Archive for June, 2012

2

Free books!

By
Torie Atkinson
– June 30, 2012 10:00 amPosted in: Uncategorized

Some of you may know that I inherited a fairly large science fiction library from my college sci-fi club. The rare and historically significant books are preserved in a rare book library, but I’m left with a bajillion “common,” or not valuable, popular books, which I am sorting through for donation.

Among them I found quite a few Star Trek novels. If anyone on The Viewscreen is interested in these, please let me know. I’ll be happy to post them (even internationally) to a fan rather than donate them, where they will likely to be tossed for lack of interest.

Some are very well read and have many creases (the TNG books mostly); others are in fine shape for 30-year-old books. Here’s the list. Leave me a note in the comments and e-mail me at torie@theviewscreen.com. If you can chip in a buck or two for postage that’s great, but if not, I’ll send them anyway.

List is below the fold.

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28

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “The Outrageous Okona”

By
Torie Atkinson
– June 28, 2012 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“The Outrageous Okona”
Teleplay by Burton Armus
Story by Les Menchen, Lance Dickson, David Landsberg
Directed by Robert Becker

Season 2, Episode 4
Original air date: December 12, 1988
Star date: 42402.7

Mission summary

As the Enterprise makes its way through a twin planetary system, it stumbles across a class 9 freighter called the Erstwhile. Onboard, a single plucky human is trying to whack the side of his guidance system to get it working again. He makes a few flat jokes and Picard, ever the humanitarian, decides to help out this disheveled, saucy “rogue”–let’s call him Sman Smolo–and asks Geordi to work on replacing the guidance system for him.

Smolo, who goes by “Okona,” beams aboard and immediately tries some lines on the lady at the transporter post:

OKONA: And thank you for beaming me here and enabling me to see a truly beautiful woman. You have the majestic carriage and loveliness that could surely be traced back to the noblest of families.
ROBINSON: Well, I’m sure that you’ve said that to many ladies before, and it was no more true then than it is now.
OKONA: But it’s how I say it that’s really important. The warmth, the attraction that I have for you. The attraction that we share.

Riker and Geordi look at one another meaningfully because it’s always funny to watch your coworkers get harassed by arrogant douches, especially when they use words like “carriage” that are probably best left to auto repair guides and not used on women. (Suspension of disbelief destroyed in 3…) Robinson is successfully seduced (…2…) and gives Okona her room number (…1! HAHA YEAH RIGHT). That lovable scamp is going to turn this place upside down, just you wait!

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31

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Elementary, Dear Data”

By
Eugene Myers
– June 21, 2012 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“Elementary, Dear Data”
Written by Brian Alan Lane
Directed by Rob Bowman

Season 2, Episode 3
Original air date: December 5, 1988
Star date: 42286.3

Mission summary

The crew of the Enterprise has absolutely nothing to do for a few days, so La Forge and Data decide to cosplay as Dr. Watson and Sherlock Holmes in the holodeck. Things seem to be off to a great start: The holographic recreation of the drawing room at 221B Baker Street is incredibly detailed, and the friends soon settle into their roles. But as soon as Inspector Lestrade arrives with a case, Data instantly recognizes the scenario as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “A Scandal in Bohemia” and “solves” the mystery immediately. La Forge storms out, annoyed that Data has spoiled the ending of a story published 474 years earlier.

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29

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Where Silence Has Lease”

By
Torie Atkinson
– June 14, 2012 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“Where Silence Has Lease”
Written by Jack B. Sowards
Directed by Winrich Kolbe

Season 2, Episode 2
Original air date: November 28, 1988
Star date: 42193.6

Mission summary

Worf invites Riker to the Klingon’s ultraviolent “calisthenics program,” a lengthy and pointless opening sequence that winds up being the most exciting part of these 44 minutes. The actual plot1 begins2 when the crew stumbles upon a “black void,” or what Data calls “nothing”: no sensor readings, no life signs, just a “hole in space.” This threatens to be interesting but it’s actually just Act I of an absurdist tragicomedy featuring a bridge with no exit.

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31

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “The Child”

By
Eugene Myers
– June 7, 2012 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“The Child”
Written by Jaron Summers, Jon Povill, and Maurice Hurley
Directed by Rob Bowman

Season 2, Episode 1
Original air date: November 21, 1988
Star date: 42073.1

Mission summary

As a shuttlecraft from U.S.S. Repulse drops off Enterprise’s new chief medical officer, Dr. Leonard McCoy Katherine Pulaski, the recently promoted Chief Engineer La Forge shows off his elaborate new containment module to Captain Picard and Commander Riker, who is showing off his new beard. The modules have been designed with completely independent environments, the better to transport dangerous specimens of a plasma plague from ’aucdet IX to a science station for research.

Meanwhile, Commander Data detects a “random energy transference”—a small light that enters the ship through its aft hull and flits through corridors and crew quarters until it darts under Counselor Troi’s blanket and enters her body, uh, aft. Troi wakes up all hot and bothered.

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