Star Trek: The Next Generation - Episode 173 (Firstborn)

Note:  This review was originally posted to my Epinions account.

Worf is a Klingon and proud of it. Klingons are a warrior people with a long, proud tradition. Being a Klingon parent, Worf wants his son to grow up with said Klingon traditions. Unfortunately, Alexander doesn’t want to grow up as a Klingon. Alexander spent the first few years of his life with his mother, K'Ehleyr, who was half human. (Alexander is 3/4 Klingon and 1/4 Human.) She didn’t particularly embrace Klingon traditions and values and passed this sentiment on to her son.

It hasn’t been easy for Worf to instill Klingon values in Alexander. It comes to a head in this episode when Worf wants to have a talk with Alexander about the first Klingon Right of Ascension. The First Right of Ascension is a coming-of-age ceremony where a Klingon dedicates himself to the ways of the warrior. Alexander has the right to refuse to undergo this, but if he doesn’t do it before his thirteenth birthday, he can never do it.

Alexander finally becomes excited when he and Worf visit a Klingon outpost that the Enterprise happens to be near. There’s a festival underway, which would be a good way for Alexander to see part of what it means to be Klingon. Alexander does get excited about his Klingon heritage and has a chance to meet other Klingons his own age. However, when Alexander and Worf are heading home, several Klingons attack them. Another Klingon comes to the rescue. He identifies himself as K’Mtar, who Worf recognizes.

K’Mtar is a trusted member of Worf’s house. (Here, house is used in the sense of noble family.) Worf’s brother, Kern, sent K’Mtar to protect Worf and Alexander. The word is that the Duras sisters are out to assassinate someone in Worf’s house. (The Duras sisters are members of a rival house.) The Enterprise eventually tracks them down. When presented with the evidence, one of the sisters notices something strange. Eventually, the truth comes out. For the sake of not ruining it, I won’t give it away. However, Worf and Alexander seem to come away understanding each other a little better.

The latter part of the final season of Star Trek: The Next Generation had a sort of lame-duck feel to it. The series got to end on its own terms, which meant that everyone knew that the end was coming. You can see it in a few other episodes. They all seem to be preparing for the final episode, which ties everything together.

Here, the acting was pretty good, as was the script and the sets. However, they weren’t great. When K'Ehleyr and worf were together, they served as great foils for each other. It took a while for Alexander to fill that role. In previous episodes, he always appeared a little out of place in the episode. Even in this episode, Alexander seemed a little awkward. The character was just about where he needed to be, but not quite. (Alexander appeared in a few episodes of Deep Space Nine, but was played by a different actor and had started to accept his role as a warrior.)

It’s a good episode, but not excellent. It’s somewhere between three and four episodes, not really average but not really above average. I’m more inclined to give it three stars.


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Star Trek: The Next Generation - Episode 47 (Peak Performance)

Note:  This review was originally posted to my Epinions account.


Sometimes, it’s not whether you win or lose. It’s how you play the game. Captain Picard doesn’t particularly like war games or war simulations, feeling that Starfleet’s primary function should be exploration. However, the recent encounter of the Borg changed his mind. The Borg are a frightening enemy and determining how one plays the game is important.

Commander Riker is to take command of the Hathaway, which by all measurements is inferior to the Enterprise. Real weapons will be taken offline and replaced with fake weapons that won’t do any real damage, but will allow the computers to track what’s happening. Onboard the Enterprise is Kolrami, a Zakdorn observer sent by the Federation. Riker will have 48 hours to prepare the Hathaway for battle.

Riker has a few tricks up his sleeve, such as Worf’s suggestion that they trick the Enterprise’s computers into thinking that an enemy vessel is approaching. However, shortly after the Enterprise figures out what happened, a real Ferengi ship approaches. Thinking that it’s another trick, Picard ignores it until the Ferengi fire on the Enterprise.

It seems that the Ferengi saw the fake battle and somehow thought that the Hathaway had something of value. It takes a little trickery, but Picard and Riker are able to convince the Ferengi to leave.

The b-plot involves Data. Kolrami is said to be very good at a game called Strategema. I’m not sure how it’s played. However, Kolrami beats Riker easily. Dr. Pulaski puts Data up to challenging Kolrami, thinking that a humanoid is no match for the Android. Data is beaten easily, thus ending up with a bruised ego. Data spends the entire episode doubting himself until he and Kolrami have a rematch. Instead of playing to win, Data plays to not lose. The game goes on for so long that Kolrami quits in protest.

So far as I know, this is the only time that Data doubts himself. He’s faced far greater defeats and never taken it so badly. We also get to see Wesley lie to get something that he needs. So far as I know, Wesley doesn’t get in trouble for this. In fact, I don’t think that much ever comes of this episode. I don’t think that the war games were ever mentioned again. You’d think that they would have tried again. We never even see another Zakdorn again.

It was a good episode, but once again proves how laughable the Ferengi still were in the early seasons of The Next Generation. They were becoming more of a serious race, but were still very one-dimensional. They only wanted profit. When that motive was removed, they just left with their tail between their legs.

I’d give the episode three stars. I really couldn’t recommend buying this episode on VHS. The acting is good, but the story is mediocre. It’s interesting to watch the first time, but it has little replay value.


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Star Trek: The Next Generation - Episode 7 (The Last Outpost)

Note:  This review was originally posted to my Epinions account.

The Ferengi have come a long way. Many who are familiar with the race are familiar with Quark of Deep Space Nine. However, early in The Next Generation, there was The Last Outpost, which was their first appearance.

The Ferengi had stolen some equipment and the Enterprise is sent after them. The Enterprise catches up with them near a planet, only to discover that much of their equipment has stopped working. They can’t leave orbit, but they soon discover that the Ferengi are having the same problem.

Both send landing parties to the planet, where they find all sorts of strange things, like large crystal formations. They eventually discover a guardian, who tests them and finds Commander Riker to be worthy. The guardian surprised to find out that the empire that the planet was part of is long gone; apparently, he had been asleep for many millennia. Power is restored to both ships and the Enterprise gets the equipment back.

So far as I can tell, the only purpose of this episode is to set up the Ferengi. Coincidentally, Armin Shimerman, who plays Quark on DS9, plays one of the Ferengi. However, the Ferengi in this episode are vastly different. The Ferengi were supposed to replace the Klingons as the main adversaries, but that didn’t work out too well. Here, they’re more goofy than threatening. They come across as ugly clowns gone bad. Supposedly, not much is known about the Ferengi at this point, despite the fact that both Picard and Captain Archer of Star Trek: Enterprise have had dealings with them.

I can’t see giving this episode more than two stars. The message is just a little obvious and the Ferengi are just plain ridiculous. Someone could easily skip this episode and not miss much. If you get the DVD set or happen to catch it on TV, I’d recommend watching it just to see how bad it is, but I can’t recommend investing hard-earned money on the VHS tape

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What the Bleep Do We Know!? (2004)

Note:  This review was originally posted to my Epinions account.

There’s this one joke that I really like. I think most guys will identify with it.

This guy walks into a bar and sits down next to an empty seat. He orders two beers, places one in front of the empty seat next to him and proceeds to drink the other one. When he’s finished, he orders another drink and consumes that one, leaving the first alone. This continues for a while until he’s almost ready to leave. He then consumes that first beer and leaves. This goes on for a few weeks until one day when the bartender asks him what’s going on. Is he waiting for someone that never comes?

“No,” the guy says. “As you know by now, I’m a professor of quantum physics and according to quantum physics, it’s possible that matter continually appears and disappears. This means that it’s possible, even if remotely so, that a beautiful woman might randomly appear in this chair next to me. I want to have this other beer waiting for her.”

“Now, wait a minute,” the bartender says. “You’re obviously intelligent; you have a good, well-paying job and you also look like you keep in shape. There are plenty of real women that would love to talk to you. In fact, that woman sitting over at that booth would be a perfect match for you.”

The professor looks over at the woman that the bartender indicated, looks back at the bartender and says, “Yeah, right. What are the odds of that happening?”

That joke basically describes this movie. I discovered it while looking on Netflix. If I recall, I was looking for movies that Armin Shimerman had been in. (He plays Quark of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine fame.) I also saw Marlee Matlin, who viewers of The West Wing might recognize. I saw that it was about quantum physics, which I have an interest in, and figured that it couldn’t hurt. After all, Netflix charges by the month. Boy, what a waste of a position in my rental queue.

The movie takes a little physics, a little basic biology and a big help of mysticism and puts it all together in a PBS-like special that calls itself a movie. There’s a story of Amanda, a photographer played by Matlin. The story is basically used to illustrate the various things that the interviewees are saying. The thing that gets me is that none of those that are interviewed are identified during the movies. Usually, when you have someone interviewed, you get a little caption saying something like, “Bob Smith/Professor of Physics, Cornell”. The people here could all have Ph.D.s from Harvard or they could be a few random people that the producers pulled off the street. You just don’t know.

Judging by the way they presented themselves, it looks like you get the full spectrum out of the four or five people being interviewed. The thing is that eventually, you realize that many of them are probably full of [bleep]. The basic premise of the movie is that reality and perception don’t work like we think they do. Instead of reality determining perception, perception determines reality. Thus, everything you see is a result of you perceiving it.

There’s even a story about a Caribbean tribe that isn’t able to see Columbus’s ships because they can’t perceive anything like it until the shaman notices ripples caused by the ships and figures out what’s going on. One of the men being interviewed even says that the camera recording him is there only because he wills it to be so. Someone else says that crime in D.C. went down by 25% because 4,000 people willed it to be so. Fine, then. When everything is tallied on Epinions for the month of March, I’ll earn $1,000. I will it to be. Maybe if I get enough people to help me out, it will happen.

There is some truth to the movie. Some of the science is accurate, even if it is misused. They also mention the idea of an ‘ultimate observer’ out there observing the universe. If you accept that the universe is dependent on a user, then who observed the universe before anyone came along? However, there’s too much in the movie that goes against what I believe to be true. I look at what a lot of the ‘experts’ are saying and think to myself that it’s just a big pile of [bleep]. The shame of it is that this was actually shown in theaters as an actual movie. If I had seen this in a theater, I think that I would have walked out and asked for my money back.

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