Monday, October 13, 2008

5 Ways To Make Star Trek More Like Star Wars

So we've been told that the writers of next year's Star Trek reboot want to "bring more Star Wars" to Gene Rodenberry's brightly-colored vision of America's interstellar tomorrow. But what does that actually mean? We've given it some thought and come up with five ways in which the crew of the Enterprise should model themselves after Luke Skywalker, C3-PO and company.

Make Your Heroes Less Perfect.
Rodenberry's future of humanity was a utopian one - We had all transcended racism, bigotry and hatred of almost every kind... we had evolved past the need for money, and worked towards the common betterment of society. We were, let's be honest, really kind of dull (Unless some outside force was making us insane/horny/whatever the plot required that week). Star Wars's heroes, on the other hand, were much more flawed... and much more interesting. Whether it was Han's gambling debts, Lando's willingness to sell out his best friend for the good of his well-lit city in the sky or just Luke's incessant whininess, we could see ourselves in the characters, and that made it easier for us to care about them. So let's see a Kirk that doesn't always save the day and get the girl, or a Bones that's the alcoholic that we always suspected him of being.

Less Talk, More Action.
Perhaps because of the show's budget, or perhaps because future humanity was so fucking diplomatic, Star Trek never really got into the whole exciting battle thing (Even later attempts like the Borg attacks in Star Trek: The Next Generation seemed half-hearted and slow). Sure, they managed to have a tussle every now and then that got our pulses racing -

- but imagine if that awesome Alexander Courage music was being used for something more exciting than prop-assisted wrestling. There is no way that a Star Trek with more space battles and less attempts to sit down and talk things through like grown-ups would be a bad thing.

Ignore The Laws Of Physics.
Okay, so Scotty kind of made a living doing that very thing on a regular basis despite his protests, but this isn't just managing to get that dilithium crystals back online a week earlier than expected that we're talking about here. As Robert Loren Fleming once pointed out, George Lucas ignored scientific fact that said that there was no sound in the vacuum of space and became a multi-millionaire. JJ Abrams has proven that he's willing to ignore reality in favor of fun storytelling in Fringe, so I'm looking forward to a Star Trek that takes full advantage of the possibilities of science fiction to give us the most dramatically satisfying story ever. And if that means that we see multiple time-traveling James T Kirks all existing in the same scene to punch a room full of Romulans, all the better.

Have At Least One Sequence That Will Make A Good Video Game.
You know what I'm talking about; there's one in every Star Wars movie, whether it be pod-racing, speeder-biking through the forests of Endor or cutting Anakin Skywalker's legs off while lava bubbles all around you. At its best, the Star Wars series doesn't just put you in the center of the action, it makes you want to literally be the one doing all the action. There's no better way to hit the nerd g-spot than appeal to our wish-fulfillment fantasies so blatantly, after all. And what does Star Trek have to compare? Nothing... yet. JJ, you know what you have to do.

Put Uhura In A Metal Bikini At Some Point.
And talking of nerd wish-fulfillment fantasies... As much as you may sigh and pretend that you're all appalled at such pandering, you know you want to see it. Especially if she's chained up next to one of those green Orion slave girls.

Top 10 Best Guitar Players of All Time6Oct08

Watch here videos of the 10 best guitar players of all time, according to Rolling Stone magazine. One of the most important instruments in modern music, the guitar is at the basis of popular rhythms such as rock and blues. Considered gods by many fans, guitar players have a role as crucial as that of many singers, when it comes to exciting the audience.

Fewer people downloading music illegally

By Nicole Martin, Digital and Media Correspondent

Young woman lying down, listening to MP3 player
Illegal downloading showed no signs of slowing down among teenagers Photo: GETTY

Around 39 per cent of music fans currently download tracks from illegal sites, compared to 43 per cent last year, the annual digital music survey of 1,500 people found.

However, of those, 72 per cent said they would stop if they were contacted by their internet service provider (ISP).

The research suggests that people are heeding warnings from the Government that it is serious about curbing rampant internet piracy.

Under proposals announced in July, ministers said that illegal downloaders face having their internet access restricted if a voluntary crackdown on piracy is not effective.

Under the voluntary agreement between Britain's six biggest ISPs and the British Phonographic Industry, the internet providers will write to customers identified as illegally downloading material and warn them that their activity is being monitored.

Currently, film and record companies must apply via the courts for the ISP to match the identity of an illegal downloader to the address.

One of the proposals being considered by the Government is to get ISPs to give out that information without a court order.

Russell Hart, the chief executive of Entertainment Media Research, which carried out the study, said:

"It is quite evident that an ISP-led strategy has bite because illegal downloaders are fairly convinced that ISPs are currently monitoring their activities and are more likely to act against them than the courts."

However, illegal downloading showed no signs of slowing down among teenagers.

Some 58 per cent of them said they were not paying to download music, compared to 57 per cent last year and 41 per cent in 2006.

Original here