Amnesia of the Future: The Last Outpost

16th November, 2009 9 Comments

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What the hell? 

I just…I mean…Seriously?

Good thing I combined watching The Last Outpost with dinner so that the hour wasn’t a total wash.  Eggplant jambalaya.  It was pretty darn good.  The jambalaya.  Not the episode. 

First off, it didn’t catch my attention watching the show, but reading the corresponding chapter made me wonder why we have firewalls for company and government servers and yet 400 years into the future an alien race with different technology can scan the library of the Enterprise.  How come there is no firewall on the Enterprise’s library?  That’s the problem of setting a story so far into the future without any idea of what new technology is going to appear in the next decade or so.  The writers already predicted the Kindle in Encounter at Farpoint, but they seem to have missed the memo on DRM.  Which would totally come in handy in situations like this.   

falling_hare_restoredThen, we finally meet the the Frengie? Furengy? (Google, please help me!)  Ferengi kind of remind me of a cross between a rotten potato and the little airplane-destroying gremlins in old Bugs Bunny cartoons. 

Have you ever heard the hypothetical question about how many violent killer five-year-olds you could take on and still survive? Watching the Ferengi fight Warf and Data is sort of like that.  Three tiny and effete Ferengi can take on three humans and a Klingon so long as the humans don’t have a woman with them.

For all I know this is an interesting episode, but I’m too distracted by the horrid set that is the planet.  I’ve been on a backstage tour of the Metropolitan Opera and they have such incredible realistic sets that it takes you a minute to realize the rocks are made out of foam and even then only because the tour guide tells you so.  The last outpost looks like it got decorating tips from some horrible pulp B-movie and I half expect a killer tomato to appear instead of the portal.  I hear the sets for the original series looked like they were made out of cardboard, but come on!  Make an investment here.  You can use rocks for EVERY planet, get some nice ones. 

Does anyone else get the impression that the portal is having a grand ol’ time messing with everyone?  There’s this moment where he goes from condemning the crew to being BFFs with Riker.  It’s like a switch goes off and his entire personality changes.  While before he was tight with the Ferengi, he’s now too darn cool to hang out with such dweebs.  Ha.  Silly Ferengi.  He’s just so patronizing to overcompensate for sort of being duped by their lies.

Memories of the Future:  Chapter 5

untitledOh, hey…those Ferengi, they’re supposed to be the big evil enemy we’re afraid of?  Who knew?!  So glad that detail is in the book because I definitely would not have gotten that impression from having just watched the episode.  I’m still just floored that I spent an hour watching that oh my god it was bad.

Apparently Wil Wheaton and I have verydifferent idea of what a great looking planet looks like.  Maybe it’s because I can’t compare this to the original series and their cardboard cut-out sets.  After writing up my initial reaction, I did re-watch the episode and decided the planted wasn’t as bad as my initial reaction.  Mostly just those plastic looking crystal things that made it look all fake and combined with the Ferengi I was predisposed to loathe things more than they maybe deserved.

The chapter definitely came in handy with figuring out just what the hell was going on.  The Ferengi are terrifying in the same way “interpretive” dance is scary, resulting in distraction from what was actually going on. Reading between the lines of snarkiness, suddenly things started to make more sense and many questions were raised, mainly one tangentical to the plot:

Where does the Enterprise get its power that it never needs to refuel a la The Jetsons at some space gas station, and yet within a matter of hours (assumedly) can have all it’s power drained?  Also, food.  Is there some sort of biodome floor that provides food for all these people floating for years in space?

Thankfully, Wil Wheatongoes where I debated, but hedged for a moment–those “whips” totally look like a vibrator/light-saber half-breed.  I worked at Toys “R” Us through high school and we used to play this game called “make fun of all the unintentionally dirty toys” because that’s what horny teenagers do.  Anyway, my favorite was Mr. Bucket with his tag line “The balls pop out of my mouth.”  My second favorite was the light-up, vibrating…light saber.  Way to ruin Star Wars, you stupid toy manufacturers.  Those “whips” looked exactly like that light-up, vibrating…light saber.

I do intend to continue watching, but as Wil Wheaton describes the episode in the first sentence of the “Bottom Line” section of the chapter:

 TNG’s epic struggle to find its way continues!

Sure the characters are taking shape and the acting of the main cast is strong, but the storytelling just seems so frivolous and silly.  Not in any good definition of the words, either.  There were way too many moments of thinking, “What the fuck is going on and who hired the jumping beans to play an evil alien race?  I know of a small rabbit scarier than the Ferengi.”  In the early days of a television series, each episode has to be strong enough to encourage viewers to return the next week.  Instead, The Last Outpost required reading a twelve page recap and re-watching in order to get past all the horrible and just understand what the hell was going on.  Not a good sign. 

Wil Wheaton pointing out in a book twenty-two years after the fact that there are some rather strong elements to the episode and some great changes to come doesn’t change the fact that I will not get that hour (two and a half if you count the reading and re-watching) back.  How the series made it to this wonderful third season I keep hearing about, I will only know because the whole thing is now on DVD and not demanding I remember week after week to tune in.

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9 Comments

Daryl Boman

November 16th, 2009 at 11:10 am    


Very funny stuff! It nails the first season of ST:TNG. As I recall, which is kind of fuzzy because it was around 20 years ago, there was a big advertising build up around the appearance of the the new ‘Bad Guys’ on TNG. Then with much anticipation when we actually viewed the episode, the laughter could not be contained. I think that we continued watching just to see what strangeness the writers would come up with the next week!

Clint

November 16th, 2009 at 3:12 pm    


I found this site via Wheaton’s blog, which means, of course, that I am now insanely jealous of you for having been name-checked by Wheaton.

And without offering the spoilers you’ve probably already heard, I want to emphasize what others have told you: it gets WAY better in season three. You have a lot of really bad episodes ahead, some far worse than this one (The Season Two premiere will just make you feel … pain), but in the end I think you’ll think it worth those lost hours. Just don’t quit … I want to read how you experience my youth, especially once things turn good.

Marcelo

November 16th, 2009 at 3:12 pm    


A few points:

The reason the show was able to stay on the air despite this rather disastrous first season is because it wasn’t a network show, it was first run syndication – rather than go on a big network and compete against other big network shows of the time (which almost certainly would have led to early cancellation), they presold their shows in syndication to smaller networks that didn’t need the massive numbers of an NBC affiliate and thus they were able to stay on the air long enough to develop and grow and find their niche. It was a risky but really bold move, and its success in the first run syndication market led to a ton of other shows like Xena, Babylon 5, and Baywatch (which was originally cancelled by NBC) to try the same model with lots of success.

Also, my info-hippie Free Culture side must make a techy geek point – Firewall and DRM are totally different things. DRM on the Enterprise would mean that the computer wouldn’t be able to provide a Sherlock Holmes program for Data because the Conan Doyle estate didn’t allow it, or that if you read a book on your lil laptop screen you wouldn’t be able to take it with you on your future Kindle. But I understand that’s not your point (which is a really good point). :)

Finally, It’s important to note that the Ferengi get fleshed out much more interestingly once they’re no longer the BIG BAD VILLAIN of Trek. By the time DS9 is hitting its stride there are some magnificent Ferengi-centric episodes featuring some pitch perfect guest casting (the guy they get to play the leader of the Ferengi is the ONLY person you could imagine in that kind of role).

And most importantly, if the Ferengi hadn’t completely flamed out as the big bad villain of TNG, we probably would never have gotten what turned out to be Trek’s biggest baddest villainous race. You don’t even have to wait until season 3 for them to appear. ;)

Stay strong! I believe in you!

@mattstratton

November 16th, 2009 at 9:30 pm    


Actually, Marcelo, I think Christina’s point is valid. One assumes that they were able to connect into the library over the network, and it would stand to reason that said network should be firewalled off to prevent unauthorized network traffic.

Signed, your friendly neighborhood IT pro :)
.-= @mattstratton´s last blog ..Fussy Follow Friday – @doniree =-.

Christina

November 17th, 2009 at 9:50 am    


Nit-picker. Data and the Enterprise are like an ipod and itunes – even with DRM he’d have access to the Sherlock Holmes information.

Marcelo

November 17th, 2009 at 2:54 pm    


“Actually, Marcelo, I think Christina’s point is valid. One assumes that they were able to connect into the library over the network, and it would stand to reason that said network should be firewalled off to prevent unauthorized network traffic.”

I totally agreed with her point too, I just questioned the use of the term DRM, which is a content rights management concept, not an unauthorized network traffic file security concept.

Let’s move on. :)

Eli Morris-Heft

November 19th, 2009 at 2:01 am    


As a life-long Trek watcher, this is an interesting journey to watch. Things that get taken for granted in my mind because I know so much about the universe are not yet set, and it’s great to watch someone bump into them. Stay with it – the universe is worth it, especially in later TNG and DS9. (And Voyager! I liked Voyager!)

So’s you know:
1) The Enterprise collects hydrogen (and other fuel) via a ramscoop mechanism, which essentially means that, as it’s traveling along, it scoops it up out of space. (Yes, there is enough hydrogen just floating around out there to make this plausible. In fact, the ramscoop idea is definitely not Trek-exclusive nor Trek-originated and is one of the only real ways being considered to have a self-sustaining ship in space.) The warp drive requires matter and anti-matter, and uses the energy from smashing the two together. Assuming hand-waving for the containment, that part is actually sound as well, but they had to add the notion of ‘dilithium crystals’ to regulate the reaction, which is pure BS.

2) Food replicators all over the ship provide food for the crew and passengers. There is usually one in every quarters, as well as in Picard’s ready room and in ten-forward of course. Replicators use transporter-like technology to create food (and other things) out of their component atoms. You’ll see plenty of this in various episodes of the show, but talking about it isn’t a spoiler or anything, so I thought I’d answer your question.

Too much detail? Probably. But now you know!

Also, I probably shouldn’t point you towards memory-alpha.org, a Trek wiki that is scarily complete, if you have any self-control issues about clicking links on Wikipedia. Er, whoops…

Christina

November 19th, 2009 at 11:56 am    


Thanks Eli – that helps a lot!

I am working on a review of Lonely Amoung Us and got a hint at the food replicator. But I was quite interested in knowing how the ship ran and have made the decision to stop looking at Wikipedia until after the first season. Then it’s hog-wild obsessive time researching all my questions.

bandsxbands

February 2nd, 2010 at 6:09 pm    


I truly believe that we have reached the point where technology has become one with our world, and I am fairly certain that we have passed the point of no return in our relationship with technology.

I don’t mean this in a bad way, of course! Ethical concerns aside… I just hope that as memory gets cheaper, the possibility of copying our brains onto a digital medium becomes a true reality. It’s a fantasy that I dream about almost every day.

(Posted on Nintendo DS running R4i DS NePof)

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