the very beginning in the 60s has provided social and political commentary. And I believe the Kzinti would be ideal for continuing that with SNW. Kzinti are ruled by a male leader known as the Patriarch. And he would be a perfect stand in for the "strong man" rulers who have risen to power in the 21st century. These leaders brook no dissent, no questioning of their leadership. They impose their will on others in their government and the general population of their countries. And they often seek to impose their wills on those in other countries. They believe (or project the image) that they can do no wrong. The "strong man" leader promises his people "greatness" through the force of his will. (Sadly, too many people readily buy into this BS.) And in the end, these leaders usually make significant mistakes because there is a lack of diversity in viewpoints and honest discussion over the merits of policies and plans.

And that's why I see the Kzinti (under the leadership of the Patriarch) as the ideal antagonist to match our current 21st century time.

BTW, the bit of Tumblr nostalgia with today's overlay showing the old Windows taskbar and the Y2K warning is a good reminder that many of the subject matter "experts" that are quoted in the news are really quite incompetent. Many of us in the IT profession knew that the whole thing was way overblown because while many devices and programs had non-Y2K compliant code, the vast majority of this stuff never used the year. Most of what was affected were finance and accounting systems and they were fixed well in advance of Y2K because they dealt with future dates.

On Dec. 31, 1999 some of the people in my IT department were planning to stay the night at work. For myself, I knew the risk was very low for the systems I was responsible for. Plus, once we were past midnight UTC (4 pm my time) with nothing happening (not just with my systems but nobody else as well), I knew it was safe to go home and enjoy NYE.

Every now and then Josh Gates works with someone who can deliver puns just as readily as he can as was the case with archaeologist Pierce Paul while they were examining the toe bone recovered from a 2,500 year old submerged tomb.

Pierce Paul also displayed a sense of humor similar to Josh's when they had this dialogue as they were diving into the tomb and Pierce Paul was discussing the dangers in being in the tomb.

Josh: What are your feelings on the movie "The Mummy"? Pierce Paul: I love a good Brendan Fraser. Josh:  *Laughing* Thats, uh, that's not possible though. Right? That's not going to happen here. Pierce Paul: Never say "never".

To all my broke Star Trek homies: Paramount just made all of SNW season one available for free on YouTube!

Someone in the notes said they were unable to find it. And my guess is that the videos are geolocked to places where Paramount+ is available. This really isn't a surprise. All of the streaming services are struggling financially right now. And they're trying to entice sign ups by making some episodes and seasons widely available.

It's highly likely the season 1 eps will only be free for a limited time. You can find them on the Paramount+ Youtube channel or you can search for "Star Trek SNW".

Unfortunately, most of the good stuff that Garak says in "In the Pale Moonlight" was too long to fit

Feel free to comment with ones I missed and maybe I'll make another poll

How about the times when Garak offered ridiculous explanations for his knowledge? Such as

"Oh, it was just something I overheard while hemming someone's trousers."

and

"Oh, you'd be surprised at the things you can learn while you're doing alterations."