Red Dragon by: Thomas Harris

 

Thomas Harris’ 1981 thriller Red Dragon is a book that owes its identity to a lot of sources.  From Agatha Christie’s The A.B.C. Murders, to the many horror performances of Vincent Price, to a general history of problematic tropes in media to Red Dragon is a thriller to captivate the masses.  The main plot of the novel is actually not nearly as well remembered as the minor character of Dr. Hannibal Lector, a cannibal and serial killer kept in captivity.  Now I, like most others am most familiar with the character through Anthony Hopkins’ portrayal in the Jonathan Demme’s adaptation of the sequel novel, The Silence of the Lambs.  Despite being a minor character, the main thrust of the novel is this interplay between Lector and protagonist Will Graham.  Lector as a character is coded to be queer, he is an example of a queer monster, only a precursor to a lot of the transphobia at the center of The Silence of the Lambs, yet his presence is what elevates Red Dragon from pulp to be a fascinating book.  The interplay between Lector and Graham is underscored with this constant tension of two people who clearly hate each other, one of them has scarred the other despite being put behind bars, the animosity is further brought to the forefront as this deep respect.  Harris does not intend this to be read as attraction in any way, but between every line Lector has in the novel, and much of Graham’s perspective are two people who have this deep attraction to each other.  Will Graham as a character is portrayed as equally disturbed as the killers he investigates and rounds up, that’s why Red Dragon largely works, while Lector on the other hand as presented in this novel knows exactly what he is and is confident in that identity.

 

The fact that Lector doesn’t have a diagnosable psychosis is where Harris’ problematic queer theming elevates the novel further.  The actual serial killer, the Tooth Fairy, is playing to the equally ableist tropes of people with dissociative identity disorder are dangerous killers.  Harris reveals who the killer is to the reader at approximately the halfway point, to go into how he was abused by practically everybody in his childhood and how he has developed an obsession with a William Blake painting.  That Blake painting provides the figure for what the novel calls the dominant personality, again Harris using largely outdated language and not treading DID as a proper thing, but a source or horror.  Except of course, that isn’t entirely true.  Harris wouldn’t spend so much time in the head of our killer if we weren’t at the very least supposed to sympathize with how society has abandoned him.  Adding into the queer theming it is arguable that the Tooth Fairy as a serial killer is an interplay with the repressive force of society, something that Demme would clearly elevate in his adaptation of The Silence of the Lambs.  This is a killer who has used the cycle of the moon to perform his killings, is heterosexual but completely maladjusted and is sent into a rage when mischaracterized as queer potentially.  Harris in a way is reversing what would largely be expected by the genre of thrillers: queer characters are often the killers whenever they would appear, or someone’s queerness would be used as a twist or motivation, Robert Bloch’s Psycho being the most culturally ubiquitous example.

 

It's all of this theming that makes Red Dragon actually work.  This is a great example of a thriller making the reader uncomfortable because Harris is interplaying with problematic ideas and aspects of society that clearly captivated people.  This is a novel that became a bestseller and within three years was adapted into a film that I sadly have not seen.  Reading it myself, there was this captivation and just a further need to see what Harris actually laid down for Demme to adapt in The Silence of the Lambs.  8/10.

Unnatural Selection by: John Mason and Mike Gray and directed by: Paul Lynch

 

“Unnatural Selection” is written by: John Mason and Mike Gray and is directed by: Paul Lynch.  It was produced under production code 133, was the 7^th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 2, the 33^rd episode overall, and was broadcast on January 30, 1989.

 

How many times is Star Trek going to do this plot?  Okay, this is technically only the second time Star Trek has done rapid aging, the first time being in the original series episode “The Deadly Years”, which was a weak episode that treated aging as horrific.  Star Trek: The Next Generation in the first season had “Too Short a Season”, which was that plot in reverse, which while different essentially covers the same dramatic and thematic ground.  Not even a full season later, Star Trek: The Next Generation produces “Unnatural Selection”, the only episode written by producers John Mason and Mike Gray.  Mason and Gray were producers only on half of the second season of Star Trek: The Next Generation as well as writing this episode, which covers the same ground as “The Deadly Years” though without actually saying anything concrete on ageing.  The virus that makes you age to death rapidly doesn’t make any commentary on aging outside of the very vague aging is a source of horror.  The virus in the episode could really have been any virus, it barely integrates into the episode, it just has to be coming from the genetically modified children spreading this to a different ship that is already dead.  It begs the further question as to why aging is part of the episode? Is it because it’s an episode focusing on Dr. Pulaski, seeing as Diana Muldaur was 53 during her time on Star Trek: The Next Generation? If so then it doesn’t actually examine the fact that Pulaski is an older character.  Is it supposed to add to the genetic engineering questions it poses?  Perhaps, but again those are questions that are essentially flavor text to the episode.

 

The episode isn’t helped by being directed by Paul Lynch who seems to think framing shots in a weird manner is a replacement for any real style.  Lynch had previously directed “The Naked Now” and “11001001”, both episodes that lack style in terms of how they are shot.  “Unnatural Selection” focusing on Pulaski actually has a lot of potential: she is the show’s newest character and while a replacement for Crusher, she has already had a character arc put through the early episodes of this season.  Pulaski as a character in every previous appearance has essentially been a foil for Data and “Unnatural Selection” wants to do more with her as a character, focusing on her stubborn determination to complete her duties and ensure everyone gets out alive.  It’s actually a great extension of what has been previously established with the character and gives her some character growth.  There are also plenty of little character moments in the episode that are interesting enough to watch.

 

Muldaur is clearly acting the hell out of the part despite an underwhelming script and the odd blocking of Lynch’s direction.  There is this tiny moment in the episode between Picard and Data that shows how far the crew have really come to acknowledge Data as a person, same with Pulaski and Data.  Muldaur, Patrick Stewart, and Brent Spiner all have some great scenes.  Marina Sirtis has some great little positive moments early on, clearly allowing Sirtis to feel at ease in her role as Troi despite not getting many episodes to really focus on herself.  There’s also a background player, the transporter chief played by Colm Meaney who is actually given the name O’Brien and actual dialogue and plot.  It’s an incredibly odd thing to happen in this episode, the rare thing being a background player with basically no dialogue being elevated to the status of a character with motivation, and a plot.  Now, I am aware that this also isn’t a one-off thing, O’Brien is apparently throughout the rest of Star Trek: The Next Generation and is a main character in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.  The episode also ends on a fairly somber note as the infected, dead ship is destroyed with reverence which is one of the few scenes of the episode that is truly emotionally effective.

 

Overall, there is so much of “Unnatural Selection” that is flavor text to add depth to the characters, coming in the form often of little acting choices from actors who know that this script isn’t actually doing much.  As an episode, it’s a rehash of an episode from the original series but instead of examining the regressive messaging of “The Deadly Years”, it just kind of takes them out without replacing it with anything.  It’s certainly not the worst episode of the show, or even the worst episode of the season so far, but it also isn’t a good episode.  It’s this below average episode that you’ll probably forget soon after the credits roll.  4/10.

The Schizoid Man by: Tracy Torme from a story by: Richard Manning and Hans Beimler and directed by: Les Landau

 

“The Schizoid Man” is written by: Tracy Torme, from a story by: Richard Manning and Hans Beimler and is directed by: Les Landau.  It was produced under production code 131, was the 6^th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 2, the 32^nd episode overall, and was broadcast on January 25, 1989.

 

“The Schizoid Man” takes its title from an episode of The Prisoner: a 1967 British television series with a focus on counterculture about a man working for some British intelligence agency resigning and being exiled against his will to the Village, christened Number Six, and constantly psychologically monitored and tortured.  “The Schizoid Man” for The Prisoner is an examination of identity through an almost romantic lens, Number Six being tricked into believing he is in fact Number Twelve in an attempt to break him.  It’s a piece of counterculture and is one small part of a revolutionary story deconstructing the ruling authority.  Star Trek: The Next Generation takes the title to write an episode around an old, dying scientist who takes over Data’s mind, is lecherous for a while, and then just kind of vacates while transferring his knowledge to the Enterprise’s computer.  If we’re going to connect anything thematically between “The Schizoid Man” and “The Schizoid Man” are themes of identity, this is an episode that once again is building Data as a human character despite being an android.  There is an argument to be made that “The Schizoid Man” is attempting to explore transhumanism, but Dr. Graves as a character is explicitly a villain and the episode doesn’t ever really coalesce into a theme.  Looking on the surface Tracy Torme’s script indicates that transhumanism is a bad thing: the knowledge that is allowed to persist is fine but only if it’s taken away from the human element.  It doesn’t really have enough plot to fill 45 minutes of an episode, but then again this is Tracy Torme coming in to write a script based on an idea from two writers who for whatever reason couldn’t write it themselves.

 

Torme’s previous scripts were “Haven” and “The Big Goodbye” plus writing the script for “Conspiracy” while Richard Manning and Hans Beimler both took other story ideas and converted them into scripts such as “The Arsenal of Freedom” and some of “Symbiosis”.  Torme’s track record is fine, Manning and Beimler decidedly mixed, leaning towards bad, so it’s very possible “The Schizoid Man” isn’t intentional in what it’s trying to do.  The title may largely just be a reference to The Prisoner because it’s an episode dealing with overtaking someone’s identity, and not really taking into any account why that reference might be made.  It isn’t helping that The Prisoner is a cult series, it’s not exactly well known with the general public who would be watching Star Trek: The Next Generation.  Add that to the fact that schizoid as a term outside of the very specific medical context of Schizoid Personality Disorder is close to a slur diminutive for schizophrenia (and other mental illnesses due to the history of understanding mental illness is a dark and dangerous one), and you have an episode that, humorously, doesn’t actually have any real identity.  There are a couple of good things about it: despite the fact that nobody seems to realize Data has been taken over because the script decides the crew must all be idiots even though Les Landau is directing it so the audience knows Data is no longer Data.  It’s very possible that Torme (or more likely showrunner Maurice Hurley) underestimates the ability for the audience to pay attention to what the episode is actually saying.  Landau can direct television to look interesting, the main cast is clearly having a good time especially Jonathan Frakes and Marina Sirtis early in the episode, plus W. Morgan Sheppard as Dr. Graves, despite being a totally sexist pig genius, is a fantastic character actor.  That’s about it.

 

Overall, “The Schizoid Man” is an episode that doesn’t understand what works about what it is tributing.  It feels like a lot of writers has some ideas on what the episode should actually be, but nobody actually put any of the ideas into the episode so at around the halfway point it really just falls apart.  That is, falls apart more than it already was after the already pretty weak setup.  It’s well put together and the performances are actually pretty solid, but that’s only getting you so far.  3/10.

Loud as a Whisper by: Jacqueline Zambrano and directed by: Larry Shaw

 

“Loud as a Whisper” is written by: Jacqueline Zambrano and is directed by: Larry Shaw.  It was produced under production code 132, was the 5^th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 2, the 31^st episode overall, and was broadcast on January 9, 1989.

 

Star Trek has not always been the best when representing disability.  The original series did several episodes with disabled characters, however, they were often incredibly ableist: “The Menagerie” being the biggest example of portraying physical disability as a fate worse than death, with a lotus eater style fantasy with a beautiful woman in the same type of fantasy being presented as a good ending for the characters.  Oddly enough the third season of the show with “Plato’s Stepchildren” was slightly better, but going into Star Trek: The Next Generation if we’re being honest there isn’t a whole lot of hope.  Having a character like Geordi LaForge is certainly a step forward as a blind character in the main cast.  “Loud as a Whisper” is an episode that actually tackles disability representation in an interesting way.  The plot of the episode is standard Star Trek fare by this point: there is a planet with two warring factions and the Enterprise is transporting a negotiator to stop the war.  The warring factions are not at all the focus of the episode, they are your bog standard savage natives tropes that haven’t aged well at all.  They don’t have any characterization, or even proper names or culture which is a little weird to still be doing in the late 1980s, but as it isn’t the point of the episode it doesn’t bring the episode down too much

 

The point of the episode is that the famed negotiator, Riva, is deaf.  “Loud as a Whisper” is an honest exploration of how a deaf person may live and thrive in the future, while also exploring how he interprets the world.  The episode goes the extra mile by having Riva played by deaf actor Howie Seago and really allowing him to have influence over how the episode plays out.  Riva communicates with a chorus, three people who are telepathically connected to translate played by Marnie Mosiman, Thomas Oglesby, and Leo Damian and exist in this non-traditional relationship.  Jacqueline Zambrano’s script actually portrays it as almost a form of love between these four characters, even if the three chorus members also are reduced as people to being accessibility aids.  The episode never quite reconciles that with the idea of Riva as his own full person who is just using his own disability aid.  That and the fact that a lot of the episode doesn’t actually do much in terms of exploring the main cast, Riva is essentially the main character and the conflict of the episode only comes at the halfway point.  The chorus is killed by one of the warriors on the planet just as negotiations are about to begin.  This is why the chorus is largely a problem in the episode, they aren’t actual characters and only exist to be killed so the episode can explore Riva losing his faith in his negotiation abilities.

 

The script does actually do something interesting with this, it actually makes the other characters learn the sign language of Riva’s planet instead of attempting to make Riva change.  Okay, it is Data who learns it and does it almost instantly, but that reads to me more like a limitation of the 45 minute runtime of a television show since the negotiations will still be led by Riva teaching the two warring factions, presented as willing to work towards peace, learning the sign language.  This is also supported by a minor scene between Geordi and Dr. Pulaski, offering Geordi the chance to have new eyes replicated for him and his own decision being to not take them.  His disability is part of who he is, therefore something that shouldn’t be changed.  As a message, while it is still wrapped in an episode that builds conflict around the idea that disabled people being misunderstood and in places being treated as lesser (Picard callously shouts at Riva who is trying to come to terms with losing his own accessibility aids), it actually does feel especially progressive even for 1989 when disability still isn’t seen often in media in positive portrayals.  In many ways disability representation isn’t still quite there.

 

Overall, “Loud as a Whisper” is actually one of those episodes that is incredibly messy in places, but it gets a lot of good grace for genuinely having its heart in the right place.  Technically Larry Shaw’s direction is particularly flat (he wouldn’t direct for the show again after this and you can see why) and the pacing of the conflict doesn’t quite work as well as it could, the conflict being weak.  It’s an episode that starts with the premise that disabled people are human and messily tries to show how able bodied people often do have these biases where they treat the disabled as lesser.  Having one scene affirming that a disability is something not to be fixed really does elevate it.  6/10.

Combat Rock by: Mick Lewis

 

Combat Rock is a book with a reputation.  That is for good reason.  The experience reading this novel can be described as unpleasant.  Author Mick Lewis had already contributed a similarly unpleasant Past Doctor Adventures novel in Rags, and Combat Rock seems to wish to outdo that.  That’s the point at the center of the novel, to be as unpleasant as one possibly can be while maintaining some sort of narrative.  Or author Mick Lewis simply watched Cannibal Holocaust and thought that would be a good basis for a Doctor Who story, at least in terms of how it gained cult status and the cruelty it put on-screen, both real and fictional.  That and other Italian horror films.  Lewis as a person is unhinged, claiming to have spent time among a cannibal tribe, having a girlfriend descended from cannibals, and other wild claims just short of partaking in cannibalism himself.  Talking about this novel is generally an odd thing to do.  It lacks narrative cohesion, Lewis using a generic plot of once again space marines fighting against native inhabitants, but this time there are zombies.  The jungle planet of Jenggel (get it?) was a post-colonial holiday planet, but the indigenous natives have begun to fight back after literally raising the dead and causing a series of gruesome murders.  To give Lewis the benefit of the doubt, there is potential for a story with an incredibly strong anti-colonialist message throughout, the team of space marines in the OPG are portrayed largely as bad people, but the natives are presented equally as gruesome.  This comes across as Lewis thinking he’s being complex about how different cultures interact, but then just making the natives literal savages who are doing things that are unnatural.

 

The native characters are hardly characters, Lewis taking inspiration from several horror films for their portrayal at the best of times.  This sadly isn’t a novel with many a best of times, as Combat Rock’s indigenous characters more often are presented as part of Mick Lewis’ general fetish for strong, black women.  Practically every female character in this novel, and there are many, is reduced to being a sex object, has some form of sexual assault perpetrated against them, or is at the very least threatened with it.  The treatment of Victoria Waterfield in particular is horrendous, in terms of contributions to the plot she is damseled and forced to watch horrific acts of torture and murder while also being threatened with sexual violence.  Outside of what happens to her Lewis makes a point to go into how conservative she is which you think is going to be a comment on what a character like Victoria would be in reality and not in universe, but he also has characters go on about how pure her white skin is coming dangerously close to white supremacist talking points that go completely unexamined.  While I want to give Lewis the benefit of the doubt, already there was so much racism and sexism in Combat Rock that you can only give so much before it becomes a problem.

 

Having any sort of focus is the biggest structural problem with Combat Rock, Lewis clearly going for shock value.  The title is taken from an album by The Clash, a band I am honestly not at all familiar with nor an album I have listened to.  Lewis alludes to it in the text by referring to combat rock as a type of music once or twice, but that’s about it.  Especially odd since Rags, his other Doctor Who novel, at least had a connection to music because this one really doesn’t.  The actual plot is paper thin, despite running the full 280 pages the BBC Books allow, there isn’t a whole lot that actually happens narratively.  There’s a lot of supporting characters that are almost entirely one-note and fitting into some bigoted stereotype.  The racism and sexism is clearly coming from a fetishistic place, but there’s also a character called Pretty Boy whose introduction quite literally reads “bisexual, deadly, always wore black lace over his shining black leather; eyes underscored with just a little touch of liner.  But call him effeminate and it would be the last thing you ever did.  And yes, he was pretty.  Dyed black hair thick and wavy, cheekbones raw but sleek, a sensuous mouth, and not a scar on him.” (43-44) The novel treats its one confirmed queer character as a complete freak and implied predator, though he is among a group of explicit predators.  Even Jamie McCrimmon is given the treatment, portrayed as impossibly horny for about the first 100 pages, right up until the moment Victoria is kidnapped and then he becomes violent and determined to find her.

 

Somehow, the Second Doctor makes it through the novel unscathed, Mick Lewis unironically capturing the character better than most other authors who have attempted to do so in prose.  Don’t ask me how.

 

When I reviewed Rags three years ago, I implied Mick Lewis didn’t put effort in, yet for Combat Rock there is effort.  It’s effort into almost entirely the wrong things except the Doctor’s characterization to make the novel a truly unpleasant reading experience that doesn’t have anything to say outside of violence.  Any commentary is undercut by just how uncomfortable everything about the novel is and how much it’s clear Lewis is enjoying what he’s writing here.  Yet, it’s also no worse than Rags which already was quite bad.  2/10.

History 101 by: Mags L. Halliday

Whenever Doctor Who indulges in a story with a historical setting there is always the chance the audience will have little to no familiarity with the setting, so a balance must be struck to explain and explore the setting along with the plot.  History 101 is one such tale where my own knowledge of the setting is severely lacking.  The Spanish Civil War is a period of history that I only know of in passing, the American education system not really ever finding it a significant event enough to teach around in my experience.  I understand the conflict was essentially between fascists and a left wing faction of communists and socialists, and that the fascists one, but even then that is fairly limited knowledge.  Author Mags L. Halliday in writing History 101 presents this in the form of a traditional narrative, however it is explicitly wrapped in the idea of being an account of events in an attempt to be “true”.  This is while examining exactly what it means to see the “true” history of anything, Halliday never quite coming to a conclusion and much of the science fiction conflict comes from not so much altering history (though that is part of the thrust of the novel) but of altering the perception of history.  Halliday includes a rather extensive amount of resources she clearly has used for her own research and in how the novel was written.  The bombing of Guernica is the center of the novel, as well as the involvement in the Spanish Civil War of Eric Blair aka George Orwell, eventually coming to the conclusion that there was something that created an impossible question of the bombing.  It’s used to explain the Picasso masterpiece means so much because of the perception that it causes to those who view it both in person and through photographs and reproductions. 

 

Halliday as a writer is clearly inspired by Lawrence Miles’ The Adventuress of Henrietta Street in the structure of the novel, although as this is a first story her focus is never quite as direct or focused.  Once again the Eighth Doctor Adventures have a first time writer writing a good first novel before never being commissioned again (she did recently contribute to Big Finish Productions’ latest volume of Short Trips though).  History 101 is one of those novels that were it presented as a traditional novel without the pretense of preserving the “truth”, while losing some of the major thematic element might have actually flowed better because the presentation is a gimmick that only feels like lip service is played towards instead of actually integration into the novel.  Halliday’s prose, however, is actually quite easy to read, flowing quite well and keeping the cast of characters quite manageable.  The novel is only focusing on one aspect of the war after all, even if Halliday is clearly aware of how large the conflict is.  There’s also this sense that Halliday is a fan of the Hartnell historicals, at least in terms of pacing the novel because we cover quite a large timeframe which helps greatly with the immersion of the novel. 

 

Halliday excels at writing the Doctor and Fitz in particular.  They are separated for much of the novel, Anji being paired with the Doctor and sadly being characterized as a touch generic.  With the Doctor there is this sense of ephemeral fascination with history but that underlying edge that makes the Eighth Doctor work so well as a character.  When he confronts Sabbath because he’s Sabbath is in the novel and actually moving the arc forward, there is this uncertain dynamic that makes it incredibly easy to imagine how Paul McGann would have played these scenes.  Sabbath as a character is also used sparingly, but when he does appear there is that spark that really makes him work.  I don’t know if flirtatious is the word I’m looking for but there’s this fantastic connection with and parallel to who the Doctor is.  Fitz’s plot also slots very nicely into Sabbath’s plot, with the reveal that the man Fitz has been traveling with is Sabbath’s own agent in Spain, here to see the perception of history change.  Fitz is the lovable idiot, pretending to be an impartial observer even if that is something that’s an impossibility.  There’s a moment where he sings a version of “Climb Ev’ry Mountian” because he thinks that’ll work and the changes to history involved be damned.  The Absolute as a concept is also brilliant, being portrayed as almost an element of cosmic horror in terms of what it does for history and how it attempts to establish itself.  Halliday writes it almost as something that doesn’t exist, only the Doctor being able to see it for what it is, perhaps in a commentary on how people easily see what they want to see when it comes to history. 

 

Overall, History 101 is a novel that only really suffers because there are points where the author is trying too hard to do what a very different author excelled at.  It excels when it is being an examination of the perception of history through the lens of the Spanish Civil War, even if there is a lot to be packed in its pages.  There’s also a sense of direction with this and the immediate precious installment that feels as if the Eighth Doctor Adventures have somewhere to go.  7/10. 

The Outrageous Okona by: Burton Armus from a story by: Les Menchen, Lance Dickson, and David Landsberg and directed by: Robert Becker

 

“The Outrageous Okona” is written by: Burton Armus, from a story by: Les Menchen, Lance Dickson, and David Landsberg, and is directed by: Robert Becker.  It was produced under production code 130, was the 4^th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 2, the 30^th episode overall, and was broadcast on December 12, 1988.

 

“The Outrageous Okona” comes one week after a brilliant episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation in an attempt to do something with a swashbuckling, Han Solo type character and a message about women being allowed to make their own choices, subverting the expectations of a shotgun wedding.  The general message behind the episode is fine, but feels honestly a little too late for 1988, and while there is no evidence of this being an episode that was proposed for either the original series or the proposed Phase II, it reeks of being just out of date.  It does not help the episode at all that the female character who makes the choice for love only appears in the final 15 minutes of the episode and gives a particularly flat performance from Rosalind Ingledew (she enunciates practically every word).  The climax of the episode attempts to use trickery to get to the bottom of the contradictions around what Okona was doing out in space to be in need of rescue.  The central conflict begins as the accusation of stealing a jewel and getting a woman pregnant, though neither of these things are particularly compelling in terms of telling a story.

 

It does not help that director Robert Becker doesn’t seem to know how to shoot this episode to convey Okona as the lovable rogue Billy Campbell is trying to portray.  The costume work is good, Campbell is giving it his all, and the episode conveys that he does seduce several women on the crew, but that’s all in the script.  Becker shoots the episode to be almost entirely flat, both in the A-plot with Okona an the B-plot with Data, meaning that there is very little emotional communication in the episode.  This leaves the episode with this sense of complete blandness, it’s an episode that doesn’t visually communicate anything in any real way.  Becker has directed for Star Trek: The Next Generation before, on “We’ll Always Have Paris”, another episode that attempted to have love and passion at its center that also refused to film the episode to communicate those emotions.  Because of this it means that Campbell’s performance in many ways comes across as completely muted.  Now some of it is also down to the script itself.  The story is credited to three writers, with a fourth actually writing the script.  Burton Armus’ script tries to make Okona have this dangerous edge, but there isn’t actually a whole lot of edge to what the character does.  The title of the episode calls him outrageous, but he’s largely portrayed as carefree yet slightly nice.  Since it’s the A-plot it means that so much of “The Outrageous Okona” is an episode that spends so much time on it without nearly enough plot to really satisfy it.

The B-plot of the episode is Data attempting to understand comedy and humor, basically another episode of Data learning something about humanity.  It’s a plot that’s largely paper thin, with a dive into the holodeck so Data can try his hand at standup comedy.  The standup comedy is framed as bad standup, including a random Jerry Lewis impression.  There isn’t much to the subplot, but there are some particularly good scenes between Brent Spiner and Whoopi Goldberg as Guinan.  Goldberg making her second appearance, once again is coming in to make a pretty bad episode better because she’s probably the best actor on this show and Brent Spiner as an actor is always giving it his all.  It’s just a subplot that doesn’t really do anything interesting, Spiner does a silly voice in places and it ends the episode on an original series style quip.

 

Overall, “The Outrageous Okona” in several ways feels like an episode badly impacted by the Writer’s Guild of America strike of 1988, it was one of the first five episodes put into production as soon as the strike ended.  It’s not a previously proposed story as far as I can tell, but it feels like a really outdated idea of what a progressive story is.  That doesn’t mean it comes across as regressive, but as bland which is compounded with being underwritten and poorly directed, leaving just a bad experience.  4/10.

Star Wars: The High Republic: Convergence by: Zoraida Cordova

 

You know I’m kind of surprised after the several Star Wars novels, there hasn’t exactly been one that’s riffed the original trilogy in the way that Convergence by: Zoraida Cordova does.  Not so much in terms of plot, it doesn’t make the mistake of trying to follow the plot of Star Wars because that’s a plot that had already been done to death in 1977, but a lot of the other aspects that makes the film work.  Structurally, it doesn’t resemble Star Wars, but more than any other installment in The High Republic publishing initiative it rYou know I’m kind of surprised after the several Star Wars novels, there hasn’t exactly been one that’s riffed the original trilogy in the way that Convergence by: Zoraida Cordova does.  Not so much in terms of plot, it doesn’t make the mistake of trying to follow the plot of Star Wars because that’s a plot that had already been done to death in 1977, but a lot of the other aspects that makes the film work.  Structurally, it doesn’t resemble Star Wars, but more than any other installment in The High Republic publishing initiative it resembles many of the adventure serials that inspired George Lucas so long ago.  There’s a lot of moving parts in Convergence, Cordova approaching the novel with a sense of political intrigue, this second phase meaning to parallel the prequel trilogy makes it apt, though there is more focus than really anything Lucas ever put on screen in that trilogy.  At its core are two central romances, both couples representing opposite ends of love.  The general cast also reflects several of the archetypes that populate the main cast of Star Wars: there’s a princess just attempting to do right by her people in a difficult situation (a similar enough brink of war), a dashing rogue character who is so clearly going on an interesting arc of his own, and there is a sense of being on the edge of a much larger narrative.  Convergence is clearly in conversation with The Path of Deceit and though technically it takes place before the young adult novel, it actually feels better to read this one after.  This is largely because the Path of the Open Hand, while clearly defined here with the Mother appearing and being integral to the plot, they feel in many ways more a background element.

 

Having Grafton and Ireland’s context gives the reader further insight into what the path is doing, but the way Cordova uses them in one final twist regarding the character of Axel Greylark is fascinating.  Axel in many a way is a parallel to Han Solo as a character, at least in terms of personality and how his, for lack of a better term, romance with Jedi Gella Nattai is a romance of contrasting philosophies.  The way that it develops by the end of the novel is what really elevated Convergence for me from a fairly decent book to a great book.  It’s the epilogue that really starts Phase II in terms of what these books marketed towards adult will be facing with.  The big ideas of different philosophies in exploring the Force is still present, but Cordova is clearly interested in using that as exploring the general philosophies of people.  This novel is a question as to what happens when the chips are down and the danger is coming.  Because this is taking inspiration from the Star Wars prequels on the general direction level, Cordova makes this a novel that is dripping with dread.  There is a tragedy that is about to happen, the book is set on the eve of war and it is clear from the beginning that anything the characters are about to do is only going to lead to war.  The subtextual goal is not avoiding war but mitigating exactly what it might be able to do.  Now, for me the other romantic pairing in Convergence while not poorly portrayed and clearly understandable, for whatever reason was not compelling to me.  Xiri is certainly a well developed character and her decision to marry for political reasons is great, that half of the plot just doesn’t quite spark what the Axel/Gella pairing does (it probably helps that Gella gets two lightsabers and there’s just some fun action throughout the book with that).

 

Overall, Zoraida Cordova’s Convergence works so well because of the epilogue which should annoy me more than it does.  It’s also a novel which centers romance through the lens of Star Wars among the larger backdrop of a brewing space war, something that shouldn’t appeal at all to me.  But because of how strong the characters are and Cordova’s general structure, it’s a book that makes me quite glad that I’m essentially doing Phase II of The High Republic all at once.  8/10.