Author Archives: James Pyles

Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Ep7, “The Serene Squall”

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Scene from Star Trek Strange New Worlds “The Serene Squall”

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I just finished watching “Star Trek Strange New Worlds” E7 The Serene Squall which I think was more unintentionally humorous than anything else. It also rivaled E5 Spock Amok as the lamest show to date.

We start off at a Vulcan penal colony where T’Pring is entering a personal log. Log entries are a great way to give the audience insight into what a character is thinking, but they’re also a very Star Fleet thing. Since T’Pring works for Vulcan law enforcement “rehabilitation,” why would they have a parallel process.

Anyway…

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Book Review of “The Titanic Paradox” by R.L. Corn

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I finished the short book The Titanic Paradox last night. It was written by R.L.Corn and published just last month. I happened upon it by chance when it was being discussed on Facebook (see, social media is good for marketing books).

Admittedly, I’m a sucker for time travel stories, especially involving the Titanic and I come about this preference from what some might call a silly source.

In 1966 yet another Irwin Allen production The Time Tunnel was launched. In the pilot episode Rendezvous with Yesterday, two scientists, Tony Newman (James Darren) and Doug Phillips (Robert Colbert) used an experimental time displacement device to go back in time. More specifically, they ended up on the Titanic less than a day before it was destined to sink.

Like all of Allen’s production, action was promoted over historical or scientific accuracy, but it was great entertainment for kids.

Corn, in his “Titanic” book, did a great deal more research to produce his time travel thriller.

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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Ep6, “Lift Us Where Suffering Cannot Reach”

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Scene from Star Trek Strange New World “Lift Us Where Suffering Cannot Reach”

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I just finished watching Star Trek: Strange New Worlds S1, E6 Lift Us Where Suffering Cannot Reach. I knew about the topic and the climax ahead of time and it still made me angry.

The Enterprise is on a routine mission to the Majalan System when they are hailed by a shuttle that’s come under fire. The shuttle had been traveling from a nearby moon to their world when an alien cruiser attacked.

Uhura is doing her security rotation and La’an is riding her pretty hard. The attacker refuses to break off after Pike contacts them and fires on the Enterprise. Pike gives the expected order to target their weapons and propulsion. Uhura is at the phasers and the enemy shifts course suddenly. She brings the spacecraft down instead. If it was that important, I probably wouldn’t have put an inexperienced cadet in that position, so it’s really La’an’s fault. Continue reading →

Review of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” (2021)

no way home

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Just finished watching Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) last night. It’s about two-and-a-half-hours long, and like a lot of superhero movies, it tries to cram too much into that space.

The movie starts out where Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) left off, with the recording of Mysterio/Quentin Beck (Jake Gyllenhaal) saying that Spider-Man (Tom Holland) killed him and that Spider-Man is Peter Parker.

Peter’s life goes downhill immediately and so do the lives of his girlfriend MJ (Zendaya), his wingman Ned Leeds (Jacob Batalon), his Aunt May (Marisa Tomei), and even Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau).

Federal agents detain all of them, but in spite of all their bluster, they can’t really hold any of them except Hogan who has ties to the Stark technology used in the previous movie. Even that doesn’t stick very long.

There’s a cameo of Charlie Cox appearing as attorney Matt Murdock (Daredevil) and a cute little scene where he catches a brick thrown through the Parker’s apartment window from behind. It was a tragedy that Daredevil didn’t appear in the movie because a Spider-Man/Daredevil team up would have been awesome.

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Film Review of “The Batman” (2022)

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I watched The Batman (2022) starring Robert Pattinson, Zoe Kravitz, and Jeffrey Wright last night on Blu-ray (thank you public library system). It was basically a PG-13 horror film more than a superhero movie.

Pattinson’s Bruce Wayne and Batman were both portrayed as terribly dysfunctional. Wayne himself was a noted recluse who ignores the running of his company even at the urging of Alfred (Andy Serkis). The murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne was twenty years ago and The Batman has been operating in Gotham for two.

The real mystery of the movie is how Batman and Police Lt. Jim Gordon (Wright) managed to get so close, and how Gordon pulls so much clout that he can get Batman to an active crime scene investigation past thirty cops.

Actually, the story begins with the Riddler (Paul Dano) stalking and gruesomely murdering Gotham’s Mayor Mitchell (Rupert Penry-Jones). The more canonical Riddler tended to range from playful to clever, but while this one is good at puzzles, he’s also sitting on a terrific amount of rage. He wears glasses on the outside of his mask and the moment when the audience realizes he’s in the same room as the Mayor is when we see a dim light reflecting off of the lenses. The effect is chilling.

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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Ep5, “Amok Spock”

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Scene from Star Trek Strange New Worlds “Spock Amok”

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Just finished watching Star Trek: Strange Worlds E5 Spock Amok. I’m fairly certain that Theodore Sturgeon, who wrote both Amok Time and Shore Leave, is spinning in his grave.

Oh, they did use the same “combat” music in the dream sequence as we heard when Kirk and Spock were fighting in “Amok Time.” It was kind of cool.

This was supposed to be the “comedy” episode of the season. The original Star Trek had several including I, Mudd and The Trouble with Tribbles, but in the case of “Spock Amok,” it wasn’t funny.

I mean I can see how Goldsman and Kurtzman tried to make it funny. I think they believed it was funny. But the best they got was “awkward.”

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Get “The Fallen Shall Rise” for Free Starting Tomorrow!

@james.pyles

Free #scifi #ebook offered on #Amazon July 16 – 20, 2022 by James Pyles and Starry Eyed Press . https://www.amazon.com/Fallen-Shall-Rise-224-Verse-ebook/dp/B09SP7VK38

♬ Science – TimTaj

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Free five-day giveaway from Amazon to your kindle starting tomorrow! Please feel free to write an honest review.

Excerpt:

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Free Promo for “The Fallen Shall Rise”

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Promotional image for my 224-verse SciFi Novelette “The Fallen Shall Rise”

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My 224 Verse novelette The Fallen Shall Rise is being promoted on Amazon.

For July 16 – 20, you can download a copy to your kindle device absolutely FREE!

The backmatter of the book has been updated to include a reading sample of another of my 224-verse novelettes The Haunting of the Ginger’s Regret.

From “Fallen:”

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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Ep 4, “Memento Mori”

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Scene from the Star Trek Strange New Worlds episode Memento Mori

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Just finished watching Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episode 4 Memento Mori. This one has elements of Balance of Terror which actually closely mapped to the 1957 submarine film The Enemy Below starring Robert Mitchum and Curd Jürgens. During World War Two, “an American destroyer discovers a German U-boat, and in the ensuing duel the American captain must draw upon all his experience to defeat the equally experienced German commander.”

Bonus points because David Hedison (as Al Hedison) had a role in the movie. He later played Captain Lee Crane of the nuclear submarine Seaview in the 1960s Irwin Allen TV show Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

As a child, I watched this film before Star Trek debuted, so when I saw Balance of Terror, I immediately recognized how writers Paul Schneider and Gene Roddenberry had “borrowed” from the movie’s plot.

At the beginning of the episode, we see scenes from prior shows revealing things about La’an, Uhura, and Hemmer.

Uhura is doing her engineering rotation and Hemmer is critical of her. Then again, he’s critical of everyone, so that’s not saying much. The Enterprise is taking a very powerful, very dangerous, and highly glorified air filter to the colony world Finibus 3 before their air becomes unbreathable. Heck of a place to settle down.

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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Ep 3, “Ghosts of Illyria”

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Pictured: Rebecca Romijn as Una of the Paramount+ original series STAR TREK: STRANGE NEW WORLDS. Photo Cr: Marni Grossman/Paramount+ ©2022 ViacomCBS. All Rights Reserved.

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I watched Star Trek: Strange New Worlds S1, E3 Ghosts of Illyria last night. Not a bad episode as things go, and I did find some connections to other Star Trek shows from the past.

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Scene from the Star Trek Strange New Worlds episode Ghosts of Illyria

Pike, Number One, Spock, and a landing party are on the surface of an Illyrian colony world that’s apparently been abandoned. No one is comfortable being there since the Illyrians were eugenicists, tinkering with their DNA to adapt to various environments. Ever since Khan and the Eugenics Wars, gene manipulation has been strictly outlawed.

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