Days of “Star Wars” and “Star Trek” come to an end…or have they?

All good things come to an end.

I take that back. I am not so sure everyone thinks the word “good” applies to the Star Trek television spinoffs and the Star Wars prequels given that several fans, not to mention the critics, have become disenfranchised with both franchises over the years.

Next month, two multi-million dollar, (would I be too far off if I said, “billion dollar?”) franchises come to an end on television and the big screen.

"Star Trek: Enterprise" (2001-2005) is signing off on its flagship station, UPN, which has been home for all the incarnations of Star Trek since “Star Trek: The Next Generation” debuted in 1987.

On May 19, the curtain falls on the final Star Wars prequel titled “Episode III – Revenge of the Sith.” There will be no more Star Wars movies (at least that is what director George Lucas keeps saying) after this nor will there be any more “Midnight Madness” at the local Toys “R” Us stores for the fans to shell out their hard-earned money on new film related merchandise.

This fall, for the first time in 17 years, there will be no Star Trek television shows.

What will the vast legion of faithful Vulcans, Klingons, Romulans, Jedi Knights and Imperial Stormtroopers do with themselves?

I always knew this day was coming and to be honest, I am not particularly broken up about it.

My love for “Star Trek” has always been and will always continue to be with the original series that ran for just three years on NBC from 1966-1969. I did watch “The Next Generation” off and on when it ran from 1987 to 1994. When series creator Gene Roddenberry died in 1991, however, I never felt “The Next Generation” was “Star Trek” to me.

At least with “The Next Generation,” the series creators paid homage to some of the classic characters of the original series by having Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), a 100-plus-year-old Dr. McCoy (DeForrest Kelley), and Scotty (James Doohan) make guest appearances.

I don’t think I have seen a single episode of “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” (1993-1999) in its entirety. As for “Star Trek: Voyager,” (1995-2001) all right, I’ll admit it. I tuned in sometimes because I thought Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan) looked attractive in that tight looking gray spandex suit.

The creators behind “Star Trek: Enterprise,” however, decided to go where no producer should have ventured out before it aired four years ago and that was promoting the series as taking place before the days of Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock. Being a fan of the original, I found this downright sacrilegious.

I just know every one of you Starfleet officers out there reading this who loved this show and rallied to keep the series on the air before Paramount’s studios the past few months probably now have their phasers set to kill. Admit it. You people have the latest copy of the Et Cetera’s entertainment page with my picture and article on it ready to burn the paper in effigy. Of course, in the real world, phasers don’t really work but I guess for you people some charcoal and lighter fluid will do the trick, not that I am giving you any ideas.

Well, I must put my foot down. Having a Star Trek television series open with some rock song much less having a captain take his pet dog around with him in space is not Star Trek to me.

If there is any consolation though, I will watch or record the series last two episodes next month to see how it all ends. I have only seen brief clips, but I could have sworn I saw Captain Archer (Scott Bakula) sporting that green shirt worn by Kirk in the original series.

As for “Revenge of the Sith”, as a fan who has spent hundreds of dollars on Star Wars toys since Hasbro and LEGO unleashed the line back in 1996, the truth is I am burned out on Star Wars merchandise.



I don’t find this much of a surprise. When “Return of the Jedi” came out in 1983, I was going into eighth grade. I was obviously getting a little older and my interests were starting to change. I was no longer interested in Star Wars toys. Granted, I did love the film despite the presence of those cute furry little teddy bears that helped the rebels topple the Empire. Watching “Return of the Jedi” today still brings out the kid in me in much the same way “Star Wars” (1977) and "The Empire Strikes Back" (1980) do.

But the fact is just like I was getting older back in my grade school days when “Return of the Jedi” came out, being just one more year away from becoming a freshman in high school, I am much older now five years after “Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace” came out in 1999.

Is it all a sign of growing up?

Or is it that when you get older, the desire to spend money on trivial things is no longer as great as the desire to save one’s money for a very rainy day.

I admit owning an 18-inch Darth Vader doll or a 14-inch Luke Skywalker or Han Solo that are of the utmost museum quality from Sideshow Collectibles would be cool but some of us have more important things to spend our money on. What fans pay $350 on for a Darth Vader doll, I use that money to make monthly payments on my car. Others probably use that money to buy food, pay utility bills, auto insurance, rent, etc.

Believe it or not, though, there is a light at the edge of that long dark tunnel for you fans who are mourning your childhood franchises are coming to an end.

The truth is “Star Trek” and “Star Wars” will continue in other forms. Despite the low box office earnings of “Star Trek: Nemesis” (2002), the creators behind the Trek franchise still insist that another movie is in the works.

As for “Star Wars”, Lucas has hinted that another television series is on the horizon besides the Clone Wars cartoons. Then there is the re-release of all six movies being brought back to the big screen again this time in 3-D beginning with “Star Wars” in 2007 in celebration of the film’s 30th anniversary. Each one will be re-released every year until 2013. And let’s not forget that ultimate DVD box set of all six films that Lucas probably still has planned to release years from now that will no doubt force consumers to spend more money.

The future is always in motion to quote a little green, pointy eared Jedi Master named Yoda who has graduated from being a talking hand puppet on invisible string to becoming a digitally enhanced lightsaber wielding visual effect.

I don’t know if it is “The Force” or the world of movie marketing talking but something tells me that Trekkies are not quite ready to live long and prosper nor is this galaxy’s band of Jedi Knights ready to shut off and hang up their lightsabers for good.

©4/20/05

Appreciation: Pope John Paul II (1920-2005)

Hundreds of people, a lot of them young, were interviewed on the news two weeks ago planning expensive pilgrimages to see Pope John Paul II's body as it lay in state at Vatican City for four days.

Watching these interviews made me want to ask a few questions. I wondered if these people did this because they felt the pontiff touched them in some way during his 26-year-reign, or if they were headed to St. Peter's Square just so they can be a part of history.

What is the legacy Pope John Paul II left us with? Or to be more precise, what did Pope John Paul II teach me personally

Reading Time and Newsweek's obituaries on the Pope's life made me realize and reconsider some of my own beliefs and shortcomings when it comes to forgiving others and the lessons of life and death.

I have consistently refused to forgive people who have done me wrong over the years. When Pope John Paul II forgave his would-be assassin, Mehmet Ali Agca, in 1981 and later granted him absolution in 1983 when he visited him in prison, it showed how little of a person I was in my unwillingness to forgive others who have offended me.

I now understand what the lyrics from that Don Henley song, "The Heart of the Matter," mean that say, "There are people in your life, who've come and gone. They let you down. You know they hurt your pride. You better put it all behind you because life goes on. You keep carrying that anger, it'll eat you up inside."

Thanks to Pope John Paul II beliefs, I realize now that life is precious whether he or she is paralyzed from the neck down and needs a feeding tube inserted in them in order to eat and drink, or they have been sentenced to die in prison.

It isn't our decision to end a person's life.

Up until recently, I have never understood why people are against the death penalty when it comes to some of the heinous crimes today's murderers have committed. I have always been of the belief, an eye for an eye, when it comes to divvying out justice.

I certainly felt that way in the case of Scott Peterson who was sentenced to die by either lethal injection or the gas chamber for killing his wife, Laci, and their unborn son, Connor, last month. While everyone else was cheering that this guy was getting what he deserved, I saw nothing positive about the fact this monster would be spending the rest of his life behind bars. The fact is Peterson will likely die in prison thanks to California's appeals process that takes years before someone is executed.

I felt lethal injection and the gas chamber were too humane for this guy who deserved something far worse for what he did to his wife, and how both she and her son were found.

Now I understand, to some point, why people are against the death penalty. It is basically murdering someone else because he or she murdered someone close to you. Executing that person, though, is not going to bring the other person back.

When it comes to murder cases, there are no heroes. The families of both the killer and the victims are affected. There is never any closure.

Which brings me finally to the subject of mortality. Most, if not all of us, have witnessed the pain of seeing a loved one wither away from some life-threatening disease or coming to terms with their own mortality. We've seen it in recent years hearing about the Pope's medical condition. We even saw it a few weeks ago on television when ABC news anchor Peter Jennings, unable to speak coherently, announced he had lung cancer and would begin chemotherapy.

I have always hoped, and continue to hope, that when my day finally comes that I die in my sleep. If only all of us could be so lucky.

Pope John Paul II showed us, however, that suffering is a part of life and the best way to cope is to have faith that everything is in God's hands.

I can only hope that some, if not, everyone learned something about themselves as they bid farewell to the man many called "the People's Pope." It is a legacy that his new successor, Pope Benedict XVI, will hopefully continue.

©4/20/05

Women always have the upper hand over men on "Desperate Housewives"

I must admit the commercials I saw late last August promoting ABC's “Desperate Housewives” made me think this was going to be the year's most talked about network flop. I just know that those female fans reading this, most likely every single woman in America, will take that as a typical male response.

Would it make any of you females happy if at the same time, I had also predicted another show on ABC about a group of plane crash survivors stranded on an island would never take off and how wrong I was on that one?

Were it not that I no longer work on Sundays, I would never watch “Desperate Housewives” and would be completely oblivious to why it has become so popular were it not for the front-page cover stories I have seen in Newsweek, Entertainment Weekly, and Vanity Fair.

I understand now why women love it so much and why it seems, not a week goes by that I don't see Diane Sawyer on “Good Morning America”, “The Oprah Winfrey Show” or the ladies of “The View” talk about what happened the day after Sunday night's episode.

It's because for one hour on Sunday nights, it is a world where females all over the country get to shout, "I am woman. Hear me roar!"

They can cheer for their favorite residents of Wisteria Lane who come in the forms of emotional basket case Susan Mayer (Teri Hatcher), perfectionist Bree Van De Kamp (Marcia Cross), unfaithful wife Gabrielle Solis (Eva Longoria), stay-at-home mom Lynette Scavo (Felicity Huffman), and neighborhood sex pot Edie Britt (Nicollette Sheridan). On Sunday nights, the score is women five, the men zero. It is a world where females reign supreme and the men from the teenagers on up are complete jerks with an assortment of personal problems.

You do not believe me? Well then consider this sordid cast of male creatures.

There is Bree's husband, Rex (Steven Culp), who pays Maisy Gibbons (Sharon Lawrence), the neighborhood dominatrix and call girl living down the street to enact his submissive sexual fantasies that his wife, Bree, would never understand. Lynette's husband, Tom (Doug Savant) may not only have an infidelity secret we don't yet know about but also has an eye on the young nanny (Marla Sokoloff).

Gabrielle's husband, Carlos (Ricardo Antonio Chivara), wants a baby so much that in one episode he tampers with his wife's birth control pills. I just know that when Carlos, who is in trouble with the law, told Gabrielle he is the head of the household, women viewers cheered when she took his bucket of fried chicken and walked out the front door. She sat on the curb across the street taunting him as she chowed down, knowing he cannot go ten feet away from the house without his electronic ankle bracelet going off.

"Man of the house?" she said. "You can't even leave it."

I could almost hear the words, "You go girl!" when Bree gave her husband, Rex, a tongue lashing in front of everyone at an elegant restaurant when he wanted to leave because all the patrons, women in particular (no surprise there), were staring at him in disgust. This is all thanks to the newly published client list the dominatrix had that was conveniently leaked to the public following her arrest.

Now I know what the phrase, "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned" means.

Is there no man on this street who has any level of moral decency?

Well, there is Mike Delfino (James Denton), the handsome new plumber, who just moved in the neighborhood. Trouble is I don't think one bottle of liquid Drano will be enough to unclog his criminal past.

In the real world, you would not only expect to see a mother upset that an older woman like Gabrielle had an affair with her son, John Rowland (Jesse Metcalf), who isn't even 18 yet, but the father would be as well. Such is not the case on Wisteria Lane. The elder Mr. Rowland tells Gabrielle he wished he had been that young so he too could have had the opportunity to sleep with such a goddess.

Why is it the men on this show are young teenagers who either rebel against their parents or are having trouble wondering if they are gay? Why is it always the men who have skeletons in their closets like widowed father Paul Young (Mark Moses) who I wouldn't be surprised if there are bodies buried in his backyard under the swimming pool.

What about George Williams (Roger Bart), the lonely male pharmacist who gets off watching security camera videos of Bree while eating his microwave dinner and for all we know, his former roommate was the creepy character Robin Williams played in “One Hour Photo” (2002)?

CBS President Leslie Moonves' comment in the April 2005 issue of Playboy fails to raise any brownie points for us males who are not low life scum. When asked about how the ABC hit has beat out CBS' “Survivor”, Moonves didn't just say it was because “Desperate Housewives” is a good show.

"I know a lot of guys who watch the program - it has beautiful, sexy women," he was quoted saying.

Are we male creatures the equivalent of the skid marks left by tires then where the only reason we watch a television show is because the actresses, most of whom are in their early to mid-40s, still look hot, with the exception of Texas A & M graduate Longoria who is 30? I will admit they are beautiful, but that is not the reason I have tuned in this year.

I find the show entertaining in a raunchy, twisted way. It is the poor man's answer to HBO's “Sex and the City” for those who cannot afford cable or satellite television. I know that won't hold up, however, in the eyes of the female crowd who will say I am a liar when it comes to my saying the only reason I read Playboy and FHM (For Him Magazine) is because I like to read the articles.

If there is any consolation for us guys it is that at least the women characters on “Desperate Housewives” are not angels. Their behavior is just as bad as the men's.

Susan looks to her daughter (Andrea Bowen) for advice when her dating relationships fizzle out. Gabrielle just wants to live off Carlos' wealth and not have to work for a living. Lynette does not like being a stay-at-home mom taking care of three kids. She yearns for the days when she oversaw a corporation. Yes, even Bree, my favorite character who is a conservative, a member of the NRA (National Rifleman's Association), and has a picture of President Reagan hanging near the utility room, is far from perfect. The fact her kids resent her and her husband, at first, wanted a divorce and eventually cheated on her, literally define the term "dysfunctional."

As for Edie well, all I am going to say is there is no one on my block who dresses in shorts and high heels while washing the car and if there is, I have been too busy to notice.

Then there is Mary Alice Young (Brenda Strong), a loving wife and mother who blew her brains out in the first episode for reasons only the show's creators know. She is always heard but rarely seen, except in Lynette's dreams, providing witty commentary every week the way Rod Serling narrated episodes of “The Twilight Zone”.

Are these the kinds of female characters women aspire to become or already are? I may be in the minority here, but I think I can safely say that not all men are flawed pigs. All right, most of us guys are flawed, (even me, believe it or not) but not all of us are vile disgusting creatures.

It is only in Hollywood, or in this case, on some street called Wisteria Lane where women will always have the upper hand in this immoral battle of the sexes.

When it comes to how both parties act in the real world, though, the score continues to be even.

Women: 0 Men: 0

©4/6/05