Sfdebris rips "Star Trek: Generations" to shreds

Amtmann

In what is probably the definitive review of TNG's first big screen outing, Chuck Sonnenburg, AKA Youtube's Sfdebris, castigates every aspect of the film in a masterfully produced 37-minute video review.

Enjoy!

nyarlothothep

ah saw these yesterday, every point made is spot on, although I found the whole death of picards family and his one minute breakdown que Im alright again because there is a big planetoid thing on the viewscreen worthy of a more extended criticism. The uniforms point was really well made, its pretty ridiculous that they keep changing.

Jim

Similar review, ripping into the little (and some big) things in the film. More comedy based.
Pretty sure everyone has seen this at this stage, but for those who haven't...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h06WKYFYdlo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azSh47-oRPI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zqb9q3c1Pxo

Cookie_Monster

Pretentious American, talking mostly ****e

Myrddin

Furet wrote: »

In what is probably the definitive review of TNG's first big screen outing, Chuck Sonnenburg, AKA Youtube's Sfdebris, castigates every aspect of the film in a masterfully produced 37-minute video review.

Enjoy!

Stopped the first one @ 4:44. How anyone finds that idiot funny beggars belief. If he wants to practice being a comedian, it won't be on my time. I was actually really interested in seeing someone picking the film apart, but that false American "humour" is just painful.

Amtmann

EnterNow wrote: »

Stopped the first one @ 4:44. How anyone finds that idiot funny beggars belief. If he wants to practice being a comedian, it won't be on my time. I was actually really interested in seeing someone picking the film apart, but that false American "humour" is just painful.

You really stopped too soon. I suggest you grin and bear the humour, because if you really want to see the film picked apart, he does just that. Seriously.

Myrddin

Furet wrote: »

You really stopped too soon. I suggest you grin and bear the humour, because if you really want to see the film picked apart, he does just that. Seriously.

Ok ok you've convinced me, I'll give it another roll Not just yet though

Cookie_Monster

EnterNow wrote: »

Ok ok you've convinced me, I'll give it another roll Not just yet though

don't bother its crap and full of badly made points about the most minor of things

Amtmann

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

don't bother its crap and full of badly made points about the most minor of things

Ah come one now Cookie_Monster! Why is it crap? Sfdebris at least explained for 37 minutes why he thinks Generations is rubbish. I agreed with him (though I didn't need to be persuaded). Do you actually think it was good?

Cookie_Monster

Furet wrote: »

Ah come one now Cookie_Monster! Why is it crap? Sfdebris at least explained for 37 minutes why he thinks Generations is rubbish. I agreed with him (though I didn't need to be persuaded). Do you actually think it was good?

I liked it, best after 6 and 2 IMO.

Many of his arguements were pointless, I mean who cares about the uniforms, it happened before during the change over from TNG season 1 to 2 and in my mind was good. I like the red tops better. Some points are perfectly valid too though.

Amtmann

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

Some points are perfectly valid too though.

Such as Kirk being an extra?
Such as Lursa and Betor being pointless?
Such as the destruction of the Fed Flagship, the Enterprise D, at the hands of a rickety old BoP?
Such as the Enterprise technobabbling rather than shooting its way to a Pyrrhic victory?
Such as Data's annoyingness?
Such as the the whole-"going back to the mountaintop to stop Soran" decision?
Such as the way in which the death of Kirk was dealt with?

These were his main points, and I always thought they were very valid. In my view he makes them very well indeed.

The uniforms didn't bother me, but if it turned out that the reason they couldn't be standard throughout the whole movie was because they blew a chunk of the budget on a wooden ship and ornate 18th-century naval attire that would only appear for ten minutes in what was a pretty pointless scene, then that just shows up poor decision-making on the part of the producers, and deserves to be mercilessly pointed out.

Cookie_Monster

Furet wrote: »

Such as Kirk being an extra?
Such as Lursa and Betor being pointless?
Such as the destruction of the Fed Flagship, the Enterprise D, at the hands of a rickety old BoP?
Such as the Enterprise technobabbling rather than shooting its way to a Pyrrhic victory?
Such as Data's annoyingness?
Such as the the whole-"going back to the mountaintop to stop Soran" decision?
Such as the way in which the death of Kirk was dealt with?

Except he's not really, kinda central to the whole thing
Several disruptor blasts directly to the engineering sector with no shields seem reasonable to me.
I'll givve you that one, a spread of 10 photons would have been easily do-able and done the job.
He's not annoying, its interesting to see how he struggles with emotions.
To have the minimum impact of the timeline thats already happened.
I didn't get as far ass that bit so don't know what he said, but what exactly wass wrong with it? I presume the whole idea is for Picard to say nothing about it so as not to damage the time line or provoke interest in the time-travel abilities of the Nexus

nyarlothothep

I think debris is one of the best reviewers on the web, certainly not pretentious american bs imo, I don't really see how his humour is specifically american. For that I would go to the nostalgia critic. But debris' reviews are generally intelligent and well thought out, many of his attacks on generations are justifiable in the context of maintaining the believabilty of the fictional universe (a point he makes in a voyager review iirc) and are otherwise just for fun. Randomly changing uniforms for instance does make the proceedings look a little ridiculous, not a major criticism but something which should have been ironed out nonethelesss.

Myrddin

nyarlothothep wrote: »

I think debris is one of the best reviewers on the web, certainly not pretentious american bs imo, I don't really see how his humour is specifically american. For that I would go to the nostalgia critic. But debris' reviews are generally intelligent and well thought out, many of his attacks on generations are justifiable in the context of maintaining the believabilty of the fictional universe (a point he makes in a voyager review iirc) and are otherwise just for fun. Randomly changing uniforms for instance does make the proceedings look a little ridiculous, not a major criticism but something which should have been ironed out nonethelesss.

He is a very typical American reviewer, weak humour, bad puns, singing, the list goes on. Not worth the bandwidth tbh.

TheIrishGrover

Generations is crap? When's he doing his 2 hour documentary on how water is wet?

nyarlothothep

EnterNow wrote: »

He is a very typical American reviewer, weak humour, bad puns, singing, the list goes on. Not worth the bandwidth tbh.

Puns are very English too, weak humour is universal, singing can feature in any type of comedy, I don't see how these attributes are inherently american. If you were to say The Big Bang theory or Friends is american humour then I would agree.

Myrddin

nyarlothothep wrote: »

I don't see how these attributes are inherently american

They are if the review is supposed to be taken seriously.

nyarlothothep

EnterNow wrote: »

They are if the review is supposed to be taken seriously.

What do you mean by that? If the review is to be taken seriously therefore its components, puns et al consequently render it american? I don't see how one follows from the other.

Myrddin

nyarlothothep wrote: »

What do you mean by that? If the review is to be taken seriously therefore its components, puns et al consequently render it american? I don't see how one follows from the other.

Basically it means I dont find his American humour funny. How is it American humour? Well.....he's an American isn't he? Even most serious American reviews on this level incorporate some form of general stupidity I find.

Puns english too - correct.
Weak humour universal - correct.
Singing in every comedy - correct, but I wasn't watching to be made laugh - I watched with general curiosity about filming/directorial criticism. If I wanted humour I'd still probably have steered clear of the review.

All in all no harm done, I can appreciate some find him witty/amusing. I just think he's a gimp.

Amtmann

EnterNow wrote: »

All in all no harm done, I can appreciate some find him witty/amusing. I just think he's a gimp.

Not intending to be disrespectful to you at all, but I do wonder if some of the ire directed toward him in general is mainly the result of fanboys having their feelings hurt by him pointing out that much of Star Trek is just badly conceived, poorly written bilge, happily swallowed by people obsessed with such irrelevancies as the maximum speed of this or that type of ship, etc.

If someone doesn't like his humour then that's another matter entirely of course.

Myrddin

Furet wrote: »

Not intending to be disrespectful to you at all, but I do wonder if some of the ire directed toward him in general is mainly the result of fanboys having their feelings hurt by him pointing out that much of Star Trek is just badly conceived, poorly written bilge, happily swallowed by people obsessed with such irrelevancies as the maximum speed of this or that type of ship, etc.

If someone doesn't like his humour then that's another matter entirely of course.

Quite possible, in fact, probable in a lot of cases. Not in this one however:

EnterNow wrote: »

Stopped the first one @ 4:44. How anyone finds that idiot funny beggars belief. If he wants to practice being a comedian, it won't be on my time. I was actually really interested in seeing someone picking the film apart, but that false American "humour" is just painful.

Regards the humour, that's what made me not watch it. I didn't even make it to his critical points. Pity really. Anyone know of a serious tear down of the film, preferably with no songs?

nyarlothothep

EnterNow wrote: »

Basically it means I dont find his American humour funny. How is it American humour? Well.....he's an American isn't he? Even most serious American reviews on this level incorporate some form of general stupidity I find.

Puns english too - correct.
Weak humour universal - correct.
Singing in every comedy - correct, but I wasn't watching to be made laugh - I watched with general curiosity about filming/directorial criticism. If I wanted humour I'd still probably have steered clear of the review.

All in all no harm done, I can appreciate some find him witty/amusing. I just think he's a gimp.

Just because hes american doesn't make his humour american. I'm open to the possibility that this type of reviewing style is american so I may investigate other american reviews of sci fi episodes/films on the net. There is nothing wrong in mixing in humour in reviews, it can add to it, there is the idea that comedy is form of social critique. However I don't find his reviews to be stupid at all, quite the reverse in fact, he makes excellent points on the one dimensionality of Voyager with respect to a divergence of opinions baesd on issues and how this is reflected in Janeways authoritarianism.

Fremen

EnterNow wrote: »

Regards the humour, that's what made me not watch it. I didn't even make it to his critical points. Pity really. Anyone know of a serious tear down of the film, preferably with no songs?

The review in Jim's post on the previous page does a great job. He's covered most of the recent star trek movies.
He has some crummy humour too- at the end of each ten minute clip, the camera pans out to the reviewer's basement and he makes some jokes under a serial-killer persona. Awful, unfunny stuff, but it happens at predictable intervals so can easily be skipped. It's a fantastic review other than that.

Myrddin

nyarlothothep wrote: »

There is nothing wrong in mixing in humour in reviews

Oh I agree, I guess it just falls down to how one might define humour.

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

the sfdebris review was ok, it touched on a few interesting things but the humour was fairly weak

the review jim posted in http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=67272830&postcount=3 is far far far far *far* superior

it's still got a fair bit of stupid comedy, but it just rips the movie to absolute shreds. It's so thorough and just brutal.

--edit

http://sfdebris.com/videos/t142.asp

the sfdebris review of 'q who' where we first meet the borg. Actually pretty damn great. The episode reviews are alot better than the movie reviews, probably because they're so much shorter.

Lantus

Guys please....as you all know there is only one really definitive (and really funny) AND good quality review (and funny) of the star trek movies and it's by....


RED LETTER MEDIA.

http://www.redlettermedia.com/generations.html

try here for a review of generations.

Also, if you have a spare hour it does tell you everything wrong about phantom menace elsewhere and it's all on yo tube in many parts.

Before I get any stick I am a trekker and I can watch these movies but hedoes raise good points....and he's funny......

pizza rolls.....

who's f****n with my medicine.....

IvySlayer

Generations wasn't a very good film.

The Enterprise D should've have gotten a proper farewall. Destroyed in a proper battle, ala the Defiant.

Cookie_Monster

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar wrote: »

the sfdebris review was ok, it touched on a few interesting things but the humour was fairly weak

the review jim posted in http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=67272830&postcount=3 is far far far far *far* superior
.

+1 much better review.

Stark

I didn't think Generations was all *that* bad. It made a more fitting end to the TV series than "All good things" did in my opinion. The big problem was it was essentially a TV episode trying to be a movie.

Magic Eight Ball

Stark wrote: »

I didn't think Generations was all *that* bad. It made a more fitting end to the TV series than "All good things" did in my opinion. The big problem was it was essentially a TV episode trying to be a movie.

Picard - "I should have done this a long time ago."

Perfect ending IMO.

Cookie_Monster

Magic Eight Ball wrote: »

Picard - "I should have done this a long time ago."

Perfect ending IMO.

+1

gbee

EnterNow wrote: »

I was actually really interested in seeing someone picking the film apart, but that false American "humour" is just painful.

I have tears in my eyes from laughing and sore ribs, it's so funny.

The last bit where he compares the 12,000 year old piece of sculpture and fining it again on the crashed bridge ... just threw me over the edge.

gbee

Furet wrote: »

that much of Star Trek is just badly conceived, poorly written bilge, happily swallowed by people obsessed with such irrelevancies as the maximum speed of this or that type of ship, etc. .

I've never before watched these reviews, but I was amazed that I agreed with most of his observations.

nyarlothothep

Magic Eight Ball wrote: »

Picard - "I should have done this a long time ago."

Perfect ending IMO.

+1, it showed up Picards complexity, his self imposed isolation for his career ,the personal sacrifices he made as a result and his regret. It was an awesome bookend because at the start of the series everything was really one dimensional but the show ended up being great and Picard became a fictional character of lofty stature.

bodice ripper

I thought it was quite amusing. But what would I know? I am one of those ill-bred americans and consequently part of a 300000000 strong hive mind. :rolleyes:

opinion guy

Just watched Generations.
(sorry no time for watching these reviews)

but the one massive issue I have with it is this: Picard and Kirk were in the nexus. They decide no lets go back to Veridian 3 or whatever its called. And then hey presto alakazam they are suddenly back on the planet.

Err.....how????

Myrddin

opinion guy wrote: »

Just watched Generations.
(sorry no time for watching these reviews)

but the one massive issue I have with it is this: Picard and Kirk were in the nexus. They decide no lets go back to Veridian 3 or whatever its called. And then hey presto alakazam they are suddenly back on the planet.

Err.....how????

I think the more accepted issue is, if they could go back to anywhere/anywhen...why back to Veridian 3? Why not back while Soran is safely aboard the Enterprise? Confine him to the brig until the Nexus has passed...queue end credits.

opinion guy

EnterNow wrote: »

I think the more accepted issue is, if they could go back to anywhere/anywhen...why back to Veridian 3? Why not back while Soran is safely aboard the Enterprise? Confine him to the brig until the Nexus has passed...queue end credits.

No no thats easily explained by them being thick.
The bigger issue is how did they go anywhere

Kiith

A wizard did it...

Cookie_Monster

Kiith wrote: »

A wizard did it...

the nexus is simply his wizard's sleeve, a long one too...