The Orville: A better Star Trek than Star Trek

What a ridiculous name for a StarShip.

The Orville.

Instead of going where no man has gone before...Instead of evoking visions of the first flight with the brothers Wright (as in Orville and Wilbur) 

I think of Redenbacher...

You know, the popcorn guy...

...and maybe that's the point.

But somewhere along the way Seth McFarlane managed to do something no Star Trek Series has done in 4 decades.  

In a time when the "official" Star Trek canon has been bastardized into some weird amalgamation of action movie meets Sci-Fi chic peppered with  liberal doses of gratuitous sex and violence for no other reason than they could.

Here comes a parody, a spoof, the comic relief of the genre that somehow managed to get it right.

The Orville while not as straight-laced as Star Trek: The Next Generation or as moody and lifeless as Discovery has more in common with the original series than either of them.

What made the original Star Trek series good was the writing and the chemistry of the actors.  You didn't have to club the viewer over the head with the message.  The drama made sense.  Tension had a reason and didn't have to be manufactured.  You cared about the characters, maybe even shed a tear at their pain.

Tonight while watching The Orville it happened for me.  Yes, it was campy in spots but there were moments every bit as poignant as the the best Star Trek episodes regardless of who sat in the captain's chair.  It touched me like any good Star Trek episode would.  It made me think.  It made me feel.

The Orville works for the same reason Star Trek worked in the 60's.  We can identify with the characters.  We can see ourselves in their trials and tribulations without being forced to.  I think of The Orville as kind of a Next Generation if Picard had a better sense of humor.

It's a funny show but not Family Guy kind of funny.  The laughs aren't forced, they're natural and fit the narrative.  The kind of thing you might say to a friend in a similar situation.

OK the obvious question....

"It's a show about being on a spaceship with alien people 400 years in the future.  How would I EVER be in a similar situation?"

That's the gist of it, it's relatable, recognizable.  Not in the way that Deep Space 9 was in defiling the rose colored glasses of Roddenberry's Star Trek universe by exposing its dark underbelly.  Its rai·son d'ê·tre  to make the future just as ugly as our present.

No, the problem with many of the Star Trek series that came after Kirk and Spock was that they took themselves too seriously.  Somewhere along the line, they forgot that just shoehorning a current event into a Science Fiction context wasn't enough to be relatable to those of us that were watching.

For any work of fiction to succeed it has to meet us half way.  It has to connect us to their world by reaching a hand out to ours. 

I've seen that happen repeatedly on The Orville.

In "Nothing Left on Earth Excepting the Fishes" a title which references "The King and I" we saw multiple story lines intersecting and filling out the narrative.  The most primary of which spoke to finding common ground.  Something very much in the public conscience and something only addressable through a narrative in the current political climate.

It's no surprise, however, with Star Trek heavy hitters like Andre Bormanis and Brannon Braga showing up in the show's credits.  In the previous episode "Home" we even saw a couple of veteran Star Trek actors in Robert Picardo ( the EMH from Voyager ) opposite John Billingsley (Dr. Phlox from Enterprise)

You don't have all of these celebrated Star Trek alumni  jumping onboard The Orville just because they need a paycheck.  They see it too.

Where Discovery is a militant, lifeless shell devoid of passion or reason for being other than just...being, The Orville has managed to bring us back to what good Sci-Fi should be.

It's not an action movie, it's not sexy or gratuitous just for the sake of being so.  It's not trying to make Star Trek into Mission Impossible: Space Camp.

It's good writing, a good story and a dose of humor just where it's needed.  Even if that means poking fun at it's progenitor.  

And the fans love it.

I've had a very positive view of  The Orville since it launched ( pardon the pun ) but this season seems to be raising the bar.

At the end of "....Fishes" there was a poignant scene where Ed ( Seth McFarlane ) sets free a Trill ( the primary antagonist species ) that  betrayed him by appearing as a human and starting a relationship just to lure him into a Trill trap.  As the scene closed and she boarded her shuttle, Billy Joel's "She's always a woman" played the episode out.

I literally felt that moment.  Maybe it was the song....no...not maybe....the song fit the story perfectly.

That's good writing, that's making something completely alien relatable. 

That's why The Orville is a better Star Trek than Star Trek...

Speed Channel dies amongst the roar of broadcasting mediocrity

Heard about Fox Sports 1?  You'd be forgiven if you could care less about the latest entry into the sports network wars.  These days it seems sports programming is little more than background noise for all but the rabid faithful at the local sports bar. 

But there's no denying it's a lucrative business with exclusive subscriptions from the likes of the NFL, NASCAR and even the PGA demanding hundreds of dollars per year just for the privilege of watching. 

Even if you could care less about anyone's "Season Pass" you still end up paying for sports programming.  It's common knowledge that the most basic of cable and satellite charges are comprised at least in part of fees paid to channels you may never watch like ESPN.

 If you're paying $35 a month for cable or satellite you can bet at least $5 of it is going to ESPN  (a Disney property.)   It's become the catalyst for a growing movement of  "cord-cutters"  fed up with ever increasing costs for programming they don't want. 

It's a movement I'll soon be joining myself and the final straw was Fox's decision to take on  ESPN by converting its Fuel and Speed channels to a more ESPN-like sports network.  More than just a name change Fox Sports 1 and Fox Sports 2 promise the same kind of sports grab bag that subscribers are already paying too much for with ESPN. 

There are few channels I take an active interest in on Cable or Satellite anymore.  Now that one of them  has fallen prey to Fox network's arrogance it's hard to justify paying a large portion of my monthly bill for content I have no use for.

In Broadcasting, trying to be everything to everyone is the definition of appointment viewing.  It forces viewers to suffer through programming they don't want just for the opportunity to see shows they may actually be interested in.  

Sadly, it's often a burnt offering as niche programming is forced to conform to a lineup built on the hopes of capturing the widest arc of viewership.  It assumes a fan of NFL football is also a fan of NASCAR or extreme sports.  A foolish assumption when viewed in the context of the popularity of those exclusive subscriptions mentioned earlier. 

It's a model proven obsolete by  the success of services like Netflix and on-demand programming options.  It's also proving increasingly unsustainable as ESPN appears to be losing market share not to other traditional media competitors but rather to the Internet and exclusive sports programming  packages offered by Satellite and cable.

I remember Speed channel back when it was called SpeedVision and before it became a Fox property in 2002.  Those were the golden years for the channel long before Fox flooded the schedule with NASCAR programming and AMA supercross.  There were Howto shows, coverage of racing events and lifestyle programming that appealed to the gearhead in me. 

I actually credit the channel for reigniting my interest in the automotive hobby and enjoyed the slightly quirky but always interesting shows like Chop, Cut Rebuild, Dream Car Garage and Lost Drive-In.  Later, shows like Gearz and Barrett-Jackson Car search (based on the auction) offered a respite from the incessant Fox NASCAR programming.

My initial exposure to the channel came late in 1998 while flipping through the menus on my then new satellite receiver and stopping on a strange sight.  There was Carroll Shelby sitting next to a Blue Dodge Dakota specially prepared by his shop.  A very HSN looking bar ran down the left side of the screen showing the truck's features.  At the time they were asking $45,000.   I thought I'd stumbled across some millionaire's version of the Home Shopping Network.  Shortly thereafter the annual Barrett-Jackson automobile auction was broadcast live from Scottsdale and became the catalyst for my subsequent and frequent visits to the channel.

 Fox's acquisition in 2001 and schedule domination with NASCAR and related programming slowly eroded the channel's viewership.  Instead of classic car-themed movies of the Lost Drive In viewers were assaulted with re-runs of NASCAR and motorcycle races.  SpeedVision, now Speed, had ceased being a lifestyle channel and was slowly moving towards a motorsports-only version of ESPN with "personality" driven programming a la' CNN.

There was less and less reason to spend too much time there.  Even longtime standards like the Barrett Jackson Auctions became polluted by the Fox influence.  Commentators well versed in their subject were forced to share the stage with pinup-girl types while dumbing down content seemingly aimed at adolescent males.

In the last two years of the network's life, to watch a Speed Channel broadcast of an automotive event became an exercise in aggravation.  Doubly so if you happened to be a female who didn't enjoy your intelligence being insulted by Fox's outdated stereotype of the Ideal woman.  

The acquisition of the channel by Fox was the beginning of the end as the network exerted ever more influence over its schedule.  Crowding it with programming  catering to the lowest common denominator of automotive content.

August 17th brought the final blow as Mike Joy provided the channel's epitaph...

“We love that you care as much about your cars as family, God and country. And so do we. but now it’s time to switch off the ignition and turn in the keys. This is the end of Speed in America...“

"...So now, it’s goodnight and farewell to America’s motorsports authority. Speed.”

A lifestyle event, now with stereotypes!

Article originally published on Technorati as: A lifestyle event, now with stereotypes!

It's January in Scottsdale, Arizona and that huge traffic jam on the 101 freeway can only mean one thing, Barrett-Jackson's back.  With examples from classic to wild custom there's always something to drool over at this largest of the four Barrett-Jackson auctions. 

It's said to be "The" automotive event of the year that both collector's and wannabe's alike use to value their dreams.  Is that all original Hemi RoadRunner in your garage  a good investment or is it just another Satellite?  Barrett-Jackson will clear that up for you.

Since 1993 Speed Channel, now called just "Speed" and recently acquired by Fox networks has broadcast the event.  Each year a week's worth of coverage in the middle of January dominates the otherwise Nascar centric programming on the channel.  It offers a view into not only the cars but the lifestyle and people that surround them. 

Watch it for an hour and you notice that the "lifestyle" is populated by primarily affluent 50'ish white men.  None of which seem to have any compunction against throwing ridiculous sums of money at cars your parents probably couldn't wait to get rid of back in the day.  They call it an investment but it's dubious reasoning.  The collector car market is as fickle as Wall street.  It's more likely an attempt to recapture lost youth with a bit of braggadocio thrown in at their financial ability to try.

Speed has always been good about staffing the event with veteran commentators from across motorsports.  Whether they've been covering Nascar or writing articles for Hot Rod there's sure to be at least one you can identify with.

Which makes a recent change to the event coverage perplexing.  Last year saw the addition of what can only be described as a "booth bunny" to the lineup.  I appreciate an attractive woman as much as the next guy but does shoehorning a stereotype from a bikini contest really add anything to the broadcast?

There's nothing wrong with female broadcasters so let's get that out of the way.  Speed's choice, however,  is little more than a foil for dumb blonde jokes.  Is there a dearth of female motorsports commentators versed in their subject? If this is the way motorsports views women I wouldn't blame them for staying away. 

Still, it's not as though Speed hasn't had access to female journalists at least familiar with motorsports.  Is it too much to ask to not perpetuate a stereotype?  It's demeaning.  On Wednesday night's broadcast for example,April Rose (of Maxim fame) was seated in a driving simulator and actually said,

"They should make one of these for women drivers where everyone stayed far away" 

I hate Internet shorthand but...O M G ! 

She even did the hair flip thing! 

Gender equality set back 50 years in 20 seconds.  Were I an affluent woman considering the purchase of one of these shining examples of lost youth I'd likely have switched off Speed channel's coverage left the auction and headed across the street to Russo and Steele instead..

I'd like to say it was an isolated incident but unfortunately it was only one of many.  It's obvious that to the old white men in charge of Fox, she is the pinnacle of female broadcasting.  

Politics as Product

Article first published as Politics as Product on Technorati.

Never has there been such a splendid example that we as a society are severely afflicted with Attention Deficit Disorder.  This flavor of ADD  is far from the inattentive child nervously fidgeting in his classroom, however.  

No, this is an affliction of the first world dominated by the churn of  consumerism.   It expresses itself in everything from fad to fashion and increasingly to critical thinking as well.

We in the first world have become so conditioned to reacting to a marketing message that we require no further information to make a decision.  We make the choice based on the promotion we most easily identify with.  No further deliberation is entertained. 

We've come to expect all of our information to be packaged in this way.  Politics enjoy no immunity.

Our impatience is reflected in the flood of campaign ads that have plagued our airwaves for the past year.  Probably the most obvious example is the current U.S. presidential race.  To date, both candidates for president have raised over 2 Billion dollars for their campaigns with approximately 1.5 billion of that spent thus far. 

Half truths, errors of omission and inflated context are the tools of political persuasion and they easily translate to the world of marketing.  Politics promotes the image by obscuring the product. 

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We choose our leaders with less care than our favorite sports team.  That's by design and the reason why political positions are largely parroted from political propaganda.  Politicians know voters have a low tolerance for long-winded technical arguments.  Instead they choose a popular position with their base and relentlessly repeat the same message regardless of its veracity.

Remember the Go-Daddy commercials?  In 30 seconds we knew who they were but only because we were constantly exposed to scantily clad models that appealed to a core demographic.   How many of us tried them based on a subconscious reaction to those ads instead of their reputation?

It works just as well for politics as it does for web hosting.   Think about where you get your political news.  Is it C-Span or are you more interested in the packaged offerings of Fox News or MSNBC?

Let's look at a current hot button political issue as an example...

Is it really the fault of a sitting president that the worst economic downturn since the depression of 1929 is still affecting the economy?

It is if you ignore the boring technical argument that it took a decade and a world war to bring the U.S. out of the great depression.   

Unfortunately, our short attention spans won't allow the retort.  We crave instant gratification and sway toward the product that promises it.  Ironically, If challenged we frequently justify our position based on that same marketing construct.  It's circular logic which dovetails nicely with our distaste for depth.

Perhaps it's time to examine how informed we really are.