Latent Image

 DVD, Voyager S5 (Latent Image)

Another ethics-based story after 'Nothing Human' and 'Thirty Days,' and another one where we're kept out of the 'behind the scenes' interactions so as to preserve mystery for the character around which the plot is woven, after 'Counterpoint.' Unlike the latter we're not kept in the dark right to the end - I was expecting it to be more of a secret investigation on the Doctor's part, uncovering clues, and reacting to Seven's sudden compliance like O'Brien to Odo in 'Whispers' - 'no, they got to you, didn't they!' But that never happened and it's a very different story to that 'DS9' great, sharing more DNA with the 'TNG' story about Data protecting the crew by keeping up a mystery that only he knows, though from their perspective he's conspiring against them - I can never remember if it's 'Conundrum' or 'Clues,' both 'C' titles that deal with some kind of plot to pull the wool over their eyes. As you can see, there were quite a lot of influences this episode may have drawn on, but that comes from the 'late' position 'Voyager' occupied, coming in when so many great Trek stories had already been done, and often repurposing them to these characters, which is no bad thing - it's certainly not a problem the current crop of modern Trek series' have since none of their stories come close to the kind of intrigue and adventure since they prefer much more basic action fare. While this episode may not be a masterpiece, it's a good one and I'd take it over any new Trek you'd care to name!

The Doctor discovers part of his memory is missing from an operation he'd performed on Harry Kim way back in Season 3 - you'd think the crew, including Harry, would have had a story ready just in case it did come to light again, though I suppose it was only this specific piece of work done in micro that could set off the Doc's guesswork, and only because his holo-imager showed it. Though you'd think if he could see it on the back of Kim's neck on the hologram he could also have seen it on the live version! I also didn't quite buy that he's been taking snaps as far back as Season 3, because we never once saw him with the holo-imager - while the concept existed way back in 'DS9' Season 3 ('Meridian'), Quark making an illicit recreation of Kira for Jeffrey Combs' first ever Trek role, it wasn't seen on this series until this season. But we don't see every second of every day so it's possible all the times he was taking photos (or should that be photonos!), was off screen. Also, you'd think this technology, if as we see, it can create a three-dimensional hologram of a subject, why it comes as 2D frames rather than a three-dimensional holoprogram of that moment. Either the Doc doesn't really know how to use it properly, or he prefers the 'old-fashioned' snapshot to a full-bodied 3D experience. But if you could record not just an image, but an actual event from every angle that you could then insert yourself into, I think most people would choose to do so, literally reliving fond memories, or perhaps seeing them from a different perspective in the room.

I'm not sure quite how successful the story was in its exploration of the issues - those being whether the Doctor can be treated as a sentient being, or whether he's a tool that they need to rely on and so fixing him is a high priority, even if it means wiping his memory. I must say, you'd think after all these years Janeway would have made it a priority to train up at least some nurses, like Tom Paris, and even some doctors, for the very reason that you don't want to put all your eggs in one basket when it comes to the health of the crew. So why haven't we seen a program of fast-tracked doctors who can take over for when the Doc is inevitably out of action. It's not like this kind of thing hasn't happened before, either. In 'The Swarm' his program was in danger of going kaput because he'd taken in too much data or experiences, and was simply degrading through overuse, exceeding his original programming. A shame they didn't bring in the Dr. Zimmerman diagnostic program (but I think they used it to ensure the EMH's survival, now that I come to think of it), as any time Picardo plays the irascible fellow was great fun (he'd show up again in the following season). We do see some blueshirt crewmen in the memory sequences when the Doc beams to Sickbay with Harry and Jetal, but we also see Tom in red and others in gold, so it didn't appear to be a medical team and could just as easily have been science blueshirts as medical. I imagine it was really down to practical issues such as budget that they didn't want recurring faces in Sickbay (a mistake), and after Kes left there was a move away from showing such training for a position she'd held.

Seven of Nine became the Doctor's pupil, so it was nice to see her standing up for him, though again I didn't find her argument very strong: she's part Borg which she compares to being like a Replicator and like the Doctor, and therefore will Janeway abandon her one day for that reason? It wasn't really an argument, more of an accusatory question, but at least she's learned not to keep pushing as she says her piece, then leaves, instead of getting in the Captain's face and thinking that if she's angry and bolshy enough her point of view will crack Janeway's stubbornness. It's also not the same, since she wasn't Borg from birth (if that's even possible), she was assimilated, so the machinery within her isn't part of her nature. She also wasn't manufactured like a Replicator or an EMH and her wish is to lose as much of her mechanical Borgness as she can (something we saw happen over the course of the series, and which was sadly regressed in 'Picard,' doing so much harm to the character and the reality of her story), whereas the Doctor is a program that has become self-aware, it's not that he's going to change his nature to become organic (though when they eventually bring him back in modern Trek, who knows what they'll do to/with him if they can kill off Data and turn Picard into an android...).

Is it guilt that drives Janeway, because as she says, she'd already gone over the rights and wrongs of the whole situation back when it happened a year and a half ago. The only new input is Seven, since she wasn't there then, although I'd like to think Kes (who was sadly notable by missing from the flashbacks when they could easily have brought back Jennifer Lien for a one-off, just as they'd do in Season 6), would have had the same attitude of protection towards her friend and mentor. In fact, in many ways this felt like a return to the early days of the series when the Doctor was discovering for himself that he could even be more than a mere useful tool, switched on and off like a light switch, while Kes helped him think differently. Janeway's attitude tended toward indifference to what he wanted (as then, he's treated like a robot: you're malfunctioning and need to be repaired), changing slowly to indulgent allowance in gratefulness for all he'd done for the crew, but by Season 3, and certainly by this season, she seemed to have fully accepted him as a member of the crew, so it's strange she didn't think of just pushing him through the experience before. And that is the eventual solution to his issues, simply sit with him as he goes round in mental circles, hoping it'll eventually resolve itself. I'm not really sure there was a resolution in the episode, it just ends and you have to assume his mind came to peace, with a sense of hope from the poetry he reads. I remembered the ending differently with the Doctor just going round and round with his arguments and self-doubt while Janeway sits back and patiently leaves him to run himself down until he has nothing left to say.

I'm glad it was mentioned his program is designed for triage, because that would have to be a key component of an Emergency Medical Hologram, without it he wouldn't be a very effective doctor! But it's explained that it's a conflict between different parts of his program, ethical subroutines, that kind of thing. Has he basically become 'corrupted' by too many human thoughts and emotions, to the point where he may have been more effective if he hadn't developed? It's almost the opposite of what Trek usually likes to say about humanity, but it is truer to human nature - fallen nature. This could be evidence of the Christian worldview, without them even realising what they were saying! The idea of his original programming coming into conflict with what he's become, could, and perhaps should, have been a big overarching story for the character (a little like the Jekyll and Hyde stuff from 'Darkling,' but more subtle). Because it was a momentous event that a hologram could become sentient in this particular situation - yes, we'd seen it as far back as Moriarty (soon to make a reappearance on 'Picard'), and my favourite, Vic Fontaine, but never with someone so integral to a series. It is a detriment to the series that they didn't go deeper into the characters in these later seasons. Not all suffered, I'm generalising, but you can see how well it was done on 'DS9' and can't help realise what potential 'Voyager' had that it didn't reach. Janeway also comes across as a bit pompous when she says they gave him a soul and do they have the right to take it away now, but again, at least we had B'Elanna there to counter, saying it's not really a soul, but personality subroutines, to which Janeway doesn't reply.

If the crux of the whole scenario is a little simple, in that Seven's argument not to play with the Doctor's memory, or Janeway's wondering if perhaps it would be better for him to go through the problem rather than excise it, and it really is as simple as a piece of knowledge the Doctor doesn't know, so he needs to deal with it, then I will say the message was good: work through problems, don't blank them out. We'd later see a version of the EMH that has ethical parts of his program removed (in 'Equinox'), and while it's easier for that version to do things he's also quite immoral and even evil. The Doctor needs to confront his own actions and accept what he did, even though in this case it wasn't wrong, it was something that needed to be done. That's really what it all boils down to: getting through a mental issue rather than cutting it out of you. Pretty basic stuff. It could also be taken as a balance between the ideas that knowledge is power, but curiosity killed the cat. It's generally better to know something (even though ignorance can be bliss), but not always. Takes us back to the very beginning: the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in Genesis. The desire to know what you don't know, even when it's been warned you shouldn't know it. If the Doctor hadn't been determined he'd have carried on as he had for the last eighteen months. I suppose the risk would always have been there that he could have had some kind of delayed relapse or found a clue as he did here.

At least the episode does give plenty of room for thought, which isn't the case with every story. The directing was good, the flashback scenes well done, the alien craft well-designed, as was the alien himself - makes me wish we could have met them again, but sometimes a race is only there to provide the basis for the story. I liked the reminder the Doctor doesn't kill people - my immediate assumption when he beams the invader away was he'd beamed him into space, and someone even says he should have (Kim?), in the heat of the moment, but he actually beamed him back to his ship. I don't see them doing that nowadays... It was relatively bloody for Trek as you do see actual blood in pools on the deck of the Shuttlecraft, so the gravity of what had happened was clear. Kim hadn't looked so messed up since he'd been attacked by Species 8472 back in 'Scorpion'! I wondered if there was an issue of invasion of privacy with the Doctor making holo-records of every member of the crew. Does Starfleet usually do that? Did anyone object? Did they have the right to? Nice to see Naomi again, though it was only a brief scene. And Janeway drinking coffee at 2am? Maybe she'd decided she wasn't going to get any sleep that night so might as well load up with caffeine for the day ahead. Actually, that makes me wonder: they have synthehol, so do they also have synthoffee where if you need to sleep you can just shake off the 'caffeine' boost at will in the same way you can shake off the 'intoxication'? Also, why did B'Elanna's combadge not activate when Jetal contacts her and she replies from within the same room - it was a good gag, but didn't make sense with the way combadges work! Finally, I think there was more of a conspiracy theory going on than anyone realised: the crew must have altered the photos because Janeway has a hairstyle she didn't wear till Season 4, and both Chakotay (no grey), and Kim, have the same hair as they have now. Maybe it wasn't just the Doctor's memories that were, erm... doctored.

***

The Lost Tribe

 DVD, Stargate Atlantis S5 (The Lost Tribe)

Hate to admit it, but for a brief moment I really did allow myself to wonder... could these people in the suits, I assume this lost tribe of the title... could they be... Furlings? Nah, that would be too silly, but I did wonder... Just for that brief moment before we see who's really in there. So they were Asgard, and they were ones intent on taking out the Wraith. Okay. The things I found difficult to swallow about the episode were actually the device itself which will blow up any Stargate in use in the entire Galaxy! That's going a bit too far, I could buy a Wraith ship going to warp might explode since it was in the relative vicinity of it, but no, not that - I know it's a network, but then why stop at only the Pegasus Galaxy? And then those armoured suits which so conveniently conform to whoever wears them? Leaving aside the production problem that you can see these 'empty' suits slightly swaying as Rodney and Daniel are confronting them, why would the Asgard build humanoid suits to fit anyone? Didn't make sense. And then they kill off Dr. Jackson in the silliest way possible. No, they didn't, but for a moment I entertained the possibility that this could be the last he ever played the role 'live' since I know he only comes back in 'Universe' in training videos from what I remember, and why not take out one of the founding characters of the whole franchise to make a splash in your final season? Having him back for a pretty good two-parter was a big enough splash, evidently, and the moment was a bit too light for him to really be offed, of which I'm glad since he probably is my favourite character of 'SG-1.'

The real reason for the scene where he says he doesn't think he's going to make it was for the buddy-buddy comedy of McKay about to give him a compliment which they can then joke about later and end the episode in a fun way, in contrast to the sheer volume of stuff happening. I quite enjoyed having them together, though part one was a little better. I'm not sure what really happened other than Todd's alliance with our people ending - who knows what situation he'll be in when they meet again as they're bound to do. His strategy for taking out the facility housing the device was immediately obvious to me: if Ronon's sabotaged the weapons of course he's going to ram the Daedalus into it! But I did like the solution: have Sheppard's friend's ship (Larrin of the Travellers), open a hyperspace window right in front of the plummeting vessel which takes them directly through the planet and out the other side. I could just about remember Larrin, this woman he was fond of and had met a couple of times, though I didn't recall her people being known as Travellers. Again, ever so convenient an emissary of Larrin's could show up in a ship at just the moment Atlantis needed one, but sometimes you need these plot devices - and for most of the episode I liked the escalation of events: Todd's on course for the Asgard facility, planning to destroy it, but McKay and Jackson are there. Simple, personal stakes, but good ones.

It's easy to believe in the motivations of the various factions. Okay, so it was a bit disappointing that Sheppard and Zelenka survived the main 'gate blowing merely by ducking down in another room. I mean that should really have taken the top off the tower and in the effects (which were good throughout, even if the Asgard ships were a bit ugly, and so was that hunk of junk, the fastest in its fleet, sent from Larrin, now that I come to think of it), it looked as if it had, so it does lessen the impact of the cliffhanger from part one. Not that I wanted to see either of them die, of course not, but a Stargate exploding should be a momentous event, and we hear that thousands have died from the colony Larrin's people had set up, yet two people in one tower survived - even the laptop was in one piece without as much as a crack on the screen! Maybe I'm asking too much, but a destructing 'gate should be the ultimate blast. Find another way for our characters to survive and find a new tower because it shouldn't be simple to patch it up and get back to normality. I wasn't sure if Rodney was talking about a new Stargate being installed in Atlantis or whether he was talking about somewhere else, but if things go back to normal next week it's only going to make it seem even more trivial.

These reasons and more made me like this episode less. Another thing is Ronon and Keller on their sabotage mission - again, obviously when Ronon says he's going to take out the hyperdrive he doesn't mean sitting at a keyboard overriding programs, but I suppose his blunt edge was meant to be funny, or at least Keller's reaction to it all. I do like that she's realistic about the situation - she's a caregiver, a doctor and a professional in her field, so of course she's not going to warm to being in a combat situation, love it and excel at it, but despite fears and reservations she acquits herself well. Still not sure if Ronon's motives were for himself at the end, or if he's subtly pushing Keller towards Rodney, but either is possible. Teyla is the only main character who suffers, being left behind again - I believe she is the best qualified and most trusted by John to be left in that position, especially when they're wondering if there'll be retaliation, but I feel like she should have had some kind of minor plot of her own, even if it was just the clean-up on Atlantis. And where was her baby and husband, I'd like to have seen her being concerned for them or go and see them, assuming they're still there.

Wolsey's visible and part of the story, but he still doesn't seem quite like the boss man yet, Sheppard's running the show, or Ronon in the action stakes, while Wolsey has very little of substance. It's not like they have tons of main characters to fit in, either, but we're running out of time for him to really be integrated into the series well. Zelenka's subplot of babysitting the Travellers' Chief Engineer, who's only fifteen, could also have been more than a gag. But at least it's easy to see why they brought back Michael Shanks as Daniel Jackson, with the bad guys turning out to be Asgard he was the closest person to work with them, having a special friendship with Thor, I think it was (it's been so long - I need to get back to 'SG-1' again!), and even voicing the character. I didn't see who did the voice for this Asgard, but I don't think it was Shanks. But facing one of those puppets again (this time with even more facial movement), must have felt like no time had passed for him at all, yet it had been around twelve years since 'SG-1' began and here he is doing the same thing again. It's quite nice (I could have done with a discussion about dying before and what he thinks will happen, since he had become ascended and then returned to ordinary life before), but at the same time maybe it was so many moving parts to keep track of that made it lose focus, and I didn't like it quite as much as the first part. I'd love it if Jackson came back again before the end (hey, have a full-blown 'SG-1' reunion, why not!), but I doubt they'll bring anyone else in since they're winding up the series and they probably want to concentrate on their own characters at this point, which is entirely understandable.

**

Counterpoint

DVD, Voyager S5 (Counterpoint)

Brilliant manoeuvring from Captain Janeway, able to outfox a fox. I knew the story well enough to recall the broad strokes, but I couldn't work out how Voyager was going to get away with harbouring the dreaded telepaths, and I also noticed a rather glaring mistake: yes, the Brenari get away by using two Shuttlecraft, and they aren't kept in transporter suspension, but what about the Starfleet crew? Tuvok is even seen at his station on the Bridge when the Devore make final contact. I suppose he may not be seen from the angle of the Viewscreen, but it seemed as if he shouldn't even have been there. But that's only a minor issue compared with: what happened to him? He wasn't off with the Brenari as they headed through the Wormhole and were away, they weren't coming back. So where was Tuvok hiding? And Vorik of course, who sadly gets not a single line of dialogue, his role limited to a very Vulcan nod when the Transporter brings him out of stasis. A shame to have him in the episode and not use him at all. There could have been a subplot around the telepaths, sharing experiences, going into more Devore encounters they'd had, that sort of thing, which could have given them a bigger role - Randy Oglesby, whom I'd forgotten appeared in 'Voyager,' better known for 'Enterprise' and the recurring Xindi character of Degra, but whom also had been in both 'TNG' and 'DS9,' does a fine job of appearing sympathetic with the little he's given, and of course Neelix' time with the Brenari children fitted his character and also added sympathy, but I did feel the race wasn't fleshed out.

It's much more about the masterful, though dangerous, game Janeway plays with Kashyk (possibly a 'Star Wars' reference, as Kashyykk was Chewbacca's homeworld, give or take a 'k' or 'y'). My main memory of this episode is that it was Kate Mulgrew's favourite, for obvious reasons since she gets to be the hero and use all her feminine wiles to trick the enemy. I don't know if it's always remained her top-rated episode since it was revealed on Star Trek Night, a BBC event in 2001 to mark the 35th Anniversary in which each of the then four main Captains chose their favourite episode of their respective series' which were then broadcast and could be voted for by viewers as the best. Or was it that one of the four would be broadcast by viewer selection? Either way, I think this was the one that won, probably because it was the most recent. It is a strong performance from Janeway, though I do wonder who was involved in the plot and how much was true or not. Initially I thought it was entirely fabrication on Janeway's part, expecting Kashyk to be a mole from the start - as he said himself, trust has to be earned and though he gave them the valuable data on the refractive shielding which meant they could detect Devore ships, it was all a little too good to be true compared to the little she knew of him in his Inspector guise. She's not the sort to give trust too easily, and it all makes sense, the only thing is we're denied the 'behind the scenes' story for the episode, we only get what passes between the Captain and her guest. Otherwise we'd be seeing scenes of Chakotay or Tuvok advising her or discussing how much to trust the defector and then we couldn't have had the triumphant twist at the end where Kashyk reveals his true face and smugly believes he's won only to find he underestimated her.

At least he was a good sport enough to know he'd been beaten at his own game, fair and square, and though he was a judgemental man, part of a strict and discriminatory system, he wasn't going to react in bitterness and rage at being bested - I think he quite enjoyed the contest and it made complete sense that the justification for letting Voyager go was so that knowledge of his failure, of all his crew's failures to capture these refugees, could remain hushed up, as none of them would want it known and so affect their own careers. Perhaps there was even the slight crack of regret that he couldn't go with Janeway though it could never be more than wishful thinking and would never have worked out for either of them. That's the sign of a good villain when you can see a streak of sympathy within all the lies, threat and bluster. Much like Gul Dukat he enjoyed the finer pleasures of life, hence his insistence of piping classical music through the ship on each inspection. He appreciated beauty, he was a cultured man, even if he could come across as a bit of a Nazi Kapitan - I could easily imagine J. Paul Boehmer in the role as this suave, sophisticated faux defector who does all in his power to win Janeway's trust and believes he's succeeded, though the actor they cast was certainly good. He seems more gentlemanly next to what I assume is his First Officer, Prax, much more brutish, uncaring about pleasure, only in doing his job as a soldier, there for maximum contrast with his boss.

One thing Kashyk said early on stood out to me: when he's describing the Federation or Janeway's people, he describes violence and beauty, side by side, but also science and faith, all intermingled. That's an interesting take since usually Trek was keen to distance itself from faith and belief and be fully science-based in the usual mistaken attitude the two are contradictory opposites. You do notice in what was then 'modern' Trek a gradual moving away from the Roddenberry insistence that faiths had been done away with, even on 'TNG' which he began, but ever more so as we got to 'DS9' with its central focus on the theme, but also 'Voyager' when it came to including characters such as Tuvok, whose Vulcan heritage was well explored, and Chakotay, similarly. Of course Kashyk may well have been talking generally of human history since that was part of the conversation, so perhaps in this instance it's not much to add to that evidence of a direction away from 'science only,' but it did stand out to me. Another line that stood out was Janeway's description of her position when it comes to the Prime Directive: she says she goes with her instincts when it comes to that, which does say a lot about her, and her style of captaincy, especially in these years she's been out of contact with Starfleet. At the same time it does mean she comes across as unstable in her actions because you can point to major moments in the series, such as 'Prime Factors' where she refused to trade for a technology that would have got them home, but that's what makes things interesting when you never know quite what she'll do on each occasion!

The Devore (perhaps meant to sound close to 'devour'), and Brenari were fine in terms of their look and depiction, but it was Torat, this eccentric scientist they track down who was the best design with his full prosthetic head and the addition of an expanding nose that puffs out when he's annoyed. Perhaps he is a bit of a stereotype, being a man whose pompous view of himself and his work can easily be manipulated, but it served to show Janeway and Kashyk working together, and it was fun, as well as looking good. The way he looks round as his Viewscreen is hacked by Harry reminded me of when they first met Neelix - very different reactions, clearly, but just this idea of a roaming camera that finds the occupant of a ship in the middle of something, in this case piloting, was different. Torat's point about wondering why people feel the need to align themselves with monolithic organisations like an Imperium or a Federation was also unique as we don't often have the basic situation of Trek questioned, it's usually just accepted or well known, so it was interesting to hear a different point of view even though it wasn't expanded upon. The other issue that isn't expanded upon is the idea of the intrusive possibility of telepathy. We've had many episodes of Trek that explore this ability so it's not like they really needed to go deeper on that, it was enough to reference Vulcans and Betazoids (especially for a sad reminder of Suder's fate against the Kazon), and it's one of those things that reminds you of the overarching world that Trek is taking place in, that it has its established rules and races, which is always pleasing to feel connected to. Chakotay does call out the ability when he says maybe they should just read Kashyk's thoughts, an easy way out, but it's covered by the fact Devore have tough mental training.

Saying that, they throw out the fact that Suder was only one of two Betazoids on the crew, as there's a 'Jarot' which we hadn't heard of before. Now that I think of it, I'm sure we saw a female Vulcan later in the series, inconsistencies brought about by the extreme inability for things to change, or for that change not to be noticeable. Other Treks could easily justify why a character from a known race was here in one episode and not in another, or not here at first, but there later, but the USS Voyager had no opportunity for picking up Starfleet crew or Alpha Quadrant races so they really needed to be tight on who was aboard and who wasn't, but it was that style they had of keeping as many potential story options open that could occasionally get them in trouble with their own continuity. The slackness of the series in that regard could be seen on a number of occasions unfortunately, and here again we see another example when two Shuttlecraft are given up just like that! At least we were privileged to see the ship's aft Shuttlebay which I don't think had ever been seen before judging by the fact it was created in CGI: Kashyk's one-man craft leaves, flying through the forcefield after his parting with Janeway. It doesn't look quite real, partly from the limitations of CGI at the time, but also the fact that the picture is locked off so the camera only shows one view of the exit, but it was a fun spot anyway. There's also 'Grey Mode' introduced to describe Voyager's operations on low power to avoid detection, much like in submarine films - that, coupled with mention of a Mutara-class nebula suggested 'Star Trek II' submarine warfare, or at the very least a reuse of the familiar purple-pink hues of the effects from that film which had already been used (such as in 'Flashback'), so it was slightly disappointing there was none of that and we don't even see the beautiful old effects.

It's not the episode to provoke a lot of discussion and speculation because, while it is a great twist, Janeway getting one over on an enemy who thought he had her measure, we are quite restricted in plot terms. We don't know how much the crew or senior staff knew of Janeway's plans, and in fact she even says her offer to Kashyk for him to come with them was genuine, so even she may not have known how much she trusted him - all that stuff when they're working on extrapolating the Wormhole (which, though it was lovely to see another example of that phenomenon, was nowhere near the beauty of the Bajoran example seen in 'DS9'), could have been a blind and the real work was being done by her crew. But was it? Or was it that they changed the records afterwards to fool him? I could have done with a reference to Scotty who was responsible for making suspension in a Transporter buffer possible, and how he ended up in the 24th Century, though it wasn't necessarily needed to divert attention from this story, and then again if they'd reminded us that he'd done it successfully for almost a century it makes our crew look less accomplished that they couldn't do it for even a few days or hours before cell degradation started to set in. Of course the circumstances could have been different in that situation and I like the fact that despite Voyager being the cutting edge vessel of that time there are still limits to its technology or expertise, something modern Trek doesn't seem to care about, not realising that limitations create drama (and so we have to have magical ships that spin around and can leap anywhere in the Galaxy!).

I'm surprised to learn that 'Counterpoint' was actually Alexander Enberg's penultimate appearance as Vorik, only the second time he'd appeared this season, and he wouldn't be back until right near the end of Season 7! I imagine this was something to do with the fact Jeri Taylor's influence on the series had ended and he was mainly cast in the role for being her son, I think, but he was a likeable character and a great example of a Vulcan so I'm disappointed he was one of the many recurring characters to be pretty much shot down, one of those elements of the series that was in deep shade when compared with the superior 'DS9,' when 'Voyager' could have done with (and did in the early seasons!), a community of the crew more than any other series. J. Patrick McCormack, who played Prax, was a face I recognised from 'DS9' as he played Rear Admiral Bennett in a great episode a couple of years before this ('Doctor Bashir, I Presume'), which also featured this series' Robert Picardo in dual roles! He was also a Commander in 'Star Trek Nemesis,' apparently, but I don't remember that. And this marked the aforementioned Randy Oglesby's only appearance on 'Voyager.'

I realised I didn't like this episode as much as I once did, part of that must be because I don't find as much to analyse and examine, but also we don't get much of the other main characters, it's very much Janeway's story and must be so in order to set up the twist. But I suppose twist-based storytelling has become such a problem in Trek (and other things, too), that it leaves a bad taste when the style of the story has to wrap itself around the need to preserve surprises from the viewers. Not to say I didn't like the twist, because it's the best part of the episode, and as a one-off trick I like it a lot. But I could have done with more characters, like Neelix - it's nice to see him with a group of children as he's very good with them and it suited his style very much. It's also a foreshadowing of when he'd take the Borg children under his wing in the following season and the only missing element in the scene was a role for Naomi Wildman as I imagine she's be there to help the children. And obviously I'm going to miss those scenes with Tuvok and Chakotay where they discuss the situation with their Captain - it just seemed like the crew were almost background characters, there to perform technical tasks like Torres in Engineering, and as much as I enjoyed the sense of high-class opponents sparring, and a higher class of style with the classical music, I wasn't as drawn to it, though my impression has always fluctuated with this one. If I'd starred in it, it'd probably be my favourite, too!

***

Thirty Days

 DVD, Voyager S5 (Thirty Days)

Is it an environmental lesson? A Prime Directive story? A personal crisis for Tom Paris? Yes, it's all of those, garnished with some beautiful effects work that really shows what they could do. It includes some fun Captain Proton black and white Holodeck scenes, it introduced the famed Delaney sisters that had been mentioned by Tom and Harry since Season 1 (though they'd never reappear, sadly - a case of late-'Voyager' not being favourably disposed to having many recurring characters as if in opposition to the 'DS9' way of doing things), and it reminded us of Tom's history of rebellion. But really it was all B'Elanna's fault! If it weren't for her he might not ever have considered taking matters into his own hands and trying to force change on an alien culture - it could be said that Harry Kim played a part in one small way when he reminds his friend of the words his Father said to him about how he never finishes anything, and that, coupled with Tom's own sense of guilt and unresolved issues with his Father, all contributed to his surprising course of action. I was very impressed they got the same actor back to do the voice of Admiral Paris whom we'd seen in 'Persistence of Vision' (at least I assume they got him back, since he's credited, rather than reusing lines of dialogue from the former episode?), though it makes me wonder why they didn't bring Warren Munson in to reprise the role fully when the character began to appear from Season 6 onwards, unless they changed their minds about the direction they wanted, moving away from the stern and unfriendly image to a much more avuncular version, from what I remember, in Richard Herd's portrayal.

It's always the little details I appreciate when it comes to Trek, one of the reasons modern Trek is so hard to take since it considers details to be fully flexible for the needs of badly thought out storytelling! The first thing I thought upon seeing Paris being stripped down to the rank of Ensign at the opening of the episode was, 'well, if he was on 'Discovery' he'd be eligible for promotion to First Officer from that lowly rank,' since that's exactly what happened with Ensign Sylvia Tilly in Season 3! Then in a similar vein it's easier to see why people were upset about the Kelvin Timeline's Enterprise resting underwater in 'Into Darkness,' since that's not even as advanced as the USS Voyager which Janeway said would require a week before it would be ready to travel to such depths. It's easy to get round that by saying the Enterprise didn't go very deep and it's supposedly based partly on late-24th Century technology (to include all the facts!), and I never really minded about that other than from good sense that it would be easier to simply stay out of sight in orbit and beam down. Either way, this episode looked absolutely beautiful with its superb water effects, the pre-'Star Wars Episode I' underwater sequences and 'bigger fish' ("'Tis a hidden city..."), looking terrific, and that's not always the case with the CGI on 'Voyager.' Maybe it's easier to do water than solids or gases, but even the Monean ships looked good.

That goes for the makeup, too. They were quite simple designs, but also had an aquatic impression like a manatee or other smooth-skinned lifeforms, complete with a mottled effect on the skin which contrasted well with the plain single colours and simple cut of their dress. They are very far from being aggressive or threatening in appearance, which would have made it easier for our people to intervene against. But intervention is not Starfleet's way, in general. I'm not sure how much of a Prime Directive issue it was, since they did have warp capability, but the Directive isn't just about having contact with a species that is less technologically advanced, it's also about not imposing upon them because of that. Using Tom to play out the narrative of an intervention of force did fit his character on the surface, but at the same time it almost came out of the blue, since as Janeway says, he's been an exemplary member of the crew for the four years he's served under her (love that sense of regulation and seriousness, and the distance in ranks that has been so lost in modern Trek's preference for casual attitudes, favouritism and matey buds running ships rather than a command with hierarchy and proper respect for position!). We can remember times when he showed his rebellious streak, such as the arc in Season 2 when he was going 'undercover' as a troublemaker in order to flush out the Maquis spy (see? They did use the Maquis sometimes!), but he really took to his new role of trust with this crew so that it comes across as a slight stretch for him to go rogue like he did.

Unless... he was really trying to impress B'Elanna? Women can be a source of changing character in a man, and when you consider we'd never heard about his fascination with sailing ships before (Janeway even calls it out that his interests go back further than the 20th Century he's traditionally an expert on!), it does escalate quite quickly - one moment he's interested and captivated by this ocean, the next he's becoming an activist who will go to terrorist lengths to ensure its survival (and as Janeway said, he couldn't be certain the Moneans were just going to sweep their recommendations under the rug)! It is quite shocking, and in the light of today's much more extreme political attitudes, one way or the other, the episode is a little less cosy to watch. Clearly he was wrong to get involved against the direct orders of his Captain - his argument that it isn't the Moneans' ocean to do with as they like doesn't justify his own defiance, so I was glad to see Janeway prevent his actions at the last moment (even if the actual on screen event of the torpedo exploding by being taken out by with another one from Voyager, didn't match Tuvok's line about it being deflected!). I can see the parallels of apathetic governments only willing to commit to token acts of appeasement when it comes to the modern religion of Saving The Planet, but it's concerning when it comes to curtailing of people's freedom in a perceived greater good that may or may not be hypocritical in itself, in the same way that so much freedom was taken away due to terrorist attacks like the 11th September destruction of the World Trade Towers. Environmentalism seems to be a stick to beat populations with, and while everyone has a duty to steward this world we've been given and not be frivolous with the life they have, when it comes to people being less important than the state, and governments aligning with getting rid of people because their impact on the planet makes them unjustifiable then it can be a dangerous and worrying trend.

But I digress, the topic of environmentalism and the direction we're heading in is only one small part of this episode. Obviously we like Tom Paris and we can usually respect his opinions, and there is some justification in saying the ocean isn't the Moneans since they discover it was created like some kind of inverse Noah's Ark, sucking all the water off-planet into a ball. It's a great concept, the kind of thing Trek used to be known for, and while it's since been done in various other things ('Star Wars Episode II' and 'Stargate SG-1' I seem to recall), it was exciting to see something like that here. The device of Tom recalling the events in a letter to his Father made it much more personal, knowing the troubled history between them (so it's surprising to read that was a late addition to the story), and that we'd be meeting him for real the following season, but at this stage he's still the judgemental, harsh man of Tom's childhood nightmares, and we don't know him. We do know the crew, however, and it was nice to see the various visits he has in the Brig (which I think had been previously used last season for Seven of Nine, and maybe others). Unfortunately most of these scenes weren't gold and seemed merely a chance to give the other cast members a moment, but it did show a good representation of the monotony of prison life where every little change is something to be treasured and prolonged - at what other time would Paris desire a checkup in Sickbay!

We learn something we didn't know about him - that he originally wanted to join the Federation Naval Patrol, which may well have come out of the Royal Navy which Malcolm Reed of 'Enterprise' mentioned as an organisation his own family had a history with, showing that naval tradition and dynasties were still going in the 22nd Century, and with this reference by Tom, demonstrates there was still a body that patrolled Earth's oceans, which you wouldn't really think about with all these starships, but it's nice to know such a thing exists. Then there's the Captain Proton program - Harry's penchant for making the wrong decisions gets a mention ('first it was a hologram, then a Borg, now the wrong twin'), a running joke that would continue as long as the series did (though more serious later in the season with 'The Disease'), in the same vein of Chief O'Brien always being 'tortured' at least once a season on 'DS9.' I wondered if the Delaney sisters' roles (played by real life twins), of the 'twin mistresses of evil,' and the fact they hold Harry captive, was a reference to the Duras sisters and their capture of Picard? They were quite likeable so I wonder why they never brought them back? Willie Garson played Riga, the Monean willing to risk all to force his people to listen - he was famous on 'SG-1' as the alien who creates a successful TV series out of the top secret Stargate programme in both the one-hundredth and two-hundredth episodes, so it's fun to have him in Trek before that.

I noticed a couple of apparent mistakes, apart from the visuals not matching Tuvok's description of events already noted: the Doctor usually walks right through forcefields, but when he visits Tom in the Brig he stops, waits for it to be deactivated, then walks through. I suppose it could conceivably be that the Brig would have no holo-emitters within it (what would be the point?), so he'd need to wear the mobile emitter, which of course wouldn't be able to pass through a forcefield, and when he's in Sickbay the Doctor wouldn't be wearing that since that location was designed for holograms. Okay, so maybe that was actually superb attention to detail and not a mistake after all! But there is another clunker: Torres invites Tom to dinner at 0700. Surely if she meant 7am she'd be inviting him to breakfast, unless she actually meant 1900, 7pm? A minor quibble, maybe Klingons sometimes have dinner in the morning, or perhaps she was finishing a night shift. It didn't make any difference to Tom, he was just relieved to get out of confinement! It's rare to see a crew-member on Trek receive punishment like this as they're usually professional and keep within the regulations, and even rarer to see a demotion, so I applaud the series for exploring that. I just felt it was a bit sudden for Tom to develop such strong moral feelings about something so quickly, but it doesn't spoil what is a pretty good story. Caring for the environment is an important issue, even if it can be abused, and I'm in no way opposed to such messages - of course nowadays the whole ship would probably abandon the Prime Directive and be disgusted by an alien race that refused their warnings, but then that's the time we're living in...

***

Rambo: Last Blood

 TV, Rambo: Last Blood (2019) film

Films are not one of my more common review topics these days - either I have too much to say about favourites or, more often, practically nothing for the vast majority, especially modern examples. But seeing the final (I assume), instalment in the Rambo series did give me a few thoughts in general and specifically. To give some background I saw the original trilogy twenty years ago and enjoyed the first two quite a lot - the first featured this broken man who snapped and became a kind of Jason Bourne or Batman figure, using all his jungle fighting skills learned in the Vietnam war to protect himself against a hostile civilian society and dealt with the issue of veterans who returned to hatred and fear, coming only years after the conflict ended in the real world. In the book on which it was based I believe the character dies at the end, but that doesn't make good business sense so of course he survived, and the second film had much of its pleasure coming from the fact that in the first John Rambo was reacting, while in the second he's recruited to go in and achieve mission goals so we get to see what he was like in the field rather than a 'domestic' setting. There's some tragedy with his native wife or girlfriend (it's been a while since I saw it), being killed, some great action sequences and though it doesn't have any of the complexity of the first story, it gives you what you want to see: Rambo doing what he does best, and not merely for survival this time.

'Rambo III' was where the series lost any sense of depth or being more than gorily violent Eighties action, with a slim plot about his now-peaceful (if you ignore his stick-fighting to pay his way!), retired from action, man in a foreign country having to go back into the throng to save his former commanding officer, but is really just an excuse to have Stallone kill lots of enemies (the bit where he cauterises a wound that goes right through his side by pulling a rag into it and setting it on fire in the inky blackness of a cave was certainly memorable!), and was the first one where I didn't feel like it was about anything. The fourth instalment came much later, almost twenty years after and once again was really just an excuse for Rambo to kill, even if it was for a good cause (it's always for a good cause), and because Sylvester Stallone was bringing back his two most famous roles, Rocky and Rambo, from a different era, in a time when CGI spectacle had become the norm. I remember one prominent film critic complaining about how he'd met the actor once and Stallone had reportedly said he'd never bring back those characters because that would be stupid, but everyone's allowed to change their mind so I don't criticise him for doing it, I just wish there had been a return to a deeper look at an issue, whether that be the treatment of soldiers by society, the psychological or physical difficulties of trying to readjust to that society, or anything else, rather than merely a nostalgia for 'simpler times' where it was about men standing up and being men, and as much violence as could be gotten away with.

From this fifth film's title I thought two things: one, they would probably kill off Rambo in this one - Stallone's getting on a bit (is he in his seventies?), so it would be questionable how to put him in the kind of situation you'd expect from the Rambo name, and two, that perhaps there would be some kind of circle-closing story as the titles 'First Blood' and 'Last Blood' are so nicely reflective. Of course titles and such like are designed for marketing purposes, so they want you to assume there's going to be something more to this, that's how the business of film works. In reality I found there was something less. I liked the title, I liked the fact that almost forty years after he first played the role, Stallone was back again - I hadn't expected it after the fourth film, as it seemed like it was just a revival to remind us of a character of long ago, not designed to turn him into a modern sequel franchise. I also quite liked the fact that Rambo has found a measure of peace through a surrogate family, his friendly old housekeeper and a daughter in his charge, a nice ranch, a love of horses, it's all quite pleasant, even if you know things aren't going to stay that way.

It's difficult to see how Rambo can get back into the action that made his name, he's clearly not going to go off to war and they'd already done the plot of him being in the right spot to rescue some victims that require his brand of DIY wilderness warfare. Instead, the troubles come from a very different source, a Mexican drugs and prostitution cartel that scoop up unwary young women and cruelly abuse them without compunction - indeed, the main villain, one of two brothers who run this evil crime organisation, practically boasts about how they mean absolutely nothing, over the broken body and face of Rambo after he's gone after his kidnapped surrogate daughter when she's disobeyed his orders not to go to her birth Father, a despicable, angry man who unsurprisingly doesn't want anything to do with her. I can't imagine he'd have been happy for her to be kidnapped, raped and forced into drug dependency, despite his bitter and cruel shattering of any illusions she might have had about why he left her and her Mother, but we never really get to know him other than hearing bad things about him and seeing the utter disregard for his young daughter in the face of his new family. On his side there are hints that he had reasons for his more minor villainy - bitter about his wife's dying of cancer and leaving him with this young girl, not wanting his current family disrupted by the past, but he's also less than sympathetic in the way he treats her and in the fact he claims they held him back and he was merely bored with them. This may be true or it may be that he has so much resentment over what happened that he was nastier to his daughter than he really feels - people will often lash out in that circumstance, whether that be physically or emotionally.

I liked that Rambo didn't actually harm him, or Gizelle, the 'friend' who first leads the daughter into trouble by telling her she's located her Father. He's very threatening to them both as the swiftest means of narrowing down exactly where his daughter is, but both are tragic figures. Perhaps they are evil, but not in the same league as those from the cartel - it's more about sins of omission and bad character than doing actual harm to the girl. I keep calling her 'the girl' or 'the daughter' because I don't actually remember her name! Considering she's basically the second most important character in the story (if you discount the villains), I didn't feel the setup for Rambo's position in life was well explained. Maybe I missed a line of dialogue early on, but I didn't quite understand how he came to be in that position - I thought it was said she was the daughter of a friend and now he was looking after her, but Manuel (for some reason I can remember the Dad's name!), was much younger than Rambo and clearly there was no friendship there at any time. Was Rambo a friend of the dead Mother? I didn't recall how he ended up at the end of 'Rambo' (the fourth film - I always thought it was called 'John Rambo' in the same way as the sixth Rocky film was called 'Rocky Balboa,' but it seems it was a title stripped right back to basics), and having only seen that once, over a decade ago, I couldn't say if there's any sense of connection to where he ended up there. Probably not, I'd imagine.

The lack of connection with the character and where he came from was a problem for me and one more reason why I didn't connect with this version - he didn't seem to particularly be Rambo other than obviously all the DIY traps and ability to use hit and run tactics in what was essentially a gory, 'adult' version of 'Home Alone' - that was exactly what I was thinking in that last half hour during the assault on his ranch. He sits in his rocking chair on the porch at the end and says something about this being the home where he was born and he'll protect it with his life or something, but I wasn't sure if we were supposed to take this as the specific house where he was born that he'd gone back to (like James Bond in 'Skyfall,' perhaps an inspiration?), or whether he meant America in general, as obviously Rambo was a very patriotic character. But I was disappointed there wasn't any reference to his past, specifically Richard Crenna's commanding officer. I know we see some photos of Rambo as a young soldier, and the big thing is using shots from the previous four films in the closing credits (which also had a nice piece of music - not to the level of 'It's A Long Road,' or the musical theme of 'First Blood' which was echoed briefly in places, but pleasant), to evoke how those films used to end, but he could have been Rocky, he could have been the guy he plays in 'The Expendables,' he just seemed to be Stallone. Maybe I'm judging too harshly, and it's true that I haven't watched the other films for a few years (really need to revisit those first two!), but there seemed more continuity of character in them and I was hoping for a closing of the circle, as I said.

I don't mean we needed CGI Crenna or anything like that, but they could have used his voice and maybe done flashbacks to Vietnam, or something to tie things together. There were one or two scenes where he does gaze into the distance remembering his war experiences, so it's not that the past is never referenced at all, but it's just difficult to connect this guy to the character. I'm sure that would be the case for any long-running character who has been reprised by the original actor in old-age - look at Patrick Stewart for a typical example of how badly it can go, he's a mere shadow of the great Captain Picard to the extent it's hard to watch and believe in him when all his nobility and power is stripped away. I don't know whether it was intentional to show Rambo is out of practice and age has affected his senses or judgement, but the way he just goes in seemingly without a plan to rescue his charge from the cartel was surprising. I know he's angry, but with such a delicate situation and the high stakes, you'd think he'd have been more prepared. I liked his bravery at not submitting to the vast numbers of nasty, weapon-wielding criminals, and he just keeps his head up and faces the villain down, but it did look foolhardy and it was only the villain's own arrogance and cruelty that he got out alive - they leave him battered on the ground so he can live out his life knowing what happened to the girl. In that respect I found the film to be quite a miserable story. I wanted him to get to the girl before it was too late and she was violated and an addict, but even Rambo can't stop the evil, seems to be the message.

It was a bit far-fetched that he could recover in just a few days, too. This journalist who rescues him and gives him sanctuary was an odd addition as she never really went anywhere in the story. I thought it would become some kind of mission to take down the cartel and her testimony would be vital, but before the end when he goes back to her, she just disappears. I assumed she gave him specific knowledge about the place where the brothers lived, or something along those lines, but her contribution wasn't clear at all. It's good that he was able to go back in (a courageous act considering the beating he'd taken the first time), and save the girl, only it was too late, she'd been ruined. Of course it's never really too late, a person can still be salvaged, but she was too far gone and dies on the journey home. I suppose it was a good message for teens about not disobeying parents or guardians because their rulings are there for your protection, but it was a bleak end result, and Rambo's life has basically been ripped apart once again. I understand that this is the motivation for his vicious revenge spree, both at the cartel's place and back on the farm where he goads them into coming after him, but it's still so negative. This was where the film took its turn towards ultimate misery and depression: I know the point of Rambo as he became was to do just that, wreak havoc on an implacably evil enemy of ordinary people, but it's just a sad state of affairs. If it had been more noble, like working with the journalist to take the cartel down somehow, saving his daughter and making all right with the world it could have had an inspiring, vindicating ending, but instead it just comes across as pure, grim bloodthirstiness sating his lust for revenge. But what then?

I found it hard to believe that these cartel bullies would be so well trained that they'd assault the farm like a troop of soldiers, or that on having several of them killed gorily by the various traps and pitfalls, they wouldn't have scattered and run from the place. But that was the Rambo method: a one man army who can take down the opposition with his skills and ingenuity. I liked the idea of a location he's prepared ready to take out an enemy, but it was just a little hard to fully buy. It's odd he built all these tunnels, and never explained. Was it that he always expected to have to fight off a group sometime? I suppose it gives the audience what they wanted, Rambo killing in the most violent way possible, but it was too much. The film also had the impression of being quite small because there weren't many locations and then the farm is the main scene of action, and even the travelling to Mexico and back seems like it's not far away. I don't know, up until the point his daughter died and took away all hope that his life could go on as it had, I quite liked the film, but it was too bleak, too miserable. I'm not sure whether the character should have been killed off or not, to be honest I'm not even sure it matters because what's left is a dead man, if not physically then in every other way. Maybe they were trying to touch on that tragic end from the first film where he's carted away to prison, but there didn't seem to be anything left for him here. He's shot twice by the villain so he could easily have died and the film could even be suggesting he's going to sit on this rocking chair and die now, but I didn't get that from the final scene.

Films have been playing on nostalgia for a long time, bringing characters back, and that still makes money. Would I want a sixth Rambo film? I don't think so because I don't think we really got a proper fifth Rambo film, and even the third and fourth lost what made the first two special. This isn't the kind of film I would rewatch as it really was over the top gore and had little-to-no thematic or inspirational value, it really did seem negative and depressing (much like 'Star Trek: Picard' actually, to return to the Patrick Stewart comparison), and served only to lessen my appreciation of the character and his life rather than put a cap on it - rather like Rambo to the villains, they put a cap in him instead! In the end I'd gone from interested to disappointed to depressed, and I like a good action film, but I also like a hero that means more than killing and has the self-knowledge to learn and grow and Rambo had lived through enough that he should have been in a better place no matter what came against him.

*

First Contact

DVD, Stargate Atlantis S5 (First Contact)

I don't believe it, how can they do this to me! It did seem to be going on a bit long, but I still felt like things could be resolved, and then the tower containing the Stargate on Atlantis explodes with Sheppard and Zelenka still inside the control area and the words 'To Be Continued' come up... It almost seemed like they might be blowing their tanks too early, because this level of shock and danger could be worthy of the penultimate episode of the series: Sheppard and Zelenka potentially killed, Rodney and Daniel Jackson (hooray!), trapped on some alien base having just activated a device that will make any Wraith ship blow up when going to warp, Wolsey held captive because Todd their ally Wraith believes they destroyed his Hive ships, and the Daedalus taken over with Ronon and Keller also trapped there... And blowing up the series' main Stargate, how could things get much bigger? Just when Keller's medical mission to cure the Wraith of needing to feed on humans was going well. All this and some fascinating tech, too: the idea of a device that destroys a warp activation, these suits that can drop down and bore right through multiple floors, and the glow-sticks Todd pushes together to knock out the entire ship, all added to this sense of things going wild and out of control. It's all so much to take in.

I had no recollection of 'Janus,' this Ancient who'd come up with this warp destruction device in the first place, so I'm not sure if he'd been mentioned before or this was a 'fresh' flashback. Either way it did seem a bit much to accept there was yet another secret room somewhere in Atlantis (they really haven't done enough stories where they go down and explore deep parts of the city as that's the kind of stuff I love to see, much like the potential of the ship in 'Universe'), and Dr. Jackson just happens to have worked out where it is, and there were other things in the episode which glossed over details (like Zelenka somehow able to track the signal of where McKay and Daniel are by saying it's too complicated to explain - cop out!), but that's all fairly irrelevant - the important thing is that we have Michael Shanks back and he's working with McKay! Makes sense, we'd had each of the other three main 'SG-1' characters who'd starred in the majority of that series, so it was time they brought in Jackson. It's nice that there's history between him and McKay in the sense that Rodney guest-starred here and there as a pompous, bigheaded science boffin, even if he was generally doing things with Samantha Carter. And now he's much more like his old self around Jackson - even if he is still a pompous, bigheaded boffin he tends to fit in a bit better with the Atlantis crew since they've seen more of him. But it was one of the joys of the episode to have him work with Jackson as it could just as easily have been anyone or no one - I especially enjoyed the moment they reflected on doing what they've done (don't forget it was Daniel that got the 'gate to work originally), and how they'll never get the recognition they truly deserve. That's the kind of stuff you want to see in a long-running franchise because that would be the reality.

Something else helping to raise the episode above the usual fun but derivative sci-fi was when Todd is confronted by Keller about whether he really wants his people to lose their dependence on human meat - he muses what will become of them and what will they do, and it's a valid point since their feeding is largely what motivates them, so to remove that throws all kinds of scary possibilities out and a very uncertain future. The big questions aren't usually the kind of thing this or its sibling series' dealt with so I was glad the issue was raised. I suppose I can understand Todd's jumping to conclusions in the destruction of two of his ships, too, though it seemed obvious from the fact that Wolsey was so set on leaving Sheppard behind so he could carry out the negotiation since he felt he had less 'baggage,' that trust was going to come into play somehow. The reality is that Sheppard had been through a few things with Todd, and Teyla too, so they would have been better choices to attend to provide continuity, but although it hasn't happened anywhere near as much as might have been expected, Wolsey's adherence to protocol above all else is the cause of things going wrong: I'm sure Sheppard and Teyla would have at least given Todd pause for thought, but with their absence as well it does look more suspicious.

The strange, armoured aliens, whatever they are, who make a heist on the newly discovered Janus lab, reminded me of the aliens in an early 'DS9' episode ('Captive Pursuit'), who make short work of that station's defences and are difficult to subdue. The same happens here, except these guys get what they came for, including McKay and Daniel and our team are unable to force entry to the man down they leave behind - could it be that the suit is robotic as Sheppard suggested, or could it even be something like a remote controlled device that the real culprits are operating from afar? I didn't expect to have to wait to find out! I was enjoying the story for all the stuff they were throwing in, everyone was getting something to do (except Teyla of course, who is just there with a weapon and is ordered to evacuate to the edge of the city), and it was quite a shock when the 'gate is going to explode, a really fast-acting threat. Zelenka may be the B-team when it comes to brain power, and McKay doesn't let him forget it, but he's still an invaluable fallback if Rodney's not around and seemed to be acquitting himself well until that fateful explosion. I can't believe they'd kill off Sheppard before the series ends so there must have been some escape somehow. Surely... The important thing is I can't wait to find out!

***

Retrogaming Review of The Year 2022

Retrogaming Review of The Year 2022

 In the third Year of The Virus... well, it wasn't really that as everything went back to normal, the masks came off, the screens went down, but it made no difference to my interest in replaying old games or trying some new old games. It was interesting to see plug and play versions of the Commodore 64 and Amiga 500, and while I was initially tempted, many of the games weren't well known (to me at least), and more importantly required HDMI in order to connect, which was no good to me. And were very expensive: £120! Sadly, I once again failed to get around to excavating the Amiga 1500 from the loft, but that's not to say I didn't have a good year, with many very happy memories of finishing 'Twilight Princess,' returning to both 'Goldeneye' and 'TWINE,' and surprisingly quite enjoying the remake of 'Goldeneye' on the Wii, despite it bearing little resemblance. In all, a good gaming year that I can't expect to repeat as strongly in 2023.

Awards:

Surprise of The Year: TWINE

Disappointment of The Year: Wii Sports Resort

[Ratings reflect total, historical experience, not just the enjoyment level I got out of them this time.] 

January: The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (2006, GameCube) - Very happy memories of this game, be it the week of the Masters Snooker where I would play it into the night, or the search for all the last Poes. Maybe it wasn't one of the best in the series, at least compared to the N64 versions, but for sheer nostalgia (that is, looking back this Christmas to last Christmas!), this is one of several great gaming memories for 2022, which is impressive in itself when the other standouts were two versions of 'Goldeneye,' and 'TWINE,' to the extent I feel bad for only giving it three stars and maybe it's deserving of four. Perhaps, if I'm fortunate I'll replay it in another ten Christmases time and bump up the score... In fact, no, in light of 'Skyward Sword' and my happy memories I will bump it up. Right now! ****

January - December: WSC Real 08 (2008, Wii) - I'm still not Number One in my career! That's my main takeaway from this stalwart that has kept popping in and out of my Wii as it's that game you can play for half an hour or spend many hours on if you want to, plus it's a fun two-player experience, too. In 2023 I expect to finally supercede Ronnie O'Sullivan's domination, and maybe then I'll take on the Pool Career mode. And with news John Virgo (my favourite), may well be retiring from commentary in the coming months this could soon be the only way to hear his honeyed tones! ****

January: Wii Sports Resort (2009, Wii) - I 'awarded' this the biggest disappointment, but that's because I didn't play any truly disappointing games. It just didn't fit as my new exercise game of choice, not energetic enough so I quickly went back to stalwart 'Wii Sports,' though I can see myself playing some of those games again. It's been so long that I can barely remember what games there were, but throwing the frisby for the dog was quite fun and unique (my first time using the Motion Plus sensor was with this game), and guiding a plane around using the Remote to change pitch and yaw (I think are the technical terms!), wasn't bad, though. Perhaps a little gimmicky, which is the Wii's main flaw, but I'd certainly have another go in future, this time only for the games, not for exercise. ***

January - December: UFO: Enemy Unknown (1993, Amiga 1200) - February marked twenty years of continuous regular play, with this specific game file begun on 5th January 2005, seventeen years ago! Continues to be a reassuring presence - if I ever get the 1500 down from the loft I'd like to see how it fares on the older machine. Do I ever think about giving it up by taking a trip to Mars? Sometimes, but maybe I should keep it running until I hit twenty years for this file? *****

February - March: The Lord of The Rings: The Third Age (2004, GameCube) - Not quite the game I expected, it was quite linear with constant random battles, so perhaps it was typical for the genre. Not being an RPG-er I wasn't really into careful upgrading of weapons and stats, I just whipped through all that as quick as I could, but it looked quite nice, the figures were well modelled and it did have something of an addictive quality in the sense you wanted to get to the next bit, beat this current battle, etc. This could have been up there as Biggest Disappointment except I did play it through to completion, something I couldn't say for 'Sports Resort.' It was a fairly good experience over all and one I'd picked for the dark months, so it suited its purpose, but isn't one I'd likely go back to again. The trouble was I could imagine the old Amiga game, 'War in Middle-Earth,' except translated into 3D, and this wasn't it. ***

February - December: Wii Sports (2006, Wii) - It's not quite as much fun as it's harder and harder to beat my own records and I'm not really seeing any improvement so it can be a bit demoralising, especially when I so regularly do the Boxing and all it takes is one knockdown from my opponent, not even losing the match, to be knocked down by seventy-plus points, which then take many wins to recoup, so it has become tough and a touch unfair when you break the 2000 points mark. It's also annoying that the medals aren't visible from the screen where you choose, as it would be useful to see which disciplines need to be improved and what medals are still to be won. But still fun in moderation, and all the games are worth playing. ***

March - May: Goldeneye 007 (1997, N64) - I said plenty about this in my full review, but the key is it really brought the memory machine to life and I'll always remember being chased by Jaws, and the terrible tension of that Aztec level. Among many other things about it, of course! Absolute classic, one of the highlights of the best console ever made and a real joy to get back into. Now I just miss the multiplayer with others who knew the weapons and arenas... The greatest gaming times. ***** May: Top Gear Overdrive (1998, N64) - Good, nothing special, but good, like most racing games, and as with 'Need For Speed Nitro' you can't go too far wrong as long as there are wheels and speed, racers to beat and courses to zip round. Not one of the memorable games, I'd actually forgotten I played it, but then it was new to me so no nostalgic connection. ***

May - June: The World Is Not Enough (2000, N64) - This, on the other hand, I had great nostalgic connection to, and both the main game and multiplayer will be with me as one of the most important and enjoyable memories of the year, much like 'Body Harvest' in the same early Summer slot in 2021. I loved getting back into it, but even more when I went through and beat every single one of my previous best times which I'd fortunately written down since the game has to be saved on Memory Pak and the ones I used to have always failed (never use any that aren't official Nintendo, kids!), but that also meant I had no qualms about overwriting precious game files of yore, which I don't like to do. The sense of accomplishment and addictive encouragement to knock off even one second meant this got an extra star from the four I conceived it was worth. Underrated, I'm sure, but in many ways this means as much to me as 'Goldeneye' and 'Perfect Dark.' *****

June: Command & Conquer (1995, DOSBox) - This was basically 'Dune III' after Westwood Studios had so successfully brought us the first proper RTS game in 'Dune II,' just without the licence so they could do their own thing. Pretty much the same, with graphics I found less appealing (muddy green and brown in the GDI section, more like 'Dune' deserts in the NOD campaign), and the units are largely repeats. The big innovation is the time (and wrist!)-saving addition of drag select over multiple units instead of clicking on each individually, but there are still niggles of having to send soldiers into troop transports one at a time, and not allowing queuing of builds. This version doesn't have the cut-scenes or music either, so you don't get a good sense of narrative, and it takes a while to get going as you have to play a number of easy missions that introduce the concepts of different structures and units. But once you get to the 'proper' levels it's good fun, if, as I say, derivative, although it is basically a formula of fighting off enemy attacks until you have a big enough force to strike at the Construction Centre so they can't rebuild. There's also the surprising oversight of being able to build as close to enemy bases as you want by chaining cheap sandbag walls along and then constructing guard towers, a tactic I used often. The fact you can box in the enemy and they don't seem to mind, not attacking any walls you make, means it's easier - in 'Dune' you could only build on rock so you were much more restricted. But I always wondered what this famous game was like so I was glad to finally get around to playing it, even if it does seem a backward step in some regards (only two organisations making it a less complex setup). Enjoyable all the same. Only downside was my computer dying a little way into the NOD campaign and it's a bit glitchy on my new one. Even so, at some point I'd like to complete NOD. ***

July - September: Goldeneye 007 (2010, Wii) - Almost sad to finish it all in the end! This could have been the biggest surprise as I really did not expect to like it at all: you can't steal the famous name, redo it all as a Daniel Craig-era story and expect people like me to be happy! But it proved me wrong, for while it was the same, or very similar story, it was also very different in gameplay and once you got used to the more awkward controls (on the 'Cube pad as opposed to the N64 one), ignoring the Wii controls entirely, and immersed into the levels, it was a good challenge, to the extent I went back and did all the time trials, too, which again were very different to the original, being a countdown, upping the tension. It ties into some pleasant memories of a hot Summer and though it wasn't necessarily the best game to play at that time of year (one of my biggest complaints was how dark the visuals so often were), it proved a worthwhile time investment. ***

July - August: The Settlers (1993, Amiga) - Can't really say any more about this, it's simply my favourite game of all time. I think it was due to enjoying 'Command & Conquer' and then not being able to play it for a while that made me turn to this for my strategy needs. I remember one game in particular where I was basically replaying the same few minutes for about a week before I finally was able to fight towards some kind of survival (I was playing it the toughest way where I have no resources and the computer players have maximum), and before that I'd had to restart the whole game again at least twice on the same land, so it was a real relief when I finally won through that particular conquest! *****

September - December: Need For Speed Nitro (2009, Wii) - About as good as the other entries in the 'NFS' series that I enjoyed on 'Cube, though with its own flaws. This was the first to be Wii-specific, and where the first flaw comes in: control. The Wiimote simply isn't suited to driving games compared with the superior response of an analogue stick and as with so many of the system's games it's novelty value only. Fortunately the 'Cube pad is available as an alternative, though even there the configuration isn't customisable so you're stuck with uncomfortable choices like R Shoulder for accelerate! Not only that but L is brake while B is boost, completely counterintuitive to normal control schemes. Worse, you only get an outside view of the car so you can find yourself peering over or around your own vehicle in order to see the road ahead which is most off-putting if you prefer an in-car view! It's also a much simplified version as if Wii gamers couldn't 'cope' with a 'full-scale' edition - gone is the city, and while all the usual race types are present (Circuit, Knockout, Drag, Drift, Speed Trap, Time Trial), it's all just selected from the menu as was the case with 'Underground.' Not necessarily a bad thing, it's easy to see what you have to do and there's a nice system where you earn stars from coming in 1st-3rd, beating a certain lap time and scoring above a points target, but it has the effect of making the game seem small even with five different tracks across three car classes, A-C. Plenty of cars to collect or purchase, though the Garage section's another area where things are stripped down. Again, not necessarily bad, I'm not into the tinkering, and there is a new feature where your tag and chosen colours blanket the trackside if you're in front, earning extra points. Also there's a different tactical side to the game with collectable spanners for fixing damage and police badges to set them on an opponent or reduce your own heat with the law, so there is some experimentation with the formula, but nothing can disguise it is a stripped down game, even with pretty good opposition - I didn't realise at first that you don't have to achieve all stars in a race in the same go, nor the ability to restart a track in GP mode, which makes things a lot easier (I didn't!). Some specific track modes took hours to win, so there was longevity, but its qualities are merely what you'd expect from a competent racing game rather than pushing a new machine to the heights of 'Most Wanted' levels of innovation and quality. Still fun. ***

December: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (2011, Wii) - So far, so... okay. Good. Fine. Nothing spectacular, which is what you might hope for from a 'Zelda' on a new console, especially one that had been around a few years by the time this was released. But of course it's hamstrung by the outlandish controls. It is 'Zelda,' so they're going to do a good job, but it is one that was designed to fit with an uncomfortable gaming style (who really wants the trouble of having to slash in the right direction rather than simply pressing a button). Out of all the games that have forced Wii controls, this is undoubtedly the best implemented, but it's still a bit annoying, for all that. Early impressions (I'm up to the water dragon's dungeon so far), are that environments are quite limited when you compare the vastness of its predecessor, 'Twilight Princess.' And in the light of the pleasure I had from that game this doesn't measure up nearly so well to the extent it's almost like I have to go off to work to play it, get myself up for it. There seems less incentive to search for things, too, with bugs and bits being infinite and just a case of going back to somewhere if you need them, rather than a specific item that can only be found in one place, like the bug hunt in 'TP.' Flying is a bit too much like traversing 'Wind Waker's ocean and it all feels a little more Mario platformer. I can also mention the increase in dodgy supernatural themes, characters and actions, which I can't support - it's like they didn't feel there was enough of that stuff in previous games so they've gone overboard this time. It remains to be seen whether I'll still like the game by the end, but it has the expected brain-stretching and action, so I probably will. ***

Honourable mentions: 'BoXiKoN' on Mac (Apr, ***), 'Star Wars' on Game Boy (Jun, **), the latter I just didn't have patience with, just a brief muck-about, though I do remember it as a good challenge in the past, and 'Burnout 2' for traditional Christmas multiplayer (*****, Dec).

Next Year - The choices are narrowing, there aren't that many top games left to return to, so in 2023 I'd like to:

- Bring out Perfect Dark: in the year the story is set it has to be replayed and I've been looking forward to it for several years. This will be the big early-Summer N64 spectacular for me!

- Another replay is required for the first 'Metroid Prime' since 'MP3' made me wish there was a fourth in the series, perhaps late in the year?

- 'Cube's 'Splinter Cell' is a very visually dark title so I might have to tackle that post-'Skyward Sword' while it's still Winter

- I'd quite like to play 'Pirates' on the Wii, 'Blast Corps' on N64, and maybe another 'Need For Speed'

- Didn't happen last year so maybe this will be the Amiga 1500's long-awaited comeback?

- The Christmas 'Zelda' tradition of the last few years must go on, even if it is the weak 'Oracle of Ages' since there isn't much choice as it's almost the only entry I haven't revisited, other than 'Link's Awakening' or 'Ocarina of Time' and I'm leery of deleting old game files on that, it seems like sacrilege...

Happy New Year!