ALT.SF4M Supernova • s******j@f****.**o.com 17/01/2000 00:00:000 UTC I missed a lot of movie weekends the last few months, so I made up for it by seeing _Toy Story 2_ and _Supernova_ today. Enough has been said about _Toy Story 2_. _Supernova_ was an oddity. Not totally dumb by a long shot. Pretty interesting characters and fair acting. Nice, but by-now-cliched ship and set styling. Good special effects, but far from outstanding. Soooo. There's this starfaring EMS ship. A giant thing that looks like it should be capable of hauling Disneyland around the galaxy for a tour. But it's job appears to be to carry a half-dozen medical personal to danger sites. You'd think it would be more economical to just make sure the various colonies had first-aid kits. The ship, with a tense new pilot just retired from the military, gets called to a mining colony. They pick up a young guy who claims to be the son of the chief doctor's former, abusive flame. He also has a weird artifact that seems to be modifiying his musculoskeletal structure. He claims to be a hapless treasure hunter . . . but things are not always as they seem. And, oh yeah, the system's sun is about to go Nova. And has a black-hole companion, although that's never actually talked about. I guess it looked neat and they had the clip-art. After starting out really dumb, with shouting and stupid science talk, the script throws in some loops. Actually intresting stuff about keeping the universe fresh and life-friendly. Then it turns into an above-average Scary Thing On the Ship adventure. Overall: Rent it when you have a Two-Fer coupon. Or sneak into it after watching _Toy Story 2_. Stefan -- +-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+ SeJ@ay-oh-el-dot-com ~ stefanj@eye-oh-dot-com http://www.io.com/~stefanj/ CHARGES APPLIED FOR UNSOLICITED COMMERCIAL EMAIL! • p*******x@****.com 17/01/2000 00:00:000 UTC One day in Teletubbyland, s******j@f****.**o.com (Stefan E. Jones) said: >Overall: Rent it when you have a Two-Fer coupon. Or sneak into it after >watching _Toy Story 2_. Not as good as Galaxy Quest, then? (Which was very enjoyable, BTW) Has anyone heard anything about Mission To Mars? -- 73 de Dave Weingart KA2ESK If you can read this, mailto:p*******x@****.com Y2K was over-hyped. http://www.liii.com/~phydeaux ICQ 57055207 • d********m@***.com 19/01/2000 00:00:000 UTC Stefan, I have to disagree with you about the movie becoming above average. There are far too many plot holes, poor concepts, and characters acting stupidly to keep from picking this movie to shreds. For example: This is supposed to be a medical rescue ship with dimension-jumping capability which enables it to cross great distances of space very quickly. However, to prevent being turned inside-out during a dimension jump, the crew must hibernate inside Dimensional Stabilizing Units (DSUs). There are six crewpeople on board, and only seven DSUs. Didn't whoever designed this thing ever think that there might be more than one patient at a time that might need to be transported back to Earth during an emergency? There should have been a whole bayfull of the DSUs. Later, the ship's chief engineer finds a mysterious glowing artifact of pulsating energy. What does he do? He thrusts his bare arm into the energy field! That's just beyond stupid. Unless, of course, he idolizes Jimmy Doohan, and wants to lose a finger like him. And, does it really make sense for the second-in-command to be a former drug addict just out of rehab? When they arrive near the supernova, they have 17 hours before they can leave. What do they do? Do they try to initiate repairs to the damaged ship? No, the former druggie and the ship's doctor get drunk and have zero-g sex, despite their having no chemistry on screen previously. There's a lot more to complain about, but I don't want to give away critical plot points. All things considered, rental or sneaking in would be the only ways viewing this film would be worthwhile. It's certainly not worth more than $2.00. Howard