Tagged: Star Trek

GUEST REVIEWER TACKLES BOBBY NASH’S ‘SAMARITAN!

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  • December 31, 2012

Ralph’s Rants reviewed Bobby Nash’s ebook novella, Samaritan. http://dominatr37.blogspot.com/2012/12/samaritan-review.html 

Samaritan by Bobby Nash is a novella set in the future where man is exploring space aboard prospector ships. The Aquarius is one such ship. The Aquarius has been out in deep space for eight long years and is just now returning to Earth. In all that time they have not encountered another being of any species. That is about to change.


When the ship comes upon a seeming graveyard of spaceships and spaceship parts the crew is understandably curious and excited. For the first time they have evidence of life on other worlds. Sadly, as they are about to find out, it’s better off not answering certain questions, at least not at this time.


This is a VERY well written space adventure, and within its forty plus pages an entire story is told, and nothing is left wanting. I really liked this one a lot, even more than I expected too. It held my interest and the pace which started out slow built to a frenetic crescendo at the tales end. This is as much a horror story as it is Sci-fi, in the vein of ‘Alien’.

But therein lies the problem with this tale, to me at least. The end, while excellently and professionally written, felt a little too expected for me. The big surprise was pretty much what I expected to happen.

But do NOT let that deter you from reading this story. It honestly is one of the best things I’ve read in a long time. There’s very little sci-fi out there that I like. Most of it reads like bad Star Trek or Star Wars. Or it strives far too hard to be neither. This just read like a good sci-fi story. I’ve been lucky recently and read three good sci-fi stories in a row, including this one. You can’t go wrong here. Bobby’s characters are real and you don’t like all of them, which to me is the sign of a good writer, and a good story.

Give Samaritan a whirl. It’s a short but very engrossing story. Far better than most novella’s I’ve read recently.

#####

About SAMARITAN (an ebook novella by Bobby Nash):

Deep space.

The science ship Aquarius, under the command of Captain Jeremiah Rains has finally reached the end of its exploratory mission to the depths of uncharted space and is returning home to Earth.

Captain Rains and his skeleton military crew are tired and bored from the lack of adventure they expected to find out in the great beyond. The scientists, however, are extremely happy with their many discoveries.

When the ship comes upon the wreckage of a destroyed space vessel, the crew is surprised to find one survivor; a woman, quite possibly the most beautiful woman any of them have ever seen. Her name is Lari and all she wants is someone, some Good Samaritan, to take her home.

The catch is that her planet is located at the center of a black hole.

SAMARITAN is a novella by author Bobby Nash

You can learn more about Bobby Nash’s Samaritan at www.bobbynash.com and http://BEN-Books.blogspot.com.

Samaritan will be part of the upcoming BEN Books release, FRONTIER, a collection of sci fi stories by New Pulp Author Bobby Nash. Frontier will be the first time Samaritan has been in print since its original run in Startling Stories #3 from Wild Cat Books in 2007.

Peter David has stroke

  • News
  • December 30, 2012

Peter David

UPDATE: Peter’s site is back. Feel free to add well-wishes there.

Peter David, writer of over one thousand comics for everyone over the past four decades, has suffered a stroke. He writes on his site:

I have had a stroke. We were on vacation in Florida when I lost control of the right side of my body. I cannot see properly and I cannot move my right arm or leg. We are currently getting the extent of the damage sorted out and will report as further details become clarified.

His main website, PeterDavid.net, is getting hammered, but we’ll be updating as we have more information. He’s still planning on hitting all his deadlines, though.

Peter, of course, is well known for his comics work, holding the current record for most months consistently published. comic book resume includes an award-winning twelve-year run on The Incredible Hulk, and he has also worked on such varied and popular titles as X-Factor, Supergirl, Young Justice, Soulsearchers and Company, Aquaman, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2099, Star Trek, Wolverine, The Phantom, Sachs & Violens, The Dark Tower, and many others. He has also written comic book related novels, such as The Incredible Hulk: What Savage Beast, and co-edited The Ultimate Hulk short story collection. Furthermore, his opinion column, “But I Digress…,” has been running in the industry trade newspaper The Comic Buyers’s Guide for nearly a decade, and in that time has been the paper’s consistently most popular feature and was also collected into a trade paperback edition.

His latest prose fiction, Pulling Up Stakes, is available from Crazy 8 Press. Part one is available as an e-book on Amazon and Barnes & Noble now, with part two arriving shortly. His latest comic, Richard Castle’s A Calm Before Storm, is a spinoff from the TV series Castle, starring Nathan Fillion.

NEW PULP AUTHORS VISIT EARTH STATION ONE

Some familiar names popped up on the Earth Station One Podcast this week.

The ESO crew goes on a journey we’ve been expecting for nine long years! Mike Faber and Michael Gordon, along with fellow ESO podcasters JD (The Delta Quadrant – A Star Trek Voyager Podcast) and Van Allen Plexico (The White Rocket Podcast) review the first chapter of The Hobbit trilogy. Plus, Bobby Nash is on hand to help author Jana Oliver face The Geek Seat. All this and the usual Rants, Raves, Khan Report, and Shout Outs!

You can listen to Earth Station One Episode 142 now at www.esopodcast.com.
Direct link: http://erthstationone.wordpress.com/2012/12/19/earth-station-one-episode-142-playing-riddles-in-the-dark-we-review-the-first-hobbit-film/

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Watch “Star Trek Into Darkness” trailer now!

  • News
  • December 17, 2012

If you didn’t make it to a theater this weekend to see The Hobbit, you haven’t yet seen the full-length trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness, so let’s take a look now…

When the crew of the Enterprise is called back home, they find an unstoppable force of terror from within their own organization has detonated the fleet and everything it stands for, leaving our world in a state of crisis. With a personal score to settle, Captain Kirk leads a manhunt to a war-zone world to capture a one man weapon of mass destruction. As our heroes are propelled into an epic chess game of life and death, love will be challenged, friendships will be torn apart, and sacrifices must be made for the only family Kirk has left: his crew.

Star Trek: Into Darkness brings back Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, Anton Yelchin, John Cho, and Bruce Greenwood, and adds Benedict Cumberbatch and Peter Weller to the cast. It’s written by Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci, and Damon Lindelof, and directed by J.J. Abrams. The film is scheduled to hit theaters May 17, 2013.

And here’s a quick pic from the film of Quinto, Cumberbatch, and Pine…

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Watch “Star Trek Into Darkness” Teaser Now

  • News
  • December 6, 2012

Here’s the Star Trek Into Darkness announcement teaser. So what do we know so far?

When the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise is called home, they find an unstoppable force of terror from within Starfleet has detonated the fleet and everything it stands for, leaving our world in a state of crisis. With a personal score to settle, Captain Kirk leads a manhunt to a war-zone world to capture a one man weapon of mass destruction. As our heroes are propelled into an epic chess game of life and death, love will be challenged, friendships will be torn apart, and sacrifices must be made for the only family Kirk has left: his crew.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diP-o_JxysA[/youtube]

Star Trek: Into Darkness brings back Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, Anton Yelchin, John Cho, and Bruce Greenwood, and adds Benedict Cumberbatch and Peter Weller to the cast. It’s written by Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci, and Damon Lindelof, and directed by J.J. Abrams. The film is scheduled to hit theaters May 17, 2013.

EARTH STATION ONE EPISODE 140: SURPRISING SEQUELS

So many sequels, so few of them have been good! Every once in a while comes one that lives up to the original. Mike Faber, Mike Gordon, Bobby Nash, and special guest Grundy chat reveal their favorites. And speaking of continuing missions, Star Trek/ Doctor Who comic book writer Scott Tipton takes a turn in The Geek Seat. As if that wasn’t enough, we take a look at AMC’s The Walking Dead as it heads into the fall finale. Plus the usual Rants, Raves, Shout Outs, and the ever-popular Khan Report!

Join us for yet another episode of The Earth Station One Podcast we like to call: Surprising Sequels at www.esopodcast.com.
Direct link: http://erthstationone.wordpress.com/2012/12/05/earth-station-one-episode-140-surprising-sequels/

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Mindy Newell’s Mind Rumblings

Various and sundry thoughts from the mind of Mindy this week:

The USS Enterprise (CVN-65), the eighth U.S. Navy vessel to bear that name, was decommissioned this week after 50 years of service. The world’s first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier made her maiden voyage on January 12, 1962 and her first mission was tracking and monitoring the first orbital flight of Project Mercury, with Lt. Col. John Glenn aboard the Friendship 7 capsule. In popular culture, the Enterprise was the home base of Lt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell (Tom Cruise) in Top Gun, with the late director Tony Scott filming and incorporating flight deck operations into the film, and it was the flagship of the U.S. Navy fleet participating in The Hunt For Red October.

Then, of course, there is Star Trek – and did you know that Gene Roddenberry’s original starship name was the USS Yorktown? But the fame and status of the sea-going Enterprise led to starship being rechristened the USS Enterprise NC-1701. (Art Director Matt Jeffries – yes, for whom the Jeffries Tubes are named – used the USS Enterprise CVN-65 for scale when designing the original starship.) Star Trek and her fans – through a massive letter writing campaign and, I’m sure, encouraged by not a few NASA employees – returned the favor when NASA’s first Space Shuttle was named Enterprise. And in Star Trek: First Contact, we see that models of all the ships named Enterprise hanging in a showcase in Jean-Luc’s office. (“You broke your little ships,” says Lily Sloane, played by Alfre Woodward, after Picard goes “Ahab” in his desire vengeance against Borg throwing his phaser rifle through the glass walls of the showcase.)

Staying with Star Trek…I just rewatched J.J. Abram’s remake last night, and the more I see it, the more I love it. I continue to be especially impressed by Karl Urban’s Dr. Leonard McCoy – if I closed my eyes, I’d be hard-pressed not to say it was DeForest Kelley speaking.

Again, speaking of “all things Trek” – although I am generally not a fan of comic adaption of live-action TV shows and movies, I gotta say I’m loving IDW’s Star Trek, written by Mike Johnson with art by Claudia Balboni and Stephen Molnar. Johnson is following the original series story lines, with just the right twists of plot to adhere to the “new” Trek and doing an excellent job of capturing the personalities of Kirk/Pine, Spock/Quinto, Scotty/Pegg, Uhura/Saldana and the rest of the crew with his dialogue. Kudos to the entire team!

On the other hand…Dark Horse’s Spike mini-series sucks. I mean, Spike on the moon? Gimme a fucking break! In fact, generally speaking, their whole Buffy line sucks. Really disappointed. Oh, well, dropping it will save me money.

After almost 30 years, my local comics shop, Vector Books, has closed. Joe and Tina and Frank have been a part of my life for all those 30 years, and I wish them love and health and all the best in the future. But a new comics emporium has opened to take over from Vector (and with Vector’s blessing). It’s Manifest Comics And Cards, and I’ll be interviewing its young owner, Michael, in the future to find out how nuts (and brave) he is to open a shop at a time when so many are closing.

What fucking world do the Republicans live in? Who the fuck cares what Grover Norquist thinks? Attention John Boehmer!!!! Your job is to lead, not to follow the bug-fucked extremists and Tea Party wingnuts or to worry about losing your position as Speaker of the House! Get the deal done, for Christ’s sake! You can’t blame Obama this time! Like we said in the 60s, the whole world is watching!

How many of you had to Google labia majora and labia minora from my column last week? (Thanks to Mike Gold for this.)

Over at The League Of Woman Bloggers on Facebook, there is mucho discussion going on about the attack on girl geeks by boy geeks. Much geekiness is ensuing.

Okay, who here is a Homeland fan? Is Brody now a triple agent, again loyal to Nazir? What didn’t he tell Carrie, Saul, and Quinn in the debriefing? What did he make up? (I’m betting the being tied to a car battery part.) How long did it take before you realized that Virgil and Max were in Quinn’s apartment? (I thought they were in Roya’s.) Who is Dar Adal, the guy that Quinn met on the bus? (Yeah, yeah, I know he’s F. Murray Abraham…) Who is Quinn – FBI? Black-ops CIA? Mole? (I don’t think he is – too obvious.) Was the whole “terrorist attack on returning veterans” a MacGuffin, and the real attack is still coming? Is Estes as incompetent as he seems?  Why did he send Quinn out to kill Brody? Why did Saul go to Philadelphia, knowing that Quinn would find out? And why does Jessica keep calling her husband by his last name?

Later.

TUESDAY MORNING: Emily S. Whitten

TUESDAY AFTERNOON: Michael Davis

 

LOU SCHEIMER ON CREATING THE FILMATION GENERATION

  • News
  • November 6, 2012

On November 7th, TwoMorrows Publishing will release Lou Scheimer: Creating The Filmation Generation. Scheimer and Filmation were responsible for many pulp animated projects, including The Lone Ranger, Flash Gordon, Tarzan, and more.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

New autobiography of Lou Scheimer, co-founder of Filmation Studios, debuts November 7.

(RALEIGH, NC) On November 7, TwoMorrows Publishing releases LOU SCHEIMER: CREATING THE FILMATION GENERATION, the new autobiography of the co-founder of the renowned Filmation animation studio. Hailed as one of the fathers of Saturday morning television, Scheimer devoted over 25 years to providing animated excitement for TV and film. Always at the forefront, Filmation created the first DC Comics cartoons with Superman, Batman, and Aquaman, ruled the song charts with The Archies, kept Trekkie hope alive with the Emmy-winning Star Trek: The Animated Series, taught morals with Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, and swung into high adventure with Tarzan, The Lone Ranger, and Zorro.

Forays into live-action included Shazam! and The Secrets of Isis, plus ground-breaking special effects work on Jason of Star Command and others. And in the 1980s, Filmation single-handedly caused the syndication explosion with He-Man and the Masters of the Universe and its successors. Now, with best-selling co-author Andy Mangels, Lou Scheimer tells his entire story, including how his father decked Adolf Hitler, memories of the comic books of the Golden Age, schooling with Andy Warhol, and what it meant to lead the last all-American animation company through nearly thirty years of innovation and fun. Profusely illustrated with photos, model sheets, storyboards, presentation art, looks at rare and unproduced series, and more — plus hundreds of tales about Filmation’s past, and rare Filmation-related art by Bruce Timm, Adam Hughes, Alex Ross, Phil Jimenez, Frank Cho, Gene Ha, and Mike McKone — this book shows the Filmation Generation the story behind the stories.

288-page Trade Paperback with COLOR, by Lou Scheimer with Andy Mangels
Print Edition: $29.95 cover price
Digital Edition: $9.95, available only at www.twomorrows.com

ISBN10: 1-60549-044-X
ISBN13: 978-1-60549-044-1
Diamond Comic Distributors Order Code: JUL121245

Ordering link: http://twomorrows.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=662

In anticipation of this book’s release, TwoMorrows Publishing is letting readers download a FREE PDF PREVIEW at this link: http://www.twomorrows.com/media/ScheimerPreview.pdf

ABOUT THE CO-AUTHOR: Andy Mangels is the USA Today best-selling author and co-author of over twenty fiction and nonfiction books — including Star Trek, Roswell, and Star Wars novels — and is an award-winning comic book anthology editor. He has also contributed to international magazines and newspapers, and has scripted, directed, and produced over forty DVD documentaries and Special Features projects.

LOU SCHEIMER: CREATING THE FILMATION GENERATION will be in stores on Wednesday, November 7.

Since 1994, TwoMorrows Publishing has been bringing a new day to comics fandom, through its award-winning line of magazines and books.

John Ostrander: Quo Vadis, Star Wars?

Let’s see – what were the big stories of this past week? Hurricane/Superstorm Sandy slamming the East Coast and turning off power as far away as Lapeer, Michigan. Yup. That’s the big one. President Obama wins re-election. Wait. That’s next week. George Lucas sells his holdings to Disney and Episode VII is announced.

That sounds like the one I’m going to write about.

Caveats: Although I write two Star Wars comics for Dark Horse, I know nothing more than any of you about this. I was as surprised as anyone when the story broke. I hesitated before writing this column for fear that someone might take this as an insider’s view. It’s not. It’s all just rumination and speculation on my part. We good?

There has been, of course, a cacophony of reaction all over the ‘net. Them underground tubes have been humming. Some praise, some wails of distress, some outraged howls of betrayal. Among Star Wars fans there has been a lot of speculation of what Episode VII would be like. Which part of the Extended Universe (EU) would be adapted? The Thrawn Trilogy? The New Jedi Order? Legacy?

The answer: none of the above. Official response has been that it would be “an original story.” Massive disappointment among the EU faithful and fears that the new Episode VII will make hash of the post Episode VI EU. I fully expect the new film to respect EU continuity as much as George Lucas did which was – not at all.

The reason why? If you’re not a EU fan, how many of those possibilities that I named up above made any sense to you? I’m guessing “none of the above.” The fans are important but there’s not enough of them. The first new Star Wars movie in decades? A sequel, not a prequel? Disney and Lucasfilm are going to be looking for Avengers type numbers and that means it has to be accessible to the general public. Heck, they’ll want it to be accessible to those who haven’t watched a Star Wars film ever. That’s not unreasonable. That’s why Disney made the purchase in the first place.

There are also concerns that Disney will “Disneyize” the franchise. That doesn’t make sense to me. Star Wars is very compatible with Disney as is. Also, Disney also owns Pixar and hasn’t messed with that so far as I can see. They own Marvel Comics and Marvel seems to be doing what Marvel does without much change, again so far as I can see.

Not every change is bad. I was one of the doubters when Paramount announced a re-boot of Star Trek. I ended up loving it. I also doubted when Daniel Craig was announced as James Bond. A blonde James Bond? That was just wrong. Now – I think Craig is one of the absolute best Bonds and I can’t wait for Skyfall.

There also has been speculation that the Star Wars comics would move from Dark Horse to Marvel Comics. Here you might think I have some reliable info, but I don’t. Dark Horse has the license at the moment; it was just renewed a few years back. Dark Horse is taking a wait-an-see approach and so am I.

There is history; the Disney Comics were at Boom! before Disney bought Marvel and then they got moved to Marvel Comics. And it would make sense, I suppose, to move the comics to the comic company Disney owns. On the other hand, several of the movie franchises are at studios other than Disney.

As I said, Dark Horse has a license. I have a vested interest to be sure – I have two SW titles out at Dark Horse, Agent of the Empire (the new arc, Hard Targets, has just started and the first arc, Iron Eclipse, has just been released in TPB form) and Dawn of the Jedi (the first arc, Force Storm, will be released on Christmas day, and the new arc, The Prisoner of Bogan, will be released November 28 and, yes, I’m hyping my own product, thank you very much). I’ve worked on Star Wars comics for about ten years. Would that continue if the license moved to Marvel? Beats me.

So is all this a good thing or a bad thing? It’s a thing. George Lucas has been talking about retiring for some time so it makes sense that he found a good home for his creations. He’s still around and I suspect he’ll have as much say as he wants in what happens. Things will change and that includes EU continuity. Does that bother me?

Not really. I don’t own any of the characters that I’ve worked on in the comics any more than I own any characters that I created at Marvel or DC. (I have a financial stake in Amanda Waller and that’s sweet but not ownership.) Fans often evince a feeling of ownership of Star Wars (or Harry Potter or Twilight or any other fan intensive franchise) but that’s not reality.

What we have (and I’m a fan as well) is hope, in this case maybe a new hope, that Episode VII will be everything we want in a Star Wars movie and the stories that come out of it and surround it will also be cool. Why do I hope? Because it’s in Disney’s best interest to do it right.

The galaxy will be watching.

Monday: Did Sandy Get Mindy?

 

REVIEW: Star Trek: The Next Generation 365

Star Trek: The Next Generation 365
By Paula M. Block and Terry J. Erdman
Abrams Books, 744 pages, $29.95

Let me state upfront that Paula and Terry have been friends for a long time, but I adamantly maintain that they were the ideal people to write Star Trek 365 and the recently released Star Trek: The Next generation 365. Why? Because Paula has been intimately involved with the franchise since the 1980s and knows every nook and cranny within Paramount Pictures to find rare images or information. Terry is an experienced film publicist and has a keen understanding of what people like to know and has an engaging way of sharing that with enthusiasm.

Being the series’ 25th anniversary makes this a nice companion volume to the series; chock full of images, architectural and production drawings, special effects pictures, and some on set antics. Every episode from each of the seven seasons receives not only a brief synopsis but then stories about the show, told from a wide variety of angles. You get some of the best known tales such as the banana clip that became Geordi’s VISOR to lesser known stories in how episodes were conceived. Some of the best are the ones demonstrating how a kernel of a story lingered until the right opportunity, or the right writer, or both, arrived to solve the conundrum. A good example is how long it took to produce the acclaimed “Darmok”.

Given how many images Paula approved for use through the years, she knew which ones to avoid in the hopes of finding a fresh look at the series. One approach meant leaning more towards the black and white shots the still photographer took that have rarely been used, and that adds a nice quality to the book. Many of these are behind-the-scenes and between takes shots of the cast relaxing, prepping or goofing off.

To find fresh nuggets of information about the 178 episodes, the pair interviewed dozens of people who worked on the show over the eight years it took from conception to finale. As a result, they got not only interesting new anecdotes but found additional graphics for use, especially from production designer Richard James and visual effects producer Dan Curry. Effects associate Eric Alba is also credited for coming up with a variety of candid photos for use. All of this enriches the book and ensures that it’s not a retread of previously seen images or twice-told tales.

The comes with a foreword by Ronald D. Moore, who got his big break with an unsolicited script and has gone on to a creative career among the stars. The 365 series of pop culture books are nice, compact treasure troves that are well worth a look.

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