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hat I find depressing about the current Star Wars trilogy is the lack of any real emotion or humor in the series. The first two installments [The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones], although visually incredible, are just eye-candy with the intelligence of a Saturday-morning cartoon. I know I'm looking at the series from an older viewpoint, but all the things that made the first trilogy [A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi] great have been left behind. Where are the great character interactions? There was a feeling of fun and excitement in the first three movies that are sadly lacking in the current series. The best stories are character-driven, and here you see the motivations of the characters but none of the emotion. Anakin massacres a tribe of Sand People in retribution and the Princess doesn't question a thing. That would have been a great point to question the growing darkness in Anakin versus the ideals he has as a Jedi. He comes off as an immature, whining teenager. It's all so incredibly dry and uninteresting that even the digital magic of the movie has a hard time overcoming its shortfalls.
My suggestion is to do what [George] Lucas did in the first series before he became so techno-infatuated and insulated from story-telling: hire a good writer to elaborate on the ideas and get a great director. His visions deserve more than what he's giving to them and the fans deserve more, too. There's a lot of story-telling assumption here, such as what a Sith Lord is, where he came
from, etc. Also, Anakin's immaculate conception hasn't been delved into. You see evidence of Anakin's inner struggle, but it's not felt by the viewer. There's no shame in letting a good writer and director express the ideas of its creator. If Lucas wants to produce movies of the same caliber as his original trilogy that's what he'll have to do. By the way, can't he throw in a few contractions in his characters' dialogue? Just one?
Brett B.
Brettb@aol.com
r. Ahearn: In response to your diatribe ("Attack on Clones Is Undeserved") about critics hounding The Great Visionary, George Lucas, let me state that, if Star Wars: Attack of the Clones was a vision, Mr. Lucas might want to get some glasses.
While I do agree that science fiction does get slip-shod treatment in Hollywood today (witness The Time Machine and Planet of the Apes), attempting to use this movie as an example of outstanding movie-making is sort of like telling Godzilla fans that the recent installment starring Matthew Broderick was really Godzilla. You could tell them until you're blue in the face, but they just won't buy it.
Dress it up in the same clothes, but this movie wasn't Star Wars. I even went back a second time just to make sure that all of these doubts weren't just a product of bad popcorn. I'm sorry to say that it wasn't—if anything, it was worse the second time. (I mean, Senator Binks!? Was that a dig at the backlash of the first movie, or just a commentary on American politics?) In truth, there was only one problem with this movie: It had no soul. It's as if Mr. Lucas gave up any hope of telling a deep, tragic story and opted for a bland teen drama with a wow finish.
Were there great effects? Sure. Super effects, in fact. It's just that, if I wanted to see cool effects, I'd go out and rent a video game. Unfortunately, now that I think about it, this is exactly the same effect Episode I had; a cool video game with bland filler between levels.
And another thing: Running down other franchises for their (sometimes unbelievably stupid) mistakes doesn't diminish the fact that this movie, like the last, was sub-par for Mr. Lucas. Yes, the last few Bond flicks were bad. Yes, the last Star Trek movie could have been a one-hour episode. Batman, I won't even go into. Spider-Man was a pleasant surprise, given that Mr. Raimi is usually given to cheesy (but fun) movies. Yet, all of these do not diminish the fact that Episode II was bad. We expect great things from the man because he gave us great things. When he serves up offal, it does no one any good talking about how hard the chef worked on it.
Was it as bad as the first? No, thank God. Did that diminish its level of badness? No. Anyone who needs two movies to properly set up a character's descent into darkness needs to go back and do a little more editing. To use a non-science fiction example, Francis Ford Coppola managed to fit Michael Corleone's descent into evil in one movie, win some Oscars, and go back and make an equally good sequel, and win some more Oscars, to boot. Why can't a "visionary" such as Lucas manage to tell a simple back story without crowding out the elements of a film that matter, namely a good plot and characters we can care about?
And as for your rant about "phenomenons," Batman, Spider-Man, Superman, and James Bond were around a lot longer than Mr. Lucas' "homage to '30s serials," which, I might add, included such "cinematic pygmies" as Batman and Superman, and these still survived those misadventures you talked about, like the Spider-Man TV show and the subsequent bad sequels. I hate to use this example, but you remind me of (fill in your favorite TV show/movie/book) zealots who insist that their guy was the Great Visionary. I mean, I like the shows and movies, but take a breath. Orson Welles and Akira Kurosawa were visionaries. George Lucas is just a good storyteller.
In short, this ignorant, gutless dog remains convinced that Mr.Lucas' next offering in the ongoing "phenomenon" will go unviewed by this canis domesticus.
Steven Perez
silas216@hotmail.com
just viewed Episode II this weekend and I have to wonder if [George] Lucas used all his creativity up during American Graffiti and Episodes IV and V.
Everyone that has complained about the script is right on the mark. The dialog was horrible, I thought it was flatter than even Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. The only thing I can hope for was Lucas intended for the Jedi to all sound like pompous buttheads (no wonder my Anakin turned to the Dark Side). All dialogue issues aside, can't SF writers (who presumably are a cut above the rest in terms of I.Q.), write plots that don't resort to stupid devices to prolong otherwise horrible movies?
[Warning: Spoilers ahead.]
1: Obi-Wan and Anakin in handcuffs ... um ... wait didn't Darth Vader just wave his hand to have Luke's cuffs fall off in Episode VI? You honestly expect me to believe that two world-class Jedi had to wait for some slip of a girl (that presumably had no training as an escape artist, being a queen and all. ...). Retch.
2: Big ol' column of stone about to crush Obi-Wan and Anakin while Jet Li ass-kicking Yoda and Saruman the White/Count Dracula fight it out. But wait ... Yoda suddenly saves the day by *gasp* stopping the column in mid-fall and tossing it aside straining all the way for about 15 seconds giving Darth Dracula time to escape in his nearby ship? Why didn't he just yank Obi-Wan and Anakin out of the way? That should have been child's play. Or better yet, drop the column on Darth Rochefort's
pretty ship.
3: That chase in the factory was the dumbest thing I've seen since Flash Gordon (1982). Do all droid heads have interchangeable linkups?
4: Introducing Hasbro's new "Yoda doll, with kung-fu grip!" Yawn. I dunno if I read it here or not, but someone mentioned that what should have happened, is that Yoda would have used The Force to control the lightsaber. Agreed. Kung-fu yoda is just plain stupid, particularly since he needs a
cane everywhere he goes.
5: Clones/stormtroopers being all made from Boba Fett's dad ... hehe ... this is about the only thing so far in this movie that made sense. Stormtroopers, being the worst fighters in the galaxy are, obviously, made from someone that gets killed by the second Jedi he meets.
I dunno. I'm bitter. I admit it. Episodes IV and V were so wonderful, it's become clear Lucas is only in it for the money. At least even-numbered Trek movies are good. It's a shame I can't say the same for Star Wars. I don't know why it's so hard to write a story that makes sense.
Charlie
longbow@cfl.rr.com
have a question for Patrick Lee regarding his review of Star Wars: Episode II—Attack of the Clones. [Warning: Spoilers ahead.] I have seen the movie, and was wondering if he could explain what he was referring to when he stated that Obi-Wan makes a surprising discovery about the Kaminoans. Is Patrick making reference to their cloning activities, or something about the Kaminoans themselves, as a race? The latter is how I read into it. If this is so, I would greatly appreciate a response to fill me in on what I missed about the Kaminoans. Thank you.
Patrick Mannion
DunedainStrider@aol.com
Reviewer Patrick Lee responds:
I was referring to the clone army. I didn't want to give away too much of the plot.
Best,
Patrick
ans of the Seaview model should be aware that Skyhook Models sells a conversion kit for this model to transform it to the later version used throughout the TV series. The later version only has one row of lights because the lower bay of the sub nose was used to house the flying sub. A scale flying sub also comes with the kit. Skyhook Model's Web page for conversion kit is www.skyhookmodels.com/seaview.htm.
Vern Hartsock
skyler39@comcast.net
onica Ainsley wrote: "For reasons that I will never understand, Chris Carter
never bothered to write a bible for the show, and never made the effort to
figure out in advance where the mythology was going and stick to one
direction" ("X-Files Finale Was a Flop").
The problem with Chris Carter is that he thinks he's touched by greatness, when the truth is he was touched by luck. Immediately before The X-Files, he was the bloke who found himself with the right contacts at the right time to pitch an obvious idea. Then came the casting of Duchovny and Anderson, which provided the necessary onscreen chemistry, and the input of better writers, such as [Glen] Morgan and [James] Wong. Ultimately, though, Carter is not a great TV SF writer, like Joss Whedon, or a man with a vision, like Babylon 5's J. Michael Straczynski. He's an aging surfer dude whose wave of luck is collapsing. He never expected X-Files to go past season one, never had a clear idea of where his characters are going to end up, and therefore, he could not write a bible for the show.
What I don't understand, is why he didn't employ someone who could do the job. An X-Files with true arcs and direction would have been staggeringly good.
Nathan Brazil
nathanbrazil@freeuk.com
rank Russel, Labradorian, writes: "I just want to comment that in your review of The Chrysalids you say that it takes place in what used to be called Newfoundland. It actually takes place in Labrador, not Newfoundland. Being a Labradorian, I can assure you there is a difference" ("Chrysalids Locale Is Labrador").
Canada's most recent province is now officially called "The Province of Newfoundland and Labrador," which encompasses the mainland territory of Labrador (east of Quebec) as well as the island portion of the province, called Newfoundland. While Labrador is a separate land mass, it is part of "what used to be called Newfoundland."
No one in Newfoundland questions that Newfoundland and Labrador are different—well, one's an island, the other's a part of the mainland of Canada—but they are one province. The beauty of both are staggering, and very different, but we are one province.
Sean Huxter
sean@turbinegames.com
orrect me if I'm wrong, but wasn't The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy a
novelization of a radio play done for BBC Radio? My first encounter with the material was on NPR and I scrambled to find a blank tape to record the amazing stuff that had somehow hijacked my classical music station. Then I found the books at my local library, and suddenly it was OK to read SF again after a long hiatus.
I also believe that many of the voice actors for the radio play were featured in the televised version, and therefore there was not only a word-for-word correspondence but also a cadence-for-cadence correspondence between the radio play and the televised version. My favorite cheesy special effect was that Zaphod's puppet head was sometimes on the right and sometimes on the left, often within a single scene. The magic of television!
E. Clayton Rowe
Claydog860@wmconnect.com
et me officially be the 1489th person to remind you that, before it was a TV series, before it was a book, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was a radio serial, produced for the BBC. Douglas Adams was the writer for that radio program, and it was only after the broad popularity of the radio version became evident that he converted the original scripts to book form. After the radio series had ended, he continued the story of Arthur Dent and friends in book form.
I might suggest to your screen reviewer, Ken Newquist, that the reason the actors in the TV series are so "slavishly devoted to its source material" is that they are quoting, not from the books, but from the original radio scripts. Indeed, one might say that the books are "slavishly devoted to its source material". This is to be expected. A radio broadcast is, by definition, a very verbal experience. Words have more impact when they are the only stimulus to the imagination, without supplementary pictures. I suspect the radio experience is even more powerful than books, since there is not even the visual effect of reading. As a result, regular listeners to the radio version of the Hitchhikers' Guide had a very specific memory of precisely what every character sounded like, and what they said. Knowing that, the producers of the TV series would be forced to emulate that experience in every detail possible, or risk displeasing many, many fans. In fact, I cannot document this offhand, but I believe some, if not all, of the actors on the TV series are the same ones as on the radio drama.
Maybe the editors of Science Fiction Weekly will have someone review the radio series under their "Classics" column. Even better, they could prevail upon their sister site, scifi.com, to post the original audio on their site.
Bruce E. Hanson
behanson@adelphia.net
Reviewer Ken Newquist responds:
I grew up reading the books, rather than listening to the radio show (in fact, it was years before I even realized it was a radio show), and thus, my personal bias lies there. Obviously the show came first, but in my mind, the books are always foremost. That said, having listened to the radio show (or at least the parts of it that my local library had), I felt that the TV series more closely mimicked the plotting of the first two books rather than the radio series (especially near the end), but it's been a few years, so I could be wrong. In hindsight, I should have played up the radio broadcasts more (which are talked about numerous times on the DVD), especially since, as Bruce points out, many of the actors on the TV were also on the radio.
Best,
Ken
just thought I would give a little insight to the review of the new Star Trek RPG. With most reviews, the reviewer fails to mention if the game
system existed before the new one was even written. I personally own the original Star Trek Role-Playing Game that FASA released many years ago. Of course, this doesn't include any information from the movies or any of the TV series after the original one. It would have been a nice touch to have a little more information so that I could compare the old original system with the new one. From experience with other RPG's being re-written by new owners [I know] that sometimes the system becomes more complex and less RPG. Also, unless I missed it, the article of the new system didn't list the MSRP.
Unfortunately, with most RPG systems, the books usually run $30+ per book ... at that price tag, it would be a costly mistake if the new owners of the Star Trek RPG made the game more technical and less fun. Don't get me wrong, though. The article was good and I'm glad I heard about the reviews from the SCI FI Channel. Keep up the good work!
Edward Sutton
mulliganmaster@yahoo.com
Reviewer Eric Baker responds:
The Player's Guide is indeed $30. If you own a copy of the FASA Star Trek RPG, then you are probably old enough that $30 does seem like a lot of money for a book to you, but that is what they cost these days. I remember being shocked when comic books went to a dollar and shocked again when paperbacks passed the $5 mark. Don't get me started on movie prices.
As for comparing and contrasting Decipher's rules set with all the other licensed Star Trek RPGs, long theses like that are outside the scope of what we do with the games column. Instead, I explained how this game worked, which lets the reader compare it with any game, even one the came out 20 years ago, like FASA's.
Glad you liked the column.
Best,
Eric
his is indeed a sad year for TV's science fiction. We have seen Roswell end, after multiple aborted cancellations and then renewals that barely kept it afloat, in the manner of the old Star Trek series. We have seen Earth: Final Conflict getting a disconnected and pointless season tacked on, that has nothing to do with the main storyline. Andromeda lost what little brains it had, and Mutant X fails to appeal at all. And we have seen the much-hyped finale of the X-Files, which answered no questions and merely paved the way for X-Files: The Second Movie.
In fact, it seems that as SF/F TV declines ever further, the movies dive in to help. Lord of the Rings and Spider-Man have exceeded all expectations (and box-office hopes), and Attack of the Clones was an entertaining diversion. MIB:2 sounds like it will be fun as well. And of course, we have more Lord of the Rings yet to come.
Perhaps it's time to turn off the TV and head for the theater. It may cost me a little more than simply flicking on the set, but it's a small price to pay if it actually entertains me.
LA Solinas
jsolinas@erols.com
o follow up on Mr. Rice's previous post "Spider-Man's Venom Is Not Nano," the costume in question was actually a symbiotic life form discovered by Spidey during Marvel Comics' 12-issue limited series Secret Wars. The story took place when several super-heroes and several super-villains were spirited away by an all-powerful entity called the Beyonder, and set at odds on a planet that the Beyonder created for them at the very fringes of our galaxy.
During the course of a battle, Spider-Man's costume was thoroughly trashed. After returning to their base, several of the heroes discovered a alien machine that created clothing/costumes. Spider-Man walked into the room as a few of the heroes were leaving, and they mentioned in passing the machine.
Peter was relieved, and hurried to a machine that he thought was the right one. Sitting there, trying to operate the machine by thought, a small black ball appears. Holding it, Spiderman thinks he's screwed up, until the ball dissolves and covers him in a brand new, sporty looking black costume. Peter finds that he can control the costume with thought alone. It can take the form of any clothing he likes, and it shoots webbing that is as strong, or stronger, than his original. He's in heaven.
Well, the good guys "win," and everyone is returned home. Peter enjoys the new suit, but notices that he is more and more fatigued. He soon discovers that the new "costume" is actually a life form that has been controlling him as he sleeps, and has been prowling the streets of New York using his body. At this point Venom is born, as Parker gives it its walking papers.
Therefore, the suit is not nano-tech. It's a creature.
Sam Rayfield
methos@wavegaming.com
inotopia was interesting, but only interesting. The book series which the miniseries was based on are much better than what audiences were subjected to. They must have read the book, tossed it out because it seemed boring, then dumbed down the story to include some action and romance. What is boring about being shipwrecked, then surrounded by an army of dinosaurs? What is boring about racing on the backs of dinosaurs? What is boring about a journey to discover what the world beneath is?
The producers should be ashamed for dumbing down a wonderful story and characters.
Ed Lawrence
godzillaguy@netzero.net
irefly Bumps Dark Angel." What FOX did to everyone involved with Dark Angel was despicable. What a low-dirty rotten thing to do. But this comes from a network who glorifies desperate people who want to make asses of themselves when trying to find the perfect man or woman. Or people who think they are celebrities bashing
each other because they are hard up for a few bucks.
Fox's Fall lineup is nothing to even bother with. Low quality and no talent. Fox has become the toilet bowl of the networks with no quality, only shock and trash.
Dark Angel pulled in decent ratings on Tuesdays only to be moved to Friday where those ratings sagged. Fox knew this would happen, yet did nothing about it. Instead, they go with Whedon. And whose original pilot they didn't even like. Sounds like a winner to me.
I know many, many Dark Angel fans are in an uproar. Many sites have been set up and many petitions, letters, emails and telephone calls have been sent.
It is sad to see such a lack of basic decency as shown by those at the FOX network. Just so sad. ...
Personally, with the exit of The X-Files and Dark Angel, there isn't anything worth watching on FOX. Nothing!
Elizabeth A. Mizdail
Address withheld by request
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