I spent the entire weekend angry that the new Clash of the Titans was so horrible. This was one of the seminal films of my youth, a tale that had nurtured my love for heroic fantasy, and it was utterly ruined by an almost unwatchable farce of a remake.

Monday at work I must have vented my frustration a half-dozen times. At one point, I even proclaimed that I would have been happy if only the film makers had reshot the original script and added updated special effects.

After fuming for a while, I realized I hadn’t seen the original film in many years. So over lunch I fired up Netflix and bounded over to my instant queue, where I had the old Clash of the Titans waiting for me.

By the time I was 30 minutes in, I realized how utterly wrong I had been. If the original script were shot today, moviegoers would laugh themselves out of the theater. It was bad. Really bad.

So why did I have such fond memories of this film from when I was a kid? While I’d like to think my tastes in film are more discerning now than when I was a boy, it couldn’t just be the ignorance of youth. Because despite the movie’s terrible dialogue and overwrought acting, I had one thing right: the movie told a really good story.

What I’d done was internalize the myth. I’d taken what was great and resonant about the story and hung onto it, discarding all the nonsense that sticks out like a sore thumb when watching the film today.

We do the same thing with so many aspects of life, including MMOs. Many of us look back on our days in Ultima Online, EverQuest, Asheron’s Call, and other early online games through the haze of selective memory. We internalize the myths that matter: the long camps that netted a coveted item, the fight to survive a Mistmoore train, your raid wiping and recovering in the wee hours of the morning. These tales are as vivid and vital today as they were when first experienced, and serve as the foundation for countless reminiscences with old friends.

But when I go back to EverQuest to check out the latest expansion or run through a familiar area, the game is virtually unplayable to me. The interface feels archaic, a huge impediment that actually gets in the way of my fun. Yet despite many evolutions over the years, it’s largely the exact same interface I spent countless hours interacting with.

Interfaces aren’t memorable. Dialogue and quests fade away.  The myths we internalize are rooted in the heroics of social interaction and the drama of emotional investment. If you can make a game–or movie, or book, or comic–with an experience that genuinely moves the audience, you can make something memorable. Because by doing so, you will have touched he myths that lie at the heart of all of us.

I recently bought the first season of Star Trek (The Original Series, of course) on Blu-Ray. It’s very cool, because you can switch between watching the episodes with the original special effects or the nicely redone versions they syndicated a couple years back. Unlike most revisions to classic shows, the updated effects took nothing away from the episodes and were handled very tastefully.

I don’t buy a lot of series on DVD, but the original Trek is definitely worth the purchase. This spiffy set makes me wish another of my favorite science fiction shows would receive the same treatment: Babylon 5.

B5 is perhaps the best written show of its kind, groundbreaking in that it was plotted out as a complete story intended to run five seasons. Its themes and characters hold up exceptionally well, but its special effects look horribly dated. If it’s hard for me, a die-hard fan, to stomach the ancient Amiga-era CGI, it would no doubt be tough for a modern audience used to the glorious effects of Battlestar Galactica to get past them.

Releasing a remastered Blu-Ray and DVD of Babylon 5 with new CGI would allow the show to stand the test of time and catch on with a new audience. Is it likely to happen? Who knows. Though the show always struggled in the ratings, it has sold extremely well on DVD and prompted Warner Brothers to fund further TV movies and DVD projects (including a couple attempts at follow-up shows). In fact, Warners keeps flirting with the idea of a theatrical film, though it’s still uncertain as to whether it will happen. If B5 does make it to the big screen, reviving the franchise with a remastered DVD set would be a natural promotion for a movie.

So while I won’t hold my breath for B5 being revamped, I can look forward to seasons 2 and 3 (yes, even 3) of Trek to grace my LCD screen. And that’s not a bad thing at all.

I get emotional over Star Trek.

When I was a kid, our fuzzy old TV could catch about six stations: the three networks, PBS, a local independent, and maybe a UHF channel or two. Although the local station ran blocks of monster/horror movies on the weekends, there wasn’t much else on the airwaves for a skinny nerd to call his own.

The glorious exception was reruns of Trek–The Original Series, which at the time was The Only Series. I devoured those episodes, watching them again and again. I cried every time Captain Kirk had to let Edith die in order to save the timeline, and cheered every time he beat the Gorn. Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, and all the rest were a lifeline to me. No other fictional world before or since has had such a profound impact on my life, shaping my imagination and giving me an ideal to strive for.

When I was older I embraced the movies, TNG, DS9, and to a lesser extent the other shows. Though there was plenty of mediocre moments in those hundreds of hours of Trek, there were also some profoundly moving experiences. No matter how many times I’ve seen The Wrath of Khan, those scenes between Kirk and Spock leave me a blubbering mess. Shatner’s acting takes plenty of well-deserved knocks, but when he chokes on his words as he eulogizes Spock, I think it’s one of the most touching moments on film.

So when I heard plans to relaunch the franchise with a new cast taking on the classic roles of the original Trek, I was more than skeptical.

Happily, my fears were put to rest in the first five minutes of the film. It’s wonderful; go see it. It’s not just a great Trek film (possibly… possibly… the best of them all), it’s a great movie. I loved it.

If you need to hear more, there are some minor spoilers after the break. Continue Reading »

Battlestar Galactica’s finale has aired. It didn’t answer every question we had, but it resolved most of them. Perhaps more importantly, it gave us closure for the characters we’ve come to care about over the past five or so years.

Plenty o’ spoilers after the break. Continue Reading »

If this doesn’t get you excited about the movie, nothing will!

I hate saying it as much as you hate me for saying it, but it’s true. In what should be the best of its seasons, Battlestar Galactica’s final batch of episodes has been mostly dreadful.

Maybe I wouldn’t complain so much were it not for another show that is making its peers pale in comparison. The show you should be watching: Lost.

Further thoughts (and some spoilers) after the break. Continue Reading »

There are two kinds of people in the world: Letterman people and Leno people.

Jay Leno is a funny guy, and he has bits that make me chuckle, but I mourn where he’s taken The Tonight Show from what it once was. This television tradition now feels like a bowl of bland jello, and it remains to be seen if Conan O’Brien will be able to restore any of its former glory.

David Letterman, to me, is the heir to the great lineage of talk show tradition. It’s ironic, because in his NBC days he was seen as the reckless young agitator, but today he is the elder statesman. Though he’s taken on a more conventional role in some ways, he’s now in a position where he doesn’t have to care what other people say or do.

If you need any evidence that Letterman is at the top of his game, witness the train wreck that was last night’s interview with Joaquin Phoenix. In one of the most bizarre and uncomfortable moments ever seen on television, you can observe Letterman at the beginning of the interview almost debating whether or not to swoop in for the kill on this actor who is obviously just completely gone. It doesn’t take Dave long to decide, what the hell, I’m going for it.

Check out the full interview below, and this page has other great moments from Letterman’s past that have him serving as ringmaster for some mind-bogglingly odd television moments.

This is how I talk to Shwayder on a daily basis. It’s called management skills, people! Get off Batman’s back already.

My only concern is how I’m going to fit this in my suitcase on the flight back from San Diego.

Also, I’m going to need to figure out how to install a red LED that goes back and forth.

It saddened me not a little this week to read that Star Trek the Experience, a museum/theme ride that has been in the Las Vegas Hilton for over a decade, will be closing this September.

I am sorry to see it go, not only because I am a lifelong Trek fan (however dated some of the multimedia stuff was, the collection of memorabilia was first rate) but because of the countless Fanfaire memories forever associated with the place. I’ve attended many SOE gatherings at the Hilton, and Quark’s Bar was always the epicenter where fans and devs could hang out together. Many a Warp Core Breach has been consumed while discussing the latest patch or sharing war stories of a raid gone wrong.

There are hints that the Experience may be reopened elsewhere. Certainly if the franchise relaunch film is a hit, you can expect to see all kinds of updated Trek in the media. But for us diehards, the original STE will be remembered fondly as a Mecca to which we could make our nerd pilgrimage, a place where we could share our fandom and not feel so alone in the galaxy. It was a place of hope and dreams, and we need more of those in this life, not fewer of them.