Star Trek

I watched season 3 episode 1 of Star Trek. In this episode the Enterprise goes and lands on a planet even though Kirk was warned against it. When they land they find that they have been transported to a town from the past and they are now characters in a reenactment of a gun fight. The crew tries to prevent the fight and Chekov is killed. Spock finally realizes that nothing in this town is real and convinces everyone else of this. After everyone is convinced, history replays its self but the bullets have no affect this time. After everything is over the entire crew, including Chekov, returns to the Enterprise. Here they are confronted by Earps who says that he has gained a new respect for the Federation since they spared his life.

I think Star Trek is very different than anything we have watched before for the most part. As an older show, I think it has some different goals. Star Trek is more what I think of when I think scfy. It got the aliens and space ships and stuff like that. Also, it seems to try to be very futuristic, but almost in a cheesy way. Every other scfy episode we watched was more modern and relatable. The only thing similar to Star Trek would be Firefly, and even that was very different. It had a space ship with a captain but that seems to be the only way it relates. I feel like Star Trek didn't really have much of a message to the viewer and that it was really directed towards relating to life. I definitely prefer the other scfy shows, such as Buffy, to this because I can relate them back to my own life easier.

BSG Miniseries

This was not at all what I was expecting. I thought this show would be somewhat similar to Star trek, but I was definitely wrong. The entire show didn't take place in space as I expected it to. Instead it took place on what I believe was planet earth. There were no space monsters per say, just normal humans for the most part. Even the cylons were in human form.
I thought there were several very interesting things about this show. The first was when number 6 killed the baby. I didn't quite understand why she did this, and I thought it was unnecessary and that it was also very disturbing. The second thing that I thought was interesting was number 6 and her power over men. She seemed very manipulative. I think this was a good portrayal of many women in the real world, because they can often have this affect on men, but the sex scenes were definitely not needed either. The next thing that I thought was interesting was the cylons attack on the planet. This seemed very similar to 9/11 to me. No one was expecting it and they didn't know what to do. Everything was pure chaos when the attack started. I think the people on this ship handled the attack very well though. They seemed to stay very calm and cool headed.
Overall, I thought this miniseries what pretty good, but that was probably just because I thought I was going to hate it. I don't think I would mind finishing this or maybe even watching another episode some time.

The Road Not Taken

http://www.bartleby.com/104/67.html

The Road Not Taken was written by Robert Frost in 1875. This is one of my favorite poems of all times. This poem talks about the different paths that can be taken in life. The first stanza talks about wanting to take both paths, but not being able to. The traveler stood and looked down both paths to see a far as they could down them. The next stanza talks about finally taking one of the two paths. The traveler picked the grassier of the two paths because it had the least travel. In the travels they decide that the paths are worn "really about the same". The third stanza talks about "leaves no step had trodden black". This is once again saying that no one has taken that path for quite a while. He then goes on to say that maybe he'll take the other path someday, but because decisions that are made about life are building blocks for everything else that will happen, he doubts he will ever come back to take the other path. The last stanza starts with, "I shall be telling this with a sigh somewhere ages and ages hence". This entire last stanza talks about what he will say about the path he took in the future. We don't know if that sigh is a sigh of relief or regret, because he does not yet know. He has yet to live the path he chose, but when he tells this story, he will tell everyone he took the road less traveled by and that it has made all the difference.

Normal Again

I thought this episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer was by far the most interesting one that I have seen yet. In this episode Buffy was presented with a huge conflict. She had to decide what was real and what wasn't. There were two realities that she could choose from. The first, was that she was the vampire slayer and Sunnydale was real. The second option, was that Buffy was a patient in a mental institution who made Sunnydale and being a slayer up. Both of these options were very tempting for her. In the first, there was everything she knew and believed to be real. After 6 years of this life it is hard to turn away and believe that it isn't real. In the second reality, Buffy's parents were both there. This really made Buffy struggle with her decision because she had not seen both of her parents together in a very long time. Buffy then makes the decision to get rid of her friends in Sunnydale so she wouldn't be tempted to go back to that world. After almost killing her friends, Buffy finally realizes which world she wants to live in. In the end she chooses Sunnydale over her parents and sets her friends free. I think that any person woud have made the same decision that Buffy made because it is what they know and what they are comfortable with.

One Tree Hill

One Tree Hill is probably my favorite show. I have been watching it since the first episode and it is now in season 7. The show started out focussing on two half brothers, Nathan and Lucas, through their high school years. Their relationship evolves from the two being heartless enemies to caring brothers. The basketball drama and all the relationships in the series create a very interesting drama show. After the first 4 seasons, the series skips ahead 4 years and shows the lives of all the characters after they have gone to college. Then in season 7 the series skips another year forward. In season 7 two of the main characters, Peyton and Lucas, left the show. Now the show focuses more on Nathan and the rest of the gang from high school who has now all returned to One Tree Hill. Even though 2 of the main characters are gone, it is still a great show. There are always new plot twists that keep the viewer guessing what will happen next. It has always kept me on my toes and kept me interested which is why I like this show so much.

commonplace paper problem

The problem with my paper is that I don't know where to start. I have a paragraph explaining the show Next by MTV and I'm not sure if I should start with this or if I should introduce my topic more first. I want to talk about how magazines and television degrade men and women and how people try to change themselves to be like those people they see. This can cause serious health issues.
Another problem I'm having is where to put Buffy back into my paper. I seem to base a lot of it on the show Next and I'm not sure where buffy fits into my paper anymore.

Commonplace Proposal

For my commonplace paper I am thinking about writing about how guys want the kind of girls that they see in magazines. They have this idea in their heads about the perfect girl, and they won't except anything less. Instead of guys liking a nice girl, they would rather lust after an unobtainable girl. Girls should not have to change their bodies to look like the girls in the magazines to get a guys attention. You see tv shows like MTV's Next, where a guy can look at a girl and simply say next, and another girl will come out for a date with him. This is degrading to women, because this is based purely on looks. If the guy would have stopped to have a conversation with the girl he may have found that she was very smart and had a great sense of humor. I want to relate this back to my analytical research paper by using supporting evidence from my episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Xander's lust for Buffy supports my thesis that guys want what they can't have and have an idea of the ideal woman that they want.