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Guest Post: K.W. Ramsey on the Many Sins of SyFy’s Defiance

By
K.W. Ramsey
– May 27, 2013Posted in: Reviews, TV Reviews

Let’s be blunt. Despite reports that it’s getting better, Defiance sucks as much if not more than it did when it first premiered. It sucks harder than a Tim Taylor souped-up vacuum cleaner. It sucks more than a black hole that’s so big it eats other black holes for breakfast. It sucks more than Twilight. (Okay, maybe that last one was a bit harsh. Sorry, Twilight, you don’t suck as much as Defiance.)

Defiance is quite possibly the worst bit of television SyFy has produced in the last decade. Yes, I’m calling this the worst thing on a channel that gave us Sharktopus. At least with Sharktopus they didn’t drop a hundred million dollars like a lead weight.

The sad part is, it could have been glorious. It could have been a show to captivate and draw me in. I love sci-fi Westerns. I’ve been a Browncoat from the very first episode of Firefly. Heck, I even enjoyed Cowboys & Aliens. I was inclined to like Defiance from the beginning, but it has sinned early and often.

Chief amongst Defiance’s sins is lazy writing. It’s as if the writers’ room opens up TvTropes in a browser window each day and asks “What can we steal from today?” The characters they’ve created are all stereotypes: from the gruff lawman to the evil robber baron, from the dutiful homesteader wife acting as mayor, to said mayor’s sister, the prostitute with a heart-of-gold.

Now don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with stock/stereotype characters. They can be a great starting point for characterization, a foundation to build upon, but five episodes in and Defiance has failed to even pretend its characters have any depth.

Let me illustrate this by comparing the gruff lawman, Joshua Nolan, played by Grant Bowler, with Malcolm Reynolds, played by Nathan Fillion. Both are former military men, Nolan a Marine and Reynolds a Sergeant with the Independents. Both have daughter figures in their lives, Nolan with Irisa and Reynolds with Kaylee. In fact, one might say that Nolan shares a lot of similarities with Reynolds, perhaps too many? (See what I mean by lazy writing.)

The main difference between the two is that by the end of Firefly’s first aired episode, The Train Job, we had a decent idea of who Malcolm Reynolds was and could tell this was a character with depth. The very end of that episode, when he kicks Crow into the running engine, was a wonderful, if brutal, character-defining moment. It is a perfect example of showing rather than telling.

Five episodes in and Defiance has failed to give Nolan anything close to that kind of moment. In Firefly’s first episode, one that was quickly revised to serve as a pilot after Fox nixed airing the proper one, Whedon and co. were able to define the characters’ relationships and bring across the idea that these were complex, real people. It wasn’t perfect, and the show hadn’t quite hit its stride, but it did more in one episode than Defiance seems capable of doing in an entire season.

At this point it no doubt sounds like I’m writing this as an excuse to praise Firefly and bash Defiance. Honestly, the two shows are cut from the same cloth and comparisons between them are inevitable. Both feature ensemble casts and both occupy the same genre stomping grounds. Defiance, however, lives in Firefly’s shadow and has failed to do anything to break out of it, which is another of its sins.

A prime example of this is the last episode I watched, and likely the last episode of the show I’ll ever watch, The Serpent’s Egg. It featured two different plot lines (and this will be part of the next sin I illuminate), one where Nolan and the lady mayor, played by the lovely Julie Benz, are on a transport/stagecoach that’s robbed and another where Nolan’s daughter Irisa ties up and tortures a man she believes tortured her as a child. Hmmm…sounds like a mash-up of The Train Job and War Stories to me. First off, there is no good reason for the mayor to be on the transport. We are denied even a half-hearted attempt to explain her presence. It just happens and we’re expected to accept it. Hoookay. Next, Irisa kidnaps and hides a screaming man in the middle of Defiance, not that far from populated areas, and then tortures him until he confesses he was the one who tortured her as a way of proving she was the “Chosen One” ( this is a whole other matter that could be a rant in and off itself, but then this article would be five times as long, so I’m just going to let it go).

Sigh. The stagecoach robbery is pretty much standard fare for Westerns, and in this case not much is done with it. Nolan and the mayor are put into danger and find they can rely on each other. Yawn. Already been done and it doesn’t add anything to their relationship. On the flip side, the torture scenes are just as boring and predictable, but become truly disturbing when you realize Irisa is a deputy of the law. Not only does she get away with it, but by the end she has another deputy convinced she was right to do it. Then they have sex. (No, I’m not making that up.)

So here we have two standard plots that really don’t do anything towards building or revealing characters and also feel lifted from other sources. Oh, joy. This ties into another of Defiance’s sins. In nearly all of the episodes aired so far there have been multiple simultaneous plots to the point where none of them are given enough time in the spotlight. The torture plot from The Serpent’s Egg could have been a wonderful character building/establishing moment for Irisa and her relationship with Nolan, like War Stories was for Wash, Mal, and Zoe in Firefly. This could have been the character driven episode I’ve been craving from the very beginning, chock full of moments that show rather than tell me who these people are and why they love each other. Instead it fell out of the air like a lame duck because the stagecoach plot took vital time away from it.

The sins already mentioned could be mitigated if the actors in Defiance were up to the challenge. They’re not. It’s not only a failure on the part of the cast, it’s a failure on the part of everyone involved in producing the show, and there is no excuse for it. Firefly proved that it’s possible to get top-notch actors to play genre roles, and I highly doubt that hiring them broke the bank for Fox. Defiance, however, has failed to attract the same level of talent and/or failed to provide that talent with a level of writing that could allow them to shine. Looking at the cast list on Wikipedia I can see some familiar names, people who’ve been around genre works before, but no big names. It’s obvious that very little cash was put into finding competent much less good talent.

Defiance final sin relates back to the lazy writing and multiple plots, but I’m going to let it stand on its own. As I’ve mentioned, the show fails to show rather than tell, and this has been apparent from the pilot onwards. Reading the Wikipedia entry on the show reveals a great deal about the world of Defiance and how Earth has changed, as well as providing a plethora of background material on the races. Almost none of this appears in the show, or if it does it’s introduced in the most ham-fisted way possible. The audience, namely me, should be captivated by the world the writers’ have created, but instead I’m bored and irritated.

And in spite of all its sins, Defiance has secured a second season. I could blame this on a deal with the Devil, but the truth is that the genre audience is hungry for a show like Defiance. We want something high-concept with aliens, technology, and a world unlike anything we’ve seen. We want shows with heroes and villains living on bold new frontiers. We thirst for them so much, like a man wandering the desert, that we’ll drink just about anything no matter how foul the taste. That is the secret to Defiance’s current success, and as soon as someone comes along with a cleaner, more refreshing drink I have no doubt Defiance will be tossed aside like the dirty ditch-water that it is.


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Book Review: The Anthology of European SF

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 24, 2013Posted in: Lit Reviews, Reviews

In the introduction to the Anthology of European SF, editors Cristian Tamaş and Roberto Mendes outline their intention to use an exploration of European identity as the framework for an anthology of science fiction. Specifically, they assert that “Europe has a political union and a common market, but not a cultural common market or a publishing common market.” As a result, the editors are keen to showcase this collection as a means of mobilizing Europe’s native talent for a European audience while also bringing it to the world at large.

As a result the Anthology of European SF is rather broad in its approach to the genre. For example, Ian R. MacLeod’s The Dead Orchards opens the book with a story that lands at the intersection of fantasy, post-apocalyptic story-telling, and horror. Jetse de Vries’ Transcendent Express stands out as classic “hard” SF, and is perhaps one of the best stories of the anthology for the effort. There’s even a bit of Lovecraftian horror, in both style and form, from Liviu Radu’s Digits Are Cold, Numbers Are Warm. Even without the safety net of an explicit theme or trope to hold the anthology together, a great many of these stories are strong enough to stand on their own. Generally those tales which fall short of the mark do so in terms of failing to present a measurable conflict; the strength of their prose is undeniable, but from my point of view a story must do more than build a world and end on a note of introspection.

Honour Roll

Starsong by Aliette de Bodard

As a rule, I tend to avoid recognizing reprints in this section of my anthology reviews. I think I better serve my readers by highlighting new works of fiction, rather than dwelling on stories which have already received an initial publication credit, and likely critical praise, outside of the anthology. I’m happily breaking this rule for Starsong.

The first few hundred words of Starsong almost put me off the story. The prose is elegant but somewhat difficult to parse. Further adding to the story’s opaque nature is a structure which shifts between ethereal and temporal narratives. Whatever confusion I initially felt, however, was put aside as the two layers effortlessly folded into each other. By the end of my first read through, I couldn’t believe I had even considered writing off the write-off. Mea culpa.

Starsong grounds its inner/outer universe dialogues in terms of a double story about humanity’s relationship to technology and its relationship to itself. It does so through focusing on a young woman’s marginalization from society at large. While this motif is nothing new within science fiction, Starsong pulls at the threads of this vast tapestry in a very compelling way. Ideas of racism and alienation are teased as to make the reader wonder if the “other” is indeed a literal alien. This was the hook for me. The finisher was when the story made me wonder why I thought the former question was somehow a relevant distinction.

For its ability to blend contemporary issues of racism, race loyalty, and xenophobia within a far-future human civilization, Starsong is not a story to be missed.

Repeat Performances by Carmelo Rafala

It is a rare and wonderful thing to see a story which is so much bigger than the few thousand words it comprises. Using near-future Mexico as a setting, Repeat Performances invokes elements of Latin American culture as a base for the story’s extended metaphors – FYI: de Bodard’s story does the same thing. How interesting that this part of the world prove such a fertile ground for European storytelling.

The conflict at hand is driven by an attempt to reclaim agency and reunite family within a world of exploitative flesh traders and post-humans who have symbiotic relationships with alien parasites. I believe this to be something of an intentional commentary in that all of the story’s post-humans are all children who have willingly embraced having their bodies changed at the hands of an extraterrestrial McGuffin. Where children are curious enough to forfeit part of their humanity to become something else, the adults only seem capable of recognizing an opportunity to appropriate something for their own ends.

Though this was my first exposure to Rafala’s writing, I think I would gladly read a novel set within this world.

News from a Dwarf Universe by Dănuţ Ungureanu

A very simple concept drives News from a Dwarf Universe: that of a machine capable of shrinking anything and then returning said object to its original size. Using a documentarian’s voice, Ungureanu shows how this technology could usher in a golden age for humanity, at least until a significant percentage of the population gets stuck in their shrunk down state. In that light, it is hard not to look at this story as a parable on the dangers of becoming dependent upon a technology which is not fully understood.

Beyond that, this piece is commendable for its efficiency in storytelling. It’s one thing to read a work of fiction where the author says “what if” with a new piece of technology. Witnessing Ungureanu introduce said technology only to remove it, and in turn showing the ways in which this upsets the apple cart, all while working within the confines of short fiction is no small (no pun intended) achievement.

While News from a Dwarf Universe is something of a lesson in hubris, it’s also an optimistic, if cautionary, tale on a sustainable lifestyle.

The Bottom Line

If the goals of this anthology were to A) expose readers to quality content from the European science fiction community and B) promote ISF Magazine and Europa SF at large, then I would say mission accomplished. The majority of the stories in this anthology are quite good, and a few are absolutely great. Those that failed to deliver, for me at least, did so because actual story proved secondary to style, remarkable as the latter may have been. Overall, the Anthology of European SF is a solid read and a promise of great things to come from its editors and parent publisher.

The Anthology of European SF

Edited by Cristian Tamaş and Roberto Mendes

Published by ISF Magazine and Europa SF


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Movie Review: Three Inches

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 22, 2013Posted in: Movie Reviews, Reviews

Yeah, I know, I’m not exactly stretching my critical talents in taking on the likes of Three Inches. I’ll make it up to you later.

Originally intended as a pilot for a SyFy series that never was, the movie lands in a dead zone of mediocrity located somewhere between X-Men and Mystery Men. Granted, the movie has potential, especially given some of the established talent attached to the production. Yet the combination of a bloated cast and a poorly plotted script kill any chance for this movie to gel into something better than the sum of its parts

The story focuses on Walter (Noah Reid), a twenty-six year old dog washer who lives at home with his mother, played to the hilt by Andrea Martin. Right out of the gate I’m not sure what to make of Walter, whose primary goal in life seems to be finding the nerve to tell the literal girl-next-door that he’s loved her forever whist adorning the walls of his bedroom with classic Starcraft posters – methinks Blizzard kicked in a quatloo or two toward the production budget. It’s the sort of initial conflict I would expect in a movie with a teenage protagonist played by a twenty-six year old actor. The only benefit I could see in aging up the juvenile trope is it allows Walter’s inevitable superhero angst to be tied to a paper thin subtext on post-university career disillusionment.

Shortly after Walter, who also narrates the movie to little affect, gets rejected by the girl-next-door he is struck by lightning. This in turn awakens his telekinetic ability to move any object three inches – a seemingly useless power for which the writing is clever enough to find some decent applications. This extended first act, which goes on for nearly forty-five minutes, also sees some of the movie’s best comedy. It’s mostly one liners and unexpected reactions to clichéd situations which get the job done. The act also introduces James Marsters as Troy Hamilton, who fulfills the Nick Fury/Professor X archetype; it’s just a shame his part is so flimsy that a stiff gust of wind could knock it down like poorly assembled lawn furniture.

Three Inches’ sins extend beyond making a strong character actor play a boring as toast bureaucrat. The movie is hopelessly bloated with secondary and tertiary characters. I’d be happy if these players were dispensable redshirts, but the story actually tries to give them all screen time. This slows the pace so much that it takes a full hour before the story’s central conflict finally lurches into action. The writers, whoever they are as there’s no writing credits listed on IMDB, spend far too much time in the “getting to know you” and “why we fight” phase of the super hero character arc, only to skim through the actual conflict.

Then, as if somebody recognized that the script pissed away runtime that would have been better spent on framing a tangible foe or at least a clear objective for the superheroes, the third act triples down on the pathos. The “acquire the package” trope resolves into the package being a little girl and suddenly the audience is supposed to give a damn. If only we knew why she was special, beyond the lazy exposition that identifies her as a person with uber-powers. Perhaps if we learned something about those holding her captive, then we might care about this plot twist.

Cut to a cornball “I’m Spartacus” ending, sans crucifixion, followed by Walter backsliding into his crush on the girl-next-door, even though the sexy female superhero on his team all but made her intentions clear to him, and the movie leaves its audience wondering just how many executives actually thought this would be worth an hour and a half of my life.

On a technical level, Three Inches boasts some of the sloppiest editing that I have ever seen. There are scene and act breaks which cut to black for three or four seconds before moving on to the next sequence. Again, I want to know how something like that gets past the final screening. Surely somebody must have wondered why the editor was intentionally killing the pace of the story every eight minutes.

In the final assessment, Three Inches certainly showcased some potential, if only it knew what it wanted to be. It’s not funny enough to be a full-on comedy, but it’s too poorly paced for me to take it seriously as an action movie. It smacks of committee style writing and revision throughout the production. Unless you are slavishly devoted to James Marsters, Naoko Mori, Craig Eldridge, or Andrea Martin, you would be wise to give this one a miss.

Three Inches

Directed by: Jace Alexander

Written by: Nobody, apparently.

Starring: Noah Reid, Stephanie Jacobsen, and James Marsters


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A PoR Public Service Announcement: Do not Submit Your Fiction to Starburst Magazine

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 21, 2013Posted in: Criticism, The Daily Shaft

Though I’ve only sold one short story in my life, I’ve had a great many stories rejected. Moreover, I’ve been getting rejected long enough to feel a certain amount of confidence in my ability to parse submission guidelines and the rights that magazines/publishers are looking to buy. In a recent attempt to find a home for my fiction I came across Starburst Magazine. After reading their submission guidelines I feel fully confident in saying the following:

UNDER NO CIRCUMSTNACES SHOULD ANY WRITER SUBMIT A PIECE OF THEIR ORIGINAL FICTION TO STARBURST MAGAZINE.

At the time of this post, Starburst continues to accept submissions for original fiction. For the sake of convenience, I’ve reproduced their guidelines below.

Would you like to see your original fiction featured in the pages of Starburst Magazine or online at www.starburstmagazine.com? Then you’ve come to the right place! We’re currently on the lookout for sci-fi, fantasy and/or horror themed short stories, so if you’d like to submit yours for consideration, email it to:

rylan.cavell@starburstmagazine.com

Stories must be 100% your own material, previously unpublished, between 800 – 1600 words in length (for print) and categorically NOT about the zombie apocalypse. (Seriously, we love a good zombie yarn as much as the next person, but the amount of these things out there right now is frightening. And not in the good way.)

Please note: If published, Starburst will retain copyright, but any further use beyond the above will be subject to renegotiation. Additionally, while every effort is made, the demands of the submissions process deem it difficult to offer critiques on all material sent in.

I see two problems with these guidelines. First, they don’t talk about payment. Even if a magazine doesn’t pay, it should say so in the guidelines. More troublesome though is the final paragraph.

“Starburst will retain copyright?” What? That’s not right. By those terms a person submitting their fiction to Starburst is not offering it for sale but surrendering the ownership of said story.

I reached out to Starburst for clarification, assuming this was all just a mistake on my part or a typo on theirs. Here’s my email.

To the editors,

I am writing regarding your submission guidelines for original fiction.

You do not list any per-word or flat rate for payment. At this time are you offering payment for accepted submissions?

You also state that Starburst will retain copyright upon publication of a story. This suggests that you are buying the story outright and in perpetuity. Is this an accurate interpretation?

Cordially yours,

Adam Shaftoe

Starburst responded with the following:

Good evening,

Thank you for your interest in Starburst Magazine. At the current time we are not offering payment. When and if published Starburst will own the rights to the fiction, but this can be renegotiated in the future if needs be.

I hope this clears up any confusion

Rylan

For the record, reputable magazines do not bring up copyright except to reaffirm that it remains in the hands of the author. A sample contract from Lightspeed Magazine illustrates this previous point.  A magazine buys, or is given, certain publication rights. Starburst’s guidelines are on par, if not worse, than what we’ve seen recently from scummy publishers who try to gimmick neophyte writers into surrendering all rights until the sun explodes. At least in those cases the author is still the legal owner of the work in question.

Though I am not a lawyer, it seems to me that these these guidelines are so poorly written that they may not even be actionable under the laws of gods and men – at least not without a highly unconventional contract to support Starburst’s ownership claim on printed fiction. Regardless, the publishers of Starburst Magazine, either out of slime-bag malice or colossal ignorance, have set up a system which appears to appropriate the work of the artists they purport to showcase. This will not do at all.

I encourage all writers, readers, and interested parties to boycott Starburst Magazine, and share any outrage they may feel with the magazine’s editorial team until such time as Starburst’s submission policies reflect a more responsible and equitable approach to publication.

Contacts at Starburst Magazine

EDITOR

Jordan Royce jordan.royce@starburstmagazine.com

ASSISTANT EDITOR

Kris Heys kris.heys@starburstmagazine.com

PR LIAISON

Phil Perry phil.perry@starburstmagazine.com


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Predictions on CBS’ New Season

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 17, 2013Posted in: Television, The Daily Shaft

Let’s play a game, shall we? I’m going to go through the press release on CBS’ new 2013-14 primetime series, as pillaged from TV Line.com, and make some predictions on how I think they will do. Ready? Here goes.

Crazy Ones (Comedy)
EP | David E. Kelley (Harry’s Law, Ally McBeal)
DIRECTOR | Jason Winer (Modern Family)
CAST | Robin Williams (Mork & Mindy), James Wolk (Political Animals), Sarah Michelle Gellar (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Ringer), Hamish Linklater (The New Adventures of Old Christine), Amanda Setton (Mindy Project)

Log line: A father/daughter workplace comedy set in the world of advertising.

Prediction: So we’re getting a lighter hearted version of Mad Men, interesting. Buffy fans are going to go ape shit for this series because OMG BUFFY! ZOMFG! Meanwhile, Boomers will hail the return of Robin Williams to television. Williams won’t be quite as manic (or funny) as people would hope for, but he’ll be good enough to get the show picked up for a second season within nine episodes.

The Millers (Comedy)
EP | Greg Garcia (Raising Hope)
DIRECTOR | James Burrows
CAST | Will Arnett (Up All Night), Margo Martindale (The Americans), Beau Bridges (My Name Is Earl), JB Smoove (Curb Your Enthusiasm), Mary Elizabeth Ellis (It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia), Michael Rapaport (The Mob Doctor)

Log line: The multi-cam project revolves around a recently divorced man living with his parents.

Prediction: On paper, this should work. This is a talented cast with no shortage of Emmy pedigree. James Burrows has been directing smart TV comedies for longer than I’ve been alive. The problem, as I see it, is that ABC already beat CBS to the punch on this one with the dreadful Sarah Chalke comedy, How to Live With Your Parents (For the Rest of Your Life). The comparisons will be inevitable, and The Millers won’t do nearly as well as it would have under other circumstances. They’ll make it to the finish line of their first season, but not even a Will Arnett chicken dance will see it to a second season.

Mom (Comedy)
EPs | Chuck Lorre, Eddie Gorodetsky and Gemma Baker (Two and a Half Men)
DIRECTOR | Pam Fryman (How I Met Your Mother)
CAST | Anna Faris (The House Bunny), Allison Janney (The West Wing), Nate Corddry (Harry’s Law), Matt Jones (Breaking Bad), French Stewart (3rd Rock From the Sun), Spencer Daniels (The Office), Sadie Calvano (J. Edgar), Blake Garrett Rosenthal

Log line: A newly sober single mom tries to pull her life together in Napa Valley in the multi-cam sitcom.

Prediction: French Stewart in a Chuck Lorre series? No good can come from this. I foresee maudlin pathos grabs in every episode, ultimately leading to “feel good” comedy. Despite the fact that anybody with half a brain will see through Mom as dim witted schmaltz, it will get picked up for a million seasons and become the new Two and a Half Men.

We Are Men (Comedy)
EP | Rob Greenberg (How I Met Your Mother)
CAST | Jerry O’Connell (The Defenders), Kal Penn (House), Tony Shalhoub (Monk), Chris Smith (Paranormal Activity 3)

Log Line: A ditched groom moves into a short-term housing complex and makes friends with some older, divorced dudes in the single-cam sitcom.

Prediction: Brosplosion! Part of me, the very dark part that feeds on the misery of others, wants to watch Jerry O’Connell-Romijn sad-sack it up. Though there will be lots of potential for smart writing, I foresee a cloud of Kirk Van Houten oafishness and some wholesale misogyny poisoning the show for anybody who isn’t a bro. It will get cancelled before it has a chance to get to the back nine.

Hostages (Drama)
EPs | Jerry Bruckheimer (CSI), Rick Eid (CSI, Dark Blue)
CAST | Dylan McDermott (American Horror Story), Toni Collette (United States of Tara), Tate Donovan (Deception), Sandrine Holt (House of Cards), Rhys Coiro (Entourage), Billy Brown (The Following), James Naughton (Gossip Girl), Mateus Ward, Quinn Shephard

Log Line: Based upon the Israeli format, the project centers on a family caught in the middle of a grand political conspiracy and a righteous FBI agent at the center of said conspiracy whose role will come as a surprise.

Prediction: This sounds like a network equivalent to Homeland. The cast is solid. Moreover, Bruckheimer’s reputation as an EP speaks for itself. Where ABC tried and failed with smart, high-stakes geopolitical drama in Last Resort, I anticipate Hostages will pull back a bit and let the audience latch on to individual character conflicts rather than selling the politics outright. I think this one will finish its first season, and likely get picked up for a second, if only because it will attract a following from fans of CSI and The Practice.

Intelligence (Drama)
EPs | Michael Seitzman, David Semel (No Ordinary Family), Tripp Vinson, Rene Echevarria (Terra Nova)
DIRECTOR | David Semel (No Ordinary Family)
CAST | Josh Holloway (Lost), Marg Helgenberger (CSI), Meghan Ory (Once Upon a Time), Michael Rady (Emily Owens, M.D.), James Martinez (Breaking Bad), John Billingsley (True Blood)

Log line: Centered at US Cyber Command, and focuses on a unit that has been created around one agent with a very special gift, a microchip that has been implanted in his brain that allows him to access the entire electromagnetic spectrum.

Prediction: Much as it pains me to say it, I don’t think the only show that remotely qualifies as SF in CBS’ lineup will make the cut. While I blame Brandon Braga for most of Terra Nova’s failures, Echevarria’s association will be something of a poison pill. Despite featuring that guy from Lost, the pitch sounds a lot like 24 meets The Six Million Dollar Man. Genre fans will give it a go but I doubt a man with (insert ray) vision will attract enough of a broad audience to lock down a second season, at least not when people can watch Person of Interest. CBS will try to ride it out, but I expect a quiet cancellation after the finale.

And there we have it. Now to sit back and bask in my prescience, or suffer the jeers of my readers when I get everything totally wrong. Tell you what, let’s make this interesting. If I don’t bat at least .500 on this one, I shall make some sort of act of contrition, to be named by my readers, on a future podcast. My fate is in your hands.


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Afternoon Anime – Space Battleship Yamato 2199: Episode 8

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 15, 2013Posted in: Reviews, TV Reviews

The eighth episode of Space Battleship Yamato 2199 plays out as something of a throw away story. Though Wish Upon A Star confirms a few things any intelligent viewer would have speculated about on their own, this window into the culture and hierarchy of Planet Gamillon really doesn’t break any new ground. In short: if you haven’t quite figured out the series’ extended metaphor, then you will certainly get the message by the end of this episode.

Much of the story happens on Gamillon, where its citizens are feting Lord Albet Desler on the occasion of the 103rd year of his reign and the 1000th anniversary of the Great Gamilas Reich Empire. The VIP after party to the public spectacle facilitates introductions to the Gamilas high command, whose names all range on the Germanic spectrum. Once we move past the toadying and scraping before Desler, the throne room’s assembled guests are treated to the “theatre” of a new weapon being used against the Yamato.

Meanwhile our eponymous battleship has warped into a solar storm, engineered by Desler of course. A lone Gamilas ship, which turns out to be the sole survivor of the Yamato’s assault on the Pluto base, is charged with deploying the “Desler Torpedo,” thus redeeming themselves for defeat at the hands of “the barbarian ship.”

Note here that the Pluto base survivors are white-skinned as opposed to blue-skinned Gamilans. Idle racism from Desler’s inner circle confirms that these Gamilans are non-terrestrial humans who have been assimilated into the Gamilas Empire. Their worlds acceded to Gamilas’ Anschluss unification of the Large and Small Magellinic Cloud, and in return were allowed to serve as second class citizens within the greater Gamilas Empire.

Say what you will about the original series’ attempts to re-write Japanese identity, but at least it was more subtle than this. I would wager real money that Iscandar is now some sort of Space Warsaw Ghetto.

The episode’s big reveal comes in the form of the Desler Torpedo releasing a gaseous biological weapon akin to the blob. For those keeping score at home, Gamilas’ WMD count now includes radioactive meteor bombs and biological gas weapons. Is anybody unclear on how they are supposed to read the Gamilans at this point?

With the solar storm precluding another warp or effective sub-light manoeuvring, Captain Okita’s only option to escape the blob is to sail dangerously close to a star. Doing so facilitates yet another opportunity to foreshadow that Captain Okita’s days are numbered. The Captain’s plan, which apparently none of the Gamilans, save for Desler, could imagine, allows the star’s gravity to trap and consume the gas monster. The Yamato then uses the wave motion gun to blast a gap through an unavoidable solar flare (physics FTW) and thus navigate the ship to safety.

Meanwhile the Gamilas ship that fired the torpedo has advanced on the Yamato in a suicidal attempt to salvage their honour. Unfortunately, the gap in the solar flare closes around the second ship, killing the alien crew in the process.

Could the Yamato have come out of that battle any more righteous? Not only did they let the star destroy the biological weapon, but they passively allowed a force of nature, rather than their shock cannons, to melt the lone Gamilas destroyer. A single blast from the Yamato’s conventional weapons can sink a Gamilas ship. But instead of having the rear firing guns to do just that, the writers kept the Yamato’s figurative hands as pure as an Admiral’s inspection gloves.

For all this constant reinforcing of Gamilas as an evil empire, the only exception being one of the second glass Gamilans reading a letter from his daughter, and Earth as a righteous victim of an imperialist agenda, I really hope that the series is setting me up for a bait-and-switch. Otherwise it is going to be a long season of nothing but binaries of black and white. Where’s the grime and grey area of war? It doesn’t need to turn into a “Space Terrorist” story, per my last afternoon anime post. However, continuing as is seems childish in its simplicity.

Stray Thoughts

-   Lt. Niimi approaches Captain Okita with a request to explore a habitable planet discovered between warps. Okita shuts her down, citing the shelving of the “Izumo Plan.” Interesting to know that the Yamato was designed as an ark, but it’s a stretch to imagine this as becoming relevant to the main plot.

-   Okita shows the bridge personnel a telescope image of Earth when they are 8 light years from Sol. The distance allows the crew to see the Earth as a blue planet for the first time since the war began - physics FTW for real this time.

-   True to the original series, Desler is written as charismatic and somewhat aloof when compared to his zealous staff. He is a paradox as the embodiment of civilized behavior while simultaneously abiding genocide and subjugation. Perhaps the writers can find a way to explain why he is this way, rather than chalking it up to a goofy Hitler allegory.


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The People Versus Zach Braff

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 13, 2013Posted in: Criticism, Movies, The Daily Shaft

I was content to leave Zach Braff’s Wish I Was Here controversy alone. I said my piece on celebrities using Kickstarter during my last podcast. But upon witnessing the sheer condescension and doublethink of Mr. Braff’s recent knee jerk to criticism, I’ve decided to build upon my past dialogue.

I view Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and other crowd sourcing platforms as a very high class form of begging, and that’s fine. People who pass the digital plate around are usually saying, “I don’t have the money to do x, but here’s my plan, and this is the endgame. Please invest without actually buying stock.” In theory, crowd sourcing then works as a meritocracy. The essential problem here is that mixing celebrity sponsored projects into the equation has the potential to skew what should be a level playing field.

In this case, it is fair to ask if Zach Braff met his funding goals because people believed in his creative vision, or if adoring fans supported the object of their affection, regardless of the value of his project. The latter becomes problematic and potentially exploitative. I doubt Kickstarter’s founders would claim that the intended purpose of their platform was to facilitate celebrities leveraging their notoriety as a means of funding vanity projects. And in the eyes of this critic, there is a very fine line between passion project and vanity project.

In the wake of criticism from the likes of Ken Lavine, and the internet at large, Braff made the mistake of taking to youtube to defend himself. NB: I say this as somebody who quite enjoyed Garden State and mostly liked his work on Scrubs. So, dear reader, please do not assume I am jumping on board the hate for hate’s sake bandwagon. Where Braff should have applied his celebrity sensibilities and ignored his detractors, he instead he got righteous with the internet.

Braff opens with an attempt to establish a sense of legitimacy as both a citizen of the internet and film maker. Fair enough, I’ll concede Braff’s knowledge of directing outstrips mine. Unfortunately, this opening salvo very quickly turns into a sort of narcissistic doublethink. Braff points out his “huge” social media following, suggesting that “it would only take 20,000 or 30,000 people giving ten bucks a piece” to make his movie. Never mind that he set a fundraising goal of two million for Wish I Was Here; let’s stop and parse his statement. Zach Braff has over a million followers on Twitter. In his hypothetical situation Braff would be mobilizing a mere 2.5% of that fan base. To put this in context, if 2.5% of my twitter followers (at the time of this post) gave me 10 bucks for a production I’d have about $100 – enough for one new podcast quality microphone, but not the mic stand. Perhaps there is something to be said for the online community raising questions about (ab)use of star power in this situation.

Braff further attempts to leverage himself as a member of an online community when he is directly pressed on his celebrity status as a key to kickstarter success. In answering this question he segues into an anecdote involving his publicist reminding him that he was writing a production blog for Garden State before blogging was a mainstream thing. Ah, hipsterism at its finest.

The problem is that Braff doesn’t seem to realize that any points he may have scored for being “one of us” are now tallied against the fact that he’s the kind of person who begins a story with “my publicist just reminded me.” How many other people seeking funding for projects on Kickstarter have publicists? I don’t begrudge Braff his success, and subsequent need for a public relations person. Yet it remains difficult to buy into his dialogue of egalitarian oneness when he’s invoking something that is closely related to celebrity exceptionalism.

In a further discussion on community Braff discusses how he received unsolicited concept art from a German fan. Braff appears genuinely grateful for the support. Yet he never seems to acknowledge that his role in the community is of a first among equals. We might all part of an online space, but not everybody gets people doing things for free on their behalf. By virtue of his mainstream celebrity, he is predisposed to a certain type and quantity of sweat equity that other independent producers can only imagine. Again, this is fine. But when Braff idly suggests that he could call Bill Lawrence if he wanted to really make money, in lieu of working on an independent production, he’s not demonstrating humility; he’s projecting an air of cluelessness about the connections he has within the entertainment industry. Where other producers on Kickstarter will be scrounging talented volunteers, and daring to hope for mainstream recognition, Braff has a rolodex of established industry professionals to call upon. On some level, he must recognize that he’s not just some kid from Jersey with a video camera and a pocket full of dreams. Joss Whedon might have made Doctor Horrible as an indie project, but he was still able to get Fillion and NPH on-board before they’d even seen a script. Braff isn’t Whedon, but he moves in similar circles. Any pretensions otherwise land as, at best, flaky, and at worst, dishonest.

Perhaps the most damning parts of the interview occur when Braff speaks to his critics. He begins with humility but then transitions into condescension: “Those of us involved in social media, or are very web savvy, had to see this was coming.” Really, Zach? What does that mean? Seems to me like you’re suggesting those who disagreed with your vision aren’t as plugged in as you are? He also chalks up the “head scratching and vitrol” directed toward his campaign as a reaction to the unexpected speed with which his movie was funded. It’s all very polite, but there’s a distinct subtext of righteous indignation to Braff’s words. It is as if he’s saying that those who agree with him are clearly hipper than those who dare to question what is happening.

To reiterate, my ultimate point of contention is not with Braff as being “too rich” or too successful to use kickstarter. I don’t have access to his books, so I won’t speculate. I do suspect a great many people find his justification for using kickstarter distasteful. Similarly, his demands for total creative control might echo as hollow and self-aggrandizing. For me, the crux of this issue is Braff’s faux humility and strategic application of doublethink.

Braff talks about nobody making money on indie art house projects. Yet Garden State is an incredibly successful movie in terms of money. It cost, according to Box Office Mojo, $2.5 million to produce and grossed $26.7 million. He talks about Wish I Was Here as a passion project, but then discusses “Presale territories”, and commitments to screen in Rome, Berlin, and Paris. This is not the voice of an “indie” artist who has maxed his credit cards and borrowed from his parents just to submit to a local festival a la Kevin Smith’s Clerks. What it seems like is Zach Braff using Kickstarter to fund Zach Braff Studios, all the while invoking “community” and film school sensibilities as a smoke screen. This is  why people are mad at you, Zach Braff. This is why you need to shut up for a while, then say thank you a few thousand times before making your picture. You said it yourself, Zach, vis-a-vis the disaster of Morgan Freeman’s Reddit AMA, “People can smell bullshit,” and right now your riposte video stinks to the high heavens.


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Game Review: StarDrive

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 10, 2013Posted in: Reviews, Video Reviews

Where to begin with StarDrive? Perhaps, in the past. One of my fondest memories as a gamer is the Christmas break of my eighth grade. Therein I devoted a solid two weeks to my first ever game of Master of Orion. It was a sublime experience for me as a budding galactic tyrant. In the years that followed, I discovered other 4X entires: Endless Space, Sword of the Stars, and Galactic Civilizations to name a few. I also dabbled in tabletop games like Battletech and Renegade Legion: Leviathan. Bearing this in mind, it’s fair to say that my tastes lean toward the complex. But of all those games, StarDrive is easily the best I have played in terms of balancing accessibility with difficulty, offering a level of creative freedom usually reserved for tabletop games, and most importantly, evoking that same eighth grade Master of Orion sense of wonder.

Like most games of this genre StarDrive starts players with a home solar system and a handful of ships. From there, stellar hegemons must research new technologies, expand their empire, negotiate with alien races, and lead an armada across the stars – all in real time. Five seconds in real life equals one turn in the game. To the designers’ credit, I’ve never once felt bored or rushed within this real time system. Granted there are times when I pause the game to take stock of a planet’s economy or an incoming fleet of xeno scum. But no matter if I am managing a single star system or a late game empire, the pace always feels appropriate.

Though much and more of the game can be turned over to AI management, which is generally pretty sharp, micromanagers are going to find themselves utterly enraptured by StarDrive’s economic system. Each planet in the game produces two main resources, food and production. A given world can then be set to export, import, or store each resource. This allows lush Terran planets to develop as breadbaskets or hubs of research, while harsher, but mineral rich, worlds are cultivated into production centers. Facilitating this trade is an intuitive system of player, or AI, designed trade routes. 90% of the time this is a brilliant mechanic to ensure nobody in your empire starves to death. The rest of the time I’ve watched one of my expensive transport ships claiming it is “looking for a trade route” even though I’ve assigned a clear one to it. It’s a minor annoyance which would probably be eradicated if I turned shipping over to the AI, but where’s the fun in that?

Setting up trade routes also allowed me to discover some of the finer points of detail that have gone into the game. One such flourish is planets orbiting their star in real time. I discovered this quite by accident when I noticed a trade fleet sitting idle in a system. I zoomed in only to discover that planets Castor and Pollux had moved out of the trade routes I designated. This may seem like much ado about nothing, but small points like this really help sell the idea that I, personally, am managing a space empire.

Brilliant as it is to command my own version of the Colonial Union, ruthlessly exploiting the Earth as a breeding tank for colonists, manoeuvring from a galactic scope down to a single planet can be a bit clumsy. Eventually I memorized the important keyboard shortcuts, but when ship models on the galactic map are designed (somewhat) in scale to stellar bodies, there can be a lot of zooming in and tracking on the mini-map. It’s very honest to the grand emptiness of space, mind you. But players should be prepared for a bit of extra mouse work.

Perhaps if StarDrive came with an interactive tutorial I might have been able to sidestep some of this early confusion. Then again, I could have paid a bit more attention to the built-in slide show explaining the game’s core game mechanics. Beyond this initial overview, an in-game help system offers a triad of videos and expanded entries on the tutorial’s material. So if you start to feel a bit overwhelmed, the guidance is there. Just don’t expect StarDrive to teach you once the game begins. The onus is on you, the player, to learn what you are doing.

Where StarDrive really shines is in terms of ship building and ship combat. Where Galactic Civilizations had players making lego ships as a lead in to glorified paper-rock-scissors battles, StarDrive creates an experience similar to what I used to get when designing a pen and paper starship for a game of Leviathan. Each ship class has a fixed amount of space for internal and external modules. From there the player uses their tech at hand to design a ship which will suit a particular role. Let me give you an example. When the game begins you can only build fighter-class ships and freighters. Alone in the galaxy I didn’t bother researching corvette-class hulls. This proved a mistake when I ran afoul of some corsairs with ships much bigger than mine. I sent out two squadrons of my finest fighters to meet the brigands. None returned.

At that point I seemed well and truly fucked. Then, inspiration struck. I could take a freighter hull and load it up with guns. Sure it would maneuver like a pig in a bog, but it would protect the Earth. Lo and behold my mighty freighter fleet won the day. Of course they ran out of ammo during the next battle, once again proving that logistics is at the core of StarDrive.

From there I began further experimenting with ship design. Once I unlocked laser tech, I built a line of fast interceptors designed to shoot down missiles while heavier corvettes pounded the enemy with forward guns. Learning from past mistakes, I loaded out a middle weight freighter with a munitions factory so I could rain a constant stream of nukes on a “Kulrathi” planet without sending in the marines. I have dreams of building my own personal Space Battleship Yamato and blasting my foes with mighty broadsides, but I haven’t quite unlocked the titan ship class.

If that were not enough, StarDrive also offers a truly inspired fleet construction window. Rather than having industrial planets spam out ships, a la Master of Orion, players can build fleets of almost limitless scope. This involves designing a proper combat formation: fighter screens, fast attack destroyers, bomber wings, if you can imagine it, you can build it. The fleet manager then asks if you want to requisition the fleet from existing ships or build them from scratch, automatically dividing production between the core worlds of an empire. I may have got a little carried away with this during my first play through. In economic terms, I think the expression is shameless defect spending. Still, it was worth it to watch the fleet assemble in real time before FTLing into battle. Military history nerds, delight; this game is for you. It may not have the flash of Sword of the Stars or Homeworld, but the persistent top down view accentuates the player’s position as commander-in-chief instead of a mere Admiral.

At present StarDrive only offers a single “sandbox” mode. In terms of end-game, this requires either wiping out all other life in the galaxy or bringing the races together into a federation. It does, however, seem a bit odd to build in a menu option with only a single game mode in mind. I’ll assume that Zero Sum Games has plans for more content, or they’ve built in the game modes option as a means of supporting an already very active modding community.

StarDrive does fall short in a few areas, nothing critical mind you but certainly noticeable. Despite a commitment to modding, there’s no way to change the game’s default key bindings. Event notifications are just a little too spare for my taste. I don’t need a ping each time a ship gets built, but a fleet’s construction should merit some alert. Where every other screen in the game has an obvious “click this to exit” button, the fleet construction screen does not. And occasionally ships will rally to a location seemingly of their own volition. Again, these are small issues and nothing which should preclude a person buying the game. I would submit that addressing these points in a patch would make an already excellent game that much better.

In the final assessment, I’m reminded of something Jake Soloman said during one of his XCOM Enemy Unknown interviews. Soloman suggested that strategy games come in two varieties: complex and complicated. Complex games are deeply layered, but still approachable and thus still fun. Complicated games are just that, complicated. StarDrive is firmly rooted in the complex category. It’s not an easy game by any measure. Truth be told, it probably has a steeper learning curve than most games out there. But it stops well short of being burdensome upon a willing player’s patience. The current build has a few cosmetic bugs, but nothing that broke my gameplay experience. Overall, StarDrive reflects the developers’ clear passion for 4X games, as well as a long standing relationship to science fiction as a genre – see some of the alien races for various ‘in’ jokes. This is a must have for both fans of 4X games and those looking to cut their teeth on this style of game.

StarDrive

Developed by Zero Sum Games

Published by Iceberg Interactive


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Movie Review: Transfer

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 8, 2013Posted in: Movie Reviews, Reviews

Directed by Damir Lukacevic, 2010’s Transfer explores wealth and privilege within the not-too-distant-future European Union. Therein, affluent Europeans with a million Euro to spare can have their consciousness downloaded into a younger body. These new bodies, however, are no mere clones. They are living people from the developing world who, in exchange for a 10% commission on the consciousness transfer, agree to have their personalities suppressed for twenty hours a day for the rest of their lives.

This core concept is well known within science fiction story telling. Lukacevic, who co-wrote the screenplay with Gabi Blauert, builds on the trope by making the very process of aging something that can be outsourced to the poorer quarters of the world. And for that effort, the story works more often than it does not. Yet, I can’t help but notice a few glaring plot holes and a general sense of creative caution in the narrative’s execution – more on that later.

NB: Transfer is a German language film. I watched it with English subtitles. I am well aware that the nuance I found wanting within the story may have been lost in translation.

Even as a low-budget affair, Transfer offers a cinematic approach that should be the envy of most North American filmmakers. Key scenes use long slow pans rather than cuts to emphasize the importance of an event and the players within it. Where many directors cut between over the shoulder shots to facilitate a conversation, Transfer makes extensive use of reflections in surfaces and camera-in-camera shots, the latter accentuating the film’s surveillance motifs, to capture a room full of people while maintaining a medium-to-tight shot. I know I shouldn’t play into the clichés of German filmmakers, but damn if this movie doesn’t excel on a technical level.

Transfer’s principal cast positively exude pathos from start to finish. Hermann (Hans-Michael Rehberg) and Anna (Ingrid Andree) undertake the transfer process because after fifty years of marriage, and Anna’s diagnosis of stage four cancer, neither can imagine living without the other. Apolian (B.J. Britt) volunteers as a host because it is the only way to support his orphaned brothers and sisters in Mali. Sarah (Regine Nehy), a native of Ethiopia, does much the same. One would think that contrasting characters with such diametrically opposed upbringings would lend itself to preaching if not a very heavy-handed application of liberal guilt. Instead, Transfer is content to let both the Western European and African perspectives play out equally. This in turn creates the potential for a courageous piece of storytelling, while simultaneously becoming an Achilles’ heel.

The idea of letting people from the poorest parts of the world sample life in the richest, even if only for four hours a day, opens a lot of doors. Hermann embodies old Europe’s xenophobia. Anna personifies newer ideals of tolerance and integration. Sarah reflects upon the individual as part of a community, further championing the four consciousnesses in two bodies as a family unit. Apolian is the voice of post-decolonization anger, seeing all Europeans as selfish and indulgent. The words “white devil” got thrown around a few times. Do people still say white devil? Or did the person writing the subtitles take liberties?

In addition to those four themes, Transfer further dips its toes into the much deeper waters of corporate control over individual people, the existential nightmare of two consciousnesses sharing one body, and even a little bit of Cartesian mind-body-soul subtext. But at no point does it ever feel like the movie is genuinely committing to one of these potential conflicts. On their own, they all work, though some with more gusto than others. The plot, however, moves from one to the next without finding something to bring them all together.

All the while, the viewer must apply some heavy suspension of disbelief to sustain the core conceit that the technology to facilitate a consciousness transfer is incapable of wholly eradicating a host personality. Why design such a revolutionary plot device only to have it work 5/6th of the time? Surely the quality control team behind the transfer system would have recognized a host’s inevitable desire to reclaim agency over their body. And since this company proves to be of the scumbag variety, why not just erase the host all together and sell a false bill to the clients?

In the end, Transfer’s take away message is rather rudimentary:  big corporations are evil, and people, no matter how rich or poor they are, will always be subject to the interests of their corporate overlords. It’s an okay place to land, maybe even a good place considering the visual quality of the film, but when Vegas is in sight why go to Reno?

Transfer

Directed by: Damir Lukacevic

Starring: B.J. Britt, Regine Nehy, Ingrid Andree, and Hans-Michael Rehberg


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The Odd Legacy of Star Trek TNG’s The High Ground

By
Adam Shaftoe
– May 6, 2013Posted in: Television, The Daily Shaft, TV Reviews

If Captains’ Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages is to believed then The High Ground is one of TNG’s most internally lamented episodes. For those who don’t recall this third season story, it’s the one where Doctor Crusher gets kidnapped by space terrorists, who then hold her captive in exchange for aid from the Federation in securing their country’s sovereignty from planet Rutia’s world government.

Ron Moore called the episode “an abomination.” Moore goes on to say,

“We didn’t have anything interesting to say about terrorism except that it’s bad and Beverly gets kidnapped – ho hum. They take her down to the caves and we get to have nice, big preachy speeches about terrorism and freedom, fighting and security forces versus society. It’s a very unsatisfying episode and the staff wasn’t really happy with it.”

Michael Piller, credited as The High Ground’s co-executive producer, questioned the overall statement the story made about terrorism.

“Was it the point where the boy puts down the gun and says, ‘Maybe the end of terrorism is when the first child puts down his gun?’ It was effective in the context of that show, but is certainly not a statement that provides any great revelation.”

Given that the IRA crisis was far from resolved when the episode went to air in 1990, it is understandable why The High Ground was seen as a milquetoast affair in the face of a real social issue. The closest the episode comes to making an actual statement on terrorism is during a conversation between Data and Picard. Data cites Mexican independence from Spain as a precedent in support of violent insurgency as a last resort when attempting to bring about political change. Picard’s reaction to Data’s android innocence is to fall back on the series’ stock answer: “Well that’s just human nature and these are big questions for which there is no easy answer.” No wonder the writers were unhappy with the episode. At least when TNG married the prime directive with the war on drugs it came with the benefit of Lt. Yar admitting to the allure of chemical intoxication; albeit Wesley’s subsequent “I’ll never do drugs” comment was positively stomach churning.

 

Nearly a quarter of a century after The High Ground went to air, it’s interesting to note how closely the episode’s themes mirror our own contemporary dialogues on terror. Twenty-three years might have given us real world analogues to Star Trek’s PADDs, tricorders, phasers, and even a theoretical model for a warp drive, but clearly our sociology has lagged behind the science.

In the episode’s first act, Alexana Devos (Kerrie Keane), the head of Rutia’s security condemns the Ansata terrorist organization as a group of animals. She further paints the Ansata as “…fanatics who kill without remorse or conscience.” Please to note the othering of terrorists as sub-humans.

Devos’ attempts to ferret out the Ansata portray Rutia as a near police-state. Suspects with even the slightest ties to the Ansata are rounded up in mass arrests and questioned without formal charge or the benefit of legal counsel. Rutian methods extend so far as to arrest children and teenagers as potential Ansata sympathizers. Though nobody comes out and says it, the episode clearly implies that Rutia is a place where the average citizen is either with the government or the Ansata.

Meanwhile the Ansata view themselves as freedom fighters struggling against an oppressive regime. Kyril Finn (Richard Cox), leader of the Ansata, rationalizes himself to Dr. Crusher as a 24th century George Washington. When Crusher reminds Finn that Washington was a general and not a terrorist, Finn retorts that the difference between terrorists and generals is the difference between history’s winners and losers. This leads to an interesting point wherein Finn asks Doctor Crusher how much violence is buried in the Federation’s past? In terms of canon, quite a lot: The Eugenics Wars, World War 3, the Earth-Romulus war, and a century of cold war with the Klingon Empire. Finn throws the idealized world of the Federation in Doctor Crusher’s face to demonstrate the selective memory governments often utilize in the prosecution of terror while simultaneously ignoring their own “legitimate” uses of force.

When Finn takes Captain Picard hostage after a failed attempt to destroy the Enterprise, Doctor Crusher questions the difference between a mad man and a committed man willing to die for his principles. Picard, however, is utterly dismissive of the Doctor’s question. Having witnessed the Ansata murdering members of his crew, he is not inclined to entertain the broader issues of the Ansata conflict. Picard further marginalizes the Ansata position in his suggestion that Doctor Crusher’s entirely conceptual recognition of the Ansata cause is the product of Stockholm Syndrome.

Later in the episode a joint Starfleet-Rutian strike force assaults the Ansata compound. Picard and Crusher are liberated but Finn is assassinated in the process. Picard’s reaction to the kill is somewhere between indifference and tacit approval. Then, as if to wash the Federation’s hands of the entire situation, the Enterprise leaves Rutian security to deal with the aftermath of Finn’s martyrdom. At no point does anybody in a Starfleet uniform acknowledge the fact that the Federation has played an active part in making an unstable situation worse.

Given the way the word has changed over the last twelve years, it’s hard not to look at Rutia and see a blueprint for our world. Combatants turn each other into monsters to legitimize their respective actions. Disagreement is confused with dissent. Empathy is mistaken for sympathy. The High Ground may not have told the story that Melinda Snodgrass intended in 1990, a story which would have seen the Federation on the wrong side of history, but it does offer a clearly unexpected window into our own world.


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