Star Trek: Classic or Dud?

oh neat, here's the campus newspaper bit about it. It happened 10 years ago next week.

The "multi Worf" episode is when he trips some quantum singularity whatsit and he travels through a whole buncha different quantum realities, one of which includes a reality where the Borg had killed Picard and overran the Alpha Quadrant and the Federation is almost dead!!!

RASCIST!

Love that one!

Yeah, that's a good one. Not as much impact as the constant shattering sane/insane episode but still.

i know that the following is kind of odd and/or dumb, but i am bored and it's bothered me for such a long time so here goes ...

... y'all remember that episode "the menagerie," where the talosian aliens kidnap captain christopher pike in order to use him and vina (the female survivor of the original exploratory mission that crashed on the aliens' planet) as breeding stock to repair and build equipment & thereby save the talosian race, right? obviously, we all can understand the mechanics of how all that would work when captain pike was still able-bodied (even though IRL vina was all fucked up and God only knows precisely WHERE the talosians stuck her genitalia when they "repaired" her or even if it was fully functional and whatever the truth wr2 all that pike was brainwashed so he'd think that he was schtupping some hottie instead of a deformed lump of flesh).

when the talosians allowed pike to return after HIS accident, however, when he was all deformed and everything from his torso downwards was confined to that wheelchair-box device -- presumably he WOULDN'T be able to actually mate with vina, right? i mean, HIS genitalia was stuck in that wheelchair-box thing and, even IF by some feat the talosians took a can opener & "let it all out" then the sheer weight of the wheelchair would crush vina when they were getting it on.

so presumably, the talosians' letting pike rejoin vina was just an act of mercy on their part -- since the aliens were fucked as a species anyway and they seemed to be fond of human beings (even as playthings), so why not?!? is this the correct interpretation?!?

I ask the ILX massive - does being a fan of Star Trek make you a "nerd"?

My wife was disputing her nerd status the other day and I was maintaining that anyone who likes Star Trek is de facto a nerd (myself included)

particularly anyone who owns multiple action figures/lego figurines of Captain Kirk, Khan, the Gorn, and Spock, among others

Wait, your wife owns those or you do?

well, TOS has finished on bbc2 (all aired after 1am, with no fanfare, why? was a time when bbc 2 would show three different ST series at 6pm on weekdays) and TNG has resumed. it's not great.

jsut caught 'inner light' episode of TNG. best episode ever?

Wait, your wife owns those or you do?

my wife purchased them/received them as gifts, altho techically since we're married I guess they count as "ours"

fwiw I have no doubts about the certainty of my nerd status

there was a captain named christopher pike? like the kids' horror author?

i don't think star trek fan makes you auto-nerd, but i'd wouldn't make a bet against it. my mom for example is a casual tng fan and is not a nerd, she will watch it if it's on tv, f'rex.

my wife goes well beyond "casual fan" - owns all the DVDs of TOS + the cartoons, plus deluxe editions of several of the movies (first movie, Khan, Star Trek VI), has numerous books written by castmembers, etc.

> there was a captain named christopher pike? like the kids' horror author?

was the captain in the pilot episode, pre kirk. footage was later recycled in another episode and, i think, the character came back later.

that "Menagerie" episode always scared/haunted me, what with those veins you could see pulsating under the surface of the Talosians' heads.

btw, I am not a nerd. I am in nerd rehab.

i think TNG is safely in mainstream/non-nerd territory - wasn't it one of the top 10 rated shows for much of its run? that's way better than, say, buffy ever did. TOS prob isn't even that nerdy anymore, i know lots of regular ppl who have fond memories of the early 80s movies, at least (cf jerry and george getting weepy over "wrath of khan" in that seinfeld episode).

dud = "real" SF fans' snobbery abt star trek. espec since lots of original series episodes were written by terrific classic writers - theodore sturgeon, james blish, h****n ellison, etc etc.

I've never met any of these "real" SF fans

also are you worried about Harlan googling himself and showing up here to harangue you or what?

jsut caught 'inner light' episode of TNG. best episode ever?

It's between that and "Yesterday's Enterprise" - both are miles better than "Best of Both Worlds"

there was a captain named christopher pike? like the kids' horror author?

i think that the author christopher pike named himself after ST's captain christopher pike.

The Menagerie is like an animated tumor at the back of my brain, informing every move I make as an adult. Well, almost.
I was so in love with Kirk as a 13-yr-old. I never watched the lated incarnations of the show.

larer, No, later.
I r drunk

pike's going to be a major character in the upcoming movie, yeah?

Easy job for the scriptwriter then.

Pike: BLEEP. BLEEP BLEEP. BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEEEEEP.