The Doomsday Machine Redux

[Eoraptor1]

I found this "remastered" version of one of my favorite Star Trek episodes on YouTube, so I thought I'd share it with my SOH friends. I know there's a large Trek nerd contingent here; because I can smell my own kind. The fellow who posted this, Prof. Moriarty, has people drooling for him to complete the job, but he works 13 hour days, and has a real life, so he's got limited time to work with old tv shows on the computer. I personally think his CGI work is at least as good as Paramount's official remaster. Judge for yourself.

Here's Part One:


[YOUTUBE]Y9onOBZBR_k[/YOUTUBE]

Here's Part Two:

[YOUTUBE]a73eE9d0ve8&feature=related[/YOUTUBE]

There's a third part on YouTube, but it's only an unfinished test. Enjoy.

JAMES

 

[Clarke123]

I know there's a large Trek nerd contingent here; because I can smell my own kind.

JAMES

What do you mean? I only just had a bath in November. Should be good for another three months.

 

[pilottj]

lol yeah there is always room for good Trek. That guy did quite a nice job, certianly almost as good as the CBS remasters. I wouldnt mind some of the early movies get polished up too, especialy the 2-3-4 set. The Motion Picture might look pretty good polished up as well

 

[Eoraptor1]

lol yeah there is always room for good Trek. That guy did quite a nice job, certianly almost as good as the CBS remasters. I wouldnt mind some of the early movies get polished up too, especialy the 2-3-4 set. The Motion Picture might look pretty good polished up as well

There is a cleaned up "Director's Cut" of Star Trek TMP out on DVD. Our public library here has it. Among other things, you get to see what "V'Ger" looks like without the energy cloud. The Special Features are also very interesting. Star Trek came very close to coming back on the air in the late 70s; much closer than I knew at the time. You can see some of the test shots on the DVD. There was going to be a second five-year mission. To me, that would have been like the Beatles getting back together.

JAMES

 

[Clarke123]

Is it my imagination or does Kirk call McCoy, Spoons, at about 6 minutes in the first clip.

 

[Moses03]

Big Trek nerd here. The Doomsday Machine happens to be my all-time favorite Star Trek episode.

I had a chance meeting with William Windom who played Commodore Decker back in 1981 but was too shy to ask him about that role. Hey, I was just a kid!

 

[Eoraptor1]

Here's Part 3, the "test" release. All the flight-simmers here will notice the planetary rubble hasn't been completely textured, as this is a work-in-progress. I don't know why I didn't include this part in my initial posting, but here it is. You get to see the entirety of the planet killer, and also see it use its energy weapon, which looks suspiciously like Imperial technology. The Enterprise moving through the rubble also reminds me very much of the Millenium Falcon moving through the asteroid field in The Empire Strikes Back. One of the commentary posters tut-tuts Prf Moriarty for "banking" the Enterprise in what should be a total vacuum.

[YOUTUBE]GhPjam4MUeY&feature=related[/YOUTUBE]

JAMES

 

[PRB]

That's cool! This was one of my favorite eppisodes as well. Great CG work there!

 

[txnetcop]

I hate to use such a worn cliche' but SWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEETTTTTT

Ted

 

[n4gix]

I've always been puzzled why they never seemed to grasp onto the idea of seatbelts...

...it seems such a "logical" solution to being thrown all over the command deck!

 

[David_L6]

Very nice!

 

[Eoraptor1]

I've always been puzzled why they never seemed to grasp onto the idea of seatbelts...

...it seems such a "logical" solution to being thrown all over the command deck!

William Shatner says now that Star Trek is an institution, and the Enterprise is in the Smithsonian, what people today don't understand is how very low budget TOS was. The people flying around the bridge was their way of dramtically "selling" the visual and sound effects because the budget was so limited. I recommend both of Shatner's Star Trek Memories book to fans, as well as Stephen Whitfield and Gene Roddenberry's The Making of Star Trek; but the real eye-opener IMO is Nichelle Nichols' memoir. A lot of Capt. Kirk's behavior with the ladies comes directly from Gene Roddenberry's personal life, at least according to Lt. Uhura.

What I never understood was how by the 24th century the Federation seemingly hadn't mastered the circuit breaker. Consoles were constantly blowing up in crew members' faces with the slightest provocation.

JAMES

 

[stansdds]

Is it my imagination or does Kirk call McCoy, Spoons, at about 6 minutes in the first clip.

I think he did. I think the original series was always on a bit of a tight budget, most tv shows were back then. I guess if the gaff wasn't too bad, they didn't waste film reshooting the scene. The special effects were darned good for their time.

 

[Trans_23]

What I never understood was how by the 24th century the Federation seemingly hadn't mastered the circuit breaker. Consoles were constantly blowing up in crew members' faces with the slightest provocation.

JAMES

Those 24th century computers are nothing compared to the stuff they have on shows like CSI Miami and a couple other crime shows on today. I call them, the magic computers (in my best Forrest Gump voice).

 

[Eoraptor1]

Those 24th century computers are nothing compared to the stuff they have on shows like CSI Miami and a couple other crime shows on today. I call them, the magic computers (in my best Forrest Gump voice).

I've noticed that myself. My mother is a big Bones fan. She'd watch it all day if it were on. On that show they have a holographic display that could have come right from the Enterprise bridge. Emily Deschanel's portrayal of Temperence Brennan is also very Vulcan. (Brennan in the book series is quite a bit different; older and more rounded in her personal life.) I have issues with the way tv and movies portray people who work in the sciences; IMO they tend to be junior high-school high school stereotypes, or Vulcans. My mother and I often joke that Sarek should come get Temperence and take her home.

If you haven't seen it already, be on the lookout for a documentary called "How William Shatner Changed the World". Its thesis is that a lot of people who pursued careers in the sciences were Star Trek fans as kids, thought all the gadgets were cool, then went out and made things like MRIs, super-computers, and cell phones.

JAMES

 

[n4gix]

What I never understood was how by the 24th century the Federation seemingly hadn't mastered the circuit breaker. Consoles were constantly blowing up in crew members' faces with the slightest provocation.

JAMES

True enough, but following the same logic as for the lack of seatbelts (or some advanced gravitic based restraint), how exciting would it be if some circuit breaker tripped with a soft "click noise" and the console went dark?

Scotty to Kirk: "Say Jim, haf't ya got a penny? I can bridge the circuit breaker with it!"

BTW, I'm a big fan of "Bones" as well. Some of Temperance's lines do manage to convey the frequent disconnect that super-bright people have with the reality us "mundanes" experience though...

"Just be yourself Temperance."

"I don't know what that means," Temperance replies with a perfectly straight face...

 

[Eoraptor1]

True enough, but following the same logic as for the lack of seatbelts (or some advanced gravitic based restraint), how exciting would it be if some circuit breaker tripped with a soft "click noise" and the console went dark?

Scotty to Kirk: "Say Jim, haf't ya got a penny? I can bridge the circuit breaker with it!"

BTW, I'm a big fan of "Bones" as well. Some of Temperance's lines do manage to convey the frequent disconnect that super-bright people have with the reality us "mundanes" experience though...

"Just be yourself Temperance."

"I don't know what that means," Temperance replies with a perfectly straight face...

1) Point taken about the circuit breakers. Just sayin'.

2) I watch Bones semi-regularly. I enjoy a lot of procedural dramas even if I don't always believe them. Everything doesn't have to be Olivier for me to enjoy it. What I notice with Bones is they're trying to be a procedural drama and a romantic comedy. I prefer a straight up procedural without all the Doris Day/Rock Hudson stuff going on. I know a lot of people feel differently; this is just me. I'm reading Cross Bones right now. I enjoy the books more than the series; which I felt made some changes not necessarily for the better to widen the appeal to that 17-34 year old professional demographic Angela Landsbury was on about in the press when Murder She Wrote got cancelled. A lot of suspiciously attractive people in their 20s and early 30s in positions of authority. Again, a lot of people will feel differently.

3) I was an advanced placement student in high school; I got to know these ultra-high acheiving Diane Court types very well. I'm a full blown nerd. I know my people. I went to high school, college, and grad school with them, I went to their weddings, and if I hadn't gotten sick, I'd probably be cheating on my girlfriend with my 22-year old grad assistant right now. I'm not talking about rich kids, whose parents have been endowing a series of private school, prep schools, and college alumini foundations since they were born, so by the time they're 17 they view admittance into Harvard or Princeton as a birthright. I'm talking about the bright children of the middle-class. This is only my personal experience, and by no means objective, but NONE of the intellectuelles I befriended talked like Bones. A lot of them played on sports teams in school, played musical instruments, and quite a few of them had been cheerleaders. That's another stereotype I never personally encountered; the evil slutty cheerleader. The ones I knew were all very nice, and most of them ver very bright. Anyway, getting back on track, it just seems to me the networks feel the only way the viewing audience can handle a character employing scientific method is to protray them as some sort of social invalid. Just my opinion. One thing I do think Bones gets right is the highly specialized vocabulary. That's been my experience with any group of people working in a specific area of expertise; they could be doctors, electricians, military, or economists. If you're not an inititiate in their field, a lot of what they're saying when they talk to each other sounds like a foreign language. So, I do take your point there.

JAMES

 

[n4gix]

I prefer a straight up procedural without all the Doris Day/Rock Hudson stuff going on. I know a lot of people feel differently; this is just me. I'm reading Cross Bones right now. I enjoy the books more than the series; which I felt made some changes not necessarily for the better to widen the appeal to that 17-34 year old professional demographic Angela Landsbury was on about in the press when Murder She Wrote got cancelled. A lot of suspiciously attractive people in their 20s and early 30s in positions of authority. Again, a lot of people will feel differently.

Although I do partially agree with your observations, the fact is that there's always been some non-procedural dynamic in play in any real-life workplace, so having some in Bones isn't completely unrealistic. I would also go on to state that I do find it somewhat overdone. A little bit of non-sequitur humor goes a long way, but in excess... yuck!

I throughly enjoyed the Murder, She Wrote series. Some of the episodes were written by Joseph Michael Straczynski, the same fellow who produced and wrote most the Babylon 5 series. Not surprisingly, I thought those JMS wrote were the best. :ernae:

I've had more than my reasonable share of interactions with very bright individuals over the years who were socially challenged, although not perhaps to quite the degree protrayed by the Temperance character. Many of my confreres in Mensa could give lessons in social ineptness...

 

[Willy]

I'll confess. Bones is one of the few shows on tv these days that I do watch. Wonder if Angela's computer would run FSX?

 

[Eoraptor1]

I've had more than my reasonable share of interactions with very bright individuals over the years who were socially challenged, although not perhaps to quite the degree protrayed by the Temperance character. Many of my confreres in Mensa could give lessons in social ineptness...

This is only one reason I don't believe "general intelligence" can be measured by a single numerical value representing Intelligence Quotient (IQ) but I don't want to open up that can of worms...

I was a Murder She Wrote fan as well. It wasn't trying to be Mickey Spillane or Joseph Wambaugh, but Jessica Flecther did actual detective work, asking forensic questions, and following a chain of evidence. The statements Angela Lansbury made in the press when the series was cancelled really changed the way I looked at televison shows. Her show was winning its time slot when it was cancelled, but not with the demographic the network wanted. They felt that older people were saving too much of their money instead of spending it on consumer goods. Ms. Lansbury remarked that first we are young, then we are middle aged, then we are old, and that is called a life. That was something I liked about the original Star Trek feature films; they dealt with the aging of the characters and made it part of the story. The original Star Trek had the exact opposite problem faced by Murder, She Wrote; it lost its time slot, but won with the prized demographic; young professionals and such. Unfortunately for Trek fans, this was the last year the networks used raw audience share instead of the more discriminating demographic breakdown.

Now I'm beginning to sound like Don Draper from MadMen, and should stop typing.

Thank you for your responses, n4gix.


JAMES