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Keith R.A. DeCandido

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Fiction and Excerpts [4]
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Fiction and Excerpts [4]

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “Sacred Ground”

Mon Jul 13, 2020 1:00pm 47 comments 4 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“Sacred Ground”
Written by Geo Cameron and Lisa Klink
Directed by Robert Duncan McNeill
Season 3, Episode 7
Production episode 143
Original air date: October 30, 1996
Stardate: 50063.2

Captain’s log. Voyager has been invited by the Nechani to take shore leave on their world. The Magistrate gives Torres, Kim, Neelix, and Kes a tour of the caves that serve as religious shrines. Kes and Neelix peel off to check out an altar, but it turns out that it’s forbidden to go there unless you’re a monk, and Kes accidentally crashes into an energy field that puts her in a coma.

[Your creative approach to this problem has fascinated the Nechisti Council.]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

In This Life or the Next — Warrior Nun Season One Is Almost Great

Fri Jul 10, 2020 12:00pm 19 comments 6 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: Netflix

Based on a comic book called Warrior Nun Areala created by Ben Dunn that was published in the 1990s and 2000s, the first season of the new Netflix series Warrior Nun has gone live. It’s overall a good series, but it falls short of greatness due to its reliance on two extremely tired and bad tropes. However, discussing one, possibly both, of them requires a big-ass SPOILER WARNING, so consider yourself warned that this review will discuss all ten episodes of the first season, including the tenth that has major revelations.

[SPOILERS for all ten episodes of the first season of Warrior Nun….]

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “Remember”

Thu Jul 9, 2020 1:00pm 36 comments 3 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“Remember”
Written by Brannon Braga & Joe Menosky and Lisa Klink
Directed by Winrich Kolbe
Season 3, Episode 6
Production episode 148
Original air date: October 9, 1996
Stardate: 50203.1

Captain’s log. Voyager is ferrying a group of Enaran colonists back to their homeworld of Enara Prime. In exchange for getting them home in a fraction of time that their own slower ships would get them there, the Enarans provide Voyager with their superior energy-conversion technology.

[So that’s it? We just go on our merry way and nobody ever has to take any kind of responsibility?]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “False Profits”

Mon Jul 6, 2020 1:00pm 57 comments 3 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“False Profits”
Written by George Brozak and Joe Menosky
Directed by Cliff Bole
Season 3, Episode 5
Production episode 144
Original air date: October 2, 1996
Stardate: 50074.3

Captain’s log. Voyager has detected signs of a wormhole that has appeared in a region of space several times. That indicates that it may come back. Since it’s been there before, the other end may be fixed. It’s a long shot, but worth investigating. Tuvok also detects a nearby Class M world that has Bronze Age technology, but sensors are also picking up a replicator of a type in common use in the Alpha Quadrant.

[Greed is eternal.]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “The Swarm”

Thu Jul 2, 2020 1:00pm 44 comments 4 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“The Swarm”
Written by Mike Sussman
Directed by Alexander Singer
Season 3, Episode 4
Production episode 149
Original air date: September 25, 1996
Stardate: 50252.3

Captain’s log. While Voyager is getting supplies, Paris and Torres take a shuttle to investigate some odd sensor readings. They don’t find anything for several hours, but eventually they do track something—and then they come under attack by an alien ship that beams two people aboard and shoots them both, speaking in a language the universal translator can’t handle.

[Computer, delete the diva.]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “The Chute”

Mon Jun 29, 2020 1:00pm 67 comments 5 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“The Chute”
Written by Clayvon C. Harris and Kenneth Biller
Directed by Les Landau
Season 3, Episode 3
Production episode 147
Original air date: September 18, 1996
Stardate: 50156.2

Captain’s log. A bunch of Akritirian prisoners gather around a chute that opens up to dump in a new prisoner: said prisoner is Kim, and they all start beating him up. He gets tossed from assailant to assailant, until he winds up in Paris’s arms. Kim is relieved right up to the part where Paris punches him in the stomach.

[What do you want for the dead man’s boots?]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

“Just an outbreak of chaos” — Faust: Love of the Damned

Fri Jun 26, 2020 12:00pm 14 comments 1 Favorite [+]
Screenshot: Castelao Producciones

From August 2017-January 2020, Keith R.A. DeCandido took a look at every live-action movie based on a superhero comic in the weekly “4-Color to 35-Millimeter: The Great Superhero Movie Rewatch.” He caught up to real time, as it were, with Joker in January, but now that we’re at the halfway mark of 2020, Keith has taken a look at the 2020 releases to date (Bloodshot and Birds of Prey earlier this month), and now examines the one movie he missed the first time through, 2000’s Faust: Love of the Damned.

Faust debuted in 1987 from David Quinn and Tim Vigil. Consisting of fifteen issues published by Rebel Studios and Avatar Press over the course of the next two-and-a-half decades, they finally concluded the main storyline in 2013. Telling the story of a man who sells his soul to the devil to become a killing machine, he rebels against the devil and fights back.

In 2000, the Barcelona-based company Filmax produced a film adaptation.

[There is no grand design…]

Series: 4-Color to 35-Millimeter: The Great Superhero Movie Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “Flashback”

Thu Jun 25, 2020 1:00pm 48 comments 5 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

The fall of 1996 was the 30th anniversary of Star Trek. To celebrate, both of the shows running at the time, Deep Space Nine and Voyager, did episodes to celebrate this milestone. When I did the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Rewatch from 2013-2015, I did a special thing when I reached this point in DS9’s run: “Tribbles Week Redux,” in which I covered not just DS9’s anniversary episode, “Trials and Tribble-ations,” but also the original series’ “The Trouble with Tribbles” and the Voyager anniversary episode, “Flashback.” I stand by what I wrote in 2014 about the episode, so we’re just going to rerun that entry here. On Monday, I’ll be back with a new rewatch entry for “The Chute.”

[All right, Gamma Shift, time to defend the Federation against gaseous anomalies!]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “Basics, Part II”

Mon Jun 22, 2020 1:00pm 110 comments 2 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“Basics, Part II”
Written by Michael Piller
Directed by Winrich Kolbe
Season 3, Episode 1
Production episode 146
Original air date: September 4, 1996
Stardate: 50032.7

Captain’s log. After getting a summary of Part 1, we look in on the crew stranded on Hanon IV. The crew breaks into groups charged with finding tools, food, water, and shelter. Hogan finds some humanoid bones outside a cave, which Neelix tells him to gather for tools. Neelix downplays the danger from whatever might be in that cave, which proves fatal, as Hogan is eaten by a local animal.

[“You’re more talented in the art of deception than you led me to believe.” “I was inspired by the presence of a master.”]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: Second Season Overview

Thu Jun 18, 2020 1:00pm 57 comments 4 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

Star Trek: Voyager Second Season
Original air dates: September 1995 – May 1996
Executive Producers: Rick Berman, Michael Piller, Jeri Taylor

Captain’s log. In its second year, Voyager had settled into a routine of being a ship of Starfleet personnel that were trying to get home, but also doing the usual seeking out of new life and new civilizations and all that jazz. The Starfleet-Maquis conflict was barely even acknowledged, and while there were still some supply issues, they were never particularly overwhelming, simply one of many problems to be occasionally dealt with.

[No matter what happens, we’ll make it. Remember that.]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “Basics, Part I”

Mon Jun 15, 2020 1:00pm 70 comments 3 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“Basics, Part I”
Written by Michael Piller
Directed by Winrich Kolbe
Season 2, Episode 26
Production episode 142
Original air date: May 20, 1996
Stardate: unknown

Captain’s log. Tuvok visits with Suder in his quarters. The Betazoid has created a hybrid orchid that he wishes to name after Tuvok. Initially, the Vulcan demurs, though he eventually accedes. Suder also wishes to contribute more to the ship, possibly doing some work with the airponics. Tuvok promises to speak to Janeway about it.

[Why is it so dark in here? Somebody turn on the lights!]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Goodbye Puddin’, Hello Sandwich — Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)

Fri Jun 12, 2020 12:00pm 51 comments 7 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: Warner Bros. Pictures / DC Films

From August 2017-January 2020, Keith R.A. DeCandido took a look at every live-action movie based on a superhero comic in the weekly “4-Color to 35-Millimeter: The Great Superhero Movie Rewatch.” He caught up to real time, as it were, with Joker in January, but now that we’re at the halfway mark of 2020, Keith will take a look at the 2020 releases to date (Bloodshot last week, Birds of Prey today), as well as one movie he missed the first time, 2000’s Faust: Love of the Damned.

Harley Quinn was only intended to be a one-shot role. In the “Joker’s Favor” episode of Batman: The Animated Series, the producers thought the episode would work better if Joker had a female sidekick, so they created Quinn. The character was inspired by an appearance by Arleen Sorkin in a dream sequence in Days of Our Lives in a jester costume, and the episode’s writer, Paul Dini, was friends with Sorkin, and was able to get her to voice the character.

That should have been it, but hoo hah was it not…

[“You’re that singer nobody listens to.” “You’re that asshole nobody likes.”]

Series: 4-Color to 35-Millimeter: The Great Superhero Movie Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “Resolutions”

Thu Jun 11, 2020 1:00pm 72 comments 8 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“Resolutions”
Written by Jeri Taylor
Directed by Alexander Singer
Season 2, Episode 25
Production episode 141
Original air date: May 13, 1996
Stardate: 49690.1

Captain’s log. We open on a planet where Janeway and Chakotay are in two stasis pods. They’re awakened and are immediately contacted by the EMH. We soon learn that the two were bitten by insects that gave them a virus, and a month of research by the doctor has turned up bupkus.

[A soak in the tub Chakotay built always helps me focus on possible solutions.]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch: “Tuvix”

Tue Jun 9, 2020 11:00am 144 comments 4 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: CBS

“Tuvix”
Written by Andrew Shepard Price & Mark Gaberman and Kenneth Biller
Directed by Cliff Bole
Season 2, Episode 24
Production episode 140
Original air date: May 6, 1996
Stardate: 49655.2

Captain’s log. Neelix and Tuvok are on the surface of a planet gathering samples of a flower that is high in nutrition. Neelix continues to play McCoy to Tuvok’s Spock by trying to get him to be more emotional and enjoy the beautiful day, but Tuvok isn’t having any of it.

[I’ve been poked and prodded in organs I didn’t know I had!]

Series: Star Trek: Voyager Rewatch

Stalled Out on Diesel — Bloodshot

Fri Jun 5, 2020 12:00pm 24 comments 2 Favorites [+]
Screenshot: Sony Pictures

From August 2017-January 2020, Keith R.A. DeCandido took a look at every live-action movie based on a superhero comic in the weekly “4-Color to 35-Millimeter: The Great Superhero Movie Rewatch.” He caught up to real time, as it were, with Joker in January, but now that we’re at the halfway mark of 2020, Keith will take a gander at this year’s releases to date (Bloodshot today, Birds of Prey next week), as well as one movie he missed the first time through, 2000’s Faust: Love of the Damned.

Jim Shooter is one of the most polarizing figures in comics. Getting his start at the tender age of thirteen writing for Legion of Superheroes in 1966, he eventually worked his way up to becoming editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics in 1978. After he was fired by Marvel in 1987, he formed Valiant Comics.

[“All that’s left is Ray Garrison.” “And that’s enough.”]

Series: 4-Color to 35-Millimeter: The Great Superhero Movie Rewatch

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