I too would like to discuss some more about Picard's spirited ramming actions, but first I think I should point out that I haven't managed to see it yet, so I'd just be typing shit for the sake of typing it, like always. And so with that caveat, let us proceed.
It seems to me that you can't help but invoke real-world associations when you have this ship that wants to destroy the Earth, and then the flagship of the Federation smashes into it so as to stop it. Isn't it a biological weapon that Shinzon is supposed to have? And isn't Shinzon in effect a creation of Picard - he may be evil, but he was created in his image. Well you see what I'm getting at - and maybe we ourselves are going to end up half-destroying ourselves in order to stop a supposed threat. But on a broader perspective, you might see it as a challenge against complacency, except somtimes it happens that an action provokes another action, because that seems the necessary course of things - and one action leads to another action and another, when in the beginning the whole challenge was not to take action. But instead you end up going wildly over the top and then you're buggered, but that last bit probably doesn't fit in so much with what happens in the film.
Still, we should wonder at the action that Picard decided to take - and think whether his kamikazee run was so different from the Japs in dubla dubla 2, or the Jem'hadar for that matter. Sure, you're talking different tactics, but ess it;s all about stopping the enemy - for Picard it's the only weapon he has left - one might then delicately point out that it's the only weapon the Palestinians have left/ So are they wrong and Picard right? Or is it just that right and wrong, or good and evil are fluid and changable concepts? I mean it seems that a pre-emptive strike in today's world has become not just legitimate, but but a positively moral action. Even if you had the chance to avert it in the past?
Ok, enough pontification on this. Anyway, I'm going to have to see this film now to see what those tricorders look like.
Oh, and about Trek XI, I don't think it's too soon to think about it. Now personally I don't think we've seen the last of Picard whatever Stewart might say - whether or not he's in the next film, maybe in a lesser role, or whether he pops up in a cameo in some later trek film I don't think it's quite the end... besides the old dude really shouldn't take it all too personally. Spiner otoh.. well I suppose B4 could make a brief appearance? Or Data could have left a voice message in the Enterprise computers or something. But that's it! I thought he wanted out anyway/ As for the rest - well who can understand the workings of Berman's mind - though hopefully it's more likely now that Paramount would get in some1 new. Still, the way everything's been left, a whole new canvas to work on... everything to prove, nothing to lose... not unlike Al-Quida, if you're looking for all this bollocks to be tied up nice and tidy (?)
And now I'm spent.
Posted on Feb 10, 2003, 7:50 AM from IP address 62.64.201.129