Fear Itself

posted by Tygrrius @ 12:30 PM

Fear Itself
Airs Thursdays at 10 PM Eastern, NBC

I've lately been checking out NBC's summer series Fear Itself. As a longtime Twilight Zone and Alfred Hitchcock Presents fan, I'm always drawn to anthology series with a mysterious or supernatural edge. As the title suggests, Fear Itself is a horror series. So far, episodes have run the gamut between psychological horror and more commonplace blood & guts fare.

Brandon Routh (Clark Kent/Superman in Superman Returns) appeared on last week's installment, "Community." This thriller was about a homeowners' association gone wild, controlling every aspect of those who live within its gates. As someone who feels homeowners' associations are slowly taking away the freedom of American homeowners, this episode played on one of my personal fears.

Routh did a great job in his role as a husband trying to combat the association. Given Routh's undeniable resemblance to Christopher Reeve, however, I found the episode's final moment to be chilling and perhaps even unintentionally distasteful. Despite Routh's great work, this won't be an episode I'll watch again.

Though Fear Itself has been uneven so far, I think it's a great premise for a series and I hope NBC will keep this one around. Rating: 7 (out of 10).

"The Cloud Minders" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 7:37 PM

Star Trek (Remastered): "The Cloud Minders"
Remastered Episode #76 (7/12/2008)
Original Episode #74 (2/28/1969)

Though it didn't quite make my must-see list of Star Trek episodes, "The Cloud Minders" is one of the gems of the third season. Unfortunately, I don't have time to fully review this episode tonight. As I used to do when Star Trek: Remastered first hit the air back in 2006, I'm going to focus this short review only on the effects upgrades rather than the episode itself.

With a plot focused around a city in the clouds, "The Cloud Minders" is an episode I've looked forward to seeing since the original announcement of the Remastered series. The original 1969 version of the Stratos cloud city was actually fairly effective for the time. Stratos offers the chance for CBS Digital to showcase their fine work in a way that most other planet episodes do not.

For whatever reason, however, CBS Digital dropped the ball on this episode. Seen from a distance, as when Kirk and Spock are on the planet below, Stratos in the 2008 remastered version looks only slightly more convincing than the vintage version.

While close-up shots of the city details themselves look great, there were wasted opportunities here to really open the shots up, include some movement, and make Stratos seem like more than just a pretty matte painting. In the end, the whole affair comes off looking like another rush job.

I already found the 1969 effects satisfying, so I can't imagine ever watching the Star Trek: Remastered version of "The Cloud Minders" again.

Dramatic Content: 7 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 5

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"Assignment: Earth" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 9:47 PM

Star Trek (Remastered): "Assignment: Earth"
Remastered Episode #67 (5/3/2008)
Original Episode #55 (3/29/1968)

The Enterprise is dispatched back in time to determine how Earth survived "desperate problems" in the year 1968. Considering all of the trouble they almost caused last season when accidentally going back in time to 1969, Starfleet should really think twice before ordering such a mission.

The Enterprise then intercepts the transporter beam of Gary Seven (Robert Lansing), a man who claims to be a twentieth century human sent by aliens on a secret mission to save humanity from itself. Huh? While a confused Kirk tries to validate his story, he throws Seven in the brig though it doesn't hold him long.

The plot, such as it is, serves mostly to introduce creator Gene Roddenberry's proposed and subsequently rejected Star Trek spinoff series, Assignment: Earth. As episodes go, this one is overly long (actually helped, for a change, by the syndication edits) and really not all that interesting. With a flat performance by Robert Lansing, who seems as bored as the viewers, the episode is somewhat saved by an enthusiastic performance by Teri Garr as Seven's quirky secretary, Roberta Lincoln.

The proposed Assignment: Earth series seems like it would have been a sort of Wild Wild West set in the 20th century using Star Trek style technology, with Lansing as a James Bond type character. On paper, not a bad concept. On screen in this episode, it just never takes off.

Though this episode preceded many of them, the real 1968 indeed turned out to be a year with desperate problems. "Assignment: Earth" is notable for containing another chilling prediction. Spock notes that an important assassination will take place on the day they arrive. The episode originally aired on March 29 - six days before the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., on April 4, and just over two months before the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy on June 5.

There seemed to be signal problems in our local broadcast of the episode, resulting in audio problems. The video upgrades did not look as crisp as normal, including a lot of flashing brightness issues. However, I'm going to chalk that up to the local problems, as all previous Star Trek: Remastered episodes have looked much better.

The biggest disappointment on the Star Trek: Remastered version of "Assignment: Earth" is the lack of creativity on the newly replaced visual effects. Most notably, stock NASA footage of the Saturn V rocket, filling in as the launcher of a US nuclear warhead platform, unfortunately remains. I suppose one could question why bother to replace actual footage with computer generated effects, but if that is the case, you could extend that reasoning to all of the Star Trek effects.

If the point is not to improve the episodes, then why bother? I can still watch the original episodes with the original effects. The similarly-themed "Tomorrow Is Yesterday" proves that CBS Digital could have done better than this in the creativity department. The effects upgrades they bothered to make look great, though; these are the basic Enterprise in Earth orbit shots. They should have those down by now, anyway. I'm still docking three points for lack of creativity this time out.

Dramatic Content: 7 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 6
Overall Experience: 7

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"The Enterprise Incident" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 9:11 AM

Star Trek (Remastered): "The Enterprise Incident"
Remastered Episode #64 (4/5/2008)
Original Episode #59 (9/27/1968)

Forget the Klingons, the Romulans have long been my favorite villains of the classic Star Trek universe, though they only appeared in three episodes. All three of the Romulan episodes are among Trek's best: "Balance of Terror" from the first season, "The Deadly Years" from the second, and, completing the informal trilogy, "The Enterprise Incident" from the third season.

"The Enterprise Incident," which made its Star Trek: Remastered debut over the weekend, starts with a foreboding medical log by Dr. McCoy. Captain Kirk seems to be buckling under the pressure of command, like so many others before him. An angry Kirk orders the Enterprise into the Romulan neutral zone and Romulans soon surround the vessel. To the astonishment of the crew, the Romulans are now using Klingon battle cruisers.

When Kirk berates Spock for not detecting Romulans in the area, the first officer notes that the Romulans have a new cloaking device capable of fooling their sensors. Though not specified in the episode, this is evidently an upgraded, more powerful version of the Romulan cloaking device previously featured on the show.

On the original version of this episode, three Klingon-style battle cruisers surrounded the Enterprise. In the first and second seasons, the original Trek team did not have the budget to create a Klingon spacecraft. They finally created the battle cruiser model for the third season. The first episode produced to make use of the Klingon battle cruiser was "Elaan of Troyius," in which the Federation has yet another planetary claim dispute with the Klingons. Ironically, "The Enterprise Incident" aired prior to "Elaan of Troyius," so 1968 audiences first saw the Romulans using the vessel rather than the Klingons.

While updating the special effects of the entire Star Trek series, the Star Trek: Remastered team has liberally sprinkled the Klingon battle cruiser into earlier Klingon episodes where its use makes sense. The battle cruiser is a fantastic design by Matt Jefferies, who designed the original USS Enterprise as well. The battle cruiser also appeared in three Star Trek movies and several TNG-era episodes, without significant design changes.

Here, the Remastered team's computer generated renderings of the battle cruisers look mostly realistic. As a nice finishing touch, they added a Romulan paint scheme to the vessels, distinguishing them from the Klingon versions. Since the original creators had to reuse the model and footage, this sort of episode-specific detail could not have been performed on the original model.

Another change is that only two battle cruisers appear in the Remastered version of "The Enterprise Incident." The team has replaced the third with a Romulan bird-of-prey, as seen on the previous episodes. This is another nice finishing touch and continuity nod, well worth the small canon ripple. Check out pictures of the new scene here.

The Romulans order the Enterprise to stand down and demand that Kirk and Spock beam aboard the flagship. They do so and meet the Romulan commander (Joanne Linville), a woman who seems to share an instant attraction with Spock. The increasingly erratic Kirk blames the encroachment of the Enterprise on equipment failure, while Spock tells the Romulan commander that Kirk and Kirk alone is responsible.

Picture and sound upgrades are superb. With vibrant colors throughout, the episode looks even better than it did on the 2004 DVD set. As noted, the new special effects are quite effective in most scenes. I would have preferred a bit more creativity when the Enterprise extracts itself from the Romulan vessels near the conclusion, though, rather than the simple maneuver shown.

"The Enterprise Incident" is one of Star Trek's very best and is always a must-see, in its original version or its newly remastered form.

Dramatic Content: 10 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 9
Overall Experience: 10

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"That Which Survives" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 8:34 PM

Star Trek (Remastered): "That Which Survives"
Remastered Episode #61 (3/15/2008)
Original Episode #69 (1/24/1969)

While Kirk, McCoy, Sulu, and D'Amato are in the process of de-materializing to beam down to a deserted planet, a woman suddenly appears in the transporter room, tells them that they "must not go," and then kills the ensign manning the controls by simply touching him.

After they appear on the planet, the landing party immediately encounters a violent storm. CBS Digital's newly-created scenes of the Enterprise encountering that same disturbance in space are, unfortunately, laughable.

Standard shots of the ship in orbit and moving through space look great, as I've come to expect from the Star Trek: Remastered effort. The newly created planet also looks fantastic.

As it has since the beginning, though, Remastered still seems to suffer from a time and/or budget crunch that makes some of the new effects look shoddy while others look brilliant. I consider myself a huge fan of this project, but this is a very disappointing aspect.

The landing party soon discovers that the Enterprise is no longer in the area. Sulu even suggests that it may have blown up, prompting a quick reprimand from Kirk that he is not interested in Sulu's guesses. In fact, Kirk chides Sulu a couple of times in this episode - almost making me want to give it another point just to see the overrated helmsman finally get his due.

Meanwhile, Spock and the others aboard the Enterprise are trying to figure out what happened to the planet, which seems to have disappeared, before they discover that the starship has actually been transported across the galaxy.

Like Kirk, Spock is also more irritable than normal in this episode - resulting in another nice exchange where he points out the uselessness of Scotty's comment that transporting the Enterprise such a great distance in so short a time is "impossible." Since it happened, it is obviously possible.

On the planet, what appears to be the same woman appears and, not finding any red-shirted crewmembers, kills the blue-shirted Lieutenant D'Amato - to the delight of the audience, since it spares us having to hear more of his bland delivery.

The "folding" effect used to materialize the woman appears to be essentially the same as the one on the original version of this episode, as I recall anyway. I'm glad they left this alone, as it was a unique feature of this episode.

Sulu's inferiority complex must grow, as Kirk keeps up his beating. Maybe Sulu made a huge mistake between episodes and is still facing Kirk's wrath. When Sulu notes that D'Amato's death is a "terrible way to die," Kirk sharply replies, "There are no good ways, Sulu."

Later, after they bury D'Amato in a "tomb of rocks" (not unlike the fate that will befall Kirk in Star Trek Generations), Sulu notes, "It looks so lonely there."

"It would be worse if he had company," McCoy tells him.

As Kirk, McCoy, and Sulu try to resolve the mystery on the planet, Spock and Scotty have their own problems on the Enterprise. An identical woman is also appearing there and killing off crewmembers, and the Enterprise just doesn't "feel" right to Scotty.

There's some chilling music in this episode, some of the best of the series. As a mystery episode, "That Which Survives" has a lot of potential and delivers on some, if not all, of it.

By the time of "That Which Survives" in 1969, Star Trek was in the home stretch. Only ten episodes of the three-season series came after this one in production. Conventional Trekkie wisdom has it that Star Trek "jumped the shark" several episodes earlier with the infamous "Spock's Brain."

As I've said before here, I just don't buy that. Yes, "Spock's Brain" is a bad episode but it hardly destroys the entire third season for me. The third season features a new lighting approach to many scenes aboard the Enterprise, toning things down from the colorful and bright previous seasons. There are also noticeable improvements to the special effects in the original versions of these episodes, particularly early on in the season. Perhaps we see a small glimpse of what might have been, production-wise, had the series endured for the fourth and fifth seasons it deserved.

Sure, compared to previous years, there are fewer top-notch episodes in the third season. However, there are plenty of average-yet-solid, "meat and potatoes" episodes. "That Which Survives" is one such episode. While it may not be as memorable as "The Tholian Web" or "The Enterprise Incident," it still offers up what the original Star Trek nearly always delivers: a solid hour of entertainment and adventure.

Sports teams cannot survive on their star players alone. They must have solid players all around to support those stars, and they must have depth in key positions should a player go down. In a season with few "star" episodes, "That Which Survives" represents the depth of the series. Star Trek is great not only for its stand-out episodes, but also for its average episodes like this one.

Dramatic Content: 5 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 7
Overall Experience: 5

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"By Any Other Name" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 7:42 AM

Star Trek (Remastered): "By Any Other Name"
Remastered Episode #60 (3/8/2008)
Original Episode #50 (2/23/1968)

"By Any Other Name" is the episode that started it all. For me, anyway. In the late 1970s, when I was two or three years old, I watched Star Trek in reruns all the time with my older brother. Though I'm sure there were others before it, this is the first specific episode that I can remember watching.

Of course, the Star Trek: Remastered version of "By Any Other Name" isn't exactly the same as the one I watched as a kid. CBS Digital has revamped all of the visual effects with CGI, added a new matte painting of an alien landscape, and thoroughly improved the overall picture quality. A member of the Star Trek: Remastered team sent me a couple of screenshots on Thursday. Since I didn't have a preview article in the works but was planning to review the episode, I decided to save them for today. Click on each picture to see larger versions.

The Enterprise responds to a distress signal that turns out to be bait. The technologically advanced Kelvans of the Andromeda galaxy want to use the ship to get back to their own galaxy to report that ours is ready to be conquered. Andromeda will be rendered uninhabitable over the next couple of thousand years and the Kelvan scout ship was damaged beyond repair breaking the barrier that surrounds the galaxy (the one the Enterprise managed to traverse in "Where No Man Has Gone Before"). Though the journey to Andromeda would take the Enterprise over a thousand years in normal circumstances, the Kelvans plan to modify her to allow her to arrive in only three hundred.

To assist them in the use of the Enterprise, the Kelvans - who normally are large beings with a hundred independent tentacles - have assumed human form. In fact, they appear to be "perfect human lifeforms" that exhibit textbook responses. Dating all the way back to "The Cage," this is always an indication of trouble to follow.

The new matte painting (above), which is beautiful yet not too distracting from the overall 1968 feel of the scene, appears only for a few seconds early on. It features a large moon reflected in a beautiful lake. It would have been a nice enhancement to show the Enterprise pass this moon from space while leaving orbit of the planet. CGI renderings of the Enterprise are extremely realistic throughout this episode, though, so I can easily forgive them. Perhaps the moon was on the other side of the planet from where they broke orbit.

Unless you're a Vulcan, hijacking the Enterprise is normally a difficult undertaking. It helps when, like the Kelvans, you have power belts that can temporarily paralyze humans or turn them into small, tetrahedral blocks. Yeoman Leslie Thompson (Julie Cobb) is one of the first turned into a block. A human can be restored from this state as long as the block remains intact. Fortunately, the Kelvans spare us any further bad acting from Cobb by crushing her block into dust. The transformation and crushing of the block is actually the reason I so vividly recall this episode from back then, as it truly scared the two-year old version of me.

Since it didn't happen often due to the episodic nature of the series, I always love when one Star Trek episode specifically references another. When the Kelvans tell Kirk about the barrier surrounding the galaxy, he remarks dryly, "Yes, I know. We've been there." The Kelvans apparently reinforce the Enterprise in some way, though, as the destructive and ESP enhancement properties of the barrier do not come into play this time. Kirk later references an escape ploy used by Spock on Eminiar VII in "A Taste of Armageddon" and Spock tries it again.

As the Enterprise embarks on the three hundred year journey, the Kelvans reduce all of the crew to blocks except Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Scott, all considered essential personnel. The supposedly mentally superior Kelvans make the mistake of hijacking Kirk's ship but still allowing him free roam of it.

All-in-all, "By Any Other Name" is one of those average but enjoyable episodes of Star Trek. The remastered version looks incredible and is definitely worth checking out.

Dramatic Content: 5 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 9
Overall Experience: 5

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

Images are copyright, © 1968, 2008 by CBS Studios and Paramount Pictures. Star Trek is a registered trademark of CBS Studios Inc. All rights reserved.

Knight Rider (2008) TV movie

posted by Tygrrius @ 6:30 AM

I love it when I'm wrong and something turns out much better than I expect. The early promotional material for NBC's latest attempt to revive the Knight Rider franchise didn't exactly blow me away. I didn't think the Ford Mustang version of KITT looked nearly as cool as the Pontiac Trans Am, and I didn't like Will Arnett as his voice.

Knight Rider is a two-hour sequel movie to the original series. It is intended as a pilot of sorts for a new series, which NBC has not yet decided to produce. My reservations about the Mustang replacing the Trans Am faded away soon enough, as the new KITT makes an early appearance when the home of his designer, Charles Graiman (Bruce Davison), is robbed at gunpoint. I was pretty much sold on Knight Rider by the end of the opening credits, which feature more scenes of KITT and an updated version of the classic theme song.

It turns out the thieves are after Graiman's hard drives so they can access Prometheus, a Pentagon project also designed by Graiman and capable of starting full-scale war. KITT escapes the break-in and tears off to Stanford University to warn Graiman's daughter, Sarah (Deanna Russo). Since she is the only person that can break through her father's access codes, she becomes an instant target for the "bad guys."

And that's probably where Knight Rider feels most like a typical 1980s series. The bad guys here are just that, one-dimensional caricatures that come close each time one is on screen to looking right into the camera and telling us, "Yeah, I'm the bad guy."

I, for one, enjoyed the easy-to-hate villains of the 1980s, so I'm not really complaining here. While I think this approach works to stir the nostalgic feelings necessary to re-launch Knight Rider, if the show is picked up as an ongoing series the writers will likely need to make adversaries and plots that are more complicated in order to meet the expectations of modern audiences. Hey, if they're writing for children of the 1980s like me, then I'm all for "bad guys" to root against, though.

KITT rescues Sarah just as the bad guys catch up with her and whisks her away to find Mike Traceur (Justin Bruening), Sarah's childhood friend, later boyfriend, and now ex-boyfriend. Graiman told KITT that Mike would be Sarah's protector in such a scenario. Traceur has his own problems, as he is nearly $100,000 in debt to a loan shark.

In the world of the 21st century version of Knight Rider, every vehicle appears to be a Ford (the show's sponsor, as noted in an early commercial: "NBC's Knight Rider is brought to you by the star of the show, the Ford Mustang"), though a quick line does mention that the original KITT was a Trans Am.

Since we're in 1980s mode, I'll tell you that the new version of KITT is awesome. The sleek, black Mustang has many updated features that are reminiscent of the original. The special effects, including scenes of KITT repelling bullets and morphing into disguise, are top-notch for a television movie.

As I told you a couple weeks ago, Val Kilmer replaced Arnett as the voice of KITT not long before yesterday's airdate. This unplanned, last-minute change may have been a blessing in disguise for Knight Rider. The promos of Arnett talking as KITT sounded like he was doing a bad imitation of original voice William Daniels. Kilmer brings a whole new take on KITT's voice and makes it his own rather than a poor copy.

After an exciting first half, the second half of Knight Rider unfortunately throttles down. Davison turns in an uninteresting performance as Graiman, while Susan Gibney as Mike's mother, Jennifer, proves to be equally uninspired. Knight Rider also suffers from having four endings, which contributes to the overall slowness of the second half of the movie.

Still, the positives far outweigh the negatives for the new Knight Rider, which does exactly what it should by evoking the feeling of the original without being beholden to it. Stars Russo and Bruening prove more than capable enough to carry the movie, which establishes, for the first time since the 1980s, that Knight Rider can be a viable, modern franchise in the right hands. Hopefully, Knight Rider will indeed get its series and continue along, with some tweaks, at the same quality established here.

Story: 7 (out of 10)
Performances: 8
Visual Style: 10
Effects: 10
Music: 8
Overall: 9

American Masters: "Good Ol' Charles Schulz"

posted by Tygrrius @ 5:47 AM

American Masters: "Good Ol' Charles Schulz"
Original Airing: 10/29/2007

We don't review a lot of PBS shows here on The Film Frontier. In fact, this episode of American Masters is the first one. Why the sudden interest? This installment is devoted to none other than Charles M. Schulz, American master, American legend, American genius, and creator of Peanuts.

Having been born in the mid-1970's, I can't remember the first time I experienced Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and the rest of the gang. Thinking back, it just seems like they were always there and I was pretty much born a fan. Most likely, my first exposure was not to Schulz' daily comic strip but to the myriad of television specials.

Back in those days, you had to watch stuff when it aired. The general public didn't have VCRs or other video recording technologies. Unfortunately, it thus took me years to see a Charlie Brown special in its entirety. I would wait for the forthcoming airing all day, nearly cheering through the animated logo for "A CBS Special Presentation" that always signaled one was about to begin. To this day, that logo makes me think of Charlie Brown.

The show would start and whether it was themed around Christmas, Halloween, Valentines, Thanksgiving, Arbor Day, or some other holiday, I loved it. Then, the inevitable would happen: the first commercial break. Much like the CBS Special Presentation logo marked the beginning of the special for me, the first commercial break might as well have marked the end of it.

Despite my enthusiasm for Charlie Brown and Snoopy, I was unable to make it through the commercials. Every time for years, it seemed, I would fall asleep. Later that night, someone would wake me up at the end to take me to bed and I would cry realizing I had missed yet another Snoopy cartoon.

"Good Ol' Charles Schulz" is a 90-minute episode of American Masters that I stumbled across while channel surfing a week or two ago. I'd not watched American Masters before, but it's fairly similar to A&E's Biography.

With only a high school education and art training from a correspondence school, Charles Schulz became artist and writer of the greatest daily comic strip. He penned 18,977 Peanuts comic strips in a fifty year period, never outsourcing any of the art or writing. Along the way, there were also the TV specials, movies, and plenty of merchandising.

"Good Ol' Charles Schulz" shows us that it was the daily comic strip, though, that kept Sparky (as friends called him) going. In a life marked by as much change and turmoil as that of you or I, the comic strip was his one constant.

The documentary is well assembled, drawing on contemporary interviews with friends and colleagues (including real-life inspirations for the "Little Red-Haired Girl" and Linus) and archival interviews with Schulz himself.

Close-up footage of Schulz drawing his deceptively simple-looking characters is priceless. The documentary also uses a very effective slide-book approach to displaying various installments of the daily strip, including the very first one back in 1950.

In 1965, Coca-Cola was interested in sponsoring the first television special based on Peanuts. The idea was sold on a Wednesday, and Schulz had the script ready by that Monday. The story? A Charlie Brown Christmas.

For that first special, Schulz had to battle CBS on a number of issues. He insisted that actual children voice the characters and that a laugh track not be used. CBS executives were also concerned about overt religious references appearing in a Christmas special (it seems that television executives have not changed so much over the years). None too pleased with the results, CBS was ready to turn the special into a big tax write-off.

Then, A Charlie Brown Christmas aired on December 9, 1965. The next day, the documentary notes, "all heaven broke loose." After a huge ratings smash, CBS quickly ordered four more specials.

"Good Ol' Charles Schulz" paints a portrait of a man who could seemingly connect to the entire world through his comic strip, but had trouble connecting personally with family and friends. He lived through his strip.

"Do you think God ever gets discouraged?" he asked a friend and reverend as he was going through a divorce from his wife of over twenty years. It seemed he threw himself into his work while experiencing his marriage problems, for the documentary notes that the period leading up to his divorce in 1972 was one of his most creatively productive.

Schulz married again in 1973, a 27-year union ended only by his death in 2000--just a day before the publication of the final Peanuts strip.

Speaking of his many fans, a tearful Schulz, battling cancer, told Al Roker in his last on-camera interview, "It is amazing that they think what I do was good. I just did the best I could."

* * *

Do you know the great thing about PBS? No commercials. I didn't fall asleep during "Good Ol' Charles Schulz." But I still cried at the end.

Overall Experience: 9 (out of 10)

Related Links
American Masters: Charles Schulz
Includes an excerpt from Schulz and Peanuts, the new biography by David Michaelis. You can also check airtimes for repeats of "Good Ol' Charles Schulz" in your area.

The Official Peanuts Site
Includes a revolving 30 days worth of classic Peanuts strips, historical info, and lots of great merchandise.

The Peanutizer
Which Peanuts character are you? I'm most similar to Linus, according to PBS' Peanutizer. As personality tests go, it's not exactly spot-on but it's still fun.

"This is a distinct philosophy of mine ... No problem is so big or complicated that it can't be run away from!"

Although Linus Van Pelt carries a blanket and sucks his thumb, he is also a decisive and serious intellectual with philosophical insight. He has wisdom beyond his years, and this paradoxical maturity helps him put up with his older sister, Lucy. He is not interested in romance, and he often rebuffs Sally when she vies for his attention. Linus is kind to his friends and strives to be ethical.

"The Deadly Years" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 9:52 AM

Star Trek (Remastered): "The Deadly Years"
Remastered Episode #48 (11/10/2007)
Original Episode #40 (12/8/1967)

"The Deadly Years" is one of Star Trek's best episodes, so I've been looking forward to seeing the remastered version of this one for some time. After visiting planet Gamma Hydra IV, near the Romulan neutral zone, Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scott, and Galway experience rapid aging. The only member of the landing party not affected is Chekov.

McCoy runs multiple tests on Chekov (Walter Koenig) to determine why he's immune to the condition. Unfortunately, a lot of the ensuing fun moments from Koenig are lost in the syndication cuts to allow more time for the expanded commercial breaks of 2007.

As the aging Kirk, William Shatner proves once again that he is a top-notch actor. His portrayal is quite convincing, which makes the episode all the more realistic. Fantastic makeup effects by Fred B. Phillips also convey the illusion of age.

McCoy takes on a thicker-and-thicker Southern accent as he ages, in a wonderful performance by DeForest Kelley. "I'm not a magician, Spock. Just an old country doctor."

"Yes, as I had always suspected," retorts Spock.

The rapid aging effect will kill them all within a week unless McCoy finds an antidote. Meanwhile, Commodore Stocker is aboard, anxious to be ferried to Starbase 10. When Stocker assumes command of the Enterprise due to the senility of the senior staff, Kirk calls him a "chair-bound paper-pusher."

To top it all off, there's a showdown with the Romulans. "The Deadly Years" even includes references to previous episodes ("Balance of Terror" and "The Corbomite Maneuver"), a rare touch for the original series.

The updated effects by CBS Digital are mostly high-quality. We finally get to see multiple Romulan warbirds taking on the Enterprise, as indicated in the dialogue but never shown until now. The image quality, even on non-effects sequences, has never looked better.

All in all, an episode I'll remember in my old age . . . which won't be for some while I hope.

Dramatic Content: 10 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 8
Overall Experience: 10

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

Chuck, Journeyman, Bionic Woman (9/29 TV Roundup)

posted by Tygrrius @ 9:42 PM

I'm famous for not watching current television shows. I tend to pick them up later on DVD, if at all. This year, I've decided to watch some new TV rather than waiting months for the DVDs. With that goal in mind, I tried out a few new shows this week.

Chuck
Episode 101: Pilot
Airs Mondays at 8 PM Eastern, NBC
Official site
Though the blah title tried to turn me away, I taped this one on a whim and I'm sure glad I did. Chuck (Zachary Levi) is a geeky guy who is more comfortable with comic books and video games than he is with women. You know the type. He wants to write a five-year plan to improve his life, but hasn't figured out the right font yet. His fingers are chafed from playing Call of Duty for hours on end. And his sister (Sarah Lancaster) has to invite women from her work over for his birthday party in hopes of getting him a date.

Chuck, who manages the Nerd Herd at Buy More, receives vital security information and beautiful CIA agent Sarah Walker (Yvonne Strahovski) arrives to retrieve it from him. It was a terrific premiere episode, with a proper mix of humor and action. Adam Baldwin (Superman Doomsday, Firefly) is also featured. McG, who was one of many directors once set to direct the fifth Superman movie before Bryan Singer took the reigns, directed the premiere and executive produces the series. Don't miss it, folks. Rating: 10 (out of 10).

Journeyman
Episode 101: Pilot
Airs Mondays at 10 PM Eastern, NBC
Official site
When I saw the previews for this one, I immediately thought "Quantum Leap rip-off." Still, I thought I'd give it a try. With no explanation or warning, Dan Vasser (Kevin McKidd) suddenly finds that he has traveled back in time. His sudden disappearances and bizarre behaviors in the current timeline cause his family and friends to think that he's on drugs. Dan has no control over the time traveling, though he begins to find a mission of sorts linking his various time travels.

I'm not sure how well Journeyman will fare with the general public (i.e., people who don't visit The Film Frontier on a regular basis). A lot of the time travel indications are rather subtle. Sometimes, you can tell he's gone back in time based on which hosts of the Today show happen to appear on TV screens. International audiences and others who don't regularly watch NBC may miss this entirely. Time travel stories are interesting but can often be confusing if not handled properly. They will have to be careful not to lose the audience.

The premiere starts off rather slowly and initially I was thinking I probably wouldn't be watching again next week. About halfway through, though, things finally pick up when a mystery begins to unfold. This is probably one of those season-long or series-long mysteries. This one could be promising and is worth checking out. Oh, and it didn't feel like a Quantum Leap rip-off after all. Rating: 7.

Bionic Woman
Episode 101: Pilot
Airs Wednesdays at 9 PM Eastern, NBC
Official site
I missed the original version of this series, though I've certainly heard a lot about it over the years. Since I like movies and TV series with strong female characters, this one seemed like it would be a good fit. Jaime Sommers (Michelle Ryan) is involved in a horrible car crash and loses both of her legs, an arm, and an eye. Fortunately (or unfortunately) for her, her boyfriend happens to be an expert in bionic technology and he rebuilds her.

There's a great scene in the premiere that looks like it would've been a fantastic cameo for Lindsay Wagner, the original Bionic Woman. Jaime sprints past a car driving along at a high speed. A little girl in the car tries to point her out to her mother, who is driving. The mother never sees her and tells her daughter not to make up stories. Though Wagner does not play the mother, it just feels like it was written as a cameo.

Maybe it's because the scene is likely an homage to the classic scene in the extended version of Richard Donner's Superman in which a little girl on a train (Lois) sees a teenaged Clark running past and her mom won't believe her. Her mother was Noel Neil, the original live-action Lois Lane. Her father, Kirk Alyn, the original live-action Superman.

The Bionic Woman premiere isn't great, but is interesting enough to warrant tuning in again next week. Ryan does a fantastic job in the lead and is very reminiscent of Helen Slater (Supergirl), one of my favorites. Plus, the episode concludes with bionic woman-vs-bionic woman martial arts action, so it can't be all bad, right? Rating: 6.

By the way, if you missed any of these episodes, you can watch them in their entirity on NBC.com through the links I've provided above. Seems that I didn't have to worry about recording them with my archaic VCR and VHS tapes after all.

"The 'Galileo' Seven" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 7:24 AM

Star Trek (Remastered): "The Galileo Seven"
Remastered Episode #41 (9/15/2007)
Original Episode #14 (1/15/1967)

A new season of Star Trek: Remastered is upon us. By default, this is the last season--at least for updates to the original series. Unless, of course, they decide to CGI all of the visuals on the animated series. Once they had their approach down, they could even create new episodes to fill out the season. I'm sure there are some leftover scripts or concepts around somewhere.

Back to reality, though. "The Galileo Seven" kicks off the 2007-2008 season, a perfect choice for the lead-in. One of the best Star Trek episodes, it also offers a potential extravaganza of visual effects. With last season's 40 episodes under their belts, is CBS Digital ready to take it to a new level?

Things start promisingly enough, as we get a fantastic view of the Enterprise approaching Murasaki 312, a quasar-like formation. (Check out our preview article about this episode for a still of this and other key effects sequences.) The Enterprise is en route to Makus III with urgent medical supplies but since he has a couple of extra days, Captain Kirk decides to send a shuttle out to investigate the quasar.

Kirk claims he must do this, due to "standing orders to investigate all quasars and quasar-like phenomenon." I don't buy it, though. I think he just wants to get under the skin of Galactic High Commissioner Ferris, on board to deliver the medical supplies. Ferris is one of those annoying Federation bureaucrats that the Enterprise carts around from time-to-time. You know, the ones who are always trying to order Kirk around aboard his own ship. The plague of government bureaucracy is alive and well in the 23rd Century, it seems.

Though he stays aboard the Enterprise (someone has to organize the subsequent rescue attempts, after all), Kirk loads the shuttlecraft up with just about his entire senior staff. Also joining Spock, McCoy, and Scotty are Yeoman Mears and Lieutenants Boma, Gaetano, and Latimer.

The shuttlecraft launch is outstanding, and we even get a nice view of another shuttle, Columbus, sitting on the flight deck as the Galileo departs. We've seen other shuttle launches on Star Trek: Remastered before, but I still can't get over how real the effect looks. To see the Enterprise and other classic vehicles from original Star Trek fully realized for the first time has been nothing short of amazing, a lifelong Trekkie's dream-come-true. CBS Digital is doing all of this with budget limitations that are rivaled only by time constraints.

As you might expect, things go horribly wrong and the shuttle crashes after losing contact with the Enterprise. Not only has the Murasaki effect crashed the shuttle, it has also severely limited the Enterprise's sensor capabilities (not unlike the Mutara Nebula, actually). They are essentially left to search for the shuttle within four solar systems by sight. Ferris, who opposed the scientific mission in the first place, is none too pleased when Kirk informs him that finding a needle in a haystack would be "child's play" compared to finding the lost shuttlecraft.

All of this before the opening credits!

While Kirk has to deal with the nagging Ferris, Spock has his own set of naggers to deal with during his first command. Dr. McCoy gangs up with Lieutenant Boma to pester Spock at every turn. Though I'm a McCoy fan, the writers take him a bit too far in this episode. It seems out of character for him to allow Boma to insult Spock so often and even to jump in with a few thorns of his own. Sure, Spock and McCoy have an ongoing "feud" about passion versus reason but it is usually good-natured.

Here, McCoy just seems mean. Perhaps he has a hard time dealing with stress when Kirk isn't around, as the only other episode I can think of where he seems so out of kilter is "The Tholian Web"--where Kirk is presumed dead and Spock is in command.

The rest of the episode overcomes the problems with McCoy, though. As we see Spock in command for the first time, the Vulcan learns a number of lessons about logic. As he would later tell Valeris in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, "Logic is the beginning of wisdom, not the end." Full of tension, drama, and action, "The Galileo Seven" represents Star Trek at its best.

Speaking of one of his command decisions, Spock notes, "I may have been mistaken."

McCoy retorts, "At least I lived long enough to hear that." That's the McCoy we know and love, so the writers weren't completely off target.

As for Boma, he places extremely unrealistic demands on the Vulcan. Though he is supposed to show the human consequences of Spock's logical decisions, his constant nipping at Spock gets annoying. When the planet's ape-like natives kill two members of the shuttle crew, Boma insists that they take the time to bury them despite the enormous ongoing danger posed by the natives (the damaged shuttle needs to be freed of excess weight if she is ever to lift off).

While I understand the need to give the dead a proper burial, it's just not the right time for it. You don't jump out of the trench in the middle of a battle to bury the poor guy killed next to you. Otherwise, you'd better dig two holes.

Aboard the Enterprise, Ferris repeatedly stalks on and off the bridge, reminding Kirk constantly of exactly how much longer he has to conduct the search before he assumes command of the ship to deliver the medical supplies. Kirk shows great restraint by not knocking the guy on his bureaucratic ass.

The ape-like creatures have not been updated. They still throw small spears that suddenly turn larger (a creative but failed attempt on the original episode to give a sense of enormous scale to the creatures) and they still look way smaller than 10 to 15 feet tall as they approach one of the crewmembers for a kill.

CBS Digital usually does not tackle these sorts of changes to the on-set costumes and effects, though they did make the Gorn blink last season on "Arena." The end results would likely not justify the time. I think it's fine as it is, as I don't want every single piece of the classic show to be updated anyway. Yes, the creature looks fake, but it's a charming reminder of the simpler television times of the 1960s.

The newly created visuals are breathtaking throughout. We even get to see the Columbus ferrying back and forth from the Enterprise as she searches for the Galileo. One of these includes a movie-quality shot of the Enterprise from below. Fortunately, the Columbus is not similarly affected and crashed or Kirk would have even more officers to find.

If you have an HD DVD player, it's episodes like this one that will make the remastered Star Trek season 1 set worth the seemingly high cost in November. Since "The Galileo Seven" was part of the original series' first season, it is included on the set. (The remastered episodes air out of sequence in syndication.)

"The Galileo Seven" represents the finest work of both the 1966 and 2007 creative teams. This is a must-see.

Dramatic Content: 10 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 10
Overall Experience: 10

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"Tomorrow Is Yesterday" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 11:39 AM

Star Trek (Remastered): "Tomorrow Is Yesterday"
Remastered Episode #29 (5/5/2007)
Original Episode #21 (1/26/1967)

After last week's light-on-effects installment of Star Trek: Remastered, "Tomorrow Is Yesterday" provides the CBS Digital team the opportunity to show off a bit.

Though I unfortunately didn't receive them in time for a preview article, I've intermixed pictures from CBS for this weekend's episode with my review. Click on each picture to view larger versions.

After encountering a black star that hurls her across time and space, the Enterprise falls into a low Earth orbit, nearly out of control. The year: 1969. Just a week before the launch of Apollo 11.

The initial shot of the Enterprise in 1969 is somewhat disappointing. The tiny ship wobbles unrealistically, a little too reminiscent of the 1967 effect for my tastes.

After a return from the opening credits commercial break, though, CBS Digital more than makes up for the weak start with an awe-inspiring view of the Enterprise as she flies over the US midwest (below).

I'm sure that RiffTrax's Mike Nelson would call this "fanboy porn," but if so I'm definitely a fanboy when it comes to TOS. I replayed this sequence several times before proceeding with the episode.

For me, this marks the true achievement of Star Trek: Remastered's potential, a chance to see the original Enterprise as we always imagined her. The new series has been a classic Trek fan's dream come true.

Spotting the Enterprise on radar, the US Air Force sends up a jet fighter to intercept. As the crew regains control of the starship, Spock notes that the fighter's nuclear weapons could prove a danger if the pilot were to open fire.

The Enterprise snags the fighter in a tractor beam, but the aircraft begins to break apart. With no other choice, they beam pilot John Christopher (Roger Perry) aboard.



Throughout the episode are fantastic shots of the Enterprise orbiting Earth (including the one above). Though the pilot has been beamed aboard a ship from 300 years in the future, Kirk naturally decides to give Christopher a tour of the vessel, with no restrictions on what he learns.

As they enter the bridge, Christopher is relieved to find that Kirk is from Earth of the future, rather than an alien. "I never have believed in little green men," says Christopher, who then looks up to see Mr. Spock for the first time.

"Nor have I," replies the Vulcan.

There's a bit of fun in this episode, as the ship's computer has recently been reprogrammed on the female-dominated Cygnet XIV to respond as a flirty woman rather than in the normal monotone, much to Spock and Kirk's dismay.

Kirk and Spock soon must deliver bad news to Christopher: he cannot return to Earth of 1969, for he has seen and heard too much about the future and could pose a danger to the timeline. There are other problems, though, for no one is sure how to return the Enterprise to the 23rd century.

Though it is a solid episode, "Tomorrow Is Yesterday" is not stellar. Parts of it drag on, including a subplot to retrieve footage of the Enterprise taken by Christopher's aircraft while in flight. A subplot rendered meaningless by the episode's conclusion, I might add.



The updated effects are mixed, alternating between unbelievably great and disappointingly mediocre. I'm not sure why there is such a marked difference, except perhaps for the issue that plagues all projects: lack of time. I will say that the good stuff here is terrific enough to make up for the mediocre. I'm left with a feeling of awe, which is how Star Trek is supposed to be.

One aspect of Star Trek: Remastered that I've failed to highlight in previous reviews is the overall enhancement to the picture throughout each episode, not just the effects. Even compared to the 2004 DVDs, these newly broadcast versions have much more vibrant colors and a crisper look.

In many ways, "Tomorrow Is Yesterday" is the perfect episode for the Star Trek: Remastered concept. The original version suffered due to the limitations of the 1967 effects (one shot of the Enterprise leaving Earth had portions of the warp nacelles disappearing, for instance). Now, today is yesterday and it is as if Remastered line producer Michael Okuda and crew were able to slingshot around the sun and give the 1967 team a bit of 2007 technology.

Dramatic Content: 7 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 8
Overall Experience: 8

* * *

Episodes and air dates for Star Trek remastered

US stations carrying Star Trek remastered

For more information

Images are copyright, © 2007 by CBS Studios Inc. All rights reserved. Star Trek and related marks are trademarks of CBS Studios Inc.

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"A Piece Of The Action" (Star Trek: Remastered edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 4:57 AM

Star Trek (Remastered): "A Piece Of The Action"
Remastered Episode #28 (4/28/2007)
Original Episode #49 (1/12/1968)

The Enterprise discovers a planet of mobsters who have patterned their lives on a book called Chicago Mobs of the Twenties. The book was among the items left behind by the USS Horizon, which visited about a hundred years ago and prior to the adoption of the non-interference directive. It's up to Kirk, Spock, and McCoy to undo some of the damage.

William Shatner proves yet again that he's great with comedy, when given the right material. As Spock, Leonard Nimoy is the ultimate straight man. In fact, much of the back and forth between Kirk and Spock in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, the pinnacle of Star Trek comedy, is reminiscent of "A Piece Of The Action."

After riding along in a 1920's style car driven in fits and starts by Kirk, Spock dryly notes, "Captain, you are an excellent starship commander but as a taxi driver, you leave much to be desired."

Later, when they need the car again, Spock hesitates and notes that it's not as safe as walking.

"Are you afraid of cars?" asks Kirk.

"Not at all. It's your driving that alarms me."

The mildly insulted look on Kirk's face after Spock's retort is priceless.

* * *

I'm having a harder time getting excited about Star Trek: Remastered versions of episodes with little or no effects. That's no reflection on the shows themselves, as "A Piece Of The Action" is one of the best.

It's also no reflection on the quality of work by CBS Digital. I'd be the first to complain if they added barrel rolls or other such nonsense to spruce up the few seconds of time that the Enterprise appears in this episode. For the effects that need upgrading, their work is great.

The main problem is that I've gotten used to watching the classic Star Trek episodes on DVD over the last few years and it has spoiled me. No commercials to fast forward through, and, more importantly, unedited versions.

Since fewer commercials aired when Star Trek was first broadcast in the 1960's, most of the classic episodes are around 52 minutes long. To fit the commercial requirements of a one-hour timeslot today, about ten minutes of episode has to be trimmed. That means the edited versions have lost an astounding 20 percent of their original content.

Though CBS makes both edited and unedited versions of the syndicated Star Trek: Remastered episodes available, my local station chooses to air the edited versions. They have to pay the bills, after all. Apparently, most of those bills are paid by 900 numbers offering a variety of services, at least in the wee hours of the morning that Trek airs.

This is a fun episode, one of the all-time classics. Make it a double-feature with Star Trek IV and laugh all night.

Dramatic Content: 10 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 7
Overall Experience: 10

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"All Our Yesterdays" ("Star Trek: Remastered" edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 11:08 PM

Star Trek (Remastered): "All Our Yesterdays"
Remastered Episode #27 (4/21/2007)
Original Episode #78 (3/14/1969)

Though it is essentially an inferior remake of "The City on the Edge of Forever," there's something oddly compelling about "All Our Yesterdays," which was the second-to-last episode to air of the original Star Trek. It certainly would have made a better season/series finale than "Turnabout Intruder."

Maybe it's the librarian with the perfect name, Mr. Atoz (Ian Wolfe). Or perhaps it's Zarabeth (Mariette Hartley), a political prisoner exiled into an Ice Age solitary 5,000 years in the past by an apparently blind evil dictator. There's also a strong performance by Leonard Nimoy, in perhaps his most convincing display of emotions as Spock. (There's no crying in Star Trek!)

Okay, it's Zarabeth. Without her, this episode's probably a five. Six at best.

Arriving just before a planet's sun is about to explode, Kirk, Spock, and McCoy find that most of the inhabitants are missing. The only ones left are Mr. Atoz and several duplicates of him. When Kirk hears a woman screaming for help, he naturally runs off to assist and accidentally steps through a time portal. Don't you hate when that happens?

Seeing their captain vanish, Spock and McCoy of course run after him and vanish, too. Fortunately for them, it wasn't a vaporizer ray. Anyway, Kirk arrives just in time to save an annoying woman in the past. She soon accuses him of being a witch, since he keeps talking to an unseen voice named Bones. The Captain is imprisoned as such and, worse, so is the annoying woman.

Spock and McCoy arrive in a different time period, much farther back, during the planet's Ice Age. McCoy nearly freezes to death and tells Spock to leave him behind. The Vulcan refuses, but soon a mysterious person dressed head to toe in fur appears and takes them to safety in a nearby cave.

The mysterious person turns out to be Zarabeth. She heats up the cave so much that she has to strip out of most of her fur garments. Back in 1969, the NBC censors, in their infinite wisdom, went after "All Our Yesterdays" because Hartley's costume was originally too revealing. They demanded that shocking and disturbing imagery of Hartley's bare . . . belly button not be shown.

I suppose the thinking was that the sight of 28-year-old Hartley's private part would just be too much to handle for whatever audience was left watching Star Trek near the end of its run.

The rest of the actresses' body remained relatively unclothed through most of "All Our Yesterdays," though. Who says that Star Trek lost the vision of Gene Roddenberry in the third season?

Hartley later appeared in Genesis II, a failed Roddenberry TV pilot in the early 1970's. In that show, she exposed two belly buttons. Get it? An extra one to make up for the one they had to cover in 1969. The Great Bird was a clever guy.

As Zarabeth, Hartley heats up the cave, the screen, and Spock. "It is agreeably warm here," he tells her. He uses that line on all the women. Zarabeth's belly button is kept safely hidden, though, so it's okay for the kids to watch this one.

I was going to get into speculation on how the inhabitants of the planet would have been "prepared" for this time travel, essentially escaping to the past to avoid the future. It would seem that sterilization and possibly even memory wipes might be necessary. But then, I remembered those words of wisdom: It's just a show.

CBS Digital makes the most out of an episode that has nearly no effects at all. The Enterprise looks great, they've really got her down. Usually, the ship leaving the planet sequence at the end is a bit of a throway, but this one actually has content. There's an incredible shot of the planet's sun exploding, somewhat reminiscent of Star Trek Generations.

The Star Trek: Remastered version of "All Our Yesterdays" is worth watching, just for those few seconds.

And for Zarabeth, of course, who needs no enhancements.

Dramatic Content: 8 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 8
Overall Experience: 8

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"And The Children Shall Lead" ("Star Trek: Remastered" edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 10:54 PM

Star Trek (Remastered): "And The Children Shall Lead"
Remastered Episode #26 (4/14/2007)
Original Episode #60 (10/11/1968)

"And The Children Shall Lead" is a horrible episode of the original Star Trek. At least, that's what I've read online over the last week or two. And if it's online, obviously, it must be true.

Why the hatred among the normally mild and gentle online population of Trek critics? For one thing, it's a third season episode. Third season automatically equals bad.

And the episode includes, shockingly enough, children. And children just aren't cool. And us Star Trek fans are all cool right? We don't want Annie Skywalker characters to ruin our franchise. We're better than that.

Wesley Crusher.

Now that I've brought you all back to reality, I'm going to go out on a Star Trek limb here and say "And The Children Shall Lead" is not a horrible episode. And the third season does not suck.

There are some horrible episodes of classic Star Trek. I don't watch every episode through rose-colored glasses (of the future!), after all. I can think of four right now, without even trying very hard.

But "And The Children Shall Lead" is not on that list.

The problem with "And The Children Shall Lead" is that there are so many great episodes of the original Star Trek that average, mediocre episodes like this one look worse by comparison.

In many ways, the Remastered effort thus far has been a "best of" collection. Since all 79 episodes will eventually be presented, though, episodes like "And The Children Shall Lead" (and even the truly horrible ones) have to be tackled at some point.

After two effects-heavy episodes in a row, this one offers a bit of a breather to the Remastered team. What's here looks nice, and there are the usual small, polishing touches.

There is one thing that continues to bother me about Star Trek: Remastered, though. I've tried not to harp on it too much but I'll mention it here as it annoys me every single week - especially in third season episodes.

Remastered team, you're doing great and I've tried to support you as much as possible on this little site, but you really need to do something about that opening theme song. I'm not sure why it was necessary to re-record it in the first place. The rest of the music on the episodes has not been re-recorded, so why re-record this?

The new version of the theme sounds horrible. The female vocalist is way too high in the mix. I even compared it against the original version this week, just to see if I was crazy. Still no verdict on my sanity, but the original does not feature the operatic vocals so loudly. I'd prefer to hear the original theme, but at least try turning the female vocals down a bit if you insist on the new version.

All right, that's the last time I'll mention it - unless, of course, it is fixed in the future. And now on with the episode.

The Enterprise arrives at a Federation colony to find all of the adults dead, apparently due to mass suicide. The only survivors are children, none of whom are overly concerned over the loss of their parents.

They are beamed aboard the starship and soon plot to take it over. The children have been empowered with a form of mind control by an evil entity known as Gorgan. Gorgan wants to use the Enterprise to spread his "wisdom" to other planets.

As you might expect, Captain Kirk objects at this point. The children overtake the bridge crew by capitalizing on their deepest, darkest fears ("the beast that will consume them").

Uhura sees her own death, an agonizingly slow one where she looks like an outtake from "The Deadly Years." Contrary to a lot of people's beliefs, Uhura's death apparently does not begin with a fan dance while she sings "The Moon is a Window to Heaven" in the nude.

Kirk's worst fears, of course, are of losing command, losing the Enterprise, and being alone.

As for Sulu, he's apparently afraid of runaway daggars flying backwards through space that would inexplicably destroy the well-shielded Enterprise. His other fears are that people will forget to address him as "Captain Sulu" and that Chekov will get all of the good bit-part lines.

Had they been executed just a bit better and expanded for more of the running time, the "beast within" images of fear may well have nudged this episode up a notch or two. They almost work, creating a sort of Twilight Zone feel. Sci Fi purists will hate it, but they hate most everything (including, alas, the term "Sci Fi").

Is this a heart-pounding episode that will blow you away? No, but it's definitely one that's worth watching. Especially if you're not busy...busy...busy.

Dramatic Content: 5 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 7
Overall Experience: 5

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"The Immunity Syndrome" ("Star Trek: Remastered" edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 7:32 PM

Star Trek (Remastered): "The Immunity Syndrome"
Remastered Episode #25 (4/7/2007)
Original Episode #48 (1/19/1968)

"The Immunity Syndrome" is a terrific but often overlooked episode of the original Star Trek. It first aired during the second season, just three months after the similarly-themed "The Doomsday Machine."

While "The Doomsday Machine" featured a planet killer constructed by a warring civilization, "The Immunity Syndrome" features a naturally-occurring living organism that presents as much, if not more, of a threat. The gigantic "space amoeba" of this episode can reproduce, resulting in enough offspring to destroy the entire galaxy.

When the USS Intrepid goes missing, the Enterprise is diverted from shore leave to find out what happened. The Intrepid is manned by a crew of over 400 Vulcans and Spock instinctively knows they are all dead. Since the Enterprise is populated by over 400 humans with a lone Vulcan science officer, I've always wondered if the Vulcan-heavy Intrepid had a lone human aboard. Doubtful as a science officer, but maybe a janitor or something.

Fearful of facing the same fate as the doomed Intrepid, some suggest fleeing the area. "Our orders do not say 'stay alive' or 'retreat.' Our mission is to investigate," Kirk admonishes them.

En route, the Enterprise encounters a "negative energy field" and is quickly drawn into it. The area is completely devoid of stars. CBS Digital comes through in full force with the effects upgrades here with wonderful scenes of a darkened Enterprise lit only with internal sources rather than the normal, starlit version.

They soon discover they are being drawn towards the space amoeba. McCoy, Spock, and Kirk argue with each other over which of them gets to take on the suicide mission of investigating further with a shuttlecraft. The Remastered team took the right approach on the look of the amoeba itself. It stays true to the original, which was actually a pretty good effect in its own right.

The episode includes some classic McCoy vs. Spock moments, and the Vulcan seems quite pleased when Kirk picks him over McCoy for the mission. Spock points out that it is not the first time that superior capability has won out over higher credentials.

After another nice shuttle launch scene, Spock flies into the amoeba. It's a bumpy ride and Spock notes, "Oh, and Dr. McCoy, you would not have survived it."

"Wanna bet?" Bones answers.

There are some mostly beautiful shots of the Enterprise approaching the amoeba. A few seconds appear rushed or of lesser quality compared to the others, leaving me to wonder if they were perhaps under a more severe time crunch than normal on this effects-heavy episode.

The Enterprise punching through the wall of the amoeba is extremely well executed. Some of the best Remastered work so far.

When the Enterprise takes the shuttle in a tractor beam (against Scott's wishes, I might add, for the chief engineer appeared perfectly content to leave Spock behind), Spock complains that they should release the shuttlecraft rather than risk the starship to save him. "Shut up, Spock, we're rescuing you," McCoy tells him.

Sounding almost amused, Spock actually gives in, "Why thank you, Captain McCoy."

The Remastered team may have restricted themselves a bit too much at times, though. It would have been nice if they cut away from the bridge action for a second or two to show the Enterprise firing a probe into the amoeba or the Enterprise towing the shuttlecraft.

But that's just the Trekkie in me, always wanting more. This episode is one of the finest presented on Star Trek: Remastered so far, right up there with "The Doomsday Machine." It's a lot of fun seeing modern effects applied to my favorite Star Trek series.

Dramatic Content: 9 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 9
Overall Experience: 9

The Film Frontier's Related Articles

"Wolf In The Fold" ("Star Trek: Remastered" edition)

posted by Tygrrius @ 5:20 AM

Star Trek (Remastered): "Wolf In The Fold"
Remastered Episode #23 (3/10/2007)
Original Episode #36 (12/22/1967)

"Wolf In The Fold" offers up a second-season murder mystery from writer Robert Bloch. Bloch is best known, perhaps, for writing a little novel called Psycho. It was later adapted into the screenplay of the Alfred Hitchcock film. Bloch also wrote the Trek episodes "Catspaw" and "What Are Little Girls Made Of?"

After suffering a blow to his skull due to an explosion caused by a woman, Scotty is brought to a night club on a pleasure planet by prescription of Dr. McCoy.

You see, there's a concern that Scotty might subconsciously harbor resentment towards women due to the accident. McCoy's thinking is that watching women dance seductively would ease any such resentment from Scotty's mind. Taking one for the team, Kirk accompanies the two.

Though not an Orion slavegirl, the dancer Kara certainly evokes the style of one. You can almost imagine the shadow of Gene Roddenberry as he watches off-camera.

Scotty sweet-talks Kara and she leaves with him. Unfortunately for the chief engineer, the dancer soon turns up dead - a victim of multiple stabbings. Scott is found holding the weapon. The rest of the episode is spent trying to explain how Scotty could not have committed the murder, or two subsequent ones in which he manages to implicate himself.

"Wolf In The Fold" offers the Star Trek: Remastered team a bit of a breather, as it contains nearly no effects beyond standard Enterprise in orbit shots. The computer-generated Enterprise continues to look beautiful. She looks real.

Forget the effects, though, what really needs replacing in "Wolf In The Fold" is James Doohan's fake Scottish accent. As a featured background player, Scotty is usually acceptable. In the forefront, as he is in this episode, he often becomes annoying. The character is just too much of a caricature to bear the spotlight for long.

Speaking of characters more suited to the background, Doohan looks like an acting genius compared to George Takei in a thankfully brief appearance near the episode's end. He stinks up the place as a tranquilized/drunk Lieutenant Sulu.

This episode marks the first (and, as far as I know, only) appearance of the "psycho-tricorder," probably a nod to Bloch's novel. The psycho-tricorder looks amazingly like a standard tricorder, the major difference being that it is held by the exquisite Lieutenant Karen Tracy rather than somebody boring like Spock. Tracy is left alone with Scotty, though, so her Trek career is short-lived.

All-in-all not a bad episode, but not one of the great ones. The nice thing about the original Star Trek is that it could feature a murder mystery without having an android play dress-up as Sherlock Holmes.

A couple of good companion movies to "Wolf In The Fold" would be Time After Time (written and directed by a pre-Star Trek Nicholas Meyer and starring a pre-Star Trek Malcolm McDowell and a pre-Star Trek David Warner) and Fallen (starring a pre-Star Trek Denzel Washington - who is technically still pre-Star Trek and, thus, still has a career).

Dramatic Content: 7 (out of 10)
Effects Upgrades: 7
Overall Experience: 7