Nintendo diehards have been on the ropes as far as the general gaming fandom is concerned. Even though Nintendo’s on top in hardware sales (both on the handheld and home console fronts), the Wii in particular is the target of endless vitriolic hatred from the “hardcore gamer” community.

Any longtime Nintendo fan will admit that it’s been rough over the past few years. The Nintendo 64 and GameCube both plummeted in popularity, but at least we still had great games to play. With the Wii absolutely destroying the competition in widespread appeal, most of us thought we’d see a return to NES/SNES-era levels of quality and quantity. Instead, Nintendo has seen fit to focus more on the “casual gamer.” This business tactic is one that I personally have no real problem with; bringing new fans into the gaming fold, no matter what kinds of games they wish to play, is always a plus.

I knew from the start that when I bought my Wii on launch day, it would just be my “Nintendo player.” I’m not shitting on Nintendo by declaring that the Wii won’t be my primary console; far from it. As annoying as it may be at times, I’m comfortable with the fact that I’ll be starting the Wii up to play new games only a few times per year. Why? Because I know I’ll be playing absolutely top-notch software every time. Just look at Nintendo’s latest offering, Punch-Out!!.

It’s funny because he’s fat.

The franchise has lain dormant for fifteen years, but the new game is near-perfect. Rarely, if ever, do you see that kind of dedication from other publishers. Sure, Nintendo’s had its share of misses, but nowhere near as many as other companies.

And what do they get for their hard-earned comeback? Smear campaigns from the Sony and Microsoft fans. It’s absolutely ridiculous; plus, as I’ve said many times before, many of these haters grew up playing legendary Nintendo franchises like Mario and Zelda. It must be the “in” thing to hate Nintendo now. The anti-Wii crowd just needs to grow up and face facts: the system, and Nintendo itself, are going to be around for a long time. No one’s forcing you to play their software and hardware, so why complain about it?

Here’s a bit of weirdness: why has there never been a portable version of the Punch-Out!! series?

Sure, there’s been other boxing games on the Game Boy and its successors, but never Nintendo’s flagship punchfest. I know the franchise was essentially dead from 1994 until 2009, but the Game Boy was in its prime in the early to mid-1990s; that would’ve been the perfect time. The NES game used special mappers to handle those larger-than-life sprites, but I’m sure the whiz kids at Nintendo could’ve pulled off a similar feat with the lil’ green-and-black wonder. Hell, even a straight port would’ve been great! C’mon, who wouldn’t have wanted to beat the shit out of King Hippo during long car trips?!

(If you haven’t seen the new Star Trek film yet, consider this your warning, as this post will contain MAJOR SPOILERS.)

I’ve been a hardcore Star Trek fan for my entire life. I grew up watching reruns of the original series and the animated series, and was on board with The Next Generation and its successors from day one. The films? Opening weekend, every time since Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. So, in keeping with this nerdity, I naturally checked out the newest film, aptly titled Star Trek (and sometimes referred to as Star Trek XI) as soon as possible.

Let me state from the get-go that I loved it. In fact, I’ve already seen it twice! It was a fun movie, loaded with great stuff for both Trek newcomers as well as diehards like myself. The film wasn’t absolutely perfect, but it was a much-needed breath of fresh air after Rick Berman and Brannon Braga ran the franchise into the ground.

Now then. Since this is a blog where I complain about things, Star Trek did have some nits I’d like to pick. They vary in severity, and some were obviously a result of dramatic license; those I’m only bringing them up for completeness’ sake. Besides, you really can’t call yourself a science fiction fan if you don’t love nitpicking! It’s fun! So, without further ado…ahead, Mr. Sulu, warp factor six!

Minor problems:

• Flaming exhaust. Warp engines shouldn’t shoot out streams of hot plasma when they activate. As we’ve seen in other episodes and films, that’s usually a sign of a serious problem!

• The ship is a TARDIS. This is a classic special effects scaling problem. We see that the Enterprise shuttle bay has shuttles stacked on either side, two levels high. However, given that the ship’s only around 300 meters long (judging by window sizes and whatnot), the bay physically couldn’t be that size! We run into the same problem with the engineering section; many of the shots showed an ugly, pipe-laden engineering area that was far too big to fit into the ship’s hull. (There’s a link at the end of this post that examines these problems in more detail.)
• Warbirds of prey. Klingon ships were referred to as “warbirds.” Klingon ships are actually “birds of prey.” Romulan ships are warbirds.
• Nokia’s connecting people. Doesn’t the Federation use a moneyless economy? How would a business like Nokia still exist, not to mention using the same damn ringtone over two centuries from now? Even if they were a free contractor, we’ve never seen Nokia logos in Star Trek before. Product placement in movies always pisses me off, but this was a particularly silly example. (The same applies to the “Budweiser Classic.” Ugh.)
• The best defense is no defense? Why doesn’t Earth or Vulcan have any anti-starship defense systems? The Narada was able to plow through ships, sure, but advanced technology or not, it would fare considerably worse against planetary artillery.

Major problems:

• The Romulan/Vulcan connection. In the film, Starfleet is well aware that Vulcans and Romulans share common ancestry, which they originally were not aware of until the classic episode “Balance of Terror.” Even excepting the fact that the Narada‘s appearance altered the timeline, the crew of the Kelvin should not have known.

• Disappearing black holes. The physics were completely wrong on this one. Why does the black hole that ate Vulcan suddenly disappear once the planet’s gone? “Red matter” doesn’t cut it, especially since the various black holes created by the substance all had different effects and durations.
• Cadet to Captain. That’s one hell of a promotion for James Kirk! Granted, he saved Earth, and likely many other Federation worlds, but commanding a starship still requires a significant amount of field experience. Kirk just doesn’t have that yet, genius or not.
• Canon fodder. Now, before you start screaming that “Star Trek is an all-new timeline! Old canon doesn’t apply anymore!”, hear me out. While everything after the Narada appeared in 2233 is an alternate reality (they clearly state this in the film), there’s still a few facts we need to take into account. First and foremost, everything that happened before the film is still canon. That means the Star Trek: Enterprise series, as well as all of the temporal incursions in other series that happened before the year 2233 (“Tomorrow is Yesterday,” “Time’s Arrow,” Star Trek: First Contact, and so on). Spock Prime himself came from original Star Trek canon, albeit many years after the events of the last film (Star Trek: Nemesis).

  Furthermore, it’s also been established in Star Trek canon that when something goes back in time and does damage to the timeline, somebody follows it with the express purpose of fixing whatever damage was done (e.g., Star Trek: First Contact). In fact, by the time the 29th century rolls around, Starfleet’s got an entire division devoted to scanning multiple timelines to make sure nothing gets screwed up (e.g., “Future’s End”)! So, while the alternate reality doesn’t affect or replace the primary timeline (otherwise, Spock Prime may have disappeared, and we’d run into a colossal grandfather paradox), we’re left with one big question. Why would Starfleet in the primary timeline choose to ignore the damage that was done in the alternate one? That’s very out of character for them. I’d think the deaths of six billion Vulcans, at the very least, would be significant cause for concern!

  On a related note, the comic book prequel series Star Trek: Countdown explains a lot of Nero’s backstory, why the Narada is so super-powerful, and various other “fill in the gaps” measures. But, guess what: it doesn’t count as canon, even though the film’s writers created it! The comics may say “official movie prequel” across the top, but Paramount has defined Star Trek canon to only be the films and television shows. (There’s a brief editorial on the official Star Trek website concerning canon.) UPDATE 5/22: An interview with writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman definitively claims that Countdown is not canon. The writers themselves have admitted it.

Dramatic license issues:

• The engineering pipe farm. I heard that they filmed those scenes in a brewery, but the engineering section of the Enterprise is far too overloaded with pipes and valves. Spacecraft now aren’t that ridiculous!

• Warp drive versus hyperdrive. In the film, Vulcan’s only a few minutes away from Earth at warp speed, which is completely at odds with everything we’ve known about warp physics. While this could technically be classified as a major problem, I’m placing it under dramatic license for a very specific reason: I think the writers confused warp travel with the hyperspace travel seen in Star Wars. Further credence is lent to this theory by the fact that when we see ships traveling at warp in the new film, they often appears to be traveling through a “tunnel” in space that looks similar to the hyperspace corridors seen in Star Wars.
• Vulcans hating humans. Why are the Vulcans so incredibly racist? They were like that back in Star Trek: Enterprise, but that situation was explained and remedied during the fourth season. Well, in the new film, their racism is a strong part of Spock’s character development; thus, it was a very conscious choice on the writers’ part, and I don’t think it would’ve worked otherwise.
• The goddamned lens flares. Whitewashes, blue stripes, glare…bad lighting effects were everywhere. I understand that some of that might make the film seem more “realistic,” but when it’s that noticeable, it’s far too much. Half the time, they obscured characters and ships! Even the director, J.J. Abrams himself, has admitted that the lens flares are “ridiculous.” Hopefully the filmmakers won’t repeat that mistake with the inevitable sequel. Seriously, the lens flares were the single worst part of the entire film.

There’s more nits to pick, but I’ll leave that up to other fans. The good news is that while Star Trek certainly had it flaws, the sum of these flaws was nowhere near enough to damage the overall quality of the film. (This is in sharp contrast to the Star Wars prequels, where the exact opposite happened!) Star Trek is still a great piece of cinematic science fiction, and I can’t wait to see where they take it from here.

For further reading on this subject, I strongly suggest you pore over the following articles posted at Ex Astris Scientia:

• Star Trek XI: Reboot or Multiverse? (Note: This article was written well before the film’s release.)

• Star Trek XI Review
• Time Travel in Star Trek XI
• Star Trek XI Inconsistencies
• The Enterprise Size Controversy

You’ll notice that Bernd Schneider, author and owner of EAS, had many of the same concerns that I did. I should also note that Bernd is most certainly not your garden variety obsessive Star Trek nerd who does nothing but bash anything that’s not “perfect” Trek. Quite the contrary, he’s the most intelligent and articulate Star Trek fan I’ve ever come across (and an actual engineer!), so do not dismiss him or his opinions out of hand. That would be the ultimate exercise in foolishness and ignorance.

Ten years ago today, Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace hit theaters.

The Phantom Menace was released towards the end of my time in college. We had just seen the remastered and “updated” versions of the original trilogy in theaters a few years before, and also enjoyed the excellent Shadows of the Empire campaign prior to that. Star Wars fever was riding high, and the new film couldn’t possibly disappoint, could it? Walking out of the theater after first seeing the film, everyone was caught up in the hype. But later, having had the chance to think about what we just saw…ugh. The poor script and acting, the over-reliance on special effects, the questionable continuity additions, and Jar Jar Binks…it was very painful for longtime fans.

Along came two more prequels, which couldn’t be nearly as bad as the first one, right? Wrong. Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith were just as bad as The Phantom Menace, for largely the same reasons. The acting and script was terrible, some continuity elements made little to no sense, but worst of all…the heroic Jedi were portrayed as completely ineffective, and Darth Vader — one of the greatest science fiction villains ever created — was revealed to be a whiny, complaining pussy. Not to mention that with each prequel film, a new badass character was introduced…only to be violently killed by the end of the movie!

The darkest side of all of this Star Wars mania is the resurgence of the fanboys. Hardcore scifi nerds aren’t exactly social butterflies, but holy shit, The Phantom Menace and its sequels really drew ‘em out of the woodwork. With the insane popularity of the entire saga, it also gave many Star Wars fans a “right” to be obnoxiously arrogant, letting them relentlessly bash other popular franchises like Star Trek and Doctor Who (both of whom predate Star Wars by more than a decade), simply because George Lucas’ saga is more of a moneymaker. Sure, fanboy wars had always been there, but the prequels gave the Star Wars fanboys more ammunition. (Odd, concerning the films’ noted lack of quality!)

The prequels left a bad taste in the mouths of many (myself included; it took me a few years to get over it), but there’s no denying that Star Wars was a huge part of everyone’s life in 1999. And for the past decade, the franchise has been more popular than ever. While the focus seems to be on the prequel era more than anything else, there is quite a bit of good that has come out of this. The uptick of interest has resulted in a bevy of top-notch Expanded Universe content; most notably, the Dark Times and Legacy comic book series, as well as the Force Unleashed project.

To sum up, the prequel era ushered in a new age of shit, but thank goodness we’ve got decent science fiction writers and creators to handle the great stories coming out of the Expanded Universe. Without them, I (and many other fans) likely would’ve written off Star Wars for good.

Someone please do the world a favor, and scuttle the pirate fad. Pirates of the Caribbean was one thing, but now the shitty fad has gotten way out of control. They actually have pirate-themed conventions now; as if science fiction and comic book conventions weren’t bad enough! Then, of course, there’s the whole timeliness factor; pirate fans are rejoicing in that shiver-me-timbers nonsense, while real world piracy has gotten so incredibly bad that it’s no laughing matter.

Maybe we should have these pirate wannabes step up and deal with the situation in the Somalian waters?