Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Hyperbole, & Good Trek/Bad Trek #67 The Ultimate Computer
Intro: I’ve loved Star Trek since I was a kid. I started by watching TNG in 6th grade. I’ve been a fan since then and though I’ve spent a lot of time watching Star Trek, I’ve never watched The Original Series. So, I’m watching and reviewing them as a fan of Star Trek, but one who’s never seen any of them. So I’m watching all the TOS episodes for the first time and saying whether or not they suck. At the end, I give examples of better and/or worse Star Trek episodes to watch that remind me of this episode. Usually, I ramble on about some bullshit before the Trek. That’s it.
I just got around to seeing the most recent Star Wars. The one about the last Jedi. It was called The Last Jedi. It’s one of the movies that I’d read the most about before seeing it. I came across a lot of opinions about it. Well, I came across two opinions repeated ad nauseam. I read that it was the greatest movie of all time and I heard it was the worst movie of all time. And both those opinions are very very wrong. I thought it was okay. I thought it was really okay. There were parts of it I liked and parts I didn’t. All in all, it was fine. I’m glad I watched it, but I won’t be in a rush to ever see it again. And that’s fine. I don’t know what it is about the internet where we all have to be in a constant state of hyperbole one-upmanship. If you thought it was the best movie ever that’s great. I think you’re probably lying to yourself, but that’s fine. I’m glad you enjoyed it more than I did.
If you didn’t care for the movie, that’s fine too. But was it really the worst movie of all time? Maybe it just wasn’t for you and that’s okay. Not everything has to be for everyone. What happened to that opinion? Remember when you could just not love something and go about your day. Now the internet is constantly locked in a state of hyperbole one-upmanship. There’s no opinions that exist between A+++++ and the worst thing ever. The Last Jedi was a solid C. That’s fine. I was a solid C student. Most things in life are average. That’s why we have that word. To describe most things.
There’s a fan movement to remake it which is dumb. You can check out the petition here. They’re trying to raise millions. Partly because the “diversity agenda” was rammed down our throats. For starters, it was rammed down your throat. You chose to watch it. You could have just stayed home. There’s nothing easier than not watching a movie. All you have to do is literally anything else on earth. You bought tickets to see a movie and you thought there were too many women in it so now you want to remake it. I can’t imagine anything more baffling than a Star Wars nerd raising money to have fewer women in their life.
Recap:
We’re at a station and Kirk is a real grumpy Gus. He’s been summoned to take part in a war game. Where a computer takes over his ship. Then a bunch of other ships are going to confront the Enterprise. Kirk is skeptical, to say the least. Cue the dramatic music. The computer is installed and goes a tad haywire. It takes over and does well, but then destroys an unmanned ore vessel and thinks the wargames are real. Lives are lost. To make matters worse the computer decides it doesn’t want to be disconnected and will kill to make sure that it isn’t.
Good Trek?
This is one of my favorite episodes so far. I put it right up there with Balance of Terror. Shatner hams it up a little bit, but that’s to be expected. He’s a bad actor. Bad actors act poorly. That’s what happens. The only thing I didn’t really get about it, and I know that it’s just a show and none of any of this is real. But what’s the point of this thing? I imagine computers were already able to do a lot of this stuff. Targeting weapons and reviewing crew rosters. I’d be surprised if computers weren’t already able to do this. Don’t they have unmanned probes in this universe? Is that really all that different. It doesn’t really make sense that some of these jobs weren’t already being handled by computers. What’s really the point of having an actual navigator?
The doctor was talking about paving the way for humans not to have to do this stuff anymore. Which is fine, but humans already don’t have to explore space. They’re choosing to do this. It’s not like this is some burdensome thing that folks are forced to do. Humans are out there exploring space because they want to. There’s no real need to do any of this. There was that. But other than that stupid nerd quibble, I loved this one.
Kirk gets a little reactionary when it comes to computers doing his job. Pretty sure if the tests went well then it’d only be a matter of time before he’d be voting for a space Trump for Federation President because of promises to reopen the starship captain mines.
This is another episode that makes Star TrekDarknessrknesss so frustrating. This would have made such an awesome movie. Why wasn’t this one made into one? I’d have loved to see this given the big screen treatment. It would’ve been great, but, instead we got a remake of a movie that in no way needed a remake. Fuck you, Into Darkness!
Better Trek?
The Ultimate Computer is great sci-fi. Watch that one. There are other episodes that have similarities, but I think The Ultimate Computer is the best of the bunch. It’s certainly not the best episode but there are similarities to 1001100 (or whatever). It’s an early run TNG episode. It’s not bad for a season one episode, but it’s not great. Some computer linked nerds take over the Enterprise. It’s really only worth watching for the jaw-dropping scene where a hologram offers to get double teamed by Picard and Riker. It’s something else.
Emergence is another TNG one where the computer takes over the ship. It’s not bad. A lot of it takes place on the holodeck and those episodes usually suck but this one is not awful. It’s not the est, but it’s solidly not awful. I like The Ultimate Computer a lot better. So if you want to watch an episode about computers taking over starships then this is definitely the one I’d go with.
