Since FF.Net's on the Fritz Again...

[athersgeo]

...here's a spot of shameless self-promotion:

New Story:
Category - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Title - Gallitep
Rating - T (or PG-13)
Summary - Gallitep didn't just imprison the workers there, it trapped their overseers and their rescuers too... [tag to the episode Duet]
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3426248/1/

/shameless self-promotion

Comments

[germankitty]

Very nice. Um, if that's the right word ...

Didn't know you're into DS9; I barely remember that episode, or the whole history behind it. It was good to be reminded. :)

Also, am I the only one who hears echoes of "Schindler's List" or of survivors revisiting the Concentration Camps of WW II? (Maybe it's just my personal background ...)

[athersgeo.livejournal.com]

No; you're not the only one. It was something that struck me very much as I was writing - and even moreso as I watched (and, yes, rewatched!) Duet. No idea whether the writers did it intentionally - Trek's normally less subtle with the parallels than Duet ended up being...

And thank you :)

[germankitty]

Quite welcome. :) I really ought to watch the whole series of DS9 again, but I'm not sure I'm up to close to 200 hours of anything in a row; I remember when I copied all my TNG episodes into continuity, it pretty much burned me out. And at least half of the tapes DIDN'T even need copying!

I just scanned a bunch of K/S artwork to send to another PR fan who's started illustrating my "More Than Friends And Brothers" -- her style is quite similar to the two artists I remembered. Makes me want to reread a ton of K/S material ... hmm ...

[athersgeo.livejournal.com]

Ah yes. K/S. The original slash fandom...

...which is not to say it's ever held any interest to me (seeing as I can't stand Spock and I find Kirk to be thoroughly annoying [gimme Picard and Sisko any day!]), but I do know there were plenty of great authors involved with it :)

I've only got the first three seasons of DS9, so far. At nearly £50 per set, I can't see me acquiring any more until Christmas, though! I know the burn-out though; I used to tape tree Highlander (and Peter Wingfield stuff) and even now, I don't think I could watch certain HL episodes again because I really HAVE seen them that many times - though it wasn't as bad as Cold Squad, which wasn't even the sort of show you could really watch more than once per episode. Unfortunately, because it was rare to have it in non-NTSC format, that was what got copied most... Even now, five or six years later, I can *STILL* recall snippets of dialogue and the plot of most of the episodes *grin*

[germankitty]

... and my first forays into writing fanfic. :) If it weren't so much bother, I really should retype the two stories I managed to put into fanzines ...

I'm nostalgically fond of both Kirk & Spock; I found Picard an utter bore, to be honest (took me years AND 3 weeks in Wales with only BBC to get into TNG). Sisko grew on me (along with his beard). :)

But I'm not bothering with DVDs; I'm just not interested anymore, besides, I could always transfer my tapes to DVD if I wanted. What was REALLY bad was 25 years ago when we had about half a dozen fans in Germany who had access to BBC or Australian copies off TV and kindly copied for others for a small fee -- remember, back then a VCR wasn't available for less than €500! And the "banned" episodes, like Miri and the Nazi one were FILMED off NTSC tv, then put onto video ... *shudders*

[athersgeo.livejournal.com]

*chuckles* I think one of the reasons I liked Picard more than I ever liked Kirk was probably because, at least subconsicously, I found Patrick Stewart to be a far better actor. I guess, also, TNG *FELT* more like my show - whereas TOS was something my dad watched and creeped me the hell out (what can I say; the repeats were on when I was no more than five or six, so I didn't properly get that it was faked).

I can imagine what it was like back then - it wasn't exactly *easy* to get hold of HL episodes even ten years ago, if you hadn't taped them when they were first broadcast. (It certainly helped that I had a VCR that would play NTSC tapes!)

I have to ask, though: Miri? Nazi episode? I'm *guessing* they're TOS episodes, but do feel free to correct me!

Lastly: I think it'd be fun to see what you wrote back then (as I mentioned, I'm not a K/S fan, but for a great author, I'm always willing to give things a shot!)

[germankitty]

WEll, yeah. I never liked Shatner's acting style much, although I've seen him in some very early roles where he wasn't bad at all. :) I just never went in for the older, bald guys. :) Also, I first saw ST:TOS as a teenager (early 70s here) and had to suffer through the long hiatus until ST:TMP came out, with only fanfic and the novels keeping the fandom alive, so my feelings are a bit different. :)

To be honest, the first couple of times I tried watching "Encounter at Farpoint", I fell asleep. But that 1991 vacation in Wales? Daily repeats of season 3/4 (or thereabouts) on BBC, nothing else to watch, and suddenly bingo! - "Hey, it's not such a bad show after all!"

As for those episodes -- yeah, TOS, and the Beeb banned "The Empath" and "Miri" for being too violent. I don't remember the title of the Nazi episode (someone established a Nazi-like regime on a distant planet and K/S had to wear SS-like uniforms) was never shown in Germany -- for kinda obvious reasons. :)

NTSC-capable VCRs ... back then, there was ONE model on the market, from AKAI, costing around €1000. *winces* People in Bavaria had it easier -- they could get access to AFN AND buy VCRs off US service personnel who were relocated. Lucky them. :)

[athersgeo.livejournal.com]

*grins* Yeah; different times and circumstances - though, I do have to admit that Encounter at Farpoint is NOT one of my favourite episodes (though I do rather love Q!), so I can understand the whole falling asleep thing! TNG did pick up between season 2 and season 4, right around the time they developed The Borg...

Ahh; yes, I did vaguely know the Beeb had banned a couple of episodes (*ponders* I wonder if they're still banned...), but being only distantly interested in TOS, I never dug in and found the details out. As for the Nazi one, yeah; I can understand that!

As for NTSC capable VCRs, they weren't really all that common even fifteen years ago when I got mine - I think there were maybe four on the market at the time and three of them were well over the £100 mark (compared to a PAL only one at £50!). The one I bought was, I think, £80 or £90 - so not *that* much cheaper and still more expensive than most PAL onlies. Nowadays, if you can *get* a VCR (!), I think they play NTSC as standard.

[germankitty]

*nods* Having seen what TNG had become made it easier to go back (through the reruns on Sky One) and watch the early stuff. By the end, I really liked it.

Even most DVD players on sale here (from as little as €50) can play region 1 DVDs these days; it's just DVD recorders which are single-region models unless you buy the VERY high-end ones. :(
I remember having bought a cheap Korean VCR years ago just to edit/copy tapes ... the manual said PAL only, but when I popped in an NTSC tape, I found to my delight that it could handle both formats. (Of course, that was about 2 months AFTER I'd had the Turbo movie professionally converted from NTSC to PAL for a shitload of money ... grrr ...)