Xav Watches Star Trek S1E2 "Charlie X"

Every time I watch another Star Trek episode I keep telling myself, "I can't believe I haven't seen this show." "Charlie X" is currently my favorite episode of the 3 I've seen. The United Space Ship Enterprise receive a call to take aboard a passenger named Charlie since they are on their way to Earth. Charlie was the sole survivor of the ship Antares, which crash landed on the planet Thasus. Charlie lived alone, and learned to communicate from the ship's computers. He was rescued, however, and he is excited to finally be with people of his own kind. He's a teenage boy and he has never seen a girl before. It is kind of interesting to imagine what it would be like for him.

Charlie quickly falls in love with Janice. Janice is a bodacious blonde, with an amazing braided beehive. She also stands up for herself, and is not afraid to speak her mind, which I love.

Charlie also quickly comes to admire and respect Captain Kirk. Captain Kirk takes Charlie under his wing, and he teaches him how to treat a lady and how to do martial arts. The martial arts scene is amazing because Captain Kirk does it shirtless and in spandex. Ow! Ow! Ow! I'm just kidding. I don't really have the hots for Kirk, but he definitely has charisma.

There's one other thing about Charlie, he is able to manipulate matter with his mind. Think of it like Stephen King's Carrie. Don't get her mad, or she can kill everyone. Charlie does this when he can't take being treated differently anymore. To be honest, he is going through what every adolescent goes through in life: feeling different and unappreciated. Only, imagine giving that adolescent unlimited power. It is only natural he would use it against adults to force them to give him what he wants. In a way Charlie's powers make him evil. It is kind of sad.

What Charlie does to the crew is actually quite scary. He makes people disappear. He turned a girl into an iguana simply because he didn't find her attractive. People were laughing in the mess hall, and he didn't like the sound of their laughter so he made their faces disappear, so they just looked like solid masses, where they could no longer see, smell, or speak. That was freaky as hell, and "Charlie X" felt like it came right out of the Twilight Zone.

In a sense, Star Trek reminds me a lot of the Twilight Zone, only it takes place in space. Many of the situations the crew find themselves in are bizarre, dark, and creepy. If the show took itself a little more seriously, Star Trek could really be seen as a horror show.

All in all, I give "Charlie X" a 9 out of 10. It was excellent, and I loved the mystery aspect of the episode. I also loved watching how Captain Kirk dealt with the scenario. He never wanted to kill Charlie because he recognized he was just a boy, but the lives of his entire crew, and the lives of everyone on Earth was at stake.

I'm so happy I decided to watch this show. Each episode stands out on its own, feeling fresh and inspired. I am not surprised that Star Trek has left such a lasting impression on so many people. The show itself is creative, ahead of its time, and utterly engaging. Can't wait to keep watching!

Xav Watches Star Trek S1E1 "The Man Trap"

The title of this episode is horrible. "The Man Trap"? Is it because it is about a woman who seduces and traps men? The feminism in me feels strongly against it. Oh! And then there is Lieutenant Uhura...When she appears, I cheer because she represent to me a strong black female character, but her first lines made me shudder. Spock talks to her scientifically, and Uhura says she does not want to speak about work, but she wants to speak to Spock about love and romance. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. It was like the show was saying women only have Love on their mind, and this is compounded by the fact that women seem to only play the role of beauty in the film, where it is the men who care about serious matters. I hope that changes swiftly. Besides the shallow portrayal of women, however, the Man Trap is really an incredible episode.

The Star Trek Enterprise has a mission to go to a remote planet to check on the health of an archaeologist and his wife. Only Leonard McCoy, the Doctor of the ship, knows the Archaeologist's wife, and the two had quite the romance when they were young. It makes for an interesting story, and we also meet Captain James T. Kirk, played by the infamous William Shatner. I did not find anything strange about Shatner's performance skills at all. He seems to be a competent captain with the best interests of his crew in mind. Also, he is somewhat of a Casanova, I believe, which is charming. Not that I find him particularly attractive, but I mean he holds a Casanova role in the show.

We also meet Sulu in this episode, which I found fascinating. Like I said in an earlier blog post I have never seen Star Trek, so it was nice to see George Takei acting. I know George Takei from his social media presence, and he is amazing, and I love being able to see him on screen. It somewhat surprised me that Sulu was the botanist on board. I knew him to be the pilot. I suppose later in the episode we find that Sulu is the pilot, but I guess he also grows alien plants too.

We also see red shirts for the first time. However, none of them die. Surprisingly yellow and blue shirt crew members die. Perhaps that is a trope that simply has not started yet.

I don't want to spoil the plot, so I will just say that it is a sci-fi murder mystery who-dunnit, where we the audience knows who did it, but we watch as the Captain, the Doctor, and Spock try to figure it out.

All in all, I loved the episode. I would give it an 8 if it were not for several plot holes and inconsistencies, so I would give it a 7, but the ending felt so satisfying with them drifting off into space that it feels like an 8, but then I remember the shallow portrayal of women in the episode and it returns to a 7 again.

7 out of 10.

Xav Watches Cinema "Cracks"

Cracks (2009) stunned me last night. Cracks is a poetic film with metaphor and symbolism interlaced throughout. Even in the title screen, we see the word CRACKS appear with the A in upper case, small, and to the side in crimson red. You knew the A stood out, and thus there must be a reason for it. It dawned on me. It was the A in The Scarlet Letter, which stood for Adultery and symbolized an outcast woman. This was the first piece of the puzzle.

The opening scene is beautiful, a woman named Ms. Green and a young girl are out on the water in a small boat. The young girl looks at Ms. Green with piercing admiration and lust. Ms. Green nonchalantly smokes a cigarette and dresses like a man. I love this costume choice. Not only does she look handsome and seductive, but it plants the first seed in our minds that Ms. Green is not your typical woman of the 1930s.

The young girl Di then talks about how she read the book Ms. Green gave her, and how the book was banned by the school, and how Di does not think it corrupted her. I got the sense that the book did corrupt her, or that Ms. Green's influence is corrupting the young girl. Ms. Green then passes her cigarette to the girl, who takes a drag.

The next scene is a remarkable juxtaposition. We go from a romantic scene between a girl and an older woman, to a church, where the girls sing in the chorus about God, which plays as the antithesis of sexual desire, let alone homosexual desire. However, some of the girls show a deviousness in their eyes, which plays again on the possible corruption by Ms. Green referred to in the earlier scene. I feel like this is the first occurrence that the film demonstrates the binary between holiness and sin. We have the holiness of the pure young virgin girls singing with angelic voices in a Church in homage to God, and then we have the look in their eyes of their desire to experience something much deeper and darker and primordial.

In the next scene the Di confesses her sins to a Priest. The Priest is one of the few male figures in the film, and remarkably he does not have a single line. He merely reacts to the young girl, who surprises him by saying she has had lustful thoughts towards the gardener boy. Then she asks him if she should recite every single lustful thought she has had, and how she has had many. The Priest looks stunned and beside himself.

The confession is a symbol of Di wiping away all of her sins. When you confess you become pure again until the next time you sin. However, this does not seem to be a girl who will remain pure throughout the film. Also, she admits she did not confess all her sins. She is secretive and mysterious, not only to us, but also to God. There is a sinful nature to this, but to us it appears poetic and beautiful. I feel like the film glamorizes sin as a thing of lush beauty to be gazed at and admired.

Later we encounter the headmistress of the All Girls Christian Academy. I was reminded again of how important woman are to the importance of this film. I only notice because this is a rarity in film today. It is often the case where men are 90% of the characters in the film, and women only play minor, support roles to the main men of the film. This is the complete opposite case, which I love and find refreshing.

From the headmistress, we find out that Di is the Team Captain of the Diving Team, and also we find out how cruel and mean the Captain can be to new girls. Also, we find out a new girl is coming to the school to join their Diving Team. Her name is Fiamma and he has been sent from Spain. She is an Aristocrat, much like a Princess. The Headmistress asks the girls to be nice to Fiamma, since she is unfamiliar with England and is not used to the provincial lifestyle.

When Fiamma arrives at the school, we get a good look of the building from wide angular shots, that show a gray cold facade. Then when Fiamma walks the hallways, they seem stale and unwelcoming. The girls look and stare, and Fiamma stares back. She seems completely out of her element and unsettled.

When she walks into her room, where the girls on the Diving Team all sleep in different beds in the same room, Fiamma suddenly becomes strong willed. She holds her chin up high, and she shows no signs of wanting to interact with the other girls. She does not even introduce herself, and merely brings her luggage to her bed, and starts putting her things on the night stand. It is like Fiamma is marking her territory, and claiming this space as hers. Di will have none of this, and sees Fiamma's air as threatening. Di marches over to her and demands that she only have 5 things on her nightstand and how those are the rules. Both Di and Fiamma are strong-willed, very much alike in certain ways, but due to this nature they clash. Fiamma does not hate Di, and I don't think Di hates Fiamma, but Di is the leader and she feels the need to impose her power onto others. (I forgot to mention in the dining room scene with the headmistress, Di scolds and humiliates one of the other girls for not putting enough butter on her toast. Then Di justifies her actions by saying there must be order, and it is her job to ensure there is order, or there would be chaos.) Di plays on this idea with Fiamma, and Fiamma then says my favorite line in the film:

In her Spanish accent, Fiamma says, "Listen..." It is mysterious and poetic, because we are unsure what she is asking Di to listen to, as though there is an invisible sound in the room. After a pause, Fiamma then says, "That is the sound of the world ending." Her sarcasm and wit is astounding. She is basically saying to Di, I don't give a fuck how many things I can have on my nightstand. Using the metaphor of Cracks, this is the first crack that appears in Fiamma's relationship with the other girls.

Oh! I failed to mention, before Fiamma arrives in the school, Ms. Green has a remarkable meeting with the girls of the swim team. She asks one of the girls what the most important thing in life is. The girl says, "God." And Ms. Green right away snaps, "No!" I love how quick Ms. Green says no, as though that is completely not the answer. However, this is a Christian Academy, where God being the most important thing in life would be the correct answer. The next girl says, "All of God's creatures," which Ms. Green says no too also. I also love Ms. Green's face when the girls are responding this way. It is like she is astounded that these girls could possibly care about God so much. Immediately I thought of Ms. Green as the serpent or standing in for the Devil. Ms. Green is a tempter, and she is tempting to the girls to turn away from God and to accept pleasure instead. It is Di that says the correct answer. She says, "Desire." Ms. Green affirms that is right, that desire is the most important thing in life, and how the girls should go after their desires. She also tells them how they have the power to do anything they want in life. This is actually quite amazing. I feel as though girls are taught at a young age to behave and to be obedient. That they should listen and know their place. Ms. Green is destroying this notion, and telling them they can and should do what they desire, and that nothing else matters.

One of the most beautiful scenes in the movie is when we see the girls dive for the first time. Di stands on the diving board and effortlessly dives into the water, the camera catching her in slow motion, and there is beauty and grace in her movements. We also see Fiamma interacting with the Diving Team in her element for the first time. It is obvious that Fiamma is an experienced diver. However, she covers up her body and is cold. I assume it is Spring because she shivers, and also she is used to the warmer weather in Spain. Ms. Green convinces Fiamma to dive by asking her what she is afraid of. It is obvious that Fiamma is not afraid of anything, so Fiamma naturally takes off her shawl and reveals her beauty. She is in a gorgeous diving suit, with an amazing figure. All the other girls are wearing the same black rubber bathing suit, but Fiamma is in bright cloth. All eyes are on her, especially Ms. Greens, and then Fiamma pulls off effortlessly a perfect spinning dive. It is beautiful and reminds me of the Olympics. Only the film shows it poetically, as though the image can be etched into our mind forever.

Ms. Green says to Di, that Fiamma has raised the bar, where only minutes before Ms. Green had said to Di that Di had set the bar. You can see the jealousy in Di's eyes.

Needless to say, I really loved this film. I actually don't want to go any further, because you really should watch the film yourselves. The asceticism and emotion of the film astounds me.

All in all, Cracks is a well-made, well-directed, well-scripted, well-acted, well-shot film. Also, the symbolism and structure of the film arouses my literary senses. A great film for Literature & Film lovers! Watch it! A must!

9 out of 10.

Xav Reads Parable of the Sower

(page 24 of 329)

We meet a 15 year old girl who lives in LA in 2024. The city is impoverished. Water is scarce. Raving gangs go around looting, raping, and murdering. Arsonists burn down houses out of spite or just for fun. Water is so expensive and scarce they can't use it on a fire.

The people have Christianity to keep them going. They also have walls to protect them. However walls can be scaled, barbed wire can be cut, and people can still lose everything. The girl's neighbor was tied to a chair and raped, and she lost everything. Her son and family were also all killed in a house fire. She killed herself even though she believed suicide meant an eternity in hell. Maybe she didn't believe, or maybe an eternity in hell felt better than the hell she felt on Earth.

The girl is not Christian. She has found her own God, a God that is indifferent to our suffering, but can be shaped and molded. She believes that God can be changed depending on who we view God. She believes God exists to be shaped by us.

The girl's stepmother is nice. She speaks Spanish and the two converse in the stepmother's mother tongue. The stepmother's name is Corazon, which fits nicely with her character. Her family calls her Cory.

I don't know the name of the girl. I do know she has the ability to feel other people's pain and joy, but not as how they experience it but how she imagines they experience. She feels it physically. If she punches someone she feels their punches. If someone has cut themselves she feels their cuts. She even starts to bleed. It is terrible, but sex is amazing because she feels her pleasure and the other person's pleasure. However it is a curse. Also, if anyone else found out they would torment her, so she must keep it hidden from anyone outside her family.

She got this ailment from her mother who abused drugs while she was pregnant. Her mother died during childbirth.

Despite being able to feel intense suffering, she feels surprisingly apathetic to death and murder. She accepts it as a part of life, perhaps because she has grown up with it her entire life. The children in this citre jaded from the suffering. Perhaps this makes them stronger than the adults who remember what it was like when things were better. Their memories of a better world must torment them. But the people have hope that things will improve, despite the fact that they never have.

Xav Watches Star Trek S1E0 "The Cage/Pilot"

The beginning of the episode starts off slow, but it catches my interest at the same time. We see a crew of men and one woman and they are aboard the starship USS Enterprise. We aren't introduced to these people by name, and none of them look familiar from what I know of the original show except for Spock played by Leonard Nimoy. Still, I am curious who these people are, and what they are doing. A handsome young man stands out among the crew, and we learn that he is the Captain. He is emotionless and stern, and he is especially strict with his female assistant. There is one line in particular that made me laugh when he says something about not knowing how he can get used to a woman being on the bridge. Wikipedia says this season is supposed to take place in the 2060s, but the Captain's stance towards women make it feel like the 1960s.

As the crew are flying through space, they hear a distress call. Already it feels like Star Trek Beyond (2016), or perhaps it would be better to say that Star Trek Beyond took liberties with using a plot device found in the very first episode of Star Trek. Surprisingly, the Captain decides not to send the crew to the planet. Instead, he decides to continue on course because there are men and women of his crew that need hospitalization.

What I found interesting following this scene, is the Captain walks to his cabin, and there are two people on board in casual clothing. In fact, the clothing looks not too different from clothing today, which caught me off guard. From my experience with the Star Trek reboot, which started in 2009, none of the crew wears anything except the yellow, blue, and red shirts. Notably, I didn't notice anyone wearing a red shirt, and I feel like everyone in the crew was either in yellow or blue (except for the two people walking in the hallway wearing casual dress). Also, I noticed a surprising number of handsome men on the bridge. That also caught my interest!

When the Captain walks into his cabin he decides to lay down on this uncomfortable looking bed with an uncomfortable looking box shaped pillow. Really? A box shaped pillow? Who invented that? We are also introduced to the Doctor, who comes in through an automatic door that slides open sideways. That door was actually pretty cool, and I wonder why we don't have doors like that today.

The Captain looks miserable and the Doctor seems to be giving him a checkup, but the next thing we realize the Doctor is pouring the Captain a martini. This is kind of a funny scene, because the idea is that the Captain will open up to the Doctor more if the Doctor pretends to be a bartender. It is actually a very clever plot device, and the dialogue is excellent. As the two discuss what is bothering the Captain, the Doctor switches between the role of bartender and doctor. It is an interesting portrayal of how we as humans play multiple social roles in our lives.

Getting to the bottom of what is bothering the Captain, it seems like he is exhausted from the responsibility of Captainhood. He is in charge of over 100 crewmembers, and some have died along the way. This is stressful for him because when the matter gets tense, he has to decide what they must do, and who goes on missions, and possibly who dies. It seems the recent deaths and injuries of his crew, has made him become cautious, which explains why he refused to react to the stress beacon. The safety of his crew comes first, so the rescuing of any possible survivors on an unknown planet is low priority.

The Captain then talks about how he wants to move back home. Before he was captain he had two horses, which he would ride and go on picnics everyday. It is like a faraway dream to him to relive that, a life without stress, but the Doctor says that a man who does this, stops living, is a man who starts dying. It is an interesting statement, and something I can relate to on a personal level.

When the Captain talks about wanting to quit the crew in this very first episode, it reminded me of Star Trek Beyond (2016) because they use this very same character device. At the beginning of that film James T. Kirk talks about wanting to step down from being a Captain and returning to Earth. I suppose it is neat the new film pays homage to this original episode, but it also reminds me how there is nothing new under the sun, which is a shame because Star Trek to me is a symbol of revolutionizing TV, so why can't the new film series revolutionize the cinema?

Anyway, we later find out that there is indeed survivors on the planet, and the Captain has no choice but to stage a rescue mission. We also get a taste of their communication devices, and they look remarkably like flip phone cell phones, minus a case. It would be like if you took a cell phone and could see all the innards. That was pretty neat, because it was a show in the 1960s predicting something that didn't come out until 30 years later.

When the team gets to the planet they discover a who group of people who have survived there for some 19 years. It is quite incredible because there doesn't seem to be any sort of vegetation on the planet whatsoever. There is one plant that grows on the planet, which makes a constant ringing noise as it shakes in the wind. The ringing is beautiful and eerie, but I imagine to hear it nonstop is enough to drive a person mad. The ringing literally never stops the entire time they are on the surface of the planet.

Of course, the Captain meets a beautiful blonde woman who has just the perfect amount of tears in her shirt and skirt. She is like a bodacious cavewoman in full make up. Where these survivors got make up, I have no idea...

The Captain follows her, but then the show shows us these alien like creatures who look like short, ugly humans with gigantic throbbing heads. Literally the veins in their head throb, which is kind of neat, while at the same time disturbing. These aliens are watching the crew from afar, through viewscreens. The woman wants to show the Captain this mysterious device that heals people. It feels believable, but quickly we learn it is a trap, and the aliens stun the Captain and take him into an underground cave. The crew attempt to rescue him, but have no luck.

In the rest of the episode the crew tries to rescue the Captain, while the Captain tries to figure out what is going on and how he is going to escape. If you haven't seen this episode I strongly recommend it. I love trying to figure out what is going on as the Captain is trying to figure it out at the same time. It is neat because one can immediately identify with the Captain's situation since neither of us know the full details of why he is down there. What we do know is that it is some sort of zoo, and there are other marvelous creatures in cages also, like giant humanoid gorillas and giant humanoid vultures. The cage does not have bars, but it is simply a glass screen. This is neat because the Captain is trapped in the cage, but it doesn't look like he is actually trapped. It looks like he can walk out at any time, but the glass is unbreakable and he is indeed stuck there. This plays on the idea of illusions which are thematic in the entire episode. Is he trapped? What is the trap? What is real? What is an illusion?

We also learn that the aliens want the Captain to feel severe amounts of joy. At first I gathered that perhaps the aliens feel great joy in feeling other beings feel joy. After all the aliens are telepathic, so it makes sense if they are empathic also. What it seems however, is that they want him to be happy, so that he is compliant. However, as long as he is caged in there, the Captain can never be happy, and he will always work towards trying to escape. This reminded me a great deal of another television series called The Prisoner (1967). The protagonist of that show is a prisoner on an island, and the ones running the island are always trying to control him through mind games, but the protagonist is always fighting back and trying to escape. This has a very similar feel, and as much as the Captain tries to figure it out, the aliens always seem one step ahead.

We then learn further on the woman that tricked him was not an illusion at all, but an actual woman. She is actually the sole survivor of the craft that crash landed on the planet. So the beacon was indeed real. The aliens caught her, and wanted her to be happy and find her a mate. Only, they also want the two to become an Adam and Even and spouse a society of humans, which the aliens can use as slaves. See the aliens can live a long time, so they are definitely patient to have this happen. Also, the aliens are incredibly lazy and don't like manual labor, so it makes sense. Also, the planet used to be habitable, but the aliens destroyed it through advanced weaponry. Only this happened so long ago, the aliens have forgotten how to use that technology.

In the end, the crew finds a way to rescue the Captain and the woman. At this point we also find out that the Captain's name is Captain Pike. Also, all the illusions are broken. The aliens also let them go, because while the crew was trying to rescue them, the aliens downloaded the history of the human race from the USS Enterprise's computer, and from that knowledge, they realize how violent the humans are. The aliens analyzed the humans psychologies and concluded that even if they were able to create a society of people to rebuild their planet, the society of people would be so violent they would eventually destroy the planet again. This is nice because they get to escape, but it also seems like a slap in the face to us as a species. The aliens final words feel strangely prophetic, and I wonder if Star Trek is right and that is the future that we as humans hold. It is a scary sentiment, but I believe the aliens are referring to the fact that this won't happen until millennia down the line; however, that it will indeed happen. Of course, what do hyper intelligent alien life forms know? 

It is a strange tone. Captain Pike is rescued, and the crew can continue on their journey, but perhaps humans will eventually destroy Earth. From what I know of Star Trek, it is a rather optimistic show, so this ominous tone took me by surprise, however it is intriguing nonetheless.

What happens to the woman? She doesn't make it onto the ship. Her beauty is an illusion, which is referred to earlier in the episode when the female lieutenant who the Captain calls Number One mentions that the woman was an adult upon the crash, and that she must be 19 years older. When the illusion is gone, we see a much older woman, with sores all over her body from malnourishment and scars from the crash when she must have been burned. Also, her body was severely destroyed, and the aliens had to reassemble her, but they did a poor job so she had a severe humpback. Instead of living a life full of pain and misery, the woman decides to stay on the planet with the aliens where they can give her illusions that she is beautiful and living in a fantasy world of relaxation and bliss.

Overall, "The Cage" is a super intriguing episode. I really liked the actor who played the Captain Pike. It's a shame, however, that he is not in it anymore. We shall see how much better William Shatner is. I am kind of scared, but intrigued at the same time. People say he is a terrible actor, but maybe that will make the show amusing to say the least. 9/10

Xav Watches Star Trek (1966)

A couple weeks ago I watched Mothra (1961) and I loved it, giving it 9 stars on IMDB. There was something about the simplicity and the small prop special effects that felt real and nostalgic. I grew up watching the Ray Harryhausen movies, like Clash of the Titans (1981), Jason and the Argonauts (1963), and The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958). If you haven't seen those movies, they are incredible feats of special effects for their time. Even though you can tell that the monsters and destruction scenes are fake, they feel real to the imagination, and perhaps realer than many CGI films of today.

Anyway, I was telling my buddy about this, and he recommended watching the original Star Trek (1966). I have never seen any of the TV episodes of Star Trek. Unfortunately my parents never watched the show, but perhaps that is a blessing in disguise because I have the capability of watching the entire show for the first time. I have avoided doing so because I know how gigantic the franchise is. To watch every single episode of the show would take years if not decades. However, the inspiration from watching Mothra, and the nostalgia from watching the Ray Harryhausen movies is enough to at least get me to test the waters of the Star Trek universe. It also helps that I am a big fan of the recent movies that rebooted in 2009.

I am not sure if I am going to finish the entire original series. I am not sure if I am going to finish the 1st season. It will all depend how good it is. I feel like it is worth a shot, however, and they are all available on Netflix, so I won't have to spend a dime doing it. Since I'm doing this, I might as well blog about it. Who knows? Maybe someone who is a fan of the original series can read this and be reminded of the first time they watched the show, or maybe someone who has never seen the show will become inspired to watch it themselves. That would be pretty neat.