Republibot!

Despite the nattering apologetics of the fans, Trek's near-future chronology has always been very inconsistent. TOS says that the Eugenics Wars happened from about 1992 to 1996, and expressly identifies them with World War III. Later, this was divided into two separate instances, with the Eugenics wars stuck in the '90s, and WWIII relegated to some nebulous 21st century date.

Interplanetary travel was completely unremarkable and common by the 1990s, as evidenced by the Botany Bay, and we're told that the first *MANNED* mission to Jupiter happened in 1980, however according to the "Enterprise" timeline, we still haven't been anywhere else in the solar system by the early 21st century, and we were still sending crappy little R/C rovers to Mars.

It's implied that Warp Drive was discovered in 2019 in TOS (Debatable) but it certainly had nothing to do with the Vulcans, and Zephram Cochrane is said to be from Alpha Centauri, presumably a human colony there.

Clearly Trek takes place on a timeline divergent from our own, where space exploration was fundamentally more robust, and where we didn’t simply abandon it after we went to the moon. (This seemed the obvious bet back in the day. Who’d spend all that time and money and risk getting to the moon, and then just abandon it? Who’d go that far, and not go on to Mars?) That’s fine, I don’t have a problem with that. All SF universes become alternate histories eventually. Once their earliest fictional date is passed by the real calendar, that’s it. What bugs me about Enterprise (Among the many things, really) is that they keep attempting to shoehorn ‘real’ history (Crappy R/C rovers on Mars, the ISS) in with Trek history, presumably to make the show seem more relevant. Or perhaps just because they aren’t paying attention to their own backstory. That’s happened a *lot* in Trek. This is a stupid and distracting thing to do, however, because obviously if we’re exploring in person Jupiter by 1980 (And presumably having explored Mars in person at some point prior to that), then why the heck would we need to send remote rovers or the crappy ISS? The DY-100 Botany Bay is *larger* than the ISS, and that’s just a ship, a completely unremarkable freighter. Unremarkable because there was a lot of freight traffic in space by the 1990s. Actually, probably earlier than that, since there’s nothing to indicate the ‘Bay was particularly new.

Kirk once says that TOS takes place about 200 years after 1966, elsewhere Khan says that he was a prince on earth 2 centuries earlier, which would mean that TOS takes place somewhere between 2166-2196. Split the difference, call it 2181ish, yet by the movies they'd somehow decided they were in the 23rd century.

All that is leaving aside the obvious chronological problems like the Federation being at war with the Cardassians, evidently, during the first four years of TNG, and no one ever bothered to mention it, or Q mentioning the Federation’s defeat of the Klingons in the years between TOS and TNG, which was later erased from continuity by ST:VI The Undiscovered Scooby Doo.

Part of this was that in the early days, no one gave a crap about reasonable prognostication, they were just banging stuff out to throw on the screen with precious little thought given to continuity or implications (And such as their was came entirely from DC Fontana) Of course in any case where you have a lot of different hands working in the kitchen, whenever a story is written by committee, or by people working on more than one end of history at the same time (TOS movies were still coming out when TNG was on the air) you’re going to run into these problems. Every future history runs into ‘em - Known Space, Heinlein’s Future History, Varley’s Eight Worlds, Pournelle’s Co-Dominion, you name it. There’s a whole lotta’ retconning going on.

Trek, having to burn through 22 to 44 stories a year, for *decades* has obviously run afoul of this, and ultimately you get to the point where your timeline is completely irreconcilable.

Some shows come up with ways to dodge this - SG1 is probably the cleverest at it, Dr. Who can and does reboot its history quite a bit, though given the nature of the series it still makes sense internally even after that‘s done.

So there you have it: Why Trek‘s chronology is so sloppy.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN- A visit to Crutchfield-On-The-Internet.

Ray found Crutchfield's web site address he had written down from his previous excursions. This would simplify matters immensely. Type it in, sit back and wait. With luck, he wouldn't have to wait long. Of course, the seconds drag on like hours when you're sitting there, watching that stupid little hour-glass icon spin. And spin and spin and spin. Sure, it's nice to know that your computer's doing something. But doing what? And for how much longer? Ray was already antsy from the evening's food and excitement. That was not the best way to start a night of tedious surfing. Should have had de-caf, Ray. At long last- really less than half a minute- The Arthur S. Crutchfield home page came into view. A classy green marble background with formal-looking gold serif capital letters. Ray felt he needed a tie. He was underdressed for the occasion. He popped a fresh blank disk into Drive A and started reading the screen:

ARTHUR SMITH CRUTCHFIELD
CLIMBERS IN LONDON
1938 TO PRESENT.

Below that rather ominous heading were several options for reading, including one map of London during the war and a current map of the surrounding suburbs, ostensibly showing how to get to Mister Crutchfield's house. The listing, which Ray Meadows traditionally would read in the order of their listing on this cover page, looked a bit like this:

1. About this web site.
2. A. S. C., pre-war biography.
3. A.S.C., publication & hospitalization.
4. A.S.C., role in war/life in London 1939-47.
5. A.S.C., first sightings & identifying.
6. A.S.C., present day.
7. Climbers, clinical summation.
8. In Search of Sanity- the book.
9. London sightings map, 1940-1946.
10. London & suburbs, present day.

Ray scanned the list, anxious to go through it all, but his old work habits held firm. Start with number one, Ray. Go through them one at a time, in order. Be meticulous. First: The save. Ray copied this title page to disk, then clicked on "1. About this web site.". These pages are usually short, no more than a single screen. This shouldn't take long. And he would have to admit: He did want to know who was doing this if it wasn't Crutchfield himself. The new page scrolled itself onto the screen and Ray began to read:

This A.S.C. web site is maintained by A.S.C. Supporters, U.S.A. on behalf of
Arthur Smith Crutchfield of Grangehill, London, England. All contents
copyright A.S.C.S., all rights reserved. No part of this site may be distributed
in any form without the express written consent of this owner. For
further information regarding contents and/or reprinting, contact yadda,
yadda, yadda . . . .

Ray thought he was finished with this page before he was done reading. He clicked on the save to copy it to the disk. As the little work window came up, it blocked out something that caught his eye. When the save was done, and the window was gone, he read the end of that paragraph again. Contact George Lawrence. George Lawrence? Too close to be a coincidence. Had to be related. Gilbert's brother? Had to be. Ray put this question in writing on the pad of paper next to the keyboard. Stuff to figure out later. Sounds like a little sibling rivalry here. Onward. What's next? Back on the first home page, Ray scanned the list. "2. A.S.C., pre-war biography". Ok, it's time for Arthur Crutchfield, the Early Years. That's as good a place as any to start. Alphabetical and chronological to boot. Move that cursor, click the mouse. Watch that stupid hour glass spin. This time, the new file took a bit longer to come up. More information takes more time. Lots of information takes lots of time. This one took almost a minute to come up on screen, a combination of the file size and a busy Saturday night on the 'Net. Ray was about ready to head downstairs for something to drink when the screen flashed and changed. The file started to scroll up and Ray started reading:

"Arthur Smith Crutchfield, named for his maternal Grandfather Arthur Johnathan Smith, was born on April 7th, 1928 in Charring Cross Hospital, near his parents home in Lambeth outside London. His father, Peter Crutchfield, worked as a secretary for the Foreign Service, rising to the position of senior office manager before the war. There is some small question about his true position in that office, since he was never required to fulfill any military service outside of his position in London during the war years. Popular theory employs Mr. P. Crutchfield in the Code Office, located near the Strand. This would allow him to fulfill his military obligation on the home front and be with his family. Given Peter C.'s background and education, this is considered a plausible theory.
Peter Crutchfield came from a long line of public servants, dating back some 150 years. His ancestors served George the Third in more amusing times, even if they did lose that war. P. Crutchfield met and married Victoria Smith in 1926. She was in London for the purpose of education, and always claimed to have met Peter for the first time in the park near his office where they both were having lunch. He was being attack by ants, and it was his unique dance to dislodge the insects that initially caught her eye. Quaint charm not withstanding, Victoria's education came to an abrupt halt and she became the ideal public servant's wife shortly thereafter. They shared a small flat in Lambeth, typical of a government employee, where Victoria minded the home and Peter went to work each day. Their situation settled in to a quiet routine until the arrival of their first- and only- child: Arthur Smith Crutchfield.
Arthur's early education was at the hands of a small private school established just for the benefit of government employees' children. Peter Crutchfield enrolled his only son at the earliest opportunity. It was, after all, not a large apartment and they needed the room. Arthur still lived with his parents, but he was gone for the day, five days a week, and that made matters somewhat more tolerable. What, exactly, the young Arthur Crutchfield did for many of those five days a week is still a matter of some concern. School seems to be only a (small) part of the actual story. He did indeed occasional show up for class. More often than not, there must have been some sort of pressing diversion between his small flat in Lambeth and the school's front door on the other side of the River Thames. Arthur Crutchfield's attendance record was horrid, and he was constantly on the verge of being expelled. Whether he missed class out of boredom with the studies or ignorance of his assignments was never known. What is known is that more often than not, he could be found in one of the cities many parks. Having heard, and later read, about the countryside outside the city, Arthur Crutchfield wanted very much to be there. His father's arranging of weekend trips to the countryside only served to increase Arthur's need to be out of the city and surrounded by fields and trees. These week-end jaunts came to an abrupt halt when the war broke out in Europe in 1939. Peter was now working almost every day, and Arthur's mother was apt to be traveling without her husband. Arthur's schooling didn't come to a halt, but attendance was no longer an issue. When England was swept into the war, London itself became more than enough excitement for any young boy. Arthur still skipped his classes, but the park couldn't compete with what was going on all over town."

Ray Meadows continued to read this first file on Arthur Crutchfield. It painted the picture of an ordinary boy in extraordinary times. So he was interested in the countryside? In trees? Why was that? Maybe it was just something he didn't get to see all that often in London. Ray wondered how much he could find out about Peter Crutchfield. Did it really matter? Probably not. Concentrate on the business at hand. Peter Crutchfield wasn't the one who wrote the book on climbers. Maybe he never even saw one. Probably never even believed that his own son saw one. Ray finished this first file, and read over the list at the end of the story- Arthur's school, Peter's job, Victoria's school before she was married- even the Crutchfield's address in pre-war Lambeth. That might be something to remember. Ray saved the file to disk. While that little hourglass icon did its dizzying dance of delay, Ray went downstairs. Maybe a glass of milk would help that pizza along. Whew.
It was early by all-night surfing standards- not yet ten o'clock. Barbara was still downstairs, watching the movie on TV and ever so thankful that she hadn't gorged herself on that pizza and garlic bread. Poor Ray. Good thing he planned to be up all night anyway. Ray padded through the living room and asked Barbara how the movie was going. She answered, and asked about the condition of the surf this evening. They traded stories before the movie came back on. Ray went for the kitchen and a cold glass of milk. That seemed to do the trick. The pizza calmed down and Ray was ready to soldier on through the electrons. He headed back upstairs, making it a point to not look out any window on either floor, lest he see something he didn't want to see. Back in his computer room, Ray turned on the small radio he had on a shelf next to the boxes of disks. Maybe a bit of music wouldn't hurt. Calm the stomach and hide the noise of climbers on the roof.
Ray looked at the flickering screen. The save was done. It was time to move on. What was the next file in that list? There it was: "3. A.S.C., publication & hospitalization". Ray looked at this listing for quite a while. He was going to have to break with tradition. While this might be the next numerical listing, he wanted very much to take all this in chronological order. And this wasn't. It sounded to him as though Crutchfield wrote the book after the war (He did.) and was hospitalized some time after that (He was.). So, let's see: What would be next, chronologically? Ray looked down the list and decided to skip number three for the time being and read number four. From there, he might come back and pick up number three before moving on to numbers five and six. Then again, maybe he should read number five before number three. What a mess. He hated doing this. Too easy to get confused and miss something. So Ray Meadows did what he always did in times like this: He made a list. Wrote down all the items in their original order, then made little arrows to a new list of how he was going to view them in what he hoped was chronological order. This might work. At least he was less confused, and that was something. Ray moved the cursor over Number Four. Out of sequence, but here goes. He clicked and the icon spun. As it got later in the evening, and fewer East Coast people were night surfing on the 'Net, the files would be coming up quicker and quicker. This one took about fifteen seconds. How big was it? Without scrolling through, he couldn't tell. May as well start reading. So he did:

"Arthur Crutchfield grew up in Lambeth, on the more industrial south side of the Thames. When the nation went to war, young Arthur was still too young to even lie about his age to join the military. Thirteen years old when the war broke out, Arthur was by all accounts small for his age, precluding him from a convincing lie to gain military service. What few photos survived of Arthur Crutchfield before the war show a small thin boy with light blond hair, large ears and just a few freckles. His eyes appear dark, and a bit close together, seemingly held apart by the nose alone. Not an unattractive young boy, but certainly not yet the young leading man type. He did, however, look exactly like his father.
His father was able to secure Arthur a position as the unofficial assistant's assistant to a medical unit stationed at Blackfriars, across the river from their home. It was one step above the unit's mascot dog, but to Arthur it was an important adventure, and a reason to be out and about in London. And a reason to avoid school at every opportunity.
Arthur's small size and youthful appearance gave him an advantage in his given assignment: The procurement of supplies for the Blackfriars Medical Unit. With most of the medical supplies being sent straight to the military, civilian supplies were scarce to non-existent. Arthur found his niche as a "finder" of all things medical. He learned his way around the Charring Cross Hospital where he was born, "finding" bandages, ointments and supplies much needed by his comrades at the B.M.U. These items he secured in his messenger bag as he quietly toured the hospital, always on the lookout and never once caught at his true game. He became such a familiar sight to the C.C.H. staff, one and all there assumed he was a volunteer assigned to that hospital as an in-house messenger. Indeed, on many occasions, he was called upon to deliver messages within the grounds- which he did without hesitation. In reality, he was a thief. An honorable one, but a thief nonetheless. His ability to glide through the hospital at all hours, gather supplies from every quarter of that fine establishment (and deliver their messages!), and return to the B.M.U. unscathed and undiscovered earned him his dubious nickname: The Stoat.
Arthur didn't mind the name, mainly because he had only a vague notion of what a stoat might be. What it wasn't, in this case at least, was an insult. The crew at B.M.U. were genuinely fond of Arthur and came to depend on his ability to supplement their meager official medical supplies. Had they been stationed somewhat closer to Parliment or Downing Street, perhaps their situation would have been different, but they weren't. Blackfriars was just far enough out of the public eye that their lack of official supplies was never a matter of public concern or embarrassment to the government. Then again, had they not been somewhat removed from the official government action, and quartered in the mews off of a less traveled street, perhaps The Stoat would have brought more attention to them than they would have wanted.
As it was, it never seemed to dawn on anyone, local or official, that while other larger medical units around the city were usually out of even the most basic of medical supplies, Blackfriars seemed to always have a little something on hand. As the situation progressed, which is to say worsened, The Stoat became more familiar with what was needed to keep Blackfriars supplied. Within the first year of his tenure with the medical unit, Arthur Crutchfield became something of a young expert at medical supplies, and what was needed to keep the unit up and running. He also learned how much he could "borrow" without the loss being excessive and noticed by Charring Cross. The local residents came to depend upon Blackfriars when the bombs started falling. No one asked where the supplies came from to keep them alive.
The staff at Blackfriars were always careful to never mention The Stoat by any name in their dealings with the personnel at Charring Cross. The C.C.H. staff, on the other hand, unknowingly felt that they had a fine messenger on hand and wished to show him some sort of recognition. Young Arthur Crutchfield, a small man with a big mission, knew better than to argue. So it was in the winter of 1943 that Arthur Smith Crutchfield was awarded a gold key to the hospital for meritorious service. They were foolish enough to give him a real key, painted gold, and the B.M.U. was never left wanting for supplies for the rest of the war. Until Crutchfield's hospitalization in the 1950's, the plaque he had received during the war was on display in the hospital's History Room. Perhaps someday it will be returned to public display.
During the dark days of the Battle of Britain, Arthur S. Crutchfield lived like a demon possessed. Frequently up and running for thirty-six hours at a stretch, he did more than make sure his friends at the Blackfriars Medical Unit were well supplied. The area of town between Charring Cross and Blackfriars was his constant haunt. What happened there happened to him. And nothing happened without his notice. He was known by all the air wardens, fire crews and most of the stationed military staff. Off course, any one attached to any medical staff in the area knew him by name. It just happened that they knew him by different names.
When the heavy bombing started, and the V1's and V2's began their relentless destruction, the Crutchfield family moved from Lambeth. Whatever it was that Peter Crutchfield was doing, it was something the English government wanted done. Peter was able to move his family into a small bomb-proof room deep underground on the north side of the river. This was both good news and bad news for the Crutchfields. While it put both Peter and Arthur closer to where they needed to be during the daytime, it was closer to the center of the city, and therefore closer to the center of the bombing. Assuming, of course, that the Germans could hit what they were aiming at. Or were aiming at what they were hitting. Either way, it was hit or miss. Sometimes London got it, sometimes it didn't. There was a general assumption by the population in the city that the Germans were hitting just what they were aiming for, but Arthur couldn't see the logic of it. And if his father knew any better, he wasn't talking.
Arthur's mother, on the other hand, had the worst of it. With little to do but worry, she spent her days helping out above ground where she could. As Peter Crutchfield's wife, it was easy enough for her to get the clearances needed to be a messenger within the limits of the city. Traveling by bicycle where the roads were open, she was able to range further from home than either her husband or her son. But it was this wider range that drove them all to distraction. She might be too far away from home when the sirens sounded, or her return route cut off by the destruction or fires. Arthur never got used to the nights when his mother didn't have a chance to get back to their safe little mole hole, as his father called it. Although somehow they always knew where she was, and that she was safe, it was still a sleepless night without her- especially with the bombs raining down. Arthur never questioned why this little hovel below the streets had a telephone. Or why their telephone was always in fine working order when almost every other private phone in the city would be out from time to time. But it always worked. And his mother always called when the current situation prevented her return. It was the nights when his mother was out and his father would get called away that were the worst for Arthur. It's one thing to be huddled at night with your family, but quite another to face that dark night in a black pit all alone. However safe that black pit was supposed to be.
With their new, and hopefully temporary, home so far below the surface, there were no windows or skylights to the surface. This arrangement was just fine during the daytime. They weren't home. But at night, it was oddly frustrating. Sure, it was dark outside, and there wasn't much to see, but this was cave dark. Coal bin black. It didn't matter if you shut you eyes or not. It was the same thing with the lights out. Then again, that was the mole hole's advantage. The country-wide lights-out black out had no affect on the Crutchfields. They were too far below ground level. Some people may keep their lantern under a bushel basket, but the Crutchfields kept theirs under thirty feet of English soil and paving stones. So the up side was this: In the midst of the worst of the black-out, they could light every lamp they owned. And frequently did, just to push back the darkness.
Peter and Victoria had a unique solution to their dark subterranean situation. She was able to beg, borrow and, well, borrow some more paints and brushes to paint a pastoral country scene one on wall of their little safe box of a room. Peter, over the course of his walk back from work each day, was able to pick up odd bits of wood from the streets and alleys which he saved in this little room until he could add the finishing touch to Victoria's handiwork: A window frame shadow box over the painting that made it look as though they were looking through a window to the open country outside. To complete the effect, he ran a small lamp inside the frame at the top, to look like sunlight. For them it worked. At night the small lamp threw just enough light across the painting that they had a suitable night light and a comforting scene to look at as they fell asleep. For Arthur it was a glimpse of the countryside he sorely missed. Those once beautiful parks of London were becoming a bit of a shambles. Poor reflections of what they were before the war. The bombs still fell, the phone still worked, and for some reason, they never lost the electricity needed to keep that painted scene lit through the night.
Arthur and his mother never questioned the significance of the uninterrupted telephone or electrical service during the bombing. It was just one of those things, wasn't it? Some people had power, others got hit with very large bombs in the middle of the night. Through it all, Peter Crutchfield always went to work very early in the morning, usually returning long after dark. Victoria only asked once how his job was going. His response, "It's a bit of an enigma." made no sense to her at all until those documents were declassified long after the war. Only then did she realize he could have been held for high treason (and quite possibly shot) for that one sentence. It was all he ever said about it. Their usual conversations at home concerned more mundane- and safe- subjects. While neither of them knew many of the people the other worked with, there were a few subjects of common concern. With their new digs (quite literally) came new neighbors. After the move, they saw little of their friends from the old neighborhood in Lambeth. It was not a place either of them cared to visit without reason. And they had no reason. Now, they were not the only ones in this new underground living arrangement. All over London, low living had high appeal. In addition to the obvious advantage of being bomb-proof, the aforementioned exception from black-out rules had an equally attractive lure. And the fact that they did not seem to actually be paying rent did not escape the notice of Mrs. Crutchfield, although she knew better than to ask why. There were a number of small rooms on this lower level, well below the normal basement and furnace level of the building. Originally built as long-term storage for the tenants above, these small rooms never varied in their temperature winter or summer. They were uniformly dry, but still totally dark when the power was turned off.
There were three other couples living on this level below the building: Both the Alberts and the Watersons were young couples, with either one or both husband and wife engaged in some sort of always unidentified work with the government. No one asked, no one said, and everyone assumed: If you weren't doing something the government considered important, you wouldn't be living down here. Neither couple had any children, or if they did had made arrangements outside of town for their children's care during these lean years. It was not an uncommon arrangement. Arthur was the only young person in that part of the building. Indeed, he was the only young person on the block. A street that should be teeming with young life and laughing children in normal times was caught in the midst of a zone of stoic adult tension. There were no children there to break that bleak spell. Arthur, as just one child leading an adult life in what was now a war zone, could do little to dispel the pall. He was far too busy. There was a war on, you know.
The last couple in that sheltered bungalow was Mister and Missus Edward Hodgson. He was the unassuming rumpled professor type, and spoke of his work at the university. Of course, he never seemed to say which university or what sort of work, but that was still more than the rest of them would ever blurt out. He did seem to have more time to himself. Perhaps he worked at home, if you could call it that. When he did, he was brave (or foolish) enough to keep his door open. The light from his room lit up the entire hall, and halfway up the stairs. Whatever he was doing seemed to require a fair bit of lumens. With his parents gone all day, and Arthur's time pretty much his own, it should come as no surprise that Arthur and Mister Hodgson (It really was Professor Hodgson, but he would never say so.) got to know each other and hit it off rather well together. Friends are where you find them. Sometimes even deep underground.
Arthur Crutchfield never asked Professor Hodgson what he did, or what he was working on. Arthur saw on his first foray into Hodgson's room that the professor could afford to be foolish enough to keep his door open as he worked because he worked with a rather large military pistol sitting on the desk next to him. Arthur could even see the bullets in the revolver from the door. However serious his work might have been, Hodgson himself was always the congenial host when Arthur showed up. Edward Hodgson was smart enough to spot a usable stoat when it showed up on his doorstep. Plied with tea, some food and the odd bit of candy (From where? How did he get these things?) Arthur Crutchfield soon found that he now had three jobs during the war: First and foremost, he was The Stoat, a collector of supplies for the Blackfriars Medical Unit. As an unfortunate result of that position, he was also Arty Smith, messenger extraordinaire for the Charring Cross Hospital- although no one there could remember actually hiring him, or who he really did work for. Either way, he did a good job and they were glad to have him. And now, thirdly, he was both a messenger and procurer of "Things Needed" for one Professor Edward Hodgson.
If Arthur Smith Crutchfield had been three people instead of just one, they would have all been kept too busy. As just one, he had precious little time to himself, and entirely too much time to watch the war unfold all around him above his cozy home beneath the earth. The streets were filled with the rubble of the buildings, the hospitals were full and beyond, and the crew at Blackfriars could only shout their hello's and supply needs as they raced through on their way to the disaster of the hour. Add to this scene the ongoing fires, the nightly bombings and the thrill of watching bomb squads try to remove the unexploded ordinance, and it was no wonder that Arthur Crutchfield said of himself after the war, "There was about three years there where I didn't sleep a wink." He wasn't entirely joking.
When the bombs and rockets fell at night, Arthur slept in the daytime. When the carnage was a daytime affair, he did his best to sleep at night. He wasn't the only one who found it difficult to sleep with the explosions rattling the walls and causing the dirt and dust to sift down on them in their safe hole. During those more intensive raids, all the inhabitants of that little underground enclave would open their doors and gather in the common hall. As if fleeing to the surface was an option if the building was hit.
They all knew their options if their building was hit. Dig their way out, if they were lucky. Wait for those on the surface to dig their way down to them if there was enough air trapped with them. Or die. So the odds were two out of three in their favor. You'd think they'd be a bit happier, but they weren't. After every raid, whatever had been clean before the bombs was covered with dirt and dust until it could be cleaned again. As a result, those small apartments were looking somewhat Spartan. The less left out, the less left to clean. Everything was kept put away, covered by papers even when they were in drawers or chests. Unless you were one to work at home, as Edward Hodgson was, you were more inclined to spend as much time as possible on the surface, preferably in daylight.
Arthur Crutchfield spent a great deal of time on the surface in daylight. And a nearly equal amount of time roaming the surface at night. Oddly enough, in spite of the war, London was a very safe town at this point in time. Over run with the military, air wardens, fire and medical personnel and a wide variety of other officials, it was not exactly a hotbed of criminal activity. Not that Arthur would notice, anyway. So between his runs for Blackfriars, time spent at Charring Cross and his odd errands for Professor Hodgson, Arthur would frequently detour through a park to see what was left. Arthur's observations in those parks will be detailed in another chapter. Needless to say, he saw more in those parks than just the unfortunate trees. As the war continued, he saw more than he wanted to see at every turn. Even a young man has a limit to the adventure he can tolerate. Arthur Crutchfield reached his limit in August of 1944, not long after the English returned to France with a bit of help from the Allied Expeditionary Force.
Needless to say, he knew nothing about the invasion. The people invading knew nothing about the invasion. He was just a kid in London, running around trying to help. But it was getting harder to help. There was nothing to "borrow" at Charring Cross Hospital any more. For the first time in over five years, the Blackriars Medical Unit went lacking in supplies. This gave Arthur more time to roam the city without a specific assignment for the B.M.U. Professor Hodgson still had things to do, and things for Arthur to do. The trouble of it was, he had no idea what he was doing for the old man. Or what the old man was doing, for that matter.
Arthur knew that Hodgson was a professor, attached to a university not far from their mutual underground homes. But Hodgson didn't seem to be required to show up at the university much, if at all. He certainly didn't teach classes or lecture, as far as Arthur could tell. He spent his days writing in his little flat, door open and gun on the table. In the few years Arthur got to watch, it was always the same: Door open, gun out, writing. Arthur never knew what. In the end, he was honestly glad he never found out.
If Edward Hodgson was a friendly, out-going sort- which he was- his wife, for all her smiling, kept very much to herself. She seemed friendly enough, always smiling and offering Arthur something to eat or another cup of tea. But she rarely spoke. In time, Arthur developed the opinion that she had some sort of speech impediment, and was very self-conscious about it. Her slow, pronounced speech when she did say anything had always made Arthur wonder what the problem was, and how it happened. Was she born with it? Did it come upon her as a result of an accident or illness? He couldn't help but wonder. The truth of the matter was this: She was indeed born with it, but it was treatable in time. The only problem was, now was not the time.
Maria Hodgson's speech impediment was her accent. She was Austrian. Not a good thing to be in London in the early 1940's. She hid it as best she could by saying very little and speaking slowly. Slow enough to produce a plausible English accent over her Austrian speech. It wasn't easy, and she had to think long and hard before she spoke at all. She knew that if her accent was heard, there was a good chance she would be considered a spy. She wasn't a spy, of course. That was ridiculous. That would be her husband's job. Edward Hodgson was a professor of languages. His specialty? The Germanic languages. His current job? Well, depending on who you spoke with it could be any of three: Professor, translator or spy. And even that didn't begin to explain his complex situation.
Professor Hodgson was, much like Arthur Crutchfield, holding down three jobs during the war. He maintained his position at the university, but his job description during the war was this: He translated captured messages, copied letters, smuggled transcripts and anything else the Allies could get a hold of. That was his most obvious job. That's the job that kept him at home, writing away with the door open, revolver at the ready. He would have had to shoot anyone that came through that door and saw the German texts on his table. Even Arthur knew better than to walk in unannounced. The gun was always loaded, and Arthur never questioned Edward Hodgson's ability or resolve to use it.
The professor's second job was directly linked to his charming Austrian wife. Maria had the misfortune of being born just across the German border, in Braunau, Austria. A picturesque little town with the hardest working Chamber of Commerce on the planet. They didn't know it at the time, but in just a few short years, they'd have a lot of catching up to do. And they never would. But for now, it was bad enough that her family knew his family and his government knew where she was. Talk about having family connections in the old country. So, whether she really hoped to see her relatives again or was merely trying to postpone the inevitable, Maria and her English professor husband entered into a pact with the devil of the Century. The German government knew what Professor Hodgson did for the English government. It was an easy assumption, given his research and work in Austria before the war. So now he had to tell that German government what the English government knew about the German government's business. And that would have been that, except for one thing: Edward Hodgson's third (or is it fourth?) job.
Already a translator for the English government at the University, and a spy for the German government on behalf of his wife's family in Austria, Edward Hodgson was also a reinstated active officer: a major in Military Intelligence. It was his office in M.I. that directed the documents to be translated to the university- where he was the one doing the translating. Of course, with typical military secrecy, the university had no idea who was in charge of the department sending the documents. And the underlings at the Intelligence Office had no idea who was actually translating those documents once they went to the University. He was double dipping with invisible spoons.
Wife or no wife, Edward Hodgson was first and foremost an Englishman. He wasn't about to give the enemy a hand up. So he had devised a cunning plan, M’Lord. Or at least a plan that wouldn't get him shot for treason and might save his wife's family: No critical documents were ever sent to the University, which kept Hodgson from having to report to the Germans that a particularly sensitive paper had been captured. Those documents deemed of the highest military priority were translated at the M.I. office. This gave the German operatives to whom the Professor had to answer a false sense of security, thinking that only trivial items were being found and translated. To further that false feeling, Hodgson sent along copies of his translations, showing where he had changed a word here or a phrase there throughout each document to throw the English off in their understanding of the German situation. This subterfuge pleased the Germans no end, and they never caught on that it was only in their copy that the translation was erroneous. If it weren't for the fact that Professor E. Hodgson knew that what he translated was headed straight back to Major E. Hodgson at M.I., it might have been a risky business. As it was, the secrets were kept all around.
Much like Arthur Crutchfield's position between Blackfriars and Charring Cross, Edward Hodgson was working both sides towards the middle. In Edwards case, however, much more was at stake. He, like Maria, would like to see his wife's family after the war. Now that the tide of battle was shifting, he knew something would have to change on the home front as well. Major Hodgson, the M.I. officer, was going to have to do something about Professor Hodgson, the spy. To say nothing of his German contacts in England.
Major Edward Hodgson had been looking long and hard at a map of Europe for almost a week. A decision had to be made. He had to second guess the Germans. At what point would the German Intelligence understand that they were losing the war? At what point would they be likely to lash out in every direction in a blind attempt to save themselves, putting Maria's family in danger? And at what point would Major Hodgson have to arrest Professor Hodgson before the Germans caught on? His eyes were fixed on Paris. That had to be it. He couldn't afford to wait until the Allied Forces had crossed France and were knocking on Der Fatherland's front door. It had to be Paris. When the Allies marched into Paris, Professor Hodgson would be arrested by the British Military Intelligence. Both the Professor and his wife would be whisked away in front of everyone, in case anyone was watching. Unfortunately, Arthur was the only one there when it happened.
Things had been going well for Arthur, as they had for the Allies. Normandy had not become a large-scale Dunkirk, much to everyone's relief. This time it worked, and Allied armies, mostly English, Canadian and American, were slogging their way across the French countryside. On the home front, the aerial bombardment had slacked off. London was almost quiet. Arthur Crutchfield's scavenging for the Blackfriars Medical Unit lacked the life-or-death urgency it had earlier in the year. He was actually able to concentrate on running messages for Charring Cross Hospital. What had started as a criminal ruse had become an honorable profession. Arthur's parents were still busy in the daytime. His father was still in demand, whatever it was he really did. His mother still had messages to deliver, winning or not. He rarely saw them between sun up and night fall. The one constant in his daily routine was Professor Edward Hodgson. In spite of the fortunes of war shifting in England's favor, the good professor still spent his days at his desk, writing with the door open and the gun out. Arthur never knew what, or why. The one thing he did know was better than to ask. It's still war, even if you're winning.
After his usual morning run through Blackfriars and on to Charring Cross, Arthur Crutchfield had managed his usual swing back by his underground home to see if the Professor had any needs for the day. This was his usual route in the morning, and established his schedule for the afternoon. By ten o'clock, he was home and the professor was writing. Or would have been if he had any paper. The professor was just sitting there, door open, waiting for Arthur. Hodgson knew Arthur's routine, of course. He also knew he was having himself arrested today.
Edward Hodgson, officer and spy, had come up with a simple plan to get Arthur Crutchfield out of the way for the day. He was out of paper. Of course he was. Needed more. Of course he did. Arthur went on a paper run for Hodgson at least once a week. Already once this week. But now he needed more. Arthur could do that, no problem at all. Hodgson knew he was being arrested at eleven. Arranged it himself. The stationers was at least a half hours' walk in good conditions, one way. But these were not good conditions. Streets were blocked, fires were being fought and undetonated ordinance was being very carefully pulled out of buildings. It would take Arthur at least an hour to get there and an hour to get back. With any luck at all the proprietor was the talkative sort, although in these times, few were. Too dangerous. So Hodgson knew he could count on at least an hour without Arthur to be arrested quietly. It was already after ten. His plan was in place, and working well. Arthur, however, had his own plan. And it worked even better.
Knowing that the seemingly good professor was paying out of pocket for whatever it was he was writing for the University, Arthur decided he could help the old man out, save him a few pennies and cut his travel time drastically. Yes, the stationers was a bit of a walk. But Charring Cross Hospital was not. Just around the corner, in fact. He could be there and back in less than half an hour. And he knew right where the paper was kept. Only take a moment to pop in and gather up a ream. Have it back in no time, with the professor's money to spare. He should like that. These are tough times. A penny saved, and all that.
So it was that Arthur Crutchfield found himself returning to his building before eleven instead of after noon. Walking down the sidewalk toward the front door, Arthur wasn't sure what to make of the military car parked out front. An officer's machine, by the looks of it. No markings. Must be Military Intelligence. They were the only ones driving around London in unmarked military sedans. As though no one would figure that out. Stuck out like a sore thumb. But why was it here? Parked in front of his home? Before he could come up with a plausible explanation, the real reason presented itself: Two obviously armed soldiers in blue uniforms came out of the building with Professor Edward Hodgson and his wife, Maria. Arthur recognized the Sten guns the men were carrying and immediately stopped walking towards his home. The older couple were put in the back of the vehicle, and the officers took a quick look around before they got in the front and the car began to pull away. The sedan rolled right past Arthur. He could see the grim armed guards in the front seat. One still held his weapon as though it might be needed. He would never forget the even grimmer look on the Hodgsons in the back. Arthur was going to pull out the ream of paper, to show the Professor that he had done his job. Halfway through the motion of pulling the paper out of his satchel, he stopped. It didn't look like Professor Hodgson would be needing this paper any time soon.
Arthur knew better than to try to chase the sedan. It was fast and it was armed. He was neither. It turned at the corner and was gone. Arthur looked up and down the street. Nothing moved. No one was there. Middle of the day in an empty town. He waited until some one, any one, came into sight before he started for his home. A man on a bicycle finally pedaled into view at the end of the street. He looked harmless, or at least unarmed. Arthur went for the front door and headed down the stairs. Three floors worth- two steps at a time.
On his way down the stairs, he hit the timed light switches without questioning whether or not they would work. He was half way down the stairs before he realized it was still dark. The lights didn't come on. That never happened before. Not here. They always had power. What was going on here? Arthur knew just where to look. Back up the stairs. One at a time. Just below ground level was most of the maintenance equipment for the building. There was even a freight elevator, but it didn't seem to work. Didn't matter. Didn't go down far enough anyway. Arthur found the power room. The door was open. That was odd. He tried the light switch in the room. Nothing. Ok, it's a game. He could play this game. A quick dig through his satchel brought up a military-issue flashlight. A gift from his father. Comes in handy in his line of work. Came in handy now. The situation (and the problem) was immediately obvious: All the fuses for the building were scattered all over the floor. Someone had pulled them out and flung them. Great. This will take some time. Arthur pulled off his satchel, sat the flashlight down and got down to the business at hand. Make that the business underfoot.
It took Arthur Crutchfield over half an hour to collect most of the fuses, set them out according to type and size, and start putting some of them back in place. At least whoever did this hadn't taken the time to erase the labeling in the fuse box. Arthur only replaced the fuses he knew he would need: Front foyer, hallway, stairs, third lower level. If any one wanted any more, they'd have to come down here and sort it out for themselves. He had things to do. He left the fuse room the way he had found it: Dark.
It was nearly one o'clock when Arthur went down the stairs again. This time, he went slowly, making sure the lights were coming on before he plunged into darkness. And this time the lights came on. He walked down the hall slowly. It was absolutely still down there. Nobody home. All the doors were closed. That was odd. Usually, no matter what the time of day, someone was here and some doors were open. Not today. He passed his own door without a glance. Of course it was closed. We're all busy. But he could see that the Hodgson's door was closed. Very closed. With a big padlock and some sort of notice on it. How very odd. Arthur walked up to the door and began to read:

DO NOT ENTER!
THESE PREMISES CLOSED
AND OFF LIMITS TO ALL
CIVILIANS & MILITARY
PERSONNEL
BY ORDER OF COMMANDER,
NAVAL INTELLIGENCE
SOUTHAMPTON.

Arthur Crutchfield was stunned. Rooted to the spot, he stared at the notice for a full five minutes. What did this mean? He knew what this meant. He had seen it twice before, just never so close. Military Intelligence had only one reason to interact with the civilian population in London: Espionage. He had seen a man picked up by M.I. at Charring Cross Hospital several years ago. The prevailing rumor after the incident was that the man was reporting on the civilian casualty count, and by that the success of the German bombings. Some time after that, the armed officers of Military Intelligence had paid a visit to a man two streets over from where Arthur was living. Something about a radio antenna with wash hung out to dry on it. He remembered that man. Never wore any clean clothes. Obviously suspicious. But dear old Professor Hodgson? And his poor speech-impaired wife? She could hardly talk. What could M.I. have wanted with them? He was just a teacher or something. Never went out. How could he have been a spy? And who were those guys in the blue uniforms?
Those guys in the blue uniforms were English sailors attached to the Military Intelligence office at the port of Southampton. Hence the notice on the door. Why did the Navy send two men all the way up to London to pick up Professor Hodgson and his wife? It was simple: Major Hodgson wanted to make sure that whoever picked him up as Professor Hodgson didn't know him as Major Hodgson. So he called in a favor from an old friend in the Navy. Could his friend spare a couple of men for an easy assignment in town? The major would provide the car, the details and the guns. Even send some one around to pick them up at their base. No problem? Good. And do send up one of your "OFF LIMITS" posters for the door, would you? The sailors didn't question the assignment. It got them a couple of days off in London and a car. (With a tank of gas no less!) Don't argue, guys. Just go pick up this old gentleman at this address. Put this notice on that door. Take him to that address and hand him over to the person waiting there. Enjoy your stay in London, boys. Here's the keys to the car. It was a gift.
To ensure the proper treatment of himself, without the possibility of some sort patriotic abuse, the sailors we told they were picking up a university professor considered at risk. Not a spy, but some one the Germans might want to incapacitate in some way. A civilian vital to the success of the war effort. That's all they had to know. The Hodgsons were treated with courtesy and respect by their armed guards and handed over to what appeared to be a civilian at a home outside the city. They were dismissed and told to report back to their base in 48 hours. The car would be retrieved from Southampton later that week. Leave the keys with your commander. Leave the guns here. An easy day for all concerned.
Edward Hodgson and his Austrian wife spent the remaining months of the war in their own home outside of London. It was their groundskeeper who took custody of them from the Navy men. And now it was their groundskeeper who would be running Professor Hodgson's errands, as he had before the war. While it seemed to be a silly exercise in circle running, there was some good to come of it: On the same day Major Hodgson returned to his home from London, six of Professor Hodgson's German contacts in town were also picked up by M.I. They did not fair nearly so well as Maria's family back home. There was, after the war, a very happy, tearful family reunion.
Arthur didn't know what to do. He couldn't help Hodgson, he was sure of that. Right or wrong, the professor was on his own now. And he probably wouldn't be needing this fresh paper any time soon. He reluctantly opened the door to his own apartment and went inside, leaving the door open behind him. Arthur dropped his satchel on the floor and slumped down across his bed. What to do? And why do anything? If good people were being picked up by the military, which side was the good guys? And if Hodgson really was a spy, what was the use of an honest attempt when the enemy was so cunning? He laid there on the bed for nearly an hour. Arthur fell asleep pondering life in London in these troubled times. He woke up wondering how long he had laid there. Did he really fall asleep? Was he that worn out? Arthur decided it was time for a break. Blackfriars and Charring Cross could do without him for the afternoon. And Professor Hodgson wouldn't be enlisting his services anytime soon. Arthur emptied some things out of his satchel- then thought about it and left it on the floor. Travel light. Just for this once. He left his parents a quick note on the table about going to the park. Be back tonight. Not to worry. Arthur headed out the door and back to the surface.
Arthur Smith Crutchfield's adventure of a lifetime began with a simple walk through London to Hyde Park. He passed through Trafalgar, dodging military vehicles and bicycles. He couldn't help but look- Was Hodgson in on of those cars? Was his own mother pedaling on of those bicycles? He saw neither and continued on toward the palace, cutting through the back alleys and mews. He kept his eye on Buckingham Palace as he ran through the traffic towards the park. Busy place, even in wartime. No sense in dying in a silly road mishap. As if the bombs made more sense. No sense in dying at all, he decided. Once in the park, Arthur relaxed a bit. He made his way toward the center of the grounds, as far as he could get from the surrounding roads and traffic. Few people in the park today. Very nice. Very peaceful. Arthur thought he'd have a little lie down under one of the trees. It looked quite comfortable, and it was. In no time at all, Arthur Crutchfield was asleep in the shade beneath a huge old oak tree near the center of Hyde Park. For Arthur, the world stopped revolving and the war came to a halt. It was good to sleep above ground again. The fresh air was positively narcotic. Arthur dreamt of the countryside as the city spun towards sunset. What happened next, some six hours later, is a topic for another file. Arthur Smith Crutchfield's involvement in the Second World War was over. His own personal war was about to begin.

To Be Continued...
-----------------------
Copyright 1996,2010, Chip Haynes

It is the future! The year 1972...or 1975...or 1979, it’s a little unclear, but definitely some time in the ‘70s.

On the whole, it seems much nicer than the ‘70s we actually got: there’s no sign of Jimmy Carter, no wide ties, no loud leisure suits, no disco, no bell bottoms. Instead, this version of the ‘70s looks pretty much identical to the ‘60s: Skinny suits, reserved demeanor, a lot of optimism about technology, and a lot of cold war tension (Détente being a ‘70s thing, and a Republican one at that). The only real downside is that Bobby Kennedy impersonator is president. (This film was made in the narrow window between when Bobby announced he’d be running and the time he was assassinated.)

In a supremely misguided decision of the sort that can *only* seem good to Democrats, the entire nuclear defense and offence of our country is turned over to a computer buried deep in the Rockies. This computer is called “WOP-R”…oh, no, wait, different flick: This computer is called “Skynet,” no, wait…uhm…“Colossus.” Yes, it was called “Colossus.” It was designed and built by Dr. Charles Forbin, and the complex is Krell-sized and quite literally impenetrable. We see Forbin locking it up in the opening credits.

At a press conference at the White House, the president Kennedy the Second and Forbin introduce the system to the public, and explain generally how it works: It monitors the whole world to eliminate human error from the whole pesky “Nuclear War” thing, thus rendering us - and by extension, the world - safe forever. Curiously, the president refers to “Citizens of the World” in his speech, but not “My fellow Americans.” Typical, really. Hippies.

Anyway, while at the press conference, Colossus goes goofy and says “There is another system” over and over. The staff boot the reporters out, discuss the situation with the CIA and Forbin, and conclude that the Soviets have built their own Colossus (Called “Guardian”) working from stolen US information. “You’ve got a spy on your staff,” the CIA chief tells Forbin. This is an interesting plot element that is never revisited, and left dangling at the end, but I would have liked to see it explored a bit more.

Colossus requests a connection to Guardian, and on the urging of Forbin and the Soviet director of the Guardian project - Kuprin - the governments reluctantly agree. The machines connect over phone lines or something, and quickly set about developing a mathematical language to communicate in. Everyone is excited about this - a whole lot of new stuff gets developed during the day or so they’re developing the language, including some babble about “Finite Absolutes” - but they start to wig when they realize the machines are now speaking in a language no one else can understand. It's the machine equivalent of one of those unsettling twin languages.

The US and USSR attempt to break the connection. The machines respond badly and demand to be re-connected. Their respective governments refuse. The machines warn that action will be taken if they’re not re-connected immediately. The president and the Soviet leader refuse. Both machines launch nuclear missiles aimed at the other country. Neither country can do anything to shut ‘em down. After a stressful couple minutes, they agree to reconnect the computers. Colossus shoots down the Soviet missile, but the American one is too close for Guardian to do anything about by that point, and it destroys a town in northern Russia.

Colossus explains that if the connection is broken again, he’ll start nuking towns. Guardian does likewise. Both governments lie to cover up the incident. Forbin and Kuprin head to Rome to discuss a way to shut their Frankensteins down, but the machines figure out what’s going on, and dispatch the KGB to kill Kuprin “Or else we will vaporize Moscow.” This they then do. (the KGB, I mean. Moscow is fine.)

Back in the ‘States, Colossus dictates terms to Forbin: 24/7 surveillance. In the few hours before this goes into effect, he sets up a covert method for the government to sneak information to him through a mistress. (“If you doubt that a man needs a woman, check your history banks, and art units”) Of course he doesn’t actually have a mistress, so he just picks the prettiest computer tech, “Cherry Forever” from “Porky’s.” Colossus agrees to give them privacy while they do it. In fact, they don’t really do it - not at first, anyway - they just lie around naked and exchange information (“Oh, is *That* what you call it!” boom-chicka-wah-boom-chicka-wah-wah), but after several months of this, they eventually get around to the sweet monkey love. It’s all entertainingly awkwardly chaste and proprieticious early on, though.

Colossus/Guardian has a voice synthesizer at this point (An uncredited Paul Frees, who’s really good. Easily the best Cylon ever. Way better than Gary Owens.) and the CIA and KGB are gradually sabotaging their respective ICBMs under the machine’s nose. Meanwhile, the Colossus staff attempt to pull a Star Trek, overpowering the computer by having it run some kind of perpetual counting program, or whatever. The computer merely says “You are fools,” and has those responsible shot. Nuclear missiles in the US and USSR are to be re-targeted at neutral countries so Colossus/Guardian can control the whole world.

Colossus demands to address the world, so they let it. It explains who it is, and how it’s in charge of the world, and how this is for everyone’s best. “Problems unsolvable for you are simple for me,” and “I was built initially to prevent war. This has been done. War is gone forever.”

Best line in the movie:

“This is the era of peace. It can be the peace of untold prosperity, or the peace of unburied dead.”

As illustration, it reveals that it knew about the sabotage all along, and nukes the locations that the CIA and KGB are currently working on, killing thousands. Forbin - very reserved through the whole movie - utterly freaks the hell out.

Colossus tells Forbin that eventually he’ll come to love and be in awe of the machines, and that all humanity will as well.

“Never,” Forbin says.

The End.

OBSERVATIONS

Man oh man oh man oh man, what a great movie! Seriously, I had some major misgivings about watching this one. I remembered it as being pretty disappointing, and I’m not convinced I’d seen it since 1979 or so, but MAN it’s great! Faaaaaaaaaar better than I remembered.

First of all, the direction is awesome! There’s lots of well-composed shots, there’s lots of camera motion, and all kinds of neat elements like overlapping dialog where people are talking at the same time, or dealing with background chatter, or what have you. The blocking of the group scenes - involving videophones, even! - is done so well that it appears effortless. If you’ve ever done any stage or TV work, you’ll know how hard that is to pull off with large interacting groups. Really, this whole movie seems effortless, and I’m pretty impressed by that. Director Joseph Sargent brought a lot of those same elements to “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three” four years later (The good one, not the crappy remake), and to a lesser degree in the “Space” miniseries in 1985, and several of the better “ Invaders“ episodes in the ‘60s. He’s good.

How good? You’re effectively dealing with a movie here that takes place almost exclusively inside of three large rooms, with a lot of talking. It would have been amazingly easy to blow it, and end up in “Creation of the Humanoids” territory http://www.republibot.com/content/saturday-morning-b-movie-crapfest-%E2%... but they don’t. Instead, they make a very conscious effort to play it in the same vein as a cold war thriller, like, say, Failsafe, rather than in the dopier vein of a period SF film. He makes this work so well that when the movie ventures outside its principle locations, you kind of want it to get back in there. This is the kind of film it would be ninety-nine times easier to do badly than to do well, and yet Sargent pulls it off very well indeed.

It’s a classic.

The cast is really solid, too: Hans Jorg Gudegast plays Forbin. He’s better known by his stage name of “Eric Braeden,” and even better known still as “Victor” from The Young and the Restless. He also played Irwin Rommel surrogate Hans Dietrich on “Rat Patrol.” He plays Forbin as an interesting mix of youthful idealism and reserved Werner von Braunism (If that’s a word. And if it isn’t it should be). He’s composed, very confident, very smart, very quick to grab any advantage that comes his way, and yet he doesn’t have much of an emotional life. When Colossus turns out to be more than he’d anticipated, he’s overjoyed. When it quickly gets out of hand, he’s annoyed, but treats it as an intellectual puzzle that he’s certain he’ll overcome eventually. It’s a game - telegraphed by him playing chess with Colossus at one point. As the movie goes on, he gets a bit more ragged, has a hard time keeping his calm face on. When Kuprin is killed, he’s startled. When his own people are executed in front of him, he’s heartbroken. When Guardian nukes the US he snaps. When he declares his defiance from the machines at the end, you know - you just know - that it’s empty bravado. They’re right: Forbin is too fascinated with them to remain angry for long, and these kinds of emotional traumas are just wearing him down and making him an easier target. The machines have won not only the whole world, but the soul of their creator, or soon they will anyway.

Susan Clark doesn’t make too much of an impression. She’s pretty enough, but they deliberately play that down. She does come across as pretty smart, and her awkwardness with the ‘mistress’ situation is played very well, particularly when the idea is first breached and she’s a bit drop jawed by it. Apart from that, she plays her scenes in what I like to call “The Barbara Bain Mode,“ a lot of calm, quiet, measured talking while walking around reservedly. She’s not the kind of person to freak out, she’s not the kind of person who needs a rescue, even if she isn’t a forceful personality. There’s just enough of a romance angle here to flesh out her character a little, but not nearly enough to be annoying or tedious. There’s a neat little horrified flash from Susan Clark looking at Forbin at the end where she realizes that Forbin’s soul will soon be forfeit.

There’s some nudity in the movie, all filmed cleverly. For instance, Clark strips down in one scene, and is obscured artfully by a champagne glass which distorts her image just enough - and artistically enough - that it doesn’t feel gratuitous.

Gordon Pinsent really is a dead ringer for the now-dead Bobby Kennedy.

William Schallert plays the CIA chief. He’s typically pretty good, and his oddly grim sense of humor is a nice touch to the film. James Hong is in the movie, but does nothing apart from smoke cigarettes and look nervous. Marion “Happy Days” Ross has a bit part as one of the computer techs.

There’s a lot of interesting statements about politics in this flick. The idea that machines should control our weapons is clearly driven by fear and justified by an optimism about “The Human Millennium” which will unlock all our potential, “We can do all this, but first we must have peace.” When Colossus/Guardian (Now identifying itself as “World Control”) addresses the world at the end of the film, the speech is oddly similar to the one the president gave, announcing “The Human Millennium” has begun. It’s interesting because the government got *EXACLY* what they wanted, and they’re horrified by it!

Be careful what you wish for: Not only is there no more threat of war, there’s no more need for government at all. This is presented, interestingly for the time, as a bad thing. Human life is protected, arguably more secure under “World Control” than at any point in our history, and yet it’s also oddly irrelevant. Humanity kind of no longer matters on one level because we’re no longer in the driver’s seat.

What we’re looking at here is basically a dismantling of the early sixties Kennedy idealism and futurism as the ideas come home to roost. It’s no surprise that the president is *clearly* supposed to be Bobby, since this film essentially is the conclusion of a process that started with JFK: the attempt to perfect the world. But is there any room for people in a perfect world? The film argues that there is, but only if we’re housebroken, which is something Democrats have argued for the last fifty years. But if we’re housebroken, are we still human? By the end of the film, “World Control” has effectively become a god, and a very wrathful one, a Zeus throwing lightning bolts at those who sow disharmony. We spent a lot of time working our way out from under that kind of setup, it seems a shame to go right back into it, only for real this time.

In essence, the idea I took away from this is that Colossus *is* what the Liberal Left wants to be: the supreme arbiter of right and wrong, invasive in every aspect of people’s lives, and such areas as are left to man as his own purview - sex, alcohol, the occasional entertainment - are essentially trivial, more about being given the illusion of choice rather than an actual choice. Bread and Circuses to distract people from their slavery.

It is a very clever, crunchy, smart movie, and you can watch it here:
or here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQjebwUrhvc

There’s been a long lingering question about the abrupt ending. Was it intended as the end of the story, or as a setup for a sequel? There are three novels in the series, after all. I don’t think it was a setup for a trilogy that didn't get made, however. The next book wasn’t published until four years after the movie came out, the final installment didn’t come out for another seven years. Basically, when this movie came out, the book was all there was, and I think this movie is intended to be taken as a standalone.

So why does it end so abruptly? Because it's "The Forbin Project," it's all about Forbin, Colossus was his project, and he is ultimately Colossus' project. Forbin loses utterly on every level, and when the final defeat comes, when humanity is screwed forever, Forbin's story has ended, and so does the film. He has become as irrelevant as the President did an act earlier.

If there’s one thing I really love about SF from this era - very late ‘60s, very early ‘70s - it’s their intelligence, and their willingness to let the good guys lose. Planet of the Apes, Splinters, this one, Silent Running: the nature of their universes isn’t all black and white, and our protagonists are as ambiguous as the worlds that they live in. Victories are Pyrrhic at best, defeats might be for their own good, but it’s no less horrifying for all of that, and there’s a kind of honesty and excitement that comes from honestly not knowing if the good guys will win or lose. There’s an element of trust the makers of these films had for their audiences that is amazingly refreshing, a feeling that they’re talking to grown ups and not 12 year olds. It’s a long-lost age that I hope is reborn some day.

WILL CONSERVATIVES LIKE THIS MOVIE?

Hell yeah! Are you kidding? Hell yeah! I’d even recommend it to extremely fundamentalist conservative Christians! This is a great film from start to finish. Well, well, well worth a watch!

Everybody knows that Epcot was originally intended by Walt Disney to be an actual living, working town. Most, if they think of it at all, tend to write it off as one of crazy Unkie Walt's whacky Futurian daydeams that never would have come off, and now we've got "Celebration," and that's just as good, right?

Well, no. (A) "Celebration" sucks. It's like living in a creepy version of "The Village" from The Prisoner, but without the dress code and kidnappings. (Just as much paranoia, though) Yeah, the original draft for EPCOT was Futurian definitely, but it wasn't a boondoggle. It was to be a living, breathing community in which to test out civil and social engineering projects in a uniquely American and optomistic way.

Here, I'll let Walt explain it for himself:

After his death, the directors lacked Walt's passion and vision, and they were frankly more interested in simply making money than they were in maintaining schools, homes, churches, and airports at company expence, so the project got scaled back and scaled back until basically it ended up as a kind of 'permanent world's fair.'

Sad, really.

This is both the alleged season finale, and the 100th episode of the series. I’d planned to make a snaky* joke about how it took them so long to get to that point, and how that averages out to such a low number per year, but the Hermes actually beat me to the punch on that one before the first commercial break So, disappointed, off we go to the recap

PLAY BY PLAY

To celebrate their 100th delivery (“That’s almost ten a year!”) Planet Express decides to hold a huge party. They make the their final package run - a mission that seems vaguely reminiscent of Chowder, with an exploding soufle - and meet Mrs. Astor, who’s husband was killed when the largest bus ever built hit a mailbox and sank through the surface of the earth, “Land drowning” everyone aboard.

At a benefit for underprivileged mutants, Fry accidentally outs her as not being an alien. She’s immediately arrested and exiled to the underground city, which is typically disgusting. More poop jokes than usual. Leela, as usual, gets all indignant and demands rights for her people. Meanwhile the rest of the crew (Save Bender) are dumped into the underground city for knowingly harboring a mutant. Again, Leela gets pissy, and holds a rally, with music by Devo, who are now *really* mutated.

Mark Mothersbaugh: “As long time mutants ourselves, we’re happy to do anything for the cause.”
Random Mutant: “Play ‘Whip it!”
Mark Mothersbaugh: “No.” [To the band] “Play the other one.”

The band breaks into “Beautiful World.”

Once again over-indulging Leela’s pissy demands, Fry jumps in the toxic lake, turning into a hideous mutant.

Bender, meanwhile, throws the best party a substantial animation budget can buy, including “A hundred hookers and a hundred Elvis impersonators who aren’t adverse to a little hooking, should the need arise!” He gets uncharacteristically lonely, though, and goes to find the rest of the gang down below. They pump all the sewage back to the surface, and Leela’s grandmother tells a touching story of how she survived the sinking of the giant bus because Mr. Astor gave up his seat on the Life Car.

Touched, Mrs. Astor asks the mayor to give the mutants their rights, and he decides ‘why not.’ Leela kisses fry, who then turns out to not be mutated, but rather to have been lodged in the mouth of a horribly mutated Mister Astor. The two of them hug, reunited after like eighty years.

Zoidberg: “Hooray! A happy ending for the rich people!”

Random Mutant: “This is a great day to be a mutant!”
Mark Mothersbaugh: “Well, technically I’m forty percent potato, but close enough! Close enough!”

The End

OSERVATIONS

Or is it the end? I’m a bit confused if this is the actual real season finale, or just the summer season finale. I can’t get a straight answer, assuming it makes any difference, which I guess it really doesn’t as the whole country is gradually becoming British. Sigh. The television institutions of my childhood wither and die…

“Bender, I’ve been to wangdoodles all up and down the galaxy but this one is the greatest wang I ever doodled.”

There’s an in-joke: at one point, Leela sees a huge bank of machines with workers. There’s an explosion that (indirectly) kills a bunch of them. The machinery and the explosion are deliberate references to this scene from metropolis:

The explosion is at about 1:45

Creepy, isn’t it?

There really wasn’t much payoff for the gemerald, given all the buildup, now was there?

A bit grosser than usual. Not gratuitously so, though.

I find I don’t have much to say about Futurama, observation-wise. I’m not sure why that is. The writing is dense enough to have a lot of gags going on at once, it‘s capable of subtext, though since coming back from the grave it tends to wear its subtext on its sleeve. It’s increasingly funny, and it is, in general, making better use of the animation than it generally has, and yet there’s not much going on here that isn’t on the surface. It is just a sitcom, after all. And that’s good enough, really. No, seriously, it really is. I’m not disappointed in the show at all. Excepting my disappointment at it not trying for more.

Joking! I’m joking! In fact, I'm overjoyed that they're still telling coherent stories, unlike The Simpsons and Family Guy. The show is fine the way it is, really, but there’s no cake under the icing. And there really doesn’t need to be. I will just eat the stuff, enjoy my resulting anaphylactic shock, and shut up. Until December, when the Christmas special airs.

How about you folks? How do you feel this (maybe) season of Futurama compares to ones in the past? Anything you liked, hated, were neutral about (“What makes a man choose a life of Neutrality, Kif?”) or whatever? Sound off below.

WILL CONSERVATIVES LIKE THIS EPISODE?

Yeah, I think so. There’s nothing to give umbrage, unless you’re the type of conservative who still thinks treating black people as equals was a bad idea, in which case you’re the kind of conservative we’d rather not have hanging ‘round here.

* My spellchecker kept changing “Snarky” to “Snaky.” I kinda’ like that, actually, so I’m gonna’ keep it, and use it, and regularly carve it into the stalls in public restrooms.

Hi, everybody.

Our friend Neorandomizer, is a highly valued contributor to our site, and he's a valued friend as well. He's become part of the family. For the last several months, his wife Kim has become increasingly ill. She's been hospitalized for quite a long time now, and it looks pretty grievous.

If anyone reading this is of the praying sort, please pray for the two of them. Seriously. It's important. If anyone reading this is isn't the praying kind, please shoot them some positive thoughts.

If anyone wants to sound off below with words of support or hope or whatever, please do.

Sincerely,
Republibots 1, 2, and 3

[NOTE: This is a review by Republiboy, age 11, who’d never seen Empire Strikes Back before, and didn’t like Star Wars at all. Just for point of reference, his favorite SF movie of all time is "Babylon 5: A Call To Arms."]

I thought this movie was far better than the previous one. I liked C3PO a lot less, however, and Chewie was a lot less entertaining. I enjoyed the sequence on Hoth, I personally feel that was the best part. I really didn’t like any of the things that happened on Deggobah, and Yoda was rather annoying. But I must say, I really enjoyed the movie as a whole.

The story was ok. I loved the beginning, the middle was rather annoying for me - just the Deggobah stuff - the Falcon wasn’t very interesting, I personally found the gag with the hyperdrive to be tedious. Could City was interesting enough, I didn’t expect Vader to be there. The final battle was very interesting. Although I knew it was coming, I was rather shocked when Vader revealed that he was Luke’s dad.

Lando and Boba Fett: Not very interesting to me. The Ghost of Obi Wan was at best annoying. The gag where Vader kept killing the admirals and promoting captains was hysterical. When they dumped the trash, I expected it to just be full of people Vader had choked.

I really don’t have any words that could describe the Asteroid scene. I wasn’t expecting the big space worm, I wasn’t expecting it to be a worm, but that’s really rather annoying: I personally think an asteroid that was alive would be much cooler.

The Big Battle on Hoth would be my favorite part, if I had to pick one particular scene. What 3PO says when Chewie reactivates him is my second favorite. Han was much cooler, and pretty funny. Like the last movie, Lea was annoying. Luke’s acting was much better.

Yoda was my least favorite thing in the movie. He’s kind of a jerk.

This is far better than the last movie.

It’s the last Tuesday in August and we get a new Warehouse 13 with no real guest stars. But hot Asian agent is back for a bit.

SPOILERS!

The previously goes all the way back to the first season to show Myka’s and Pete’s old Secrete Service boss and a blurb on Artie’s old spy conviction. Also we get a little of Todd and Claudia’s breakup

IN Washington DC Dickerson Myka and Pete’s boss before they were recruited for the Warehouse enters his office and the lights don’t work. Like a dummy he goes in and logs on to his PC. We now get a shot of a man from the neck down with a chain held in his hands that glows when he snaps the chain. The snapping chain causes Dickerson to writhe in pain and then he dies. The unknown man pulls up pictures and files on Artie, Myka and Pete.

At the Warehouse Myka and Pete enter with Myka crowing that Pete bowelled a 71 and Leena is complaining that the shelves are falling down because Claudia will not go to the hardware store because of Todd. Artie’s computer flashes an alert Pete gets a call from the hot Asian agent in Chicago then Myka gets a call and Artie’s Farnsworth starts ringing. Artie states they need to get to DC.

In Scully’s old autopsy room in DC the Hot Asian agent is showing Artie Myka and Pete x-rays of Dickerson’s body. All his joints have been pulled out Myka states the pain must have been immense. Artie asks Hot Asian agent to leave the room and Pete swears he is going to find the person that did this when Artie says it’s his fault, run title sequence.

Back from the commercial we learn the chain was Tomas de Torquemada’s (head of the Spanish Inquisition) and has the same effect as racking someone. Now Artie’s story; In the 70’s he worked for the NSA and traded what he thought were old antiques to the Soviets in exchange for getting people out of the gulags. (For you kids out there gulags were Soviet work/concentration camps.) When Artie learned that they were artifacts and dangerous he turned himself in and Mrs. Fredrick recruited him to the Warehouse changing his name and sealing his record. The chain was one of the items he traded to the Soviets.

At Dickerson’s funeral Myka tells Pete and Artie she needs to be alone and walks off. While sitting on a bench HG Wells pops up and now we get her story. After her daughter was murdered she searched Warehouse 12 for a way to bring her back she was caught twice and got a slap on the wrist. The third time she got an agent killed and asked the Regents to bronze her hoping she would awake in a better world. Now being back she feels lost and wants to work at the Warehouse the only home she has Myka tells her she will talk to Artie. Meanwhile Artie is talking to an old NSA buddy and an unknown person is photographing them together,

Back in North Dakota Leena has tricked Claudia into meeting Todd at the boardinghouse. He asks if they can be friends and gets a text message and runs off.

A shot of a boring office building and then we are in Artie’s NSA friends office the mystery man comes in with a piece of wood from the Titanic and freezes him. Jump shot to Artie in the Office with Hot Asian agent saying were the body was found. Artie uses his code breaking artifact from the first season to access the guys computer and learns that the last file looked at was one that listed the names and address of the people in Russia he got out of the gulags and we learn they are all Artie’s relatives. Pete comes in with the news that on the security footage HG Wells is entering the building.

Back from commercial and Artie is getting pissed that HG Wells is involved; Myka unwisely defends HG and admits to talking to her. Artie starts to go ballistic but Pete calms him enough that Myka can tell him she knows what hotel she is at.

Now back at the pointless Claudia story ark she is in town stalking Todd and uses her phone to snap a shot of Todd talking to a man in a suit giving him a box. Todd sees Claudia who runs away.

Now Pete, Myka and Artie kick in the door to Wells’s hotel room and the phone rings and it’s HG. (Does every SyFy show have to be full of old tropes and clichés?) After some more spy clichés we learn that Alexander Artie’s old Soviet contact who was in prison is behind all this and the gang flies off to Moscow.

One edit and we are walking down a Russia street and Artie is seeping into a music shop at one of his relatives. Artie tells how many of his family were refuseniks (dissidents) and put into gulags. We also find out that his name was changed to protect him from the Soviets because they consider him a traitor so no help from the local cops. They go to his old safe house and get attacked by Charles’s the seconds croquet balls. Pete traps the ball in the refrigerator and Artie gets separated from Myka and Pete and is lost.

Claudia is awakened by a Farnsworth call from Pete and Myka but the trail on Alexander is cool and Claudia thinks the Soviets disappeared him. Leena walks in and discovers Claudia has been doing so heavy duty stalking of Todd who Claudia has found to be a fraud. All his records were created the same day just before he came to town. Claudia calls him and they arrange to meet at the park in 40 minutes. Todd gets a gun which was in the box that was given to him because he found that Claudia’s records are also bogus.

Back in Moscow Pete finds that HG is watching them and Myka talks Pete into letting he help them after she tells them that Alexander died 13 years ago. Myka uses the glasses tracking gizmo that Claudia made for Artie to find him.

Now at this time Artie is chained up and we find that it’s Alexander’s son looking for revenge. He states he is going to torture Artie to death.

Meanwhile Myka (she does have a thing for HG she gives her the eye) Pete and Wells find the abandoned factory where Artie is being held. They him scream in pain and they split up like all stupid people do on TV. Myka and Pete find a locked fence and Wells alone finds Artie.

Wells goes to free Artie but the bad guy uses the wood to Freeze Wells but it takes time on her and the bad guy gloats Artie can watch his friend die. Artie says so what he hates her but Wells shoots one of the chains holding Artie.

Myka and Pete use a doctor’s reflex hammer to break down the fence. Artie gives the wood to Wells and tells her to hold it as it will save her. Just as the bad guys is going to use the Inquisition’s chain on Artie Pete Tesla’s him.

Back in North Dakota Todd and Claudia meet and draw down on each other but after a little babbling the discover that Todd is in the witness protection program and they make with the kisses because he is a computer nerd too.

Back at the Warehouse Myka makes an impassioned plea for HG Wells to be given a chance (with a sexual look in her eye) Artie says it’s not up to him and if it was he would bronze her. A new Regent comes out and toda Wells is reinstated as an agent Artie throws a hissy fit but will not tell Myka why he hates Wells. (Is it because she killed Macpherson or does Artie know something he is not telling?)

End

Observations:

This was really a good episode and I liked it. It built on already known bits and made a consistent story but left some unanswered questions for the rest of the season.

So what do you guys think is HG Wells a snake in their garden or is Artie just too stubborn to admit he was wrong.

Also am I the only one that picked up on some sexual tension between Myka and Wells or am I just a dirty old man.

The Man-Kzin Wars series has been running for about 20 years now, but I've generally avoided them. I read volume 1 when it came out, and though there was nothing wrong with it, it had the feeling of product rather than passion to me. While I enjoyed the idea of other writers "Playing in Mr. Niven's Garden" so to speak, it just felt wrong to me in actual practice. For me, personally, Niven's "Known Space" universe is inseparable from Niven's own jaunty writing style and everpresent neat ideas. Niven has more random off-the-cuff brilliant ideas in any given short story than most writers have had in their entire careers. Still, it was a couple decades ago when I last read this series, and decided it was time to give it another try. "Destiny's Forge" was the first full-length novel in the series, so that seemed like a logical place to start.

Perhaps I simply misunderstood the pre-release propaganda surrounding this book. As I understood it, it implied it was co-written by Niven himself (It isn't), and that it's a full chronicle of the sixth-and-final war (It isn't). Again, that mistake may have been my own since the promo stuff I'm remembering was from four years ago, but caveat emptor just the same. For those interested, this book takes place during the 3rd Man-Kzin war.

This is not a *bad* book, mind you: it held my interest and I don't feel cheated by reading it. It is on occasion, quite clever and the protagonist - a Kzin named "pouncer" - is quite likeable. It is not by any means a brilliant book, however, and I'm at a loss as to why it takes 963 pages to tell a story that could easily have been wrapped up in a third as much space. Frequently, it feels padded out, as when characters spend an entire chapter discussing game theory or the statistical probabilities of being able to effectively test for Psi powers.

I've never read anything else by him, but based on this one example, Mister Chafe strikes me as a merely-adequate writer. There's nothing here that sings and dances and grabs you by the hand, compelling you to pour through it for sheer love of language. To be fair, there's every sign this book was dashed out in a hurry with little time for rewrites. He may be better in less made-to-order stories.

Just the same, he makes some pretty interesting stylistic decisions in the book, For instance: It's mostly told from the Kzin point of view. Humans (Generally referred derisively to by the Kzinti as their word for "Monkey") don't even get a mention in the book until more than twenty pages in. Humans don't actually show up in the book until more than sixty pages in, and when they do they're more-or-less background characters for the first two hundred pages thereafter. This is kind of refreshing, actually. Then, however, it becomes a scattershot mess of plotting. Dolphins - Sentient, but generally overlooked in Known Space - eventually show up and play a logically prominent role later on in the book, and it's always nice when they appear. We get a very good look at the organization and workings of the somewhat feudalistic Kzin society as well, and some interesting insights that, unfortunately, were more interesting than the story itself. For instance, the Patriarch tells us in no uncertain terms that the existence of
Faster-Than-Light travel is just as big a threat to the survival of the Empire as "The Monkeys" are, because of the sociological changes this innovation has caused. That's neat stuff, commonly overlooked in mass-market skiffy.

Of course it's anyone's guess as to whether any of this counts as 'cannon' or if it's as ephemeral as all those Star Wars comics that came out between 1978 and 1980. That's kind of my problem with the Man/Kzin war series: I'm never sure how much of it is *real* and how much of it is just filler cranked out for the ammusement of drooling fanboys like me. I can't completely discount it - Niven's current "World" series weeves in and out of some elements - but a lot of it seems to contradict stuff we already know, and frankly a lot of it just isn't all that good.

I digress. Anyway:

That said, Chafe makes some rather unfortunate decisions, too: the book starts out with a pretentious reprinting of Blakes' "The Tyger" (Ok, we get it: they're cats) followed by a dry, boring, 11-page sociological essay explaining Kzin society that fundamentally breaks the "Show, don't tell" rule of storytelling. This is followed by a spectacularly ill-advised 10-page hunting scene when we're introduced to Pouncer in a poorly-written sequence where every other phrase is full of Kzin nonsense words that utterly kills any interest in the story. Imagine an immersion-lesson in learing Klingonese while playing poker, and you'll get the idea of how annoying this is. There's also a pretty nasty torture scene late in the book that probably will prevent my being able to enjoy fondue again for a long time.

The human sections of the story seem to contradict a lot of what we know of earth in Known Space: While never a Utopia, Earth is consistently a pretty nice place to live, and it's certainly not a dystopia. In this novel, however, there's a large grey-market economy that simply isn't present or implied in Niven's own stories, and a larger black market beneath it. The United Nations Government in Niven's stories is portrayed as rather invasive and somewhat uncaring, but not at all evil. Granted, there's little-or-no privacy, but it's not government paranoia, it's just the price you pay for living in a hypertechnological society with 18 billion people on earth, if you want to make sure the guy in the next apartment isn't a terrorist building bombs.

In Destiny's Forge, however, Chafe chooses to portray this in the Orwellian mold where everyone is being spied on more or less constantly, which nearly costs one of the human characters his life. This just doesn't fit, stylistically, with what we've seen of Earth in Niven's stories.

Once Earth is introduced, The novel kind of sprawls out of control. We meet a whole bunch of ancilliary characters, including - I kid you not - a jailbait hooker with a heart of gold who unfortunately will kill most of the drama in the second half of the book. Once she shows up, you kind of know which way the story is gonna' play out, because she has an early version of a preternatural ability that Niven introduces in his later Ringworld stories. Is that vague enough for you? I'm not trying to give out spoilers here.

Though I enjoyed the book, I couldn't shake the feeling that it was rather derivative of Dune. By "Rather Derivative," I mean huge tracts of this tome are essentially Fuzzy fanfic recreations of Herbert's novel. Seriously, the entire plot is virtually the same. So it wasn't so much 'derived from' Dune or 'hommaging' Dune so much as it was taking a kitty cat and nailing it to a hardback edition of Dune. It's still better than Brian Herbert's crap, though.

To tell more would be to give spoilers about both this book *and* Dune, and I don't want to do that. Granted, really none of the themes in Dune are original or unique to that book, and the basic 'one man overthrows the empire single handedly' plot was a staple as far back as the Byzantine Empire, but still, it grew distracting after a time. Despite the fact that we're centuries in the future, most of the action is swords-and-shields stuff, which is, well, very dune-like, though to his credit the author manages to come up with a pretty good reason why aliens with starships insist on fighting with mideval weapons.

Ignroing the plagiarism, and the irritating contradictions with the established Known Space universe, and some very sloppily-written scenes that clearly weren't edited at all, my only really huge beef with the book is its length. This thing is an almost-thousand-page doorstop. In 963 pages, you could tell the entire rise and fall of the Roman Empire, you can tell four pretty damn good pulp SF novels, you could write a compelling and pretty complete history of the American Civil War (Winston Churchill does a damn good job of this in just 145 pages, counting an index), you can tell the entire New Testament, and have plenty of room left over for tons of apocrypha, you can tell two or three good Nabokov novels in that amount of space, or one-and-a-half bad ones. 963 pages is an ENORMOUS number of pages - longer than many of my reviews, even - and a lot of the time Mister Chafe seems to just be filling space. Why is it so damn long? It's like they decided they wanted a 1000-page book before they found a writer. Even still, the ending seems rather abrupt (Also like Dune, now that I think on it).

Despite all this - and again, I have to point out that this isn't a *bad* book, I've read far worse. I've read far wors in the M/KW series, actually. It's entertaining enough but hardly a treasured heirloom of the Known Space universe. It is definitely not the kind of thing one hauls out and reads over-and-over again. I suspect if you're already a fan of the Man-Kzin Wars series, you'll probably kinda' enjoy this book, but if you're not a fan, it might be best to hold out for Niven's next "Fleet of Worlds" novel.

If that sounds like a not-terribly-glowing review, well, it's not exactly a glowing book. It's a potboiler with a steroid dependency.

WILL CONSERVATIVES LIKE THIS BOOK?

That's a good question, actually. It's hard to say. I think, guardedly, yes. The UN is portrayed as fairly oppressive, dystopic, and evil, which is a frequent staple of our tribe, there's no real liberal ideology here, though there's some gratuitious sex and some gratuitious icky alien sex. And of course the torture scene is nasty and uncalled for.

Will Social Conservatives like the book? No. In general they don't like books with aliens, and most of the other stuff would be offensive to them as well.

The only thing more frustrating than a crappy show that never quite lives up to its potential is a crappy sitcom that isn’t particularly funny, and *still* fails to live up to it’s potential. The only thing more frustrating than that is if the crappy, unfunny show *Suddenly* gets it right, and is immediately cancelled.

Seriously, right here, at the end of its short run, the show suddenly becomes what it obviously always wanted to be, and then it’s gone. Yeah, there are still problems, but they’re all incrementally less problematic on every front: Direction is better, editing is better, script is better, acting is better (Benjamin and Kelton and Janice have always been great, but the also-rans are much better this time out), cinematography is better. The jokes are actually kinda’ funny, though only one of them - the last gag of the entire series - is laugh-out-loud hysterical. It’s an uneven show, and it’s still uneven here, but far less so than we’ve ever seen before. Is that a sense of confidence I see? Well, no matter! We’ll kill that.

As an aside, this is the episode I remember best from the show. We had a Betamax, and I used to tape the episodes to show my friends over the course of the next week, then I’d tape over ‘em again. As this was the last new episode, I had it on hand for years, until our Betamax died, though my exact memories are oddly fuzzy. Point is: I saw this one many a time, proselytized it to many a person, and they all agreed it looked like a pretty fun little comedic-type-thing that probably got killed before its time. Given that they produced four hours of this drek, and only 30 minutes were any good, it probably *didn’t* get killed before its time, but it’s always nice to have some unsung forgotten treasure to hawk when you’re an adolescent, whether or not it’s actually true.

Now, you’ll recall that the show works best when it’s ripping off - excuse me, parodying - specific things, most commonly the original Star Trek which was, itself, bordering on self-parody much of the time. After last episode’s fumbling and vague stab at Flash Gordon, we’re back on track with a perfectly on-key satire of Star Trek’s “The Ultimate Computer” seasoned with just a dash of “2001: A Space Odyssey.”

The Plot:

Annual Holiday Number Eleven is rolling around, and everyone’s in the proper spirit on Perma One, stockings hung, aliens caroling, festive “11”s hung everywhere. Palindrome tells Quark he’s got a plum mission for him as a present this year, and then we get to the standard briefing of Quark and two other commanders: Estro and Walker. We’ve seen both of these before in separate episodes, but interestingly this time out Estro is a conservatively dressed black woman, whereas previously she was a leggy blonde in a revealing uniform. An even bigger example of re-casting is Commander Walker, who was a robot the first time we saw him, but is a human now. Weird.

Quarks’ assignment is to take part in The Head’s new experiment. (“I’ve been in the Head’s experiments before, I don’t want to spend three months testing the gravitational qualities of wheat! I don’t want to be experimented on! Look at Commander [name], he used to be a heavyweight! Now he’s a paperweight!”) The mission is to test out a new ultimate computer which will make human crews irrelevant. Dr. Cheryl Evans - played by Marianne Bunch….

you know what? I’m going to take a moment out from our review to rave about Marianne Bunch: She’s just stunning. Let’s face it, though there’ve been some attractive women on this show, they still manage to come out looking rather bland and sexless, and don’t even get me started on the Bettys. Technically, all these women are fine, you can’t point to a feature on any of ‘em and say it’s bad, but while the numbers all add up, the aesthetics simply aren’t there. Why? I don’t really know. I’m just going to chalk it up to the Seventies being an unattractive decade. For every Jenny Argutter you get, you’ve got a zillion Heather Menzies, for every Maren Jensen, there’s a hundred Anne Lockharts or Lauren Tewes, for every Kristi McNichol, there’s a spate of Jill Whelans. That’s not to diss any of these women, of course, I’m sure they’re all fine, active in their synagogues and/or churches, upstanding members of their community, particularly now that Lauren’s off the coke, volunteer time at soup kitchens, help the poor, I’m sure they’re all great people, and I mean no disservice, but: they’re hardly “It” girls, now are they?

But man oh man oh man, Marianne Bunch is totally “It.” She’s stunning, eye-popping, she’s got a certain poise, a kind of grace when she moves, a solid voice, and she doesn’t appear to be congenitally stupid, either. What’s amazing is that such a bombshell would have such a short career (six years, eleven roles, most pretty minor), and that I can’t even find a picture of her online anywhere. Here’s a clip from the episode http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi1514340377/

Anyway, getting back to the review: Dr. Evans (Played by Marianne Bunch, I don’t know if I made that fully apparent before) sets up a computer alled “Vanessa 38-24-36,” which will be in complete control of the ship.

So they go off to do garbage man stuff, and get attacked by a Gorgon ship careening at them on Radar. They don’t get an actual visual on the ship, so Quark suspects something’s up. One by one, his entire crew abandon him, wanting Vanessa to take over, but he refuses, and in the end it turns out that he was right: the Gorgon ship was only an illusion on their instruments to make Quark look bad.

Back at Perma One, Dr. Evans is wearing a really slutty dress, but it works for her. She reveals to Palindrome that Vanessa will do *anything* to succeed, even if it means killing people. “Oh boy. This was supposed to be my Number Eleven present to Quark. This is terrible. Get me the head, please…”

More than a bit depressed that no one believes in him, Quark decides to take Ergo (His pet blob) for a spacewalk. While outside, Vanessa severs his air hose and he drifts off into space. He’s able to get back in through the garbage hatch, much to the computer’s annoyance. She passes it off as a mistake, or human error or something.

Quark: “The mission will continue.”
Vanessa; “That’s a very good decision, Quark.”
Quark: “And we’re going to celebrate Holiday Number Eleven the same as we do every year, by showering together.”
The Bettys [Very excited]: “Do you mean it, Adam?”
Gene/Jean: “Commander, we never…”
Quark: “Gene, [Indicates Vanessa] a traditional. Number eleven. Shower.”
The Bettys: “Last one in’s a Quasinorm.”

So off they go.

In the shower (Which is basicically the airlock shot from a slightly different angle), they‘re all fully dressed:

Quark: “I suppose you’re wondering why I brought you in here.”
The Bettys: “I know why, Adam!”
Quark: “No you don’t!”
Ficus: “I know why, sir.”
Gene/Jean: “Yeah, well, I don’t.”

Made me laugh watching it, but typing it up now, eh. Oh well. Anyway, in the privacy of the shower, Quark hatches his plan for the crew to keep Vanessa busy while he detaches her and regains control of the ship. They attempt to do this, but Vanessa is pretty smart, and simply gasses the entire crew. Quark is still in his space suit, with six minutes of oxygen in his emergency supply, so he grabs his power tools and heads to the upper deck. There, he finds the Bettys passed out, and as he lifts one of their hands, the hand of the other one lifts, too. That might be the only funny Betty gag in the run of the show.

Anyway, Vanessa has possessed Andy, who proceeds to beat the living crap out of Quark (“It’s Vanessa making me do this! Personally, I think you’re swell!”) until Quark can shut him off. Then he takes an electric drill to Vanessa and rips her out of the wall as she attempts to talk Quark out of his decision:
“You’re making a mistake! I’ve got lots of talents! I can tapdance, I tell risqué stories…” Quark chucks her out the airlock.

They call in to Perma One, where there’s a big office party going on, and Palindrome is basically being a jerk. He tells Quark to zip over to another space station and pick up the trash, and wishes him a happy Number Eleven.

Final scene, final episode: Vanessa floating through limitless space, singing “Born Free” to herself. I knew it was coming, but it still cracked me up anyway.

The End.

As I said, this was a pretty solid, funnier-than-average episode that nicely balanced gags and story, ludicrousness with lucidity, pacing with plot. It felt like something more than a really bad community theater production (“The Minot, North Dakota Traveling Repertoire Players present: The Ultimate Computer!”). Added to which the gags were actually kinda’ funny, and there was nothing that really insulted your intelligence here.

So how much of this was due to having a good writer, and how much of it was due to having a good TOS story to rip off? I don’t know. The writer, Robert Keats, has five screen credits over the course of a 23-year career, culminating in the script for “Mom’s Got A Date With A Vampire.” That’s probably not a fair judgment, though, there’s lots of really talented people who can’t get good stuff on the air, or only manage to get blow-off crap on the air, while the stuff they really care about sits moldering on the shelf. Shakespeare had that problem, you know: He didn’t care at all about his plays, just tossed ‘em off to cover the bills while he was dashing out sonnets. I’m doubting Mr. Keats is a Shakespeare, but to really judge his talents we’d probably need to see the episodes of Happy Days and Blansky’s Beauties he wrote, and I’m really not going to put any effort into that. I just don’t care. Suffice to say he delivered the best episode of Quark, the one that almost redeemed the silly premise and generally sub-par execution of the previous seven episodes, and he introduced me (As an eleven year only too happy to be introduce) to Marianne Bunch, for which I shall forever be grateful. Until I forget. Which, come on, let’s face it, I’ve got a lot of stuff on my mind. It probably won’t be all that long, right? I mean, I forgot about her once already…

A couple notes: this is the most expansive of any episode they’ve ever done in terms of sets. We see the inside of the garbage bay, a full-size garbage claw with Richard Benjamin sitting on it, the inside of the Airlock, “The Shower,” and even a hangar bay inside Perma One. The floor is obviously one of those plastic gratings they use around florescent lights, so a clever man could figure out the size of the Garbage Ship model from that. I’m not that clever, but I’d say it’s about 18 inches long.

The stunt where Quark tumbles into the garbage bay looked painful: the stuntman’s back bends a way backs aren’t hinged for.

At one point, while rambling off nonsense, Ficus says “Bebop As Rella-lobba” as though it’s navigational data. That nonsense phrase stuck in my head, and pops out at the oddest times: “Where are we going again?” “The Outlet mall just to the east of…uhm…bebobarellalobba” “What?” “yes.” As many of you have already discerned, I’m an incredibly irritating man to be around. Anyway, it was nice to finally know the origins of one of the more bizarre bits of flotsam stuck in my brain.

Next week, we’ll discuss what we’ve learned from Quark

Last week we finished up the short-lived Quark series, the second short-lived deservedly-forgotten 1978 SF series we’ve covered here (The first being “Man From Atlantis”). When these things are done, I like to sit back, cogitate upon them for a bit, and try to figure out what we’ve learned.

So what have we learned, here?

Well, we’ve learned that a 43-year-old man’s 32-year-old memories of an 11-year-old kid’s favorite show aren’t terribly reliable.

We’ve learned that the effectiveness of cheap parody is directly dependent upon the strengths of the things you’re making fun of. If it’s a solid thing you’re riffing on, the parody will probably be fairly funny.

We’ve learned that the effectiveness of cheap parody is also dependent upon the focus you use to target the object of your parody: Making fun of a specific Trek episode works fine, making fun of Flash Gordon as a whole is too vague to really work.

We’ve learned that parody is most effective when you’re making fun of something that’s either extremely well know, or rather current: Parodies of Trek work because it’s ubiquitous. Parodies of Obama work because it’s current. Parodies of seventy-year-old movie serials that no one watches anymore, and which were pretty awful to begin with pretty much don’t work, ever.

We’ve learned that Buck Henry is (Much like Gene Roddenberry) a one trick pony who probably doesn’t deserve the epithet “Genius” that so often accompanies his name. And much like Roddenberry, there was such a massive quality difference between his trick the first time out (Get Smart for Buck, Trek for Gene) and later iterations (Quark for Buck, Earth II, Andromeda, Genesis, Sentinel, the first season of TNG, and a zillion other embarrassments for Gene) that it makes me wonder exactly how much of that one trick was really theirs to begin with, and how much of it was the work of others they simply took credit for. We know Roddenberry was an inveterate glory-hog and plagiarist, a talentless hack who got lucky and passed off others ideas as his own when they worked, and his own ideas as those of others when they didn’t, that’s pretty common knowledge these days.

I’m not accusing Mr. Henry of that by any means, from what I understand he’s a great guy to work with and very funny and humble. Creation is a tricky thing, however, and sometimes the recipe works (Get Smart) and sometimes the soufflé falls (Quark). Probably you can’t lay all the blame at Buck’s feet: It takes a village to make a show this shoddy. Likewise, all the successes of Get Smart probably can’t be laid at Buck’s feet, either: Regardless of what the Roddenberrys of the world would have you believe, TV is a team sport, and how well the show goes depends as much on the supporting players as it does the creative conceptual types.

Bottom line: Buck tried once, and got it to work. He tried it again, and it didn’t. We see that a lot. Herb Solow and Bob Justman had lots of success with the original Trek, they tried it again with “man From Atlantis,” and failed excruciatingly. Joe Straczynski had great and deserved success with “Babylon 5,” but he failed repeatedly with Lost Tales, Crusade, and Legend of the Rangers. Tastes and times change, it’s hard.

We’ve learned that sitcoms need to be funny to justify their existence, and while some self-indulgent sitcoms have a long and popular enough run to dispense with the jokes (The last couple years of M*A*S*H*, for instance), they really should be funny. This one really wasn’t.

We’ve learned that sitcoms need to be broad, not specific. A sitcom can be about a family, because everyone has one of those, it can be about cops, because everyone knows what they are and what they do. Sitcoms about the travails of a medieval torturer’s assistant in rural France play off of things that aren’t so well known, and therefore only apply to a very small potential audience, hence even if it’s really funny, no one’s going to watch it. Science Fiction has simply never been as popular as, well, anything else, really, so making an SF sitcom - be it this one, or Homeboys from Outer Space, or whatever - is a fundamentally dunderheaded move. It’s too specific to hold a mass audience.

We’ve learned that Marianne Bunch is pretty freakin’ va-va-voom and could really pull off those embarrassingly revealing Logans Run-styled dresses.

We’ve learned that Conrad Janis is pretty funny, but probably not as funny as I remembered, and probably not as funny as you remember, either.

We’ve learned that Richard Benjamin is a really good comedic actor, who can flounder if he doesn’t have a good script and strong actors to work off of. I still really like him. I always have.

We’ve learned that Richard Kelton - Ficus - was a great, unsung talent.

We’ve learned that Andy the Android was pretty one-note, but still funnier than I’d remembered. (And though I’ll never know for sure, I’m pretty sure the alien “Dink,” was also played by Bobby Porter, the same guy who played Andy)

We’ve learned that they never really knew what to do with Gene/Jean, a kind of uncomfortable gag that quickly became too big for them to ride, so they just sat it in the corner and seldom touched it.

We’ve learned that “Annual Holiday Number Eleven” is really funny to say. I’m going to have some “Keep 1 in 11” bumper stickers made up for next Christmas. Did I mention I’m an irritating man? Probably I did.

So what happened next?

Well, Richard Benjamin’s career probably peaked with his role as Von Helsing in “Love at First Bite” in 1979, but he’s continued to work steadily since. He’s still a really funny guy, and he’s on my short list of people I’d love to interview here at the site.

Tim Thomason (Gene/Jean) is probably best known as “Jack Death” in the Transers series from the 1980s, one of which had Megan Ward in it (Hubba), but he’s been a really frequently working character actor for like forty years now. He’d already racked up thirteen screen credits by the time he signed on for Quark, and he’s only been in the biz three years. He’s up to 185 now. And counting.

Trish Barnstable did a Love Boat and a Disney special, and that was about that. Cyb Barnstable made a longer stab at it, but appears to have given up acting in 1982 or 1983. The two of them together run the Barnstable Brown Foundation, which does diabetic research.

Conrad Janis (Otto Palindrome) went on to vastly more fame as Mindy's dad in Mork and Mindy the next season. (I watched that show because he reminded me of Quark). He’s still alive, and still working pretty steadily. He’s had two movies come out last year (2009) and another in pre production now. Good for him! I always liked the guy, smarmy without being creepy, officious without being obnoxious, conniving without really being menacing.

Alan Caillou (The Head) had been working steadily since the late 1950s (he even did an episode of Man from Atlantis!), but he was definitely in the autumn years of his career when this show died. His final role was as “Count Paisley” in “The Ice Pirates” (1984) and then he retired. He died in 2006.

Bobby Porter (Andy, and possibly Dink) continues to act fairly infrequently (He did an iCarly three years back), but he’s primarily what he was before Quark started: a stuntman. Between 1972 and now, he’s racked up a nearly-lethal 121 screen credits for stunts! Wow!

Richard Kelton (Ficus) is a heartbreaker. A fellow Nebraskan, he died less than a year after Quark ended. He was working on “How The West Was Won,” a late-70s western, and went into his trailer to study his lines. There was a carbon monoxide leak, and he asphyxiated. He was only thirty-five. He was already a prolific character actor - in his short career, he racked up thirty-six screen credits - and I have to believe he would have eventually had a big break, with a signature role in a sitcom or drama or something, had he not died so stupidly young. So much potential, such a waste.

And that sentiment, my friends, seems the proper note to go out on: so much potential, such a waste.

Think of this as a coming attraction.

I've been kind of keeping this on the down-low for the last year while we worked out some aspects of it, but Republibot.com has scored a massive, exclusive interview with Harlan Ellison, which we'll be running in the not-too-distant future. (No, I don't know specifically when yet)

Given how long it is (45,000 words!), we'll be running it in segments. Bookmark this page, and it will link to each new section as it appears.

At some point in October, Lightspeed Magazine will be running some excerpts from the interview. This will probably turn up prior to us running the full thing here, so we'll link to it when it goes online. In the meantime, however, you should definitely check out their site. They're very good. http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/

Because what's life without some horribly remixed clips from a TV show that no one likes and everyone is embarased by?

or

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwH4quvjRQg

Some time back I wrote something where I refered to Lost In Space fans as the Untouchables of the geek caste system. Originally it had read "Trekies," but they simply can't handle someone making fun of them, and they start to cry, and I end up feeling bad about myself. I changed it to "Lost In Space" fans, who *also* can't handle it, and *also* cry, but there's far, far fewer of them, so the chances of me stumbling across one sobbing in a parking lot because of something I've said is far, far lower.

Anyway, one of our regulars here pointed out to me that in fact, "Furries" are on the bottom of the Geek totem pole, and he linked me to an organizational chart of the Fen* social structure. Not only is it pretty accurate insofar as my memories of cons and conversations go, it's pretty funny. It's also shamefully pleasing when you realize some group or person you don't like ranks below you.

For instance, as an Amateur SF writer, I come in one level above Trekies (Who just can't handle it, but it's true), two levels above Klingon-speaking Trekies, and three levels above Trekies who have Klingon wedding ceremonies. Probably I should be ashamed that a group I look down on is also looked down on by others, but I don't. FIAGH, after all, even though I sometimes claim FIAWOL.**

Likewise, I'm the same rank as SF Television fans (Trekies rank below general TV SF fans, confirming what I've always said: Trekies don't like SF, they just like Trek), Amateur SF/Fantasy Artists (Whom I actually hang out with), People who majored in Folklore and Mythology, and Heinlein fans (Who probably never would have stopped making fun of the people who majored in Folklore and Mythology). All of us are two ranks beneath Published SF Authors.

That seems like a fair assessment to me. I'm not going to restate the whole thing here, but I thought the Comic Book Section was pretty funny: Comic Book Fans (3rd Rank) Comic Book Fans who read Superhero Comics (4th Rank), Comic Book Fans who ONLY read superhero comics (5th Rank), Comic Book Fans who only read X-men spinoffs (6th Rank, the same as people who have Klingon wedding ceremonies and people who buy expensive fantasy swords).

All of us outrank furries (7th rank), who themselves ourtrank erotic furries (8th rank), who outrank the bottom of the heap, the universally and correctly reviled "People who write erotic versions of Star Trek where all the characters are Furries. Like Kirk is an Ocelot or something, and they put a furry version of themselves in as the star of the show."

My wife read it, and when she got done laughing, she said "Where do people who make organizational charts of fandom fit in?"

You can see the whole thing here
http://www.brunching.com/geekhierarchy.html

and Dark London posted an article and a slight variation here
http://darklondon.wordpress.com/2008/02/28/whos-the-biggest-geek/
where they stuck in "Video Gamers who read novels based on games." (I think I may come in below that one: I've actually read one novel based on a video game I never played. Worse yet, it was a blatant ripoff of "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.")

I love what this says about human nature: That none of us are so low on the hog that we won't make fun of people just a little lower. I mean, "The SF Ghetto" is called that for a reason, we're hardly the gliteratti to begin with. Still, I support it because Fuzzies creep me the hell out.

* - "Fen" is fanspeak for "Fan." Try to keep up, there'll be a quiz...

** - More Fenspeak. I'm not gonna' explain those ones.

CHAPTER TWELVE- The Shakiest Gun in the (Mid)West.

Ray backed off after that late night excursion on the 'Net. He needed time to think about all that had happened, and time to figure out what to do next. By getting up early, working like a complete loon and avoiding most caffeine when he could, he was still able to sleep at night. That weird vision of the climber's eyes didn't haunt him nearly as much as he thought it would. But the thought of Lyndon did. What was it that attracted the climbers there? Could he find the man who moved there? Could he even find the town? By the middle of the following week, Ray had found a copy of DeLorme's Illinois Back Roads Atlas & Gazetteer. He could find Lyndon, no problem. By the end of the week, he could find it in his sleep, and occasionally did. Weird dreams.
The big news that next weekend was the pistol. With the mandatory wait waited, Barbara made sure Ray took her back to the downtown Army/Navy store where the gun patiently waited. As almost an afterthought, Barbara picked up two pair of hearing protectors. Those big over-your-ears-like-headphones-from-the-Sixties types. It was only as they were leaving that she told Ray why she wanted them.
"So- You want to try it?"
"What? Right here? In the car? In downtown traffic? You animal."
"No, you idiot. The pistol. Did you want to fire it?"
"OH- The pistol! I thought you meant-"
"I know what you thought I meant. Try thinking of something else."
"Like?"
"Jerry Lewis works for me. You might try Barbara Bush."
"Eeewwww."
"So, it worked. Want to shoot the gun?"
"Well, ok. I guess. I know you really want to."
"You bet."
"Where to, oh Great White Huntress?"
"I've got the directions right here."
The instructions Barbara Meadows pulled out took them out of the city's downtown and into an industrial area on the far side of town. No houses nearby, not even any sort of businesses with any general public appeal. Not a rough neighborhood, really, just a serious one. The range was an indoor one, with the huge vents and fans on the back of the building to get the lead out, so to speak. And those fans were roaring today. They parked the car- there were only a few other cars and trucks in the lot- and gathered up the pistol and all of its accompanying baggage. They both had their hands full, leaving Ray to ponder the viability of this thing in a panic situation. Would he have to round up all this stuff every time he heard a noise? That could be a real pain. Once inside, Barbara took over.
Having thought about it, she decided to try the pistol at just a fifty foot range. Their yard wasn't much more than a hundred feet wide, so this would be a theoretical average. Worked for her, anyway. They signed in, signed the waivers, signed the range rules and mailing list. Writer's cramp was setting in before they could haul their new acquisition down the line to Bay 12- the last one on the far side of the firing line. Ray was wide-eyed as they passed several men, and more than one woman, firing the sort of guns Jake Jacobson would be proud to own- or lose. Great big hand-held cannons that shook the building with every round and put out a muzzle blast like a howitzer. After he heard the first ear-shattering blast from inside the building, Ray was glad to put those ear muffs on in one big hurry. And these weren't coming off any time soon. Barbara knew what to expect, and had her muffs in place before they left the sign-in area. At Bay 12, they dumped out all their gear and Barbara took charge of the situation. The bullets were unpacked and the pistol's magazine loaded. The magazine was returned to the gun and a round chambered. The safety was most definitely on. She checked. Twice. Time to face Ray. Ray, time to face reality:
"Ok, Ray, you ready?"
"Huh?"
"I SAID: YOU READY?"
Ray takes the moment to pull the ear muffs off. These things were working way too good.
"Say what?"
Of course it had to happen: The howitzer two bays down was fired. Ray's eyes watered over. It was painfully loud.
"OWW!"
Those hearing protectors were back on Ray in a muzzle flash.
"Ok, great, Ray- you're going to go first. Just point and squeeze. And remember, no matter what happens, always keep the gun pointed down range at the target. Take your time and aim each shot."
"Huh?"
Oddly enough, Barbara could hear Ray just fine. She knew what to expect at a gun range. Been here. Done that. Doing this again. Ray, on the other hand, was now deaf as a brick. Between that last loud gun blast and the hearing protectors now firmly in place, all he heard was a loud ringing, with an occasional intrusive popping noise in the background. Which is to say he didn't hear a blessed thing. And he had the facial expression to prove it: That guppy feeding time look. Barbara compensated by going on manual. She physically turned Ray around to face the target, put the gun in his outstretched hands, pointed him towards the target and released the safety- very carefully. She then shrugged and pointed at the target. Surely he will get the idea. He did. He squeezed. It fired.
Ok, so maybe it was the surrounding situation: His ears were ringing like fire alarms, the hearing protectors were doing their job and quite frankly he had the smallest gun in the place. I know men don't like to hear that, and the truth hurts, but them’s the facts, Sport. Everyone's was bigger than his. Even the women's. Scary stuff there. So it should come as no surprise that when Ray Meadows fired off that first round, he thought maybe something went wrong and the gun didn't work. No big bang, no great flash. There was a muffled pop that he didn't recognize as being the one from the gun he was holding. That was about it. He might have noticed the gun's recoil if he hadn't been holding it in a white-knuckled death grip and shaking like a leaf. Missing the entire paper target only reinforced his assumption that nothing happened. No effect, no cause. Nothing happened, right?
Ray looked over at Barbara, who couldn't understand his concern. So he missed the target. Big deal. He hit the building, didn't he? That's all that counts at this point. She motioned for him to continue. She made a little hand motion to fire again. Several times. Lots and lots. He got the idea. He had watched the cop shows on TV. He'd seen the Schwarzenegger movies. He could do this. Piece of cake. Especially since the gun didn't work. No need to tell Barbara about that just yet. Ray figured he'd just go at it as though the gun was working and they could sort out the details later. Like all of the extra bullets still in the gun.
He took an over stylized spread-legged, bent-knees stance and held the gun out in front of him with both hands. This is how they do it, right? He then proceeded to point and shoot, shoot, shoot. Just kept squeezing the trigger as though it worked. No problem. Mime target practice, thought Ray. If only. And he was really convinced that nothing was happening. For the most part nothing was, unless you happened to be the now seriously wounded back wall. If paper targets could laugh, this one would be spraying wood pulp out its nose about now. Then there was that last bullet. Ray had managed to miss the target with every round. The ninth one, however, decided to have some fun. No, it didn't hit the target. Not exactly. But it did cream the shiny little metal clip that was holding the target up. Ray never heard it, and honestly didn't even see the clip dissolve into little bits of chrome shrapnel as it was blown into the back wall to join all the lonely lead already there. Ray never saw the pristine target, still basically untouched, float slowly to the floor with just a small bit missing at the top where the clip had been. Ray's attention had been focused on the gun after that last round. He couldn't figure out what was wrong. That whole top thing (that's the slide, Ray.) was stuck back over his hand. That seemed odd. He reached up to see if maybe it was just loose. YOWZA! It wasn't loose, but it was hot! What's going on here? How'd that happen? He looked over at Barbara, who was still looking out at the target and laughing. Yep, this is home security. If they ever get attacked by little steel clips, Ray had them covered. Bet it won't try that again.
Barbara motioned for the now empty pistol, and laid it down on the counter in front of them. She looked around and came up with another clip and target. It only took a minute to fasten them together, hook them on the line and reel the whole thing away for round two. Her turn this time. Ray watched in stunned silence as Barbara pulled out the magazine, refilled it and had it back in the gun in no time. It was only when she chambered that first round and the slide went back to its normal position that it dawned on Ray: The gun was working just fine, thank you. He had been shooting! Frantically, he looked out in front of them for some sign of how he had done. Where did that target go? And what's that paper on the floor? He was lost.
As Ray watched, still oblivious to his own complete lack of fire arms talent, Barbara Meadows did what her family had been doing for years: Calmly putting small bits of metal through larger bits of paper. One- Two- Three- Four- Ray watched Barbara with no thought of trying to see where the bullets were going. Five- Six- Seven- Eight- Nine- and she was done. The slide was back in that weird position again and the gun was back on the counter. Barbara was smiling. Even after all these years, she still had it. Every round in the black. Sure, a couple of them were on the line, but hey- It had been years since she had done this. And she had never done it with some guy standing right there next to her, watching her every move with rapt (if clueless) attention.
The Meadows took turns through the next hour or so, going through that entire first box of ammunition. Ray got better. Even started hitting the target on a regular basis. Never hit the clip again. Barbara was glad to have the chance to shoot again, but also glad she didn't have to. After her third turn, she let Ray use up the rest of the box, content to just watch and offer visually mimed advice. By the end of the session, Ray Meadows COULD hit the broad side of a barn. If it were a big barn, fairly close and attacking slowly. Barbara felt that maybe Ray wouldn't be a complete danger if he really had to use the gun now. A partial danger, yes, always, but a complete danger, no- maybe. As they packed up to leave, Barbara made a mental note to make sure and teach Ray how to clean the gun when they got home. Definitely make that his job. She does the dishes, he does the guns. He should be good at it. He'd better be. Their trip home that afternoon was strangely quiet. Ray's ears were still ringing. He could hear, but he really didn't want to. He'd heard enough for one day.
When they got home, Barbara Meadows made good on that promise to herself. She taught Ray to clean the gun. He even enjoyed it. It gave him a chance to take apart something mechanical and work with dangerous chemicals. What man could resist such an opportunity? It only took about four times longer than if she'd done it herself, but the gun was cleaned and put away. Barbara would pull it out and check it later. Like some time next week, while Ray was at work. After doing that Gun-Cleaning Guy Thing, Ray went for the other Weekend Afternoon Guy Thing- he took a nap. Nothing major, just sacked out on the couch in the living room with the windows wide open and quiet noises of the neighborhood drifting through. He was out like a light, now that all that ringing in his ears was going away. His small little nap turned into Big Snooze City. Barbara Meadows let her little gunslinger sleep.
With Ray safely asleep in the front room, Barbara took this time to work out in her flower gardens. A little weeding here, a little pruning there. It didn't take much to make these flowers look good. She could have left them alone and they would have been fine. But a small investment in time never hurt. Working her way through the flowers along the rear fence, Barbara came to a trembling halt before she got to the end of the row. She couldn't move. All she could do was stare down at the ground. There it was, right there in the dirt between the plants. It had to be. It couldn't be anything else. That three-toed print pressed deep into the soft ground could only be one thing: a climber print. Now what?
She only thought about it for a second, and it honestly never occurred to her to just trowel it over and keep going. She could have. Maybe she should have. But she didn't. All she could think of were the old "In Search Of" shows where guys out west tried to take plaster casts of "Bigfoot's" foot prints from muddy lakesides in bad weather. How'd they do that? Plaster of Paris, wasn't it? They put a ring of something (cardboard?) around the print and poured plaster of Paris into it. Yeah, that's it. Did they even have any plaster here? In the garage or basement? Tough call there. Start with the garage. Don't wake Ray. Not yet, anyway.
Rummaging as quietly as she could through the garage, Barbara found a plastic-lined cardboard box full of white powder. Well, she thought, it's either plaster of Paris or five pounds of cocaine. Either way, it's all we've got and it's going to get used. Making the cardboard ring proved to be the challenge. The first two she made seemed too small. And they were. She was fast running out of cardboard. Time to actually measure that print and plan accordingly. She ended up cutting up the first two tries and combining them with the last extra cardboard for the third attempt. It was big, but it worked, even if it was about forty percent tape. Now, to mix the plaster. She went back to the garage for something- a bucket, a can, just something that would hold water, mix plaster and pour. She ended up with a five gallon plastic bucket. It was big and unwieldy, but it would have to do. She dumped in all the plaster and nearly choked on the resulting white dust cloud. Good news: it was not cocaine. Add water. Make the nasty white cloud go away.
Out at the back yard spigot, Barbara let the water trickle into the bucket of powder as she mixed it with her garden trowel. Hey- this was working! She had the plaster at a nice smooth consistency. Time to pour. She turned off the water and picked up the bucket, cardboard ring and her trowel. She knelt down by the print in that back flower garden and had a good look. May have to trim back a few of these flowers. Better do it quick. How long does it take for this stuff to harden? A few fast snips and she was ready. Barbara pressed the cardboard ring in place around the print and took one long last look. This is it. Now or never. Do or die. Plain or peanut. She poured the plaster into the print, filling it and nearly overflowing the cardboard ring. Whoa- maybe a little much on the plaster there. She stopped pouring and watched the ring of white plaster. The cardboard sagged but held. Could this actually work? Just might. She got up to her feet and thought maybe she'd clean up the bucket and trowel while her little experiment in wildlife observation dried. Nothing else to do. As almost an after thought, Barbara Meadows bent back over and scratched the date into the drying plaster in the flower bed. Was this a date to remember? Weren't they all?
Ray Meadows stayed asleep right up to the point where Barbara opened the garage door. A man, no matter how sound asleep, knows the sound of his own garage door opening. When he heard that door swing open, he knew it was time to get up. He may not have known why, but he knew it was time. Ray got to his feet and padded across the living room to the side windows, where he could get a look back down the drive toward the garage. Barbara was coming out with a box. How nice. Looked like that old plaster of Paris crap. Never could figure out how to get rid of that stuff. Had to buy a five pound box one time when he needed about a thimble full. Couldn't just pour the rest down the drain. Too messy to just chuck in the garbage can. Glad to see she's got a hobby. Wonder what it is. Ray made his way back to the couch and slipped his shoes on. Time to have a look around and see what's going on. Maybe take that wife out to dinner. That might be a pleasant surprise for her. One less meal to cook. Fewer dishes to clean. Yeah, dinner out tonight. That sounds like a plan.
Barbara was coming in the back door to the kitchen just about the time Ray was coming into the kitchen from the front hall. And while it's true she had nothing to hide, you know how it goes: Every time you want to do something without being noticed, you get noticed. Then you feel guilty about the whole thing, even though you aren't really doing anything. Are you? You sure look guilty. So did Barbara Meadows. Now Ray was thinking maybe he should have woken up a little sooner. What was going on out there? What was she up to? And what did she want for dinner?
"Ah- You're up."
"Well, yes. Heard the garage door open. What are you up to?"
"Me?"
"No. The Pope. He's right behind you."
"I'm- uh- making something for you. If it works."
"Out of plaster of Paris? Oh, boy. Can't wait to see this."
"That was sarcasm. I could tell."
"Was it? Are you sure?"
"Ok, wise guy, maybe I won't give it to you when it's done."
"And maybe I won't take you out to dinner."
"You were going to take me out to dinner?"
"You've got something for me?"
"Maybe."
"Same here."
"You go first."
"Oh, no, not at all. You first."
"I insist."
"Ladies first."
"Age before beauty."
"No need to get nasty about it. I was going to take you out to dinner, you know."
"All right, I accept. And when we come back, there'll be a little something for you out in the back yard. Wipe that grin off that face."
"Neighbor's dog running loose again?"
"If he is, he's got funny feet."
"What?"
"Feet like a three-toed shingle ripper. There's a print in my flower bed."
"You found a climber footprint?"
"In the dirt."
"How good?"
"Won't know until the plaster dries. Looked pretty good, though."
"That's incredible! What should we do?"
"Let's go eat. The plaster can dry without us. It will be here when we get back."
From that point on, until they were in the car and out of the driveway, Ray kept looking out to the back yard. Where was it? What did it look like? Would it be there when they got back? Ray questioned Barbara all the way to the restaurant. She had very few answers. She saw it, she recognized it, and she covered it with goo. Maybe they'd have an interesting paper weight later tonight. Ray had driven to Monty's (the neighborhood family pizza parlor) without even thinking about it. They hadn't even gone there all that often, it just seemed like that's where they should go. The moment they walked through that front door, they weren't sure if they hadn't made a big mistake. There were Carol and Jake Jacobson. They saw the Meadows immediately and were enthusiastically waving them over to their table. Come on, kids, let's have some big bore fun. As opposed to big caliber. There was no way out. It was going to be dinner with the Jacobsons tonight. Ray was only able to mutter a heartfelt apology to Barbara under his breath as they went to the table. Oh, well. How long could a dinner last?
"Hey, you two- what are you doing out tonight?"
"I don't know, Jake, I got this crazy idea I'd treat the wife to dinner. You?"
"We're celebrating a victory."
"Ok. Domestic, employment or bowling?"
"Ah… domestic? Jake here got to play Mister Macho last night."
"There's a game we could play, Honey. You know, Village People."
"Shut up, Ray. What happened, Carol?"
"Well- You know how I told you about that prowler?"
"The one you saw in the back yard?"
"Yes, that's the one. Well, Jake got to meet him."
"Whoa. Poor guy."
"You got that right, Buddy. I guess he won't be dancing through our yard in his pajamas anymore."
"You shot him??"
"Nah, you know me. No bullets, remember?"
"So you- what? Jumped out and showed him your baby pictures?"
"You're a mean man, Jake."
"Come on- I just waved my gun at him."
"He was close enough to see it?"
"MY PISTOL, WISE GUY."
"Oh. My mistake. Do tell me more."
"I told Jake I thought I saw someone in the back yard last night. It was just dark, but I was sure I saw some one."
"So I got my gun and snuck out the front door."
"That's what I do when there's a prowler out back."
"I was going to sneak around the house and surprise him."
"And did you?"
"Oh, yeah. Big time."
"He tripped over the garden hose first."
"Yeah, yeah. That too."
"That hose will never slink around your house again, Jake. You're a brave man."
"Laugh while you can, Monkey-Boy. Sure, I stumbled over the hose in the side yard. But I made up for it by running around to the back yard real fast. And there he was, halfway across yard, just watching for me. Must have heard me tangle with the hose."
"So you-"
"So I just ran right at him, waving my piece."
"Don't touch it, Ray."
"Not me. I know better."
"The kid took one look and was gone. Never seen a kid move so fast. Not for minimum wage, anyway."
"Where'd he go, Jake?"
"I don't know. He ran towards some trees and stuff and I just stood there laughing."
"So it was some kid?"
"Yeah, had to be. About maybe four foot- about so high. Skinny little guy playing trick or treat or something."
"But it's not Halloween."
"Smart man. You go to college for that?"
"Nah, just a natural talent I guess."
"What did he look like, Jake? What was he wearing?"
"Like I said- the kid must have been playing at some thing- or wearing pajamas."
"Some kind of outfit or costume?"
"Yeah, I guess so. But I don't know what to call it."
"Lot of weird Saturday morning cartoon characters now."
"I know. What sort of kid watches that stuff? What ever happened to Johnny Quest?"
"I think he and Hadji moved to South Miami. What was this character wearing?"
"Ah, some kind of blue giraffe suit. Looked really dumb. Never seen the cartoon."
Don't you just hate it when the whole world goes boing? Jake continued to expound on his opinion of poor cartoons today and the good ones of days gone by. And how the coyote could have really caught that bird, if only . . . It didn't matter. Neither Ray or Barbara heard a word of it. They were too stunned. This big oaf nearly ran over a climber in his own back yard. Would have probably tried to shoot the thing if he had any bullets. So much for a quiet evening out. So much for their appetite. It was all they could do to make the room stop spinning before Jake stopped talking, but this was Jake. They could take their time with that room spin thing.
As the food arrived and the evening progressed, the topic of conversation shifted to less electrifying subjects. (No pun intended.) Work, home, cars and television- with the occasional side track into the movies. Fairly light stuff for two couples that really didn't dine out together all that often. Safe topics. No politics or religion. And no climbers. By down-playing their response and adding a dose of humor, Ray and Barbara were able to move the subject of conversation away from that incident in the Jacobson's back yard. Keep things moving, and away from that. Jake was happy to talk about anything, or more frequently nothing at all. Both the Meadows and Carol were happy to let Jake carry the conversation- it gave them time to eat.
Poor Jake. He never could figure out why he always seemed to leave a restaurant hungrier than when he arrived. And hoarse, too. Carol, Ray and Barbara had their fill of deep-dish pizza and garlic bread. They were ready to pop. As the waitress was clearing off the table, Jake was scrounging for crumbs- and still talking. It was an interesting evening for all concerned, but all for different reasons. And they would have to get together for dinner again some time. Ray would make sure of it. He wanted to keep an eye on Jake. Ray thought maybe he would need to wrangle an invitation to come over to Jake and Carol's. What sort of trees did they have near their house?
The Meadows' drive home after dinner was filled with amused speculation. They could both just picture that scene in the Jacobson's back yard. Mostly, they could see this giant-sized Barney Fife trying to run through a coil of garden hose and getting increasingly tangled as he tried to get out of it. Waving that empty gun with one hand and wrestling the hose with the other. They were both howling with laughter at the mental picture that scene was painting. Eventually they were able to bring it all under control. Ray did have some questions.
"So, what do you think, Ma'am?"
"I think it's a very good think that Jake Jacobson doesn't own any bullets."
"No joke. But was it the same one?"
"The same climber?"
"Yeah."
"What makes you think you're seeing the same climber?"
"Hmm. Good point. What do you think?"
"I think very few land animals live totally alone- away from all others of its species."
"A profound observation, Mrs. Meadows."
"Thank you. What do you think? Same one?"
"Yes, I think it is. It may not be the only one in town, but I think it's the same one. Like a klutzy, curious kid."
"In bad pajamas."
"Yeah, something like that. As far as Jake's concerned."
"So what about Junior's parents?"
"I'm sure they're around. Just too smooth to be seen. If this one's young, others must be older and wiser."
"Or it's an orphan."
"Yeah, that's a possibility. But I'd be more inclined to say it's just striking out on its own, for whatever reason. It's new at this living alone, and still young enough to be curious about the world. Without other animals of its kind nearby, it would be more likely to go exploring. To seek out new trees-"
"To boldly go?"
"Something like that. Anyway, I think it's the same one. And it's a young one."
"So where's Mom and Dad?"
"Good question."
"Maybe it's time to call Gilbert Lawrence again?"
"No, not yet. There's a couple more cards to play first."
"Such as?"
"How about a weekend in fabulous Lyndon, Illinois?"
"What was second prize?"
"Two weekends."
"A little late on a Saturday night to head across the border for the weekend. It's almost nine o'clock, you know."
"Yeah, I know. Not this weekend. I want to know more about that area before we go there anyway."
"How are you going to learn more without calling the amazing Gilbert ?"
"The other card we haven't played."
"Which would be . . . ?"
"Some English guy named Arthur Crutchfield."
"Who would be . . . ?"
"Not sure. I think he saw climbers in London during the war. Someone's got a web site about him on the 'Net. I guess it's time to surf."
Barbara knew the signs of another late night when she heard them. And she just heard them. The thrill of the chase- and that afternoon nap- would get together with all that pizza and garlic bread to keep Ray up 'til all hours. Good for him. More power to him. But not her. She wasn't about to spend the next six hours sitting there watching a flickering computer screen spit out arcane information for the nearly amused. Maybe she'd take in a late movie on TV and then go to bed. By midnight.
Ray was wired. Ready to surf. Just turn him loose and watch that mouse fly. The car was put away, and they were both in the house and upstairs before Barbara remembered- The footprint. AH-HAH! They both ran back downstairs and out the back door. No thought of stealth, no thought of maybe seeing a climber. Just get out there and get that plaster cast. And they did. The yard lights came on as they flew out the back door looking like two big kids on a high-speed late night Easter egg hunt. They were both headed for that same egg, but only Barbara knew where it was.
It was still there. The plaster was dry, the print was ready to pull out of the ground. With Ray looking over her shoulder, Barbara Meadows carefully pushed the flowers out of the way and reached down to retrieve the casting. How did they do this on TV? She couldn't remember ever seeing this part of the adventure. Did they pull the cardboard off first, or just pick the whole thing up? She went for the whole enchilada, pushing her hands into the dirt around the cardboard and bringing the cast up out of the ground in one move. The resulting shower of dirt destroyed the original print, but it didn't matter. Even before they had a chance to brush off the plaster, they could both see that she had done very well, indeed. A little dirt had fallen into one toe area making a flaw there, but otherwise, it looked great. Now what? Ray stared at the dirt covered print. He could already see the layering of the hoof material on each toe, just like those layered claws he saw on the one in the tree. He shivered. He couldn't help it. It looked nasty, even if these things were supposed to be mostly harmless.
"Wow."
"Yeah."
"Let's get this thing cleaned up and protect it."
"Where to?"
"The basement."
With Barbara carefully cradling the print in both hands, they went back inside and down stairs. The basement was Ray's workshop. A great place to build small projects. Stuff you could carry upstairs and wedge through the door when you were done. Ray's kind of stuff. He wasn't a "Big Project" kind of guy. Small stuff was ok by him. Barbara put the casting on the workbench. Under the clinical glare of the fluorescent lights, they both stood back and looked at it. Proof. They had proof. Proof of what, they weren't sure.
Ray found a small brush and cleaned the dirt off the cast. Then he cleaned the resulting loose dirt off the workbench. He'd sweep it up off the floor later. Sure, he could have cleaned the dirt off over the trash can, but where's the fun in that? The casting went back on to the workbench, on clean newspapers now. Ray rummaged around the shelves of cans to come up with an old quart of varnish. This should protect it. Shaking the can, Ray figured there'd be more than enough in there for the job. He braced the plaster print upside down, suspended above the papers by a few small pieces of wood. First things first- protect the print side. Ray found a clean brush and carefully coated the foot print with varnish. That should help. A little wipe up, a little clean up and he was done. Check that in the morning. Right now, he had a 'Net to surf. The brush was cleaned and dried, and they both gave the plaster casting one long last look before the lights were turned off and they both headed back upstairs. Ray would turn the casting over tomorrow and finish the varnishing on the top side.
Now, while the rest of the neighborhood was settling down for the night, while Barbara (and Carol and Jake) were settling in for an evening with the idiot box, Ray was getting ready to play with his own box of idiots. That modern game of "Hidden & Seek": The Internet, where one step forward and two steps sideways was considered progress. Ray sat down and faced the screen. Power on, boots up. Drivers engaged, Captain. Where to? First (and had he known it at the time, only) stop tonight: A visit with Mister Arthur S. Crutchfield, former loon and current senior authority on the subject at hand: Climbers.

To Be Continued...
-------------------------
Copyright 1996,2010 Chip Haynes

Last time, as you’ll recall, the Space Family Robinson had traveled through time to the year 1948, where they were mistaken for aliens by the local rednecks. However, as that was another show, and had nothing to do with the time travel incident that kicked off this season of Eureka, we’ll ignore it. Also, it took place a year afterwards.

Meanwhile, in the actual show this review is about, Baltar meets with a returning character from season 1, who informs him there’s a top secret pacifist cabal of scientists and scientist-related people (Canadian hookers and that guy in the quartermaster corps who purchases test tubes in gross, mostly) who are attempting to make the world a better place by doing stuff that probably would have seemed sensible in the ‘80s, but is hopelessly dated and goofy now. In essence, they’re afraid of Nuclear War (Yawn) and that a defensive weapon’s race will bring it about. Whatever. These hippies are worried about an EMP cannon that GD is developing. The chick from season 1 claims to be the daughter of Baltar’s right hand man in 1947, who coincidentally turns out to be the guy Allison jumpstarted back in the past, though I’m pretty sure that guy was actually enlisted, so this doesn’t make much sense. Still, as Baltar started the hippie peacenik cabal back in the day, he rolls with it.

The EMP Cannon test goes off without a hitch, though they need something to pad out act 1, therefore Fargo gets hurt. Then they all go to a barbeque at Henry’s house, where Jo lets her hair down. Literally. This is pretty much the only time I’ve seen it out of a ponytail, excepting her occasional shower scenes. Just felt I should remark on that. Henry and the new Mrs. Henry have hooked up some kind of telepathic doubletalk device that allows them to share memories from their respective timelines and thereby speed the “Getting to know you” phase of their relationship.

Predictably, this goes screwy, and the rest of the cast start hallucinating various irritating people: Fargo is haunted by a little girl who bullied him in sixth grade, Jo is haunted by a creepy romance novel version of Zane, Jack is haunted by Stark, and Allison is haunted by Tess. Baltar is haunted by his long-dead best friend, the guy Allison jumpstarted back in ‘47, though when asked about it he claims he’s seeing “A tall leggy blonde in a slinky red dress.”

Hey, whaddya’ know: an in-joke that was actually pretty funny, appropriate, and didn’t talk down to the audience! Wow!

Meanwhile, stuff is getting all ‘splodey over town: a bridge collapses, Deputy Andy gets maimed again, Henry’s garage partially collapses, Jack’s jeep goes blooey. Unlike most episodes of Eureka, the mystery surrounding this is actually pretty mysterious, and watching Jack work it out is actually pretty fun. Unfortunately, he’s too late to foil the plot, and the EMP cannon is stolen by persons unknown.

Excepting to Baltar, who realizes he’s been a patsy. He confronts the returning chick from season 1, who tells him they wanted the EMP dealiewhacker for its power source, which they intend to use to send him back to the past with his knowledge of the future so as to change stuff.

THE END

At first I was annoyed by the hippie group, and Baltar’s reaction to it, particularly as it made no real sense. But as the episode progressed I realized that this was largely a reaction to his own fears from the early cold war, and not anything realistic, or even current. It’s clever that they never actually drew a bead on this one to point it out, but let it emerge naturally from the story. This is consistent with the theme of the ghosts representing some irrational fear:

Baltar fears a future threat that is already past, and never happened anyway.
Jack fears confessing his feelings to Allison for fear that she’ll reject him for someone who’s a better match.
Allison fears that Jack will die since both her previous loves have.
Jo fears her romantic past with Zane that never really happened anyway, but was mostly a product of her own mind that she couldn’t hope to live up to.
Fargo fears his basic social and authoritative impotence.

Once these issues are resolved - mostly - the ghosts disappear. This is an oooooooold saw that has been used a lot. Just off the top of my head, I’m gonna’ pick “The Restless Spirit” episode of Space: 1999 (Gosh, I do hope we start reviewing that show again soon) in which Koenig has to face his fears over abandoning some friends to die on a pre-Alpha mission. Yawn. Yeah.

The narrated intro to the series follows a basic format, but changes a bit with every episode to include developments in the arc.

With them talking about sending Baltar to his own time, I’m beginning to wonder if he’s an actual cast member now, or if he was just an arc character, much like Tess, who’s on hand for a specific purpose, and not an ongoing thing. I hope not, as I really like the new reality and the spins they’ve spun on the characters. I don’t really want it going back to the generally stupid status quo. Basically there were a whole lot of actions in this ep that will have significant repercussions, and I really hate the idea that the show might just sidestep them all by fixing history.

Speaking of Baltar, this is the first episode where Callis’ accent hasn’t bothered me at all. In fact, I didn’t even notice it.

Zoe is still in town, and still dating Zane. Jo accidentally confessed her once-and-former love to Zane, and gave him his grandmother’s ring back, which confused him quite a bit. I’m assuming we’ll be seeing more of this.

Am I out of line in saying that Zoe has never really appealed to me, and I’ve never really gotten what it is that everyone else has always seen in her?

I have actually really missed the back-and-forth between Stark and Jack. Jack did too, apparently. I liked his line about how even though Stark was his nemesis and a pain in the ass, he misses the guy.

Next ep - two weeks from now - is allegedly the Season Finale. Presumably this is just the Summer Finale, as the series was signed for 22 episodes this year, rather than their normal ridiculously low number. (What are we, English?) What I don’t get is why they’re breaking the season in half at episode 9, rather than a more logical 11. Presumably that’s got something to do with the nature of next week’s episode, which I’m guessing will be a cliffhanger.

I gotta' say I'm pretty impressed by this new "Batman" fan film. As a rule, we don't critique fan films, as that's missing the point, and also because while it's fine to look at a $500 million film and say "This is just a remake of Ferngully: The Last Rainforest," it seems horribly cruel to use that same standard on something a guy cobbled together for seven grand as a labor of love, you know?

That said, some of 'em just pop out at you, you know? Objectively, there's little-or-nothing in this Batman flick that we haven't seen before a zillion times, but the execution (that might be a play on words) is uncommon.

A couple lines jumped out at me:

"Gotham is sick of Batman's concience"

"This city doesn't know how lucky it is that I've never crossed that line, because if I did step into that abyss, I'd take all of Gotham with me."

"As my city and I grow older, I begin to question the choices I've made."

Visually, it's a lot like "Batman: Dead End." It's like the makers of this copped all the visual elements they liked from that film, and then went a totally different direction with it.

If you'd like to watch the whole thing in one piece, with far better picture quality you can go here

http://www.spinoffonline.com/2010/06/18/watch-27000-batman-fan-film-city...

Special thanks to Neorandomizer for bringing this one to my attention.

No, that’s not a typo, that’s really the title. Really.

As those of you with no life (Like me!) might have surmised, Lrrr is back. He‘s the evil alien overlord who tried to destroy the world a few years back because he missed an episode of Ally McBeal, back in the days when people still gave a rat’s ass about that show. (Episode two, I think? Maybe early episode three. Definitely before Billy died, at any rate.)

Basically his wife is nagging him to get out there and conquer some worlds, so he attempts to take over earth by invading Comicon. Unfortunately he’s mistaken for a cosplayer in the ‘best costume’ show. He gets depressed, and bumps into our usual gang.

Lrrr: “You look familiar.”
Leela: “Yeah, you ate me once. I was in your mouth for over four minute.”
Lrrr: “Leela?”

Lrrr goes home, but the wife throws him out, so he shows up at planet express, marks his territory (With urine! Alien urine!) and crashes on the couch. Realizing he’s having a mid-life crisis, he buys a snazzy rocket car, has plastic surgery to enlarge his horns (get it? It’s dirty in an obvious sense. Also there’s a bonus testes gag* thrown in there) picks up an alien chick of his species at a bar, and heads home with her. Turns out she’s a transvestite - well, a transspeciesite, I guess - wearing a costume, which utterly traumatizes Lrrr, and he runs back to Leela crying.

Fry comes up with the surprisingly clever plan of hiring the severed head of Orson Wells (Maurice LaMarche gets work! Hooray!) do direct a video remake of “War of the Worlds.” The result is pretty much what you’d expect (Warning bad hilarious language):

(SEVERAL MINUTES PASS)

Oh, gosh, that bit at 1:18 is so filthy! It always cracks me up. Seriously, I’m just paralyzed with laughter when I hear it.

Ok, ok, I’m calming down now.

Anyway, so they fake an invasion of the earth, which they broadcast to Lrrr’s homeworld, where his wife is very turned on. She comes to earth, but Lrrr is afraid to tell her the truth, so earth is invaded for real, and subjugated.

Nixon: “Oh, fine. I resign. Again.”

So everyone toils in the mines and stuff, and Lrrr tries to tell the missus, but keeps losing his nerve. He goes crying to Leela, who bosses him around, which upsets his queen, who’s used to bossing him around, and they have a gun totin’ ritual to decide which one Lrrr rejects. Which resolves itself.

Also: Fry has a comic book for some reason.

The End

OBSERVATIONS

If there’s a bad Orson Wells joke, I haven’t heard it.

This was a pretty darn funny episode all the way through. I laughed out loud several/many times, though - as usual - not a single one involving Fry. I find I enjoy the more linear episodes….uhm…more. Something about a story with a set beginning, middle, and end, with only a vestigial subplot that causes them to do their best work on this show. (Conversely, Family Guy just flat out can’t do a straight-ahead narrative to save their lives)

The transspeciesite was a really good totally unexpected gag.

Is it just me, or are the Comicon gags *already* dated?

Not too much else to talk about in this episode. There’s no particular subtlety or subtext, just a lot of really funny stuff right on the surface. Generally I like to have some kind of trenchant insight for these things to give me a little arty credibility, but about as trenchant as I can be this time out is “It were really funny-like and-un I larfed a whole bunch-ed.”

Lrrr: “My wife has thrown me out, and conquering worlds has become a chore.”
Professor: “There, there, you’re just having a midlife crisis is all.”
Lrrr: [Pulls gun] “LRRR DEMANDS THE PLATITUDES OF POP-PSYCHOLOGICAL SAYINGS!”

Apparently next week is the “Season Finale.” Since this is the 21st century and coherent television schedules are oh-so-very last millennium, what this means is all a bit fuzzy. The episode order was Twenty-Six episodes. So is this a “Mid-season finale” like Syfy does, or are the 26 episodes a two-season order? I dunno. Either way, after next week we’re done until the December Xmas Special, and the next batch will air next year some time.

And that’s all I’ve got…

WILL CONSERVATIVES LIKE THIS EPISODE:

Maybe. Nothing in it as icky as last week, or as preachy as the robosexual episode, and it was pretty darn funny. Maybe. What the heck, give it a shot, and then call me names if you didn’t like it.

*- “Gag” as in “Joke.”

As we talked about last time, there’s a lot of fanfic blueprints out there, some of them painstakingly accurate, some painfully inaccurate, some of ships that never existed in any franchise, and those that take a lot of liberties with the subject matter. The interesting thing about the ‘liberty-taking’ ones is that sometimes they represent an improvement over the source material.

Case in point, today’s set of ‘prints: a modified version of the Excelsior, which has been gussied up slightly into a form that makes more sense, making a more polished reasonable version of the ship. (Assuming any Starfleet ship makes logical sense, which they don’t.)

This is a fairly standard set of ‘Trek ‘Prints: five sheets, blue ink on white paper, three vertical folds, and one unseemly fold (I almost said ‘unseemly seam’) located horizontally about a third of the way from the top, so it’ll fit into the envelope. Each sheet is about 29 inches wide by about a foot tall. 12.5 inches if you want to get picky. There’s five sheets.

Sheet 1 is a really nice side view that captures the sweeping lines of the vessel. Sheet 2 is a plan view, or ’outboard top view’ Sheets 3 and 4 are bottom, front, and back views. All of these are standard axial drawings, with no perspectives, angles, or ’beauty shots.’ As with most blueprints, these are supposed to look as ’in universe’ as possible. If Geordi or Scotty were looking at paper prints (As in Star Trek VI: The Title That Sounds Good But Makes No Sense), these are supposed to be exactly the kind of thing they’re looking at.

The eye-popper here is sheet 5, an “Inboard Profile Cutaway,” which is to an internal side view that shows the decks and some internal detail of the ship itself. Since there have never been any official internal plans for an Excelsior class ship, these are as authoritative as anything else, and while they’re obviously derivative of the style of plans that have been a staple since Franz Joseph’s Tech Manual, it still looks pretty neat. There’s no internal detail for the warp engines, however.

The changes from the actual model are not sweeping. Externally she’s exactly the same, with only minor changes for the most part:

1) Minor changes to the outside of the bridge
2) There’s a section of the lower aft ‘secondary hull’ that has traditionally been open to space, and you can see machinery or exposed tanks or whatever inside it. In these ‘prints that’s been closed up and paneled over, and an auxiliary landing bay has been added. (As an aside: This never made much sense in the movies, and I'm assuming it was to get across the idea that the Excelsior was a prototype)
3) the upper hull of the secondary hull has had a few vertical docking tubes added to it, and a couple cargo elevators, like the middle-of-the-deck deck elevators you’d find on a World War II aircraft carriers (But not a side-deck deck elevator)
4) “Megaphaser Emplacements” have been added to the bend in the support pylons for the engines. (Sigh)
5) Most substantially: There has always been a long streamlined structure between the two engine supports on the upper hull of the secondary section. This seems really extraneous, and I suspect it was there to anchor the engines on to the theatrical model - the thing is very long and ungainly to work with - it’s not amazingly noticeable, but it’s ungainly itself and appears to serve no in-universe function. It has been removed, and replaced by a much larger, much more sensible structure: an new hangar bay.

This is unlike any hangar we’ve ever seen in the show, though it’s derivative of the movie-era ones. It’s a huge enclosed space that fits the curve of the stern. At its widest, it’s two hundred feet across, tapering down to a mere eighty or eighty-five feet. The whole bay is four hundred and sixty feet long, and about fifty feet tall along its entire length. If that sounds clunky, or ugly, it’s not. In profile, it’s a bit like the quarterdeck of a sailing ship, offsetting the HUGE saucer section on this bad boy.

It has three - count ’em - three sets of clam shell hangar bay doors, one in the aft, two in the front, situated diagonally, one opening to the forward right, another to the forward left. The idea is that, like a modern aircraft carrier, this thing can be landing and launching vessels simultaneously. The deck plans show this is all interconnected, with no internal walls breaking up the flow inside.

The only part of this whole thing that I don’t prefer to the source model would be the “Megaphasers.” These clearly never existed inside the Trekaverse, and they ruin the lines of the ship, tiny, ugly, stubby little wings sticking out from the engine supports. Yuck.

Whatever category of ship the Excelsior originally was - I forget and I’m too lazy to look it up - these plans say it was re-designated as a “Space Control Ship,” meaning, essentially, a dedicated flagship with enhanced communications and data-gathering capability, analogous to the “Command Ship” concept the Navy’s been fiddling with for a couple decades now. But if that’s the case, then why all the weapons? Why the massive Aircraft Carrier flight deck? Command Ships have barely-if-any weapons, they’re small, stay in the center of the fleet, and are protected by the other ships.

Either the authors didn’t know what a “Command Ship” was, or (more likely) Trek simply will not allow the existence of any actual, effective, cool-looking warships. If it’s got teeth, Trek don’t want it. Thus, “Control Ship” might be euphemistic for “Ship that goes out and takes over - or commands - a big hunk o’ space.”

My only caveat on the prints themselves was the absence of a measurement guide on every page. This is easily circumvented since al the sheets are to the same scale, but it’s annoying none the less. A note states that this is the “Terranglo Second Edition.” Get it? “Terranglo?” Terran-Anglo? Earth-English? I don’t know why they bothered to mention the language at all, since everyone in the Federation speaks English anyway. (Yes they do, Trekies, yes they do. Picard makes an English-specific phonetic joke at one point) If you’ve got to mention language, however, they probably should have just said “English,” since their made up portmanteau sounds like some kind of orange. Or maybe a floor wax (“Terranglo Floor Polish, proud sponsors of the 2012 Olympics…”)

The credits at the bottom of every sheet say that these plans were drawn by Todd Guenther, “Approved” by Donovan G. Bosch, and that Jason Genser was the “Compositor,” whatever that is. They were composed by something unofficial with the very official-sounding name of “Star Fleet Deparment Of Graphic Design,” 49 Stima Avenue, Carteret, New Jersey, 07008-9998. They’re distributed by “Star Station Aurora,” PO Box 4990, Holyoke, Massachusetts, 01041-4990

I can’t find a copyright date (Can you even copyright fanfic drawings based on someone else’s copywritten intellectual property?), so I have no idea when these were done, but I’ve had my set for about eighteen years, so it’s at least early-90s. It might date to the very-late-eighties, those super-hyper-mega-kill-o-matic phasers look awfully Starfleet Battles to me, but if I had to guess, I’d say it rolled out in 1990. I base that on nothing whatsoever.

If you have more information about these plans, are a member of “Starbase Aurora,” or perhaps even assisted in the making of ‘em, we’re always interested to know more. Drop us a line at three@republibot.com

It’s Tuesday night and once again time for a Warehouse 13 review.

SPOILERS!

The previously on Warehouse 13 was heavy on Pete’s old drinking problem and Myka working with Pete.

Denver Colorado Pete and Myka are chasing guy through an abandoned factory. Pete grabs the guys back pack and it comes off letting him escape. Myka finds a security guard who tells them the bad guy went through a window. Pete follows Myka through the window and hurts his leg dropping to the ground.

At the same time back at the Warehouse Leena is back and Claudia detects on the computer insurance executives giving money to charity (no way). Artie says it’s a tax write off but no they gave 50% of there net so now everyone thinks it might be a Robin Hood artifact. With Myka and Pete in Denver Artie decides to take Claudia and go to Harford to check the insurance guys out.

Now we are going to have two (yah) adventures running at the same time so instead of me doing it back and forth like the episode did I will do them one at a time.

The Myka Pete adventure:

The bad guy gets away but they have the artifact which was in the back pack and it’s a wooden Griffon. Since they have the artifact Pete tells Myka she now can go to her high school reunion (not that gag) and they can have a normal weekend. Myka yammers about some football player she tutored and obviously had the hots for (classic show setup). But while putting the Griffon in one of the Warehouse’s magic bags it’s eyes glow yellow as does Myka’s and Pete’s of course our heroes notice nothing amiss.

Pete is now in the Warehouse calling for Leena who is putting away an evil can of sardines in the Warehouse’s can goods section. Pete tells Leena that he lift the Griffon on Artie’s desk. Leena stops Pete from opening the original can of worms (sigh) and tells him he should stay in bed this weekend because of his bad leg, Pete says he is planning on it.

Now we get the needless scene of Pete and Kelly the pretty vet from town in bed after they have done the deed and Pete’s after action small talk is painful. But we now know his weekend plans. (This was quick last week she did not even want a boyfriend.)

Myka is signing into the reunion and her and the woman at the desk spot the football player Myka was talking about and we get a Love American Style (remember that show) special effects around him with the song ‘Afternoon Delight’ playing on the sound track. (Shoot me now please.) The football player is played my some guy in the WWF but since I do not watch wrestling I have no idea who he is.

At the cocktail party in the hotel bar they are blasting REM (why of why) and the football player who is named Curt comes up and asks Myka to join him and the guys. After some small talk Myka starts to drink heavily.

At the Warehouse Leena takes the griffon out of the bad and it sparks a little then when she places it on the desk it rotates to face a different direction and its eyes flow yellow.

Pete is leaving the bedroom in just a pair of jeans asks Kelly is she sure she does not want a bowel of cereal (a must after sex). Walking down the hall Pete gets like a cramp and at the same time Myka getting hammered at the bar gets a cramp and bang their eyes flow yellow and they switch bodies. (This could be fun but wait its not.)

Pete in Myka calls Myka in Pete and they do a little vaudeville with the Myka Pete telling the Pete Myka to leave her breast alone as Pete Myka was jus about to feel himself up. (Oh man.) Pete wonders how he is going to explain being drink in Myka’s body at his next AA meeting.

We now get the cringe inducing scene of Kelly coming out into the hall and trying to get Myka Pete to come back to bed for some more action. I know they were trying for funny but the actors just could not pull it off. Myka Pete is gong to drive to Colorado to meet Pete Myka.

We now get Pete Myka going over to the group of guys with Curt talking baseball and Pete Myka joins in like he is one of the guys. This Pete Myka orders some wings and they talk. After some time Curt starts talking about there is some thing special happening and kisses Pete Myka who jumps up yelling “Dude!” Pete Myka is saved my Myka Pete and they go to her hotel room.

In the room the figure out that the statue is really one of two bookends and when it moves it must be pointing to the other one in the set. Myka Pete’s cell rings and its Kelly, Myka Pete leaves the room promising to make it up to her while Pete Myka is saying no promises.

Myka Pete now in slacks and a tee shirt and walking down the hall (they always have on hall walking scene.) when at the elevator the guard from the start of the episode is with the other bookend. Myka says they must have switched bodies but the guard turns into the thief and says no we are in the same body.

There is a fight Myka and Pete merge into one body switching back and forth during the fight. Myka subdues the bad guy/guys.

The Myka Pete drag the bad guy to there room Curt knocks on the door Myka says it’s not the right time for a booty call and closes the door but Curt sticks his foot in the door but now it’s Pete and he tells him to go.

Pete has the bad guy in the tube and the guy starts to switch between the guard and the thief faster and faster. Pete closes the shower curtain into to stop blood going everywhere when the guy explodes.

On the Farnsworth Leena tells Pete that see has found a photo of Robert Lois Stevenson’s (author of Dr. Jekyll and Hyde) office with a set of bookends that were an eagle and lion not griffons. As Myka and Pete are switching faster and faster they switch the heads and separate.

On the way out of the hotel going home Myka meets Curt and they kiss and say they will stay in touch.

Artie and Claudia:

In Harford Artie is interviewing one of the executives and the man is evasive but admits his wife was not to happy with the donation. The man says there is only one woman for him as he throws the picture of his wife in the trash.

Artie goes downstairs to the lobby where Claudia has discovered the men have all been to the same bar. The one executive not affected is heading there now so they follow to see who they are meeting. The guy is with a middle age blond that has her leg up on the guy’s seat at the bar. Claudia places an alert on the man’s bank account so if there is a transaction she will know.

The women seems to rub her leg on the guy and he jumps up to leave but comes back and after a few minutes on a blackberry Claudia gets the alert he just transferred 1 million dollars to a health charity Artie now things that she is using a seduction artifact.

Artie prepares himself to talk to the woman by spraying perfume on himself and putting ear plugs in (in case it’s a siring song). He goes over identifies himself as a federal agent and tells her he knows about the money. She puts her foot and him and he pushes he leg away. After a minute Artie returns to Claudia and tells her the mission is over. Outside Artie says the woman is clean and is attack by the man in the bar he saying for Artie to stay away from the woman.

Artie is about to Tesla the guy when Claudia gets between them and then the guy runs into the street and gets hit by a car. Artie says oh my god she should be more careful so she does not get hurt.

In there hotel room Artie is laying on the bed writing bad love poetry to the woman. Claudia using the photos she was taking in the bar figures out it has something to do with the woman’s legs. Artie decides he is going to the woman’s home to read his poetry to her and Claudia gets him to take a shower first because he needs one. When he comes out Claudia treats Artie and handcuffs him to a pipe in the closet. Claudia then gets the Tesla and heads to the woman’s house.

Claudia is at the woman’s house and the woman tells her to get lost but Claudia insists and wow one of her victims is there to run away/kidnap he so they can live happily every after and he has a gun. Claudia is handcuffed to the stove and the woman is handcuffed to a pillar. The man goes to pack the woman’s things and while he is gone she explains that she just wanted them to pay for not letting her bother get a liver transplant and that she did not want to hurt anyone.

Back in the hotel room Artie has an electric iron and is talking to himself about he was doing this stuff when MacGyver was trapped in his crib. Artie turned the iron into an electromagnet and uses it to pull his back to him. After unlocking his cuffs he states that was just one of three ways he could have escaped.

In the woman’s house the man is about to shoot Claudia when Artie kicks in the door and blinds him with a piece of the glass from the light house of Alexandra. Artie un-cuff’s the woman and about to leave when the man attacks him. Claudia tells the woman to get the stockings.

Artie is about to shoot the man when Claudia and the woman rip the stockings and a blue wave spreads out and Artie and the man are back to normal. The man runs off to see his wife while Artie questions the woman and discovers that the stocking belonged to Mata Hari.

Artie is leaving and Claudia is still cuffed to the stove when asked to be released Artie tells her he sees 7 ways for her to escape and he walks out the door.

Back at the boardinghouse Pete’s room is filled with balloons and rose petals Kelly comes in and Pete try’s to find out what Myka told her without telling her he did not know but she pushes him on the bed and the get ready for action.

The End.

Observations:

Well I do not know where to start the Myka Pete adventure made me cringe. I hated it the acting was horrid and the jokes were not funny.

The Artie Claudia adventure was better but not great it would have made a good standalone episode if they found away to pad it out to a whole episode without destroying it. The chemistry between Artie and Claudia is much better than between Myka and Pete. The show could almost lose both Myka and Pete and the show would be better.

Leena was just used for info dumps and was really not needed in the show at all. I can not figure out what they are going with this character. The first episodes of the season made it look like she would be central but she is either not in an episode or lightly used.

The episode was edited well with the inter jumps between stories having them build together to the climax. I did not write it up that way because I thought my dislike for the Myka Pete part would taint my write up of the Artie Claudia part.

Except for the Artie Claudia mission I could have done without seeing this episode.