Star Wars Quirks

Enjoyed that, thanks.

Anyone who watched both Battle of Britain and Dunkirk understands which of the two is a better war movie

Just now joining the conversation. Star Trek Discovery is in my top two favorite Star Trek series.

It has:

I’ll go out on a limb here an say most of TNG was just plain boring. There were a few interesting episodes but for the most part, boring. Every series after that followed suit until Discovery.

To me, it feels like Battlestar Galactica, The Expanse, Star Trek Original Series, and some of the Star Trek movies (new and old), and the result is great. The tie-in to the pilot was genius and basically solidified my opinion of the show.

Though, it must be blindingly bright everywhere on the ship with all of those lens flares. Even J.J. Abrams admited he over used it; why is this series doing the same? “Captain, getting those readings for … arrrgggh, the console is as bright as the sun!”

@alexgreat:

Horta, Tholians, Sheliak, Species 8472, Calamarain, Tribbles, to name a few on the top of my head. And then there are aliens like Gorn, which I guess could pass as humanoids in a way.

Just because those pretty dancers have lekku doesnt mean they are non-humanoid, and the same goes for wings of Geonosians.

Comparing not only screened aliens (would be unfair I guess) but all things in the books as well, I dont think that Star Wars has more biodiversity. And in any case humanoids cannot come cooler than Romulans :)

And as Wheat said, Star Trek explained why there are so many humanoids, in I guess another attempt to picture our similarities, not our differences.

So having said all that, both franchises are great if you include the books, but Star Trek is maybe richer overall, with more time devoted to more cultures.

Agree with Wheat, SciFi cannot come better than as DS9.

@wheatbeer:

@amanntai:

I just find the aliens in Star Trek boring. They all look like humans. Vulcans are humans with pointy ears. Klingons are humans with weird foreheads.
Star Wars has more biodiversity in my opinion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chase_(Star_Trek:_The_Next_Generation)

This episode sort of explained away the similarities but saying that life was seeded by some earlier species.

Most Star Wars aliens are still bipedal, with heads featuring eyes/nose/mouth/ears, who communicate with vocalizations. A truly alien creature wouldn’t be able to emote for a human audience.

(and just in case, I didn’t geek out enough already, Star Trek aliens have more deeply developed cultures than Star Wars aliens)

I wasn’t thinking of Twi’leks. I was thinking of Hutts, Ortolans, Wampas, or the Sarlacc (which is indeed a sapient creature in the Star Wars universe).

I also believe the humanoid species in Star Wars are considerably less human than the humanoids in Star Trek. Dugs are technically humanoid, but don’t really look like humans.

Also, Geonosians aren’t really humanoid. Just take a look at the Geonosian Queen, she doesn’t resemble humans at all.

Go Grant! Southerners should have got an Anglican minister to command I guess :D

Industrialization was bound to kill slavery.  however there were enough radicals in both parties to make it a major issue in the conventions.  so much so in the Charlestown convention that democrats were willing to lose the election rather than nominate stephan douglas who was THE states rights candidate.

Bulge almost worked, actually it was a good surprise attack that the allies couldnt even think could happen.  ONce again the circumstances.

As this has been posted with the authors permission, i guess that he will have a look at the forum to see how we react.

@El:

Aftermath of War: A Lesson from History
–------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Nick Robertson

…

On May 28, 1453, two of the greatest armies in the world ended an epic 52-day battle on the border of Europe and Asia. On one side the 100,000-man army of Sultan Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire and the forces of Islam were attempting to capture one of the world’s greatest cities — Constantinople (now Istanbul). On the other side, behind the supposedly impenetrable walls of the city, were the defensive forces of the west — the 10,000 man force led by Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI.

Well, i think the description here is over-exaggerated. Byzantine was kind of a “vassal” of the Ottomans for about 200 years at that stage. Its empire was the city. The city was historically and culturally great, but the number of citizens has been declining, from plague sweeping over it (AFAIR twice), from being raided by Venetians (who then imposed the “Latin Empire” and looted it thoroughly), and other internal struggles.
The forces of the “west” never were forces of west, they were forces of the east: non-catholic, greek instead of latin etc.

Dragases. The battle for Constantinople is considered one of the greatest and most important confrontations in history.

Constantinople was one of the most vital possessions of the Christian world. The city was the capital of the East Roman — or Byzantine — Empire ever since the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great selected it as his new capital in 324 AD. Constantinople was the gateway between Europe and Asia, Christianity and Islam.

It was vital as a symbol, and still had some meaning for trade, though Genoa and Venice were more important, using the Mediterranean Sea for trade (while Constntinople was important for land trade).

Though, Constantinople was a “buffer” between teh Latin Christianity and Islam. As long as it stood, the westerners cared not too much (except in the Reconquista (sp?)). After it fell, Islam found its way to the borders with the west.

The city rested by the Bosporus, a watery straight which was the most important artery of international trade. Trade ships from Venice, Genoa, England, France, and much of Europe traveled past Constantinople to the eastern Black Sea ports which connected the European continent to the major trade centers of India and China. The wealth that traveled on this route built the economic power of the Western world — a 15th century version of today’s globalization of trade.

The main shipping trade routes did not go through Constantinople anymore. It once was important for the city, true, but in 1450 it already had changed. It still had importance in the trade with the Black Sea (and thus, with part of the Rus), but it did not control the trade routes, as it did a few hundred years ago. The black eastern sea ports were not important for the trade with India/China after the Varangians had been defeated there, that trade went through Arabia.

As the battle for Constantinople began, the Ottomans unleashed man’s newest weapon, artillery, to breach the city’s massive walls. Shortly after the shocking breakthrough, the Ottomans accomplished what had been deemed impossible for over a millennium — the fall of Constantinople. There was horror and disbelief as the forces of Islam routed the Western army. Panic swept across Europe. The vital trade routes to the East were now under enemy control, and an alien army with strange beliefs threatened to march through Europe.

The “shocking breakthtough” was a small unguarded unclosed door called “Kerkaporta” or “Kerkoporta”. “alien army with strange beliefs”, well this is after the Crusades and Reconquista, the Europeans probably though they knew what would come.
A very emotional writing style all the way up to now, something that i feel inappropiate here.

Was this the end of the Western world? Quite the opposite. What seemed at the moment a knockout punch to Europe ended up causing great change. It literally forced the discovery of a new world.

the conclusion “forced” is discussable: “helped” would be better IMHO.

Constantinople had been Europe’s center for intellectual studies for centuries.

For centuries long past, when it finally fell. It was non-catholic, looted by catholics. Even then, it still had amassed a lot of historic valuable scripts and other things. Most that we know of the Ancient Greek had been saved by them. So, it was not hte center for studies, but a main archive, which the west didn’t care about to visit or use for its own good.

…Many who lived inside the city’s walls devoted their lives to studying and preserving history’s classical past. When the Ottomans conquered the city, many of these intellectuals fled to Italy. This flight from war was directly responsible for the acceleration of one of the most important periods in Europe’s history, the Renaissance.

Correct.

Classic ideas, locked inside the walls of Constantinople for centuries, broke free and spread out across Europe. Isolated city-states began to gradually dissolve. For the first time in history, nation states — like Spain and Portugal — emerged. The Renaissance brought Europe into an age of light after an age of darkness.

Not fully correct: Portugal and Spain (that is Catille and Aragon) existed for about 100 years by then. The Renaissance did not happen in nation states, but in the Italian city states.
I would not support this way of concluding that tghe fall of Byzantine lead to the rise of nation states. Not without further explanation that is.

Since Constantinople’s fall blocked overland trade routes to the spice markets of South and East Asia, the emerging nation states needed new routes to the riches of the East. The Great Age of Exploration began. Brave men such as Christopher Columbus, Vasco da Gama, and Magellan circumnavigated the globe to find new routes across vast, unknown oceans. In the process they discovered the world — and many of its secrets, treasures and mysteries.

Notice that above it’s “trade ships”, why Constantinople is important, here it is overland trade routes. Again, memerging nation states are mentioned, which is discussable. The rest is correct to my knowledge.

…

i skipped the rest of that discussion, my only comment: far stretched :)
The only thing in common is the loss of a war. The important (for the west) fled of intellectuals and access to old sources and the change to the commerce system are not present in Iraq.