Persistent, Niggling Questions

[DrWho42]

when will MST3K riff Plan 9 from Outer Space?

[Nate the Great]

A boy's mother has very strict rules about acceptable books for her son.


1. No princes or princesses.
2. No knights.
3. No dragons or other fantasy animals.
4. No talking animals.
5. No men that have to save women.


PNQ: How many books can you think of that meet these criteria?


One thing that springs to mind immediately about these criteria is the assumption of fantasy only. There are children's book genres other than fantasy, lady!


Let's get real, the big sticking point here is Point 5.



And since it's the Christmas season, I have to be reminded of Miracle on 34th Street here. Poor Doris...

[Nate the Great]

Today's Star Trek entry for Ashens' Advent Calendar is a set of coasters with TOS-style computer graphics (pre-LCARS) on them.


PNQ: What era of computer graphics do you like the best?


The TOS-style of computer interface never got a name. Since the later movies used TNG sets you'll see a bit of LCARS in them, but we'll chalk that up to real-world events, not proof that LCARS existed in the 23rd century.



The Amazing Thing I Learned Today is that Wikipedia has an article on LCARS. Weird.


Of course the Kelvinverse totally ignores canon and includes touchscreen tech called PCAP-SYS. Abrams himself felt that they should be full-blown holograms.


The 29th century timeships used TCARS instead of LCARS. Temporal computer instead of library computer. I do wonder what a "temporal computer is".

[Nate the Great]

Actually there's a Department of Temporal Investigations short story that says that they have the ability to make PADDs whose stored data will not be altered by changes to the timeline. Hence agents can see that an alteration has been made and a hint of what was changed and when. One wonders if they use TCARS.

[DrWho42]

what happened to the xindi in the 24th/25th centuries?

[NAHTMMM]

Originally Posted by DrWho42

when will MST3K riff Plan 9 from Outer Space?

Didn't RiffTrax already get it?

Originally Posted by Nate the Great

A boy's mother has very strict rules about acceptable books for her son.


1. No princes or princesses.
2. No knights.
3. No dragons or other fantasy animals.
4. No talking animals.
5. No men that have to save women.


PNQ: How many books can you think of that meet these criteria?


One thing that springs to mind immediately about these criteria is the assumption of fantasy only. There are children's book genres other than fantasy, lady!

Yeah, there's quite a few. Within fantasy, and suitable for children, I don't know. The animals are the sticking point for most of what I've read. And if there's danger then sometimes the men might have to save the women and the women might have to save the men without it being remotely sexist at all.

[Nate the Great]

PNQ: Why does everyone hate Pulaski?


When it comes to Trek characters far too many people latch onto the writing alone as a reason to hate them, with no thought to the actual performance. Neelix comes to mind immediately.



Pulaski's Spock/McCoy dynamic with Data was poorly written and it took the writers way too long to put an end to it. But that's not the fault of Diana Muldaur. In fact I think she did a worse job performing her TOS roles.



Neelix was written poorly, but Ethan Phillips gave it his all. Janeway was written poorly, but Mulgrew acted it well.



Oh boy, now I have to talk about Enterprise. That's a show where I'm not sure how much blame I have to place on the writer, how much on the director, and how much on the actors. At least I have another ten years to think about it before the ENT recap (I might move that one up five years, but we'll see).