I had previously released a version of this short book, that got a lot of reads and downloads, but I took it down, corrected it, and added a few new posts. The new version is available on Internet Archive, Notes on Star Trek.
Nus Braka takes control of the media: An obvious parallel to the present – Paramount and the White House
Vernari Ral News Network – Breaking News: The Federation is Compromised. Leaders and civilians alike are trying to flee Federation space, signaling Federation weakness – Breaking News: The Federation is on Trial! Nus Braka hosts the trial of the century aboard the Athena, a gaudy treasure of the pompous Federation (with a ticker beneath it…
Memo: Star Trek is going to have to make an edit out of Discovery season one
In Star Trek: Discovery season one Elon Musk is mentioned as a great historical figure. We all realized that was a great risk as he was still alive and who knows what the future could be. Well, now we know. Star Trek has a responsibility to not just leave it there and say “oh well.”…
Trauma and Postmodern Subtext in Star Trek
B’Elanna Torres, martyrologies, the resolve of violence superstructures to persist as their own solutions – just as the competing martyrologies-imposed doctrines of violence, so, too, did Lt. Torres imposed violence upon herself in “Extreme Risk” as the solution to coming to terms with the holodeck grotesque imagery she created upon learning of the fate of…
Star Trek is a Collaborator with Contemporary Injustice
Star Trek is a dangerous, denialist lie that is about hope in the future. We cannot hope for a future without injustice where Earth is a paradise without first addressing injustice here and now. Then we can talk about utopia. I realize not all science fiction does what Trek does. I also realize Star Trek…
A Return to Attraction to Light and the End of the Public Intellectual
In “Attraction to Light: Light as Communication of Imagined Evolution” I attempted to explicate the repeated patterns of light itself as continued motif that is symbolic of evolution as well as non-specific callings for humanity’s outer edges. I had missed one very obvious inclusion, the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, “Transfigurations” (1990). What could…
Tom Stoppard meets Star Trek (cross posted)
I had an idea for movie that is Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (play: 1966, film: 1990), which was written by Tom Stoppard and is a play that was made into a movie and is a behind-the-scenes of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, meets Star Trek, specifically focused on the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, “A Matter…
“Spock’s Brain” and the Perpetuation of Sexist Control
Regular readers will have noted that though Star Trek is discussed often in this space, not once have I discussed The Original Series. I rarely watch it. There are a handful of good science fiction episodes, but most of the series lacks everything that equates to quality and more than a few are prime examples…
The Conflict and Promises of Revisiting the Past and Seeing into the Future
I want to return to a previous post, “On Time Travel, the Subconscious Signature, and Market Capitalism” and the ethics of interpreting oneself with the present moment, detached from the past and preserved for the future. In that post, I stated, “[w]hat considerations of time travel offer us is an honest reflection of what it…
Discovery’s “Point of Light,” Klingon culture and “Ideal Theory,” New Visions for “Reproduction,” and “Commoning” as Future Utopia (Science Fiction and Charles W. Mills’s Critique of “Ideal Theory” Part III)
In Star Trek: Discovery’s “Point of Light” (2019), L’Rell is confronted with a Klingon house that wishes to return to the old ways of Klingons warring with Klingons, or, to Kol-Sha direct plan, to take over the empire and lead himself; displacing the female warrior who rules over Qo’noS. There is currently peace between the…