Puntabulous Guest Debate

Welcome to another edition of Puntabulous Guest Debates! Today I welcome Avitable who has my favorite header and headline in the whole wide world. We’re going to wrestle the topic that has plagued dorky science fiction fans (are there any other kind?) since 1977.

STAR WARS VS STAR TREK!

Avitable: Star Wars isn’t just a movie. It’s a fully realized universe that has generated and inspired movies, books, cartoons, toys, comics, hairstyles, fashion, food, and military theory. Multiple generations of humans have grown up with Star Wars ingrained in their everyday lives. The John Williams score is one of the most highly recognized soundtracks in the universe, and if you put a large cinnamon bun to each ear, everybody will call you Princess Leia. The force is strong with Star Wars, and as the most recognizable franchise in the history of mankind, every other sci-fi endeavor pales in comparison.

Craig: Yeah, Star Wars is good and all. I mean, if you believe in leprechauns, unicorns, and talking trees. But for those of us who live in the real world, you have Star Trek. A franchise that doesn’t take place in a mystical galaxy “a long time ago” but rather in our civilization in the coming future. A civilization in which we can all aspire to be a part of. Sure, what kid wouldn’t love to be Luke Skywalker? But as you get older, and wiser, you realize that being Luke Skywalker is just a selfish endeavor to live out your innermost fantasies like having a neato sword, being able to move objects with your mind, and making out with your sister. For us grownups, we can aspire to be Jean Luc Picard, a man who aspires to boldly go where no man has gone before for the benefit of mankind. Have fun with your sword kiddo. Don’t play with it too much or you’ll start to chafe.

Avitable: Start to chafe? Do. You. Mean. Like. Shatner’s. So-called. Acting? Because that chafed my brain so bad I had to snort baby powder so I could think again. There are no leprechauns or unicorns or talking trees in Star Wars. There are, however, a multitude of alien races that are as vastly distinct as each individual planet. Unlike Star Trek, where you have humans, humans with bumpy foreheads, humans with really bumpy foreheads, humans with slightly different skin tones, and humans with long pointy ears. Star Wars is all about diversity and the cultural ramifications of having so many different cultures clashing in many disparate environments. Star Trek, however, is all about aliens that speak English and a quest to boldly go where no human man has gone before – mainly, in the panties of every female alien around.

Craig: You’re right. Shatner’s acting was just atrocious. Speaking of, exactly how many Academy Award nominations did Hayden Christensen receive for his portrayal of an empty pizza box in the Prequel Trilogy? I believe it’s the same number as the amount of times the letter Z appears in the phrase: “People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.” I’ll let you do the math. And I apologize that weekly television shows and relatively low budget movies don’t afford the luxury of more complex character makeup. It’s a shame that Star Trek had to focus more on solid storytelling rather than wowing us with special effects. Maybe George Lucas should have spent a bit more money on the writing and acting portions of the movie making process rather than molding his stories around all the merchandise he can sell. Oh, and don’t even get me started on his lame character names. Darth Sidious? General Grievous? A fat guy named Porkins? That’s just lazy.

Avitable: The names in Star Wars are symbolic and hearken back to a simpler way of life, when Native Americans ruled their land with a bloody red tomahawk. Luke was a “sky walker”, Han was always “solo”, Chewbacca would “chew you”, and Leia Organa made boys want to “lay her” with their “organ”. See? It all points to something deeper – a symbolic and literal change in an ever-evolving society as it moves from evil to good. Star Trek, on the other hand, is all about American warmongers imposing their will on other cultures and demoralizing the women of those cultures. It’s like Star Wars is Obama and Star Trek is George Bush.

Craig: Please. Everyone knows that Obama is all about Star Trek. He even looks like a Ferengi! And what is this business about Star Trek representing American Warmongers? Are you forgetting Starfleet’s Prime Directive, which is to not interfere in the internal affairs of other civilizations? You know who DID interfere with the internal affairs of other civilizations? Luke Skywalker! When he blew up the Death Star and killed all those poor shlubs who just needed a crappy job so they worked for the Empire! You think the cafeteria staff of the Death Star deserved to be blown up? “Would you like fries with that?” KA-BOOM! Are these the kind of morals you wish to instill in the minds of impressionable viewers? I guess you’re just one of those people that believes in sacrificing innocent lives for the “greater good”. Meanwhile, back at Starfleet, we usually only sacrifice ourselves for the greater good. But you know, that’s just because we’re better people than you and those lousy rebels.

Avitable: Yeah, I remember Kirk “not interfering” by imposing his own rules on every civilization he came across, impregnating alien women with his spastic seed, and actually destroying some civilizations that were going along swimmingly until he “not interfered”. Maybe if he’d been more like a Jedi he wouldn’t have left such a wake of destruction and ugly alien human hybrid babies. And, you said “back at Starfleet, we usually only . . .” We? You see, this is the problem with Star Trek. It gets in your head and makes you think that you are on the Good Ship Lollipop Enterprise, alongside the crew of your favorite incarnation of the series. Star Wars fans know it’s fiction, and that’s why we’re much cooler than the Trekkies.

Craig: Boy, you seem to be fixated on the fact that Shatner macked it with so many different alien ladies. Are you just upset because Jedi aren’t allowed to get laid? They’re like priests, and we all know how staying celibate works out for those guys. And if a Jedi does manage to get laid, it usually means that they’re destined to walk the path of the darkside and bring down the entire galaxy along with them. And while we’re on the subject, what’s with this lightside/darkside business? Hasn’t anyone ever heard of a gray area? Is it because Star Wars fans aren’t smart enough to have their own opinions about right and wrong? Star Trek is more than just simple equations like: Jedi = Good, Sith = Bad. It’s the gray areas between right and wrong, and the moral dilemmas and personal conflicts that these situations can cause that makes Star Trek a much more intricate and involving series. And what’s so bad about imagining myself as a crewmember of the Starship Enterprise? I would look awesome in tights.

Avitable: Your hotness in tights notwithstanding, don’t you think you’d look even more awesome holding a long elongated object that glowed in the dark and hummed? The lightsaber is by far the coolest gadget out of both universes. Star Trek has some of the goofiest, lamest gadgets ever created. They manage to have a teleporter, but it has so many limitations that it’s essentially useless. Not to mention the fact that if you could teleport people, why bother making ships to go anywhere? And then you have a lame phaser, which doesn’t even match a blaster in coolness. And the tricorder? It’s a computer. You know, like R2-D2 and C-3PO. Except you don’t need a cranky old doctor to interpret results for you – they can tell you the diagnosis and analysis all on their own. When you watch Star Trek, the concepts and gadgets are actually limiting your imagination – it’s making you stupider just by watching!

Craig: Oh, I’m sorry. Is Data not a sophisticated enough creation for you? Because I actually thought that a robot, who could not only simulate human appearance and behaviors but also human emotions (thanks to his appropriately named emotion chip) was pretty darn impressive. But you know, if you like your robots clunky and obtuse like R2-D2, who can’t even use actual words, by all means, that’s your choice. And if your “cranky old doctor” comment is directed at Dr. Bones McCoy, I’m going to have to give you a verbal beat down and let you know that Bones is the coolest character in science fiction history. You Star Wars fanatics like to think that it’s Han Solo or Boba Fett, but seriously, Han Solo got his balls cut off after he got with Leia (a scoundrel who says “I love you”?) and Boba Fett died like the biggest chump in cinema history (by a blind guy waving a stick around). Bones may not have a cool blaster or body armor, but he’s an old guy with a quick wit who never let chicks or blind guys get in his way of being cool.

Avitable: With all of this semantic discussion, we’ve neglected the big picture. Both of these franchises can be compared to a dog. Let’s take a puppy, for example. He’ll bounce around, wagging that cute little tail of his, fetch toys, play tug of war, sit down and shake hands, give you kisses when you get home, and generally cheer you up with his upbeat doggy persona. This puppy is Star Wars. Now, let’s neuter the puppy. Once he loses his balls, he becomes morose, quiet, tired, and generally boring. He’ll just sit at your feet and sleep, and while that feels comforting, you know in your heart that you miss the playful dog you used to love. Star Trek is just Star Wars without testicles. And Battlestar Galactica is like a cat that jumps on your head and scares the shit out of you when you get home.

Craig: I have a better analogy for you: Star Trek is like the really powerful, top-of-the-line starship with the smart, diverse crew that travels the galaxy bringing peace and justice to the entire universe. Star Wars is like the crappy bucket of bolts flown by a grumpy shlub and his dog who only succeeds on dumb luck. Wait, what’s an “analogy” again? Let’s face it, Star Wars peeked in 1980 with The Empire Strikes Back, while Star Trek continues to reinvent itself with new and exciting characters and stories. Star Wars has been telling the same story since 1977. Is a new Clone Wars cartoon series really necessary? How about you start telling some new stories George?! What’s going on in the world of Star Trek these days? Oh, that’s right! A movie by science fiction dork extraordinaire: J.J. Fucking Abrams! BOO YA!

So who do you guys think won? His pictures are pretty incredible. You can click on them to enlarge them. The one of me imagining myself as a member of Starfleet is currently residing as my desktop wallpaper. Thanks Avitable!

Be sure to head over to Avitable’s blog: Avitable!

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