By
Derek | Friday, May 17th, 2013 at 12:29 am
REVIEW SYNOPSIS: Though it starts strongly, the sophomore journey of the fresh-faced crew of the starship Enterprise covers too little new ground.
MY REVIEW: 
SYNOPSIS: When a rogue Starfleet agent attacks a secret archive, Captain James T. Kirk is tasked with hunting him down and terminating him.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Good opening sequence; strong interaction between Kirk and Spock; good turns by Karl Urban and John Cho.
CONS: Anemic, especially in its revelations; far too derivative of the previous movie; laughable emotional sequences; action scenes that drag on far too long.
Star Trek Into Darkness, director J. J. Abrams’s follow-up to 2009’s Star Trek, is everything its predecessor was, only too much more so. This isn’t necessarily a good thing, though several good things work in its favor. Abrams’s gamble with making over Gene Roddenberry’s classic space opera with a new perspective on a much-beloved universe and fresh faces on seasoned characters reaped a handsome payoff, though astute audience members wondered if he could sustain what often seemed a one-picture trick. They had a right to question how a crop of young actors possibly could play roles so identified with elder thespians that they wove their dramatic tics into the fabric of their characters. Loyal fans, by contrast, knowing the full future history of the United Federation of Planets and the floor plans of the NCC-1701 U.S.S. Enterprise down to the last rivet, expressed honest trepidation at possible revisions to Roddenberry’s timeline, to say nothing of its philosophical underpinnings. The resulting Star Trek was an entertaining if occasionally brainless affair, balancing well the expectations of both a summer movie crowd and faithful Trekkers despite dangling plot lines and scientific rationales bent into configurations that would snap the most pliable rubber.
But it worked even after the novelty wore off, and proffered challenges for a sequel. Could Abrams and company make a follow-up that was less cluttered with the need to make the new timeline work and more focused on the things that made Roddenberry’s utopian vision compelling—namely, character and story?
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Middle school…the final frontier!
I’m going to take a moment to examine why I find this so nerdishly charming in so many ways…
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Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the heck out the Star Trek reboot. It managed to cater to existing fans while being accessible to new ones — exactly what it needed to do. That said, the film did have it’s problems…as this spoiler-laden video easily demonstrates…
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The Internet has way too much time on its hands…
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We don’t often post commercials but when you get Spock 1.0 and Spock 2.0 trading quips and ripping on past events – like The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins! – it simply becomes a requirement.
Enjoy!
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This week’s Saturday Night Live featuring Zach Galifianakis included the omnipresent mock game show. This time around, it was a game show based on HBO’s Game of Thrones.
Enjoy Game of Game of Thrones…
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This is the best thing I’ve seen all week.
“There’s too many different peanuts…looking sad.”
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REVIEW SUMMARY: A fantastic hour and a half of SF television.
MY RATING: 
BRIEF SYNOPSIS: A body falls out of the sky in the Canadian Arctic and sparks an international firestorm in a post-oil world.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Fantastic plotting, acting and potential.
CONS: Never picked up for a series.
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REVIEW SUMMARY: A promising return to form from the SyFy channel.
MY RATING: 
BRIEF SYNOPSIS: In 2046, the Earth has been radically transformed following the arrival of seven alien races and subsequent war between the newcomers and humanity. After the war, the town of Defiance springs up in the ruins of the old world.
PROS: Vivid, immersive new world with lots of potential.
CONS: Story, CGI are somewhat lacking.
After five years of development and a major media blitz, the SyFy Channel has released their latest tent pole show: Defiance. Following the cancellation of shows like Caprica and Stargate: Universe (not to mention the failure to pick up Battlestar Galactica: Blood and Chrome), the channel has a new space-based show. There’s a lot to like here: There’s aliens! Frontier-like settings! Lasers! Drama! A cynical hero! Amongst it all, the network that’s been known for its space shows, such as Stargate SG-1/Atlantis/Universe, Battlestar Galactica, Farscape, and others, finally has something that directly appeals to the fans who have been missing their fix of the prime-time Science Fiction drama that’s been missing from the airwaves for so many years.
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Patton Oswalt appears on tonight’s epsiode of Parks and Rec, where he gives the following awesome filibuster. On Star Wars.
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Lots more scenery and special effects appear in this new trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness. And — gasp! — is that a federation ship facing off against our beloved Enterprise…?
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According to Blastr, two classic science fiction novels are headed to the SyFy channel.
The first is Ringworld by Larry Niven. The four-hour miniseries version of Ringworld follows a team of deep-space explorers investigating an alien artifact. (Guess which one?) The team crash-lands, encounters alien technology, and discovers the ruins of a lost civilization that could control the fate of the world.
The second novel is Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clarke, which depicts the effects of an alien invasion that “turns the Earth into a near-utopia”.
Blastr notes other miniseries adaptations in the works at SyFy: Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King, The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick and an apocalyptic project titled Darkfall.
[via David K. M. Klaus]
It looks like the next genre title getting adapted is going to be Susanna Clarke’s multi award-winning novel Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. It will air as a 7 part series on BBC’s Supernatural Saturday programming block. It is being directed by Toby Haynes
From the Press Release:
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MachinimaPrime has a its first-ever original sci-fi drama web series. It’s called Omega. Directed by Jared Pelletier (In the Hearts of Men), the series takes place five years after humanity’s first contact with aliens, the Earth finds itself in ruins, and guns rule the land. Led by the strongest who remain, a small group of civilian and military survivors are at moral odds as they roam, scavenge, and plan their next steps through a now treacherous planet.
Here’s Episode 1…
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The SyFy Channel premieres Defiance on April 15th, but you can get a taste right now in the 14-minute preview. This is the series that has a simultaneous video game tie-in. Both the series and the game are about a near-future, terraformed Earth. In a town called Defiance, actually, which used to be St. Louis.
Here’s a synopsis of series and game, as well as a 14-minute video preview of the series.
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Well, I suppose this was inevitable…
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I think is a commerical for some new Star Trek videogame. Whatevs…
It’s got William Shatner fighting a Gorn!
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Geek & Sundry, the YouTube video channel started by Felicia Day, has announced a new set of shows for the new season, which begins on April 1st.
Highlights of the press release follow:
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In the prequel to the new season…”the Doctor takes a break on Earth, despondent that he can’t find Clara”…
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