The original Sony Walkman is apparently 30 years old this week. The (admittedly low-key) media coverage of the subject reminded me of something I was going to talk about a month or two ago but for some reason never did. No time like the present.

Portable devices that can reproduce music from a recording certainly aren't new. Portable Gramophones, reel-to-reel tape decks and 8-track players have allowed the travelling public to take their music with them for the past century. The last in this line of portable playback devices suitable for public listening was the ghetto blaster (or boombox to some). Often loud and not particularly refined, this product of the 70s and 80s accompanied families on outings and turned street corners into miniature discos.

However, the 80s saw a transition from portable music players to personal ones - the personal stereo was born. Instead of the thump of the ghetto blaster, public spaces were filled with faint, tinny noises emanating from the headphones of teenagers. The "personal" trend stuck as technology progressed through CDs and digital audio players, via Minidisc and a number of other forgotten technologies that never really took off.

If you're wondering where I'm going with this, stay with me; we're almost there. Recently, the mobile phone has taken over as the portable music device of choice among the nation's youth. Notice that I said portable there, not personal. One odd side-effect of music playback transitioning to the mobile phone, a small device usually equipped with a speaker or two, is that listeners appear to have given up on personal headsets, opting instead to listen to their music on the device's internal speaker(s).

Now maybe I'm finally reaching the age where everything the youth of today does seems weird and alien, but this behaviour is completely baffling to me. The quality of the audio produced by these tiny, tinny speakers doesn't come anywhere near the quality of even the cheapest headphones, earbuds, etc. For youths in a group, I can perhaps see the appeal; it's the ghetto blaster of today, a social music device that everyone can enjoy... even though it sounds terrible. But I see people walking on their own with their phone screeching away in their pocket. They must know there's a better way. In fact I'll wager nearly all of them were quite familiar with headphones at an earlier point in their lives. So what made them switch to something that produces vastly inferior sound and annoys everyone within 20 metres to boot? I must be missing something...

</minirant>

A little more awake today, although the heat is doing its best to undo my weekend of rejuvenation. Apparently it's only going to get warmer as the week goes on. :(

This was my first quiet weekend in a while so I've been making the most of it by doing as little as possible. Sleep was the first thing I set my sights on. I've been quite tired for a while now, but I really struggled this last week; more than once I had a hard time concentrating at work or staying awake when I got home in the evenings. I blame most of that on the lack of sleep I had the previous weekend. Anyway, today I caught up on at least a little of the sleep I missed out on. I think I stayed in bed until about noon, alternating between sleeping and dozing. It felt nice knowing that I didn't have to be anywhere or do anything. I don't think I've fully recovered yet, but I'm getting there.

I popped to town in the afternoon. I saw a rat on the way in, although it was gone in a flash, long before I could reach for my camera. I know they're not held in particularly high regard and one nip would probably have cost me a week in the hospital, but they are rather cute up close.

My mission in town was (as well as some boring household stuff) to look for a copy of Okami and Soul Calibur 2/3. My sister lent me her PlayStation 2 last weekend - an extended loan until she gets bored of her Wii (so maybe not all that long) - so I've been looking for a few games for it. I borrowed PuyoPuyo Fever and retrieved the copy of Final Fantasy XII I bought when I came out of hospital a year or two ago (25% through and I can't remember what happened, so I may well restart it) but I wanted to get my hands on a couple of other titles. Sadly, Okami seems to have become quite rare, as despite having access to a Gamestation, two Game stores and a CEX, I couldn't find a copy anywhere. CEX had a copy of SC3 but at a rather high price. I meant to look for a copy of ICO too, but forgot about it until I got back home. I didn't leave empty handed though; I picked up a pre-owned copy of Gran Turismo 3 for the quite affordable price of £2. Something to pass the time if I don't feel up to gaming that's particularly mentally challenging. ^^;

I've also eaten quite well today (too well perhaps *rolls around*) and spent a pleasant evening cooking in the kitchen - something I haven't had a chance to do properly in quite a while. It all turned out very well and I even baked myself a crumble for desert, using some half-price raspberries I picked up in town, which went very nicely with the ice cream I bought yesterday. Taking into account my meals, a couple of apples, and an orange & strawberry juice I had in town (very nice), I think I've had at least ten of my five-a-day. Hopefully that will make up for a lack of fresh fruit and veg earlier in the week.

It's been very hot here all day, even during a brief shower this afternoon. To stop myself from falling asleep in the warm air after eating, I continued the rat theme and watched Ratatouille, a recent Pixar title I hadn't seen (I now only have Cars to watch) but which my sister bought me for Christmas. Given my track record with Pixar films, I expected to find it pleasantly enjoyable and I wasn't disappointed. (Note to self: must see Up this summer)

Anyway, it's finally cooling down a little now - my thermometer is reading 24°C and I can feel the cool night air blowing gently through my window. I wonder what it is about night air that gives it that lovely refreshing, cool, clean smell? A lower temperature, maybe. Or fewer contaminants. Perhaps I'll ask Google tomorrow if it knows the answer. Before then though, I have another long night of sleep to enjoy.

Several weeks ago, I had the opportunity to visit the cinema not once but thrice. First to see J. J. Abrams' "reboot" of the Star Trek franchise and then again to watch the stop-motion animated feature based on Neil Gaiman's Coraline. And then finally to watch Star Trek a second time as my sister had no one else to go with. Rather than allow my swirling thoughts to dissipate, I thought I'd put them here so that I can look back on them and perhaps share them with the few who might be interested in reading them.

I'm afraid that this post took a little longer to write than I had originally planned, but then I was thinking of something a little shorter and not this 20K wall of text. Anyway, as a result of writing this post a little bit at a time over the course of several days, it might not flow particularly well — so my apologies if things don't seem to make sense. If you point out anything you find confusing in the comments, I'll do my best to correct the problematic text and explain what I was trying to say.

Before we begin, you should pay close attention to the following important notice...
 
 

 
 
Star Trek

Since it's a little fresher in my mind, let's begin with Star Trek. The eleventh film in the series is directed by J. J. Abrams, the man behind Lost and lots of other popular things I've never watched.

I've been a fan of Star Trek to a greater or lesser extent for as long as I can remember. When the new film was announced and promised to bring something new and fresh to the franchise, I was excited and at the same time worried. While I have still yet to see Nemesis, I am aware of how poorly it was received — the consensus, among both fans and non-fans, seemed to be that the series was getting old and had lost the spark it once had. Starting over with the aforementioned "fresh" elements therefore seemed like a good idea, but change is always difficult when you're used to the way things are. This is especially true of a series like Star Trek with over 40 years of established history.

Going into the cinema to view the film, I really wasn't sure what to expect. I'd taken great care to expose myself to as little information as possible — in the weeks leading up to the release, I tried my best to avoid all spoilers, reviews and comments. This wasn't always possible; popular media outlets such as the BBC covered the film quite extensively and mentioned generally favourable reviews, but I managed to resist the urge to delve too deeply into the articles. From the early interviews and previews, I was aware of a few basic facts — that the series was going to be a fresh look at the early days of the ToS crew — but otherwise I really had no idea what it was going to be about.

Before I get started on the details, a quick summary of the plot would seem to be in order. The story begins in the established Star Trek universe, a decade or so after DS9/Voyager. Hobus, a massive star in close proximity to the Romulan home world, is growing increasingly unstable. Scientists fear it may explode, destroying Romulus and threatening other nearby systems, and methods for preventing disaster are sought. The Vulcan Science Academy engineers a substance capable of making a gravitational singularity and a plan is soon hatched to create a black hole near the unstable star in order to absorb it. Unfortunately, the ship en route to Hobus, piloted by Ambassador Spock, does not reach the Hobus system in time; the star goes supernova, destroying Romulus. While in the process of creating the singularity, Spock is approached by a surviving Romulan mining vessel, the commander of which blames Spock for the destruction of his home. Unable to escape the pull of the forming singularity, the two ships are absorbed along with the matter from the star.

The intense gravitational forces result in a time distortion, throwing both vessels over 100 years into the past. Intent on revenge, the captain of the mining vessel, Nero, resumes his hunt for Spock, wreaking havoc with the past and influencing the lives of a young Kirk and Spock. With a little help from a rather familiar crew and the older Spock, the two must stop Nero before he can put his plan — to give the Romulan Empire an advantage in this timeline by destroying the worlds of the Federation — into action.

Soooo, let's start with the whole alternate timeline thing. I will admit that when the story became clear, I initially saw it as a great big cop-out (the science fiction equivalent of "it was all a dream"). In retrospect, however, it was really the ideal plot device to satisfy everyone. The fans are happy because it doesn't disturb canon and allows them to experience something new and exciting yet also familiar. The production team are happy because it gives them the freedom to construct this new universe without being too constrained.

Despite the obvious effort taken to leave established canon alone, there were still a number of not-insignificant changes to the original timeline (apparently now referred to as the "prime" timeline in fan circles, so I shall adopt that convention in this post). Historically, major events taking place in Star Trek have made use of the planet-of-the-week plot device, free to be terrorised or destroyed as the story requires. This is the first time I can recall that writers have destroyed a major world in the Star Trek universe. Of the major planets that could have been destroyed, Romulus probably has the least impact due in part to the Romulans being one of the less prominent species in Star Trek stories (at least in the later ones — they started off as one of the Big Three alien races along with Vulcans and Klingons, but apparently fell out of fashion after TNG) and also because Remus provides the surviving Romulans with a backup planet of sorts (assuming it wasn't destroyed as well). Even so, it will be interesting to see how things develop should stories in the "prime" timeline continue.

The "death" of Spock (i.e. his removal from the timeline) was another event of some significance. It was a sensible time for him to exit the original timeline — he's arguably been around longer than any other character in the series and he had effectively retired as a character. I'm sure removing him from the "prime" timeline while allowing him to continue his humanitarian (vulcanitarian?) work somewhere else will satisfy most fans.

The alternate timeline didn't escape unscathed either. (Rather obviously, otherwise it wouldn't be very alternate.) Again, Vulcan, while being a major world in Star Trek lore (a founding member of the Federation, etc.) was effectively a fringe world for most of the series. However, it remains to be seen whether a Federation without the guidance of Vulcan will develop differently in this timeline.

So, those are the major in-universe events. What about changes to established canon in the film itself? Well, I'll start with the Romulans. Apparently it's not just the Klingons who can get forehead adjustments these days; the Romulans in the new film look very different from their traditional counterparts. These are "prime" Romulans so it's not something that can be dismissed as an alternate timeline thing. Maybe, since these Romulans are supposed to be miners, the designers thought that getting them to swap their hair for tattoos would make them seem more rugged and "hard".

The other noticeable case of retcon is the design of the Federation ships and technology. Until now, the franchise has left original series technology mostly intact when revisiting it in later series. In the latest film outing, the classic switches and dials have all been replaced with shiny, touch-sensitive display panels in whitewashed environments lit so brightly that it's a wonder eye protection isn't required. While not quite true to the TV series, to be honest the new, shiny technology probably looked less out of place on the big screen than the retro technology of the original series would have. Most of the other changes to things we're used to can be explained away as the result of historical differences in the alternate timeline.

The characters were an interesting bunch. I thought McCoy was probably the most authentic — the actor who played him (sorry, I don't know any of the names of the stars of the new film yet >_>;) captured the character of DeForrest Kelly's Bones very well. I wasn't too sure when I first saw him on screen, but I quickly warmed to him when he started talking. The portrayal of Spock was reasonably well done. The way he reacted did at times remind me quite a lot of the younger, original series Spock — a little arrogant with brief flashes of suppressed emotion. There will never be another Nimoy, but the new actor had a pretty good stab at the role.

Speaking of Nimoy, he portrayed an older Spock from the "prime" timeline. I had heard he would be enjoying a small appearance in the film, but it turned out to be a much larger role and one quite central to the plot. Someone commented that they felt Nimoy's lines were delivered with a lack of enthusiasm, as if he'd said them dozens of times before and was tired of saying them — but I disagree. The Spock character evolved throughout the films that followed the original series and developed a more mature, wise, introspective personality. I thought his delivery was spot on, a perfect performance of the Spock we've come to know in the later movies and guest appearances in TNG. This is most likely the last time Nimoy's Spock will make an on-screen appearance and I thought it was a worthy send-off.

Kirk was a little annoying. Since the Kirk in this universe had experienced a troubled childhood and lacked discipline and guidance while growing up, the more annoying Kirk traits were a dozen times more pronounced then in the Kirk of the "prime" universe. Part of me wanted to see him fail and watch his confidence take a bruising. I suppose it was probably a reasonably accurate portrayal of a Kirk with the history this one had.

I don't have much to say about Chekov and Sulu. They both played their roles well enough and provided a few moments of light-hearted humour. Scotty seemed a little weak and was late to the party, but again the differences between him and the Scotty we know could be attributed to an alternate history.

Uhura is a rather complicated one. When we first see her buying drinks at the bar, she's very much Uhura. When we see her working or brushing off Kirk, again she's the Uhura we've come to know. But the Uhura seemingly offering her body to Spock in the turbolift was definitely something I hadn't seen before. The first time I saw this scene, which takes place just after Spock witnesses the tragic fate of his planet and his mother (you did heed that spoiler warning, didn't you?), I was taken aback somewhat. I didn't see any lead-up to it and it just seemed rather out of character. When I went to watch the film a second time, I paid special attention to the relationship between Uhura and Spock and, having picked up on a few things I missed the first time around, came away happier with the events than I had before.

The key thing I didn't pick up on the first time around was that Spock and Uhura were already quite close. Oblivious to the signs on my first viewing (I'd seen them all but written them off as Uhura being assertive or Spock uneasily interacting with humans), the first time I noticed the relationship between the two characters was the turbolift scene. It seemed to come out of nowhere. Suddenly here was Uhura draped over Spock, apparently exhibiting a high degree of emotional attachment to him. On my second viewing, now that I knew what I was looking for, I managed to pick up on the relationship between the two characters long before that particular scene.

It is established early on that they have at the very least a good student-teacher relationship, but it's the scene in the hangar at Starfleet HQ that first hints at something more. There is a brief exchange between Uhura and Spock where Uhura complains to Spock, who is in charge of assignments, that she didn't get the assignment he knew she wanted. He replied that he didn't want to be seen to be showing favouritism. The tone in Spock's voice almost seems to imply that it is understood by both that he does indeed consider her to be a favourite though, as does Uhura's indignant reaction upon discovering which ship she has been assigned to. The situation is resolved when Uhura demands that Spock assign her to the Enterprise and Spock complies without a fight — again rather unusual for a typical student-teacher relationship. It does seem to suggest that they are friends, although it is unclear exactly how close they were before the events aboard the Enterprise. Anyway, now that I am more aware of Uhura and Spock's background, the turbolift scene and those that follow make much more sense.

I suppose it wouldn't have been original series Star Trek if none of the characters had had a love interest. Although intra-ship relationships in ToS were rare, and when they did happen you knew that the character (who coincidentally had never appeared before) would be dead by the end of the episode.

The story itself was reasonable, but there were still quite a few things that bothered me. Why was Nero bent on seeking revenge, for example? Revenge for what? Because Spock had been unsuccessful in preventing the destruction of Romulus, an event which presumably would have occurred with or without his participation in it? The only way I can see that Nero's grudge would be valid would be if the Vulcan Science Academy had advised the Romulans not to work on a solution of their own since the Vulcans would handle the situation. I can't see the Romulans going along with that idea though. An alternative theory is that Nero is just a bit odd in the head, which is quite feasible given that he's just lost his home, family and planet. I read some production notes recently that indicated that a number of Nero's scenes were cut; perhaps if they come to light, his motivation will become clearer.

The rapid career advancement of some of the cadets was another thing that confused me a little. Pike's choice of Spock and Kirk for first officer seemed a bit odd. Spock perhaps — on a crew of mostly cadets, he was probably the most qualified. But Kirk? The arrogant command student with no experience who had been suspended and gained passage on the Enterprise by illegally stowing aboard? Was there really no one else aboard better qualified? Pike did seem rather taken with Kirk since their encounter in the bar, probably due largely to Kirk's father — that's about the only explanation I can think of. I originally objected to Kirk's assignment to the Enterprise as her captain at the end of the film too, since it's rather strange for someone to leap out of the academy and straight into the big chair. I'll accept that saving Earth is probably enough to earn such a promotion though. >_>

There were a number of other things I wasn't so sure about on a technical level either. The Romulan ship, for a start. As the evil, enemy vessel, it works well enough visually. But it's just about the least practical mining vessel I've ever seen. Why the dark spikes? What possible purpose do they serve other than to look menacing? Is it supposed to intimidate asteroids into giving up their ores?

The supernova event too was a little oddly done. The star expelled a sphere of matter that reached as far as Romulus before Spock could interfere. Yet somehow Spock was still able to get close enough to the star to create a singularity that could capture all of the matter — how does that work?

The film was intended to be fun first and foremost, and on that level it definitely succeeds. I wouldn't call it a popcorn movie, but it is heavy on the action. At the same time though, I think it manages to retain the Star Trek feel. It's a fresh take on an old franchise that seems to have been largely popular with both fans and newcomers. Word from Paramount is that we could be seeing at least one more film set in this new universe, but whether it will become the focus of Star Trek in the long term (assuming the franchise continues) remains to be seen. The success of this movie is certainly promising though and gives me hope that Star Trek will be with us for a while yet.

Even taking into account the issues I have covered above, I quite enjoyed the film. I look forward to seeing where the series goes from here. Everything is familiar, yet at the same time the future of this new universe is completely unknown. Exciting times!

This one grabbed my attention when I first saw the trailer. Based on a children's book by Neil Gaiman, Coraline is a stop-motion animation directed by Henry Selick (The Nightmare Before Christmas). Thanks to Selick's involvement, at times it feels rather Burtonesque, despite Tim Burton having nothing to do with the project.

It tells the tale of Coraline, a girl who finds herself living in an large, old house in the middle of nowhere as a result of the demands of her parents' occupations. Far from the friends she had to leave behind, Coraline seeks ways to escape from the realities of life with her somewhat dysfunctional family and eccentric neighbours. While exploring the house from top to bottom, she happens upon a small door, long forgotten and wallpapered over. Initial excitement quickly turns to disappointment though when she discovers that the door appears to lead to nowhere.

At night however, the mysterious doorway transforms into a tunnel leading to another world; one that is a mirror of her own but where everything is "better". Her parents always have time for her and her eccentric neighbours entertain her. After escaping to the alternate world on a number of occasions, her "other" parents propose that she stays; after all, why return to her original world when everything there is worse? Although Coraline is at first interested by the idea, she soon discovers that all in the "other" world is not as it seems.

I felt Coraline was a nicely rounded fantasy film. A mixture of family strife, fantasy and darkness. If I had to level a criticism at it, I'd have to say that at times, it almost felt too rounded, lacking the slightly edgy feel we've come to expect from similar-looking films from the likes of the previously mentioned Mr. Burton. Enjoyment of the film probably depends on how each viewer relates to the protagonist. Despite a few annoying quirks, I found her easy enough to connect with. And she has a rather nice hat.

The character of Wybie was almost universally panned. An original character introduced for the film, Wybie's purpose was apparently to provide Coraline with someone to talk to so that she could convey the thoughts in her head to the audience without having to talk to herself all of the time — something that is of course easily done in print. I haven't read the book so I can't say how well the film's approach compares. I fear the book probably pulled it off better though. Wybie seems to be used to provide brief, silly distractions more often than he functions as Coraline's sounding board.

All things considered, I enjoyed the film. It was more of a popcorn surreal fantasy than anything intensely thought provoking, but it has a certain charm about it. The well-executed stop-motion animation and enchanting fantasy visuals probably play a large part in that. One I will almost certainly be picking up on DVD at some point.

I was visiting central London with my sister again on Saturday and we stopped off for another round of tea and neon muffins at Candy Cakes. I went for banana and toffee this time (the yellow one). My sister said the thing on top of hers was a chick, but I remain unconvinced.

Today I discovered that bees are really hard to photograph. I found a few dozen going about their business by the side of the road when I popped out for lunch today. Sadly, they move too fast, lingering on each flower for barely a second — and my phone camera takes about twice that long to focus in macro mode. So I had to anticipate the paths the bees would take between flowers and hope for the best. After a number of failures, I did manage to snap a couple of pictures with bees that weren't quite as blurry as the others.

Just a quick, random, disjointed update. Only three posts in May. That was a bit of a poor showing, although I did lose half a month to work I suppose. Still, I hope to improve upon that this month.

Summer is finally here and the weather is keen to remind me of that. It's been stiflingly hot in the warehouse this week. Unfortunately meteorologists are predicting an exceptionally hot summer so it's probably going to get a lot worse before it gets better. Roll on the refreshing showers of autumn.

I think my hearing is getting worse. I watched the Star Trek movie again today and heard one or two things differently. Apparently Sulu wasn't engaged in fancy combat, he was fencing. Although I still think the former is closer to the truth. >_> Another incidence of hearing failure that came to my attention this week concerns the song Halo by Beyonce. (I had to look up both the song and the artist from the lyrics since they're outside my area of popular music knowledge.) It's been playing on the radio at work for a few months now, although due to the low volume and the rather terrible sound our radio emits I can only hear the chorus. Until yesterday I thought the lyrics were "Hello hello hello hello hello hello hello..." — it wasn't until I saw the title written down that it occurred to me that I had heard incorrectly. So the song isn't quite as silly and nonsensical as I originally thought it was. Although I still don't like it much.

Relatedly, I finally got around to re-checking the lyrics to Hikki's Poppin' and was disappointed to see that it was indeed bottles popping and not bodies. Oh well. The fun version still plays in my head whenever I hear it.