Set Phasers to, Rage!

So this week's assignment from the league is Star Trek, A show near and dear to my heart (and other organs!)- I have always liked Star Trek, but sometime around 1986, I became obsessed with it. Taping episodes on the family VCR, and replaying them constantly taking in every nuance of Gene Roddenbury's epic "wagon train to the stars" Also finding out that I live about an hour from James T Kirk's birthplace of Riverside Iowa, made me have to take the pilgrimage every year. Heck I even got George Takei to sign my copy of the Decipher Star Trek RPG Player's guide. Trek is in my blood, if we are going to argue Star Wars or Trek, this is a no contest for me Trek every time. I would rather deal with the innane space hippies or Wesley Crusher at his worst, than deal with Jar Jar Binks, and midichlorians!

 Not sure I am really this much of a Trekkie (Trekker's take note, I use the term Trekkie, because it is what Roddenbury himself used, hey he created it, he gets fanbase naming rights!) Here is a picture of Me and my wife and dog, Ein, at Trekfest in 2011,

Ein, is Dressed as "Bones" obviously, but yeah I look like goof, in this pic, but the wife and dog look fine. Speaking of Riverside, and knowing that this is Nerd RAGE against the machine, Brings me to a bit of a sore subject. 

One thing that really pisses me off about Star Wars (yeah I know this is about Trek, but just let me give a bit of backstory first!)  fans is their incessant need to try to prove superiority, I recall being in a Firefly discussion on line and listening to such winning arguments as "If it's the future why do they still use bullets, and drills?" Oh I don't know SITHDUDE2013, probably because they are proven to work, how long have nails been around? or the wheel Barrow? even with more modern ways of putting 2 boards together the nail works dumbass! And this from a fan of a show where we have energy beam based melee weapons and yet no one understands the basic concept of railing. the queens palace, endless chasms, no railing, the Deathstar, you need to go out on a 4" ledge over a endless chasm to turn off the tractor beam and of course, no railings. Osha would have a field day in a galaxy far far away how F&*^ing hard is it to come up with a metal bar about chest high, oh sure we can put forcefields all over the damn place the idea of a safety rail alludes us! Well With the new Trek movie, the complaint from all Star Wars fans was the same. "It's like a total rip off of a new hope!" "Old man mentor tells young idealistic kid to lead a bigger life and he fights a planet killing device. I mean Captain Kirk is like a total Luke Skywalker rip off!" So as someone who lives within spitting distance of Kirk's home town let me point this out! 

Riverside Iowa is about 30 miles from Iowa City. the former capital, it is also home to my alma matter, the University of Iowa, which is still rated as one of the top 10 party schools in the USA. The shot above is a normal tailgating during a home game. lets' compare this to the largest city we know that was near Luke Skywalker. 

Mos Eisley, never will you find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. In short a back water world with a heavy crime rate run by a space slug. What is my point? simple Kirk as a teen had access to both a big ten University which has a top flight medical school, and a huge party scene every weekend. While luke (in the script and cutscenes) mostly does chores and hangs out with a few local acquaintances.  Kirk was most likely taking AP classes due to his higher intelligence, and sneaking over to the left side of Burge Hall (the women's side) on the weekend, if not trying to get in to One Eyed Jakes, the Field House or thier 22nd century Equivalents. This is why kirk turned out like this-

While Luke turned out like this. 

The bar scenes in both films tells the story pretty well. Luke meekly listened to Obi Wan, and was victimized in the bar leading to Obi Wan having to save his farmboy ass. Kirk, strode into the place, hit on the hottest girl he could find, and when someone tried to "defend her honor" Kirk was spoiling for a rumble. In this case no meekly hiding behind a Jedi, no Kirk jumped in full bore! this is the difference between Luke and Kirk, Luke is an innocent who was thrust into a much larger world, but Kirk was already too big for where he was.  I won't deny that there are similarities. Just like there are similarities between Star Wars and other established fantasies I mean a small town boy thrust into a war against an evil empire who has been given a power to destroy it, while it's the plot to star wars, it's also the plot to lord of the rings! In fact let's be fair all you Jedi out there, Lucas borrowed heavily from tons of sources, R2D2 And C3PO were inspired by two yojimbo from Kurusawa's hidden fortress. Vader's armor? Samurai.  Han and Chewy? Gunslinger and sidekick from about any western, and Obi Wan Reeks of Gandalf the Grey, complete with best friend who stabbed him in the back, but he comes back more powerful than you can possibly imagine. 

So what are the other blogs up to you may ask? 

Well,

 Fortune and Glory (days) talks Kreo.

AEIOU and sometimes why discusses power records.

the 30ish year old boy discusses heresy,( By going all pro Star Wars)

and infinite hollywood goes for the retro hat trick with mego!