Dark Reality

That may be a good point for the coin counters in Hollywood, but someone on the GameFAQs board (would you believe, that's where I heard of this?) posted a better point: That Star Trek is about going where no one has gone before, and that means moving forward, not backward.

In my opinion prequels hurt sci-fi. I am interested in watching Enterprise since I've heard of this Temporal Cold War arc, but the first episode bored me, and I didn't get into it. More than that, Archer's Enterprise completely owns Kirk's. Of course a 2000's model Enterprise is going to be better than what they did in the 1960s. And it's not just Star Trek - I know I'm not the only one who thinks the ships looked better in the Star Wars prequels - not to mention the absence of the double-ended lightsaber however many years later the originals take place.

If Kirk and Spock are sellable characters, that's one thing... but considering they haven't made a sci-fi prequel to date that is anywhere near convincing, maybe they should take the elements of Kirk and Spock, find the elements that made TOS work, and work that into something new. Or perhaps what made TOS work, is that it was the original. If so many people are going to disregard everything that comes after TOS because TOS was the original, then nobody's going to appreciate another TOS movie because it's not the original.

How do you do a Constitution-class ship in CGI? Or are they going to break out the old one, with the fishing line, and drag it across the screen? Same thing with the sets - blinking lights, or full-color computer displays? They're either going to have to abandon all the advances in filmmaking and truly make another 60s movie (or 80s movie)... but the coin counters also realize that CGI sells. Their best bet for making a Trek prequel is to put Kirk and Spock into something which somehow shames every ship, including Voyager and the Enterprise-E (while selling it as a 23rd century ship), but doesn't have a holodeck, or replicators, or anything else Picard's crew took for granted. It's going to look silly. But it just might sell. I think, to true fans (either fans of TOS, TNG, DS9, or just of the whole franchise), it'll be a farce at best.

Paramount is breathing life into its "Star Trek" franchise by setting "Mission: Impossible III" helmer J.J. Abrams to produce and direct the 11th "Trek" feature, aiming for a 2008 release.

 

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Project, to be penned by Abrams and "MI3" scribes Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, will center on the early days of seminal "Trek" characters James T. Kirk and Mr. Spock, including their first meeting at Starfleet Academy and first outer space mission.

 

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"Star Trek" has been Hollywood's most durable performer other than James Bond, spawning 10 features that have grossed more than $1 billion and 726 TV episodes from six series.

 

Decision to relaunch "Star Trek" comes less than a year after UPN pulled the plug on "Star Trek: Enterprise" amid dismal ratings following a four-season run and four years after "Star Trek: Nemesis" turned in the worst performance of the 10 films with $43 million domestic.

I do hope that this information is incorrect. Nothing against TOS, but I think with six movies, it has had its time, and newer elements should be brought to the big screen. Deep Space Nine, Voyager, even TNG elements yet to be explored. This is not a film I would be looking forward to at all - it would have to have something really special to justify going back to Kirk and Spock.

I think Dukat's my favourite character in DS9. Tied with Worf.

Because really, how bad is Dukat? I think a lot of the things people hold against Dukat, they hold against all Cardassians. And the Cardassians are a really cool race. IMHO they're a lot more intereting than the mostly-xenophobic Bajorans. They have two major points against them - the Occupation, and their government (which includes their justice system). But they're a very intelligent species with a keen eye for detail. If Cardassia reformed, or if some more liberal Cardassians split off and made their own world somewhere else, I think people from that world would add a lot to any crew or station, would be greatly admired. Oh, and plus they just look like villains, like the Jem'hadar. The Klingons were done the same way, really.

Well, it's been almost a month, and now we're coming up on the end of Season 2. Looks like we do about a season a month, and it's looking like we'll get through the whole thing. The Dominion have been mentioned 2-3 times, we've seen the Maquis, and we've seen the Alternate Universe. We haven't seen the Jem'hadar, the female shapeshifter, Martok, or Vic yet, of course - those elements come later. And we're coming up on some good episodes. I'm looking forward to Worf and the Defiant. The show really picked up (though it was great to start with) when Worf joined. Just seeing Worf on screen makes me smile. Michael Dorn must be the Trek actor with the most episodes under his belt, period. Everyone else has at most one whole series and cameos in a couple of the others. Dorn was in seven seasons of TNG, four of DS9, and four movies. Worf practically IS modern Trek.

I just realized that we are only a few episodes away from the introduction of the Defiant. The very start of 3x01 "The Search, Part 1" is one of my favourite scenes, when the Defiant sneaks into DS9's perimeter. I'd forgotten that The Jem'Hadar and The Search (parts 1 and 2) actually make up a 3-part episode formally introducing the Dominion and answering Odo's big question all at once. Jen's gotta get up early tomorrow morning - I think we'll just watch the next two episodes ("The Collaborator" and "Tribunal") tonight, and save the 3-part for tomorrow night - maybe watch "The House of Quark" as well.

First of all, I considered posting this in the Qo'noS forum. But then I went in there, and a lot of the topics were of a political nature, having nothing to do with Star Trek. My post does, but it is somehwat controversial. I was unsure, but decided to post it in here. If my decision was wrong, I'm sorry - please move it. Anyway:

Why can't more shows be like Star Trek? Is it fantasy, exclusive to Science Fiction that races intermingle on television? One reason I never liked UPN is, aside from Star Trek, I always thought it was a very racist network. Every single person on every single non-Trek show they did was black/African-American. Now, I have nothing against African-Americans, not at all! But it's hardly approaching an acceptable level of realism if everyone in the world is black, as portrayed on these shows.

Then I was reading that UPN and the WB were merging, and an article in either TIME or Rolling Stone (maybe Entertainment Weekly) was saying that a lot of African-American cast and crew members would be out of work.

WHY?

Shows shouldn't be all-white or all-black. One thing I love about Star Trek is that it sort of elevates itself beyond science-fiction. Sci-fi is cheesy, for the most part; Star Trek is not. These are good - no, great - stories, set in the future. So there's this sci-fi backdrop, but the story is so much more than that. And part of the realism is the parallels with everyday life. On Star Trek, you have people who are "white", people who are "black", Asians... and aliens. It represents a true cultural diversity which exists in real life. We don't have aliens, but we *do* have a lot of oddballs. I can understand a whole family being of one race. Jake and Ben Sisko are both black; Beverly and Wesley Crusher are both white. But that doesn't mean all their friends, neighbors, co-workers, and so on have to be the same skin color, the same race, the same heritage. In real life people are different, and Star Trek is one of the few shows that actually portrays that. Science fiction, my foot. The real science fiction is these shows about all-white and all-black planets.

As far as crew (behind the scenes), there should be no excuse why they don't have good diversity. In front of the camera, however, they *do* have to assign races to some characters based on their relationships with other characters (of the same race). But what I'd like to see is shows portraying real and OK relationships between people of different races, different religions. Heck, DS9 did the whole religion thing and nobody boycotted Paramount. Did the right-wing conservative Christian activist groups completely miss DS9 because Paramount substituted God for "The Prophets" and "Christians" for "Bajorans"? DS9 hit on a lot of controversial topics. I don't think that because they were using aliens was the only reason they "got away with it". I think a lot more people are more accepting than the television execs often assume. People are still coming to terms with homosexuality ("Brokeback Mountain" was nominated for Best Picture, after all - it didn't win; people in general still have a ways to go, but that it was nominated speaks a lot toward our progress as an accepting people) but I think as far as race is concerned, we have that nailed down. (I thought in moving to the South, I'd see a lot of racism, rebel flags - in fact it's quite the opposite - white and black get along fine, so far as I can tell, Confederate flags are rare, but most people don't seem bothered by them.)

I think it's time for television to take a giant leap forward in evolution. Let's see a sitcom that plays off the recent movie "Guess Who" - a married couple, one's white, one's black, and the kids are mixed. They have family and friends of both races and then some, but not done in such a way that it looks like they're promoting affirmative action. Let's see more shows with people from more walks of life. I know it's not all black and white, that some shows do have mixed races - but if people are worried that UPN shows might get cancelled, that African-Americans might be out of work - well, why? Why can't they find homes in other shows, or new shows? What's the problem?

*spoilers!*

I have to give this episode five stars.

The first time through, it made me mad. Real mad. I can't say how mad this episode made me, without risking the wrath of the moderators. If you've seen it, you know why.

I just watched it the second time with my lady, and I got another aspect of it. This is a really good episode. Anything that makes you think about it well after it's over is good for that reason alone. Three parts of this episode really stood out to me. First, that Sisko was unwilling to take off his uniform, that he was willing to go in the metal box in the sun rather than change who he was. Second, that even after whatsername was exposed as a fraud and was to be brought up on charges, it was proven that she'd intentionally crash-landed the ship, set up the whole situation, let people die - and admitted that she would have even killed her son for her beliefs, everyone else was willing to stay. They liked the life they now had. I admired them for what they were doing, but not their leader for forcing it upon them. And third, the ending was pure class: the two kids (one boy, one girl) standing alone after everyone cleared the stage. Because you know those kids were born there, it's their home - the adults could leave at any time, but I got the impression those two (and the other kids) were going to stay there, make that planet their home.

It's episodes like this that make/made DS9 stand out, not only among Star Trek and science fiction, but among television in general. I'm afraid what DS9 brought to cable television will never again be seen.

Well there was also the stipulation that those who had been resurrected could not leave. Though I guess stopping the resurrection wouldn't have been as easy as allowing them to leave.

I convinced Jen to watch four DS9 episodes last night! :lol: I told her that "If Wishes Were Horses" was OK at best and "The Forsaken" wasn't that great, but "Dramatis Personae" was a lot of fun and "Duet" was the first great DS9 landmark - but that we were watching the whole thing. She watched the first two, then wanted to play some Diablo II (awesome PC game). She played for a while then went to the bathroom, so I played for about an hour till she was done. Then we watched the other two.

I tried to push for a fifth one to close out season 1, but it didn't happen. I'm downloading last Monday's WWE RAW, and she really wants to see that (it should be done by the time she gets home). So if I play my cards right, we'll watch last night's RAW and 1x20, start Season 2 tomorrow night, unless I get the videocapture card I ordered tomorrow (Newegg.com is known for shipping a day early, though it isn't guaranteed) in which case I'll spend the time she's at work editing the ads out of tonight's RAW so we can watch that. She loves wrestling, and with the return of Mick Foley (as Cactus Jack) she'll put WWE ahead of DS9, which is OK with me. Maybe we can watch SmackDown together because I have to work when it's on, and she can watch RAW on her own time when I'm at work, because I see it when it comes on, while it's being taped. So I don't really think WWE will get in the way. And at the current rate, we're getting through a season a month. If we keep that up we could be done with DS9 by year's end, though I think our marriage, honeymoon, and a couple trips we have planned might get in the way. But hey, if we can watch all seven seasons inside a year (to be done by March 2007) that's pretty good for two full-time working people with different schedules. And we'll have another Niner for sure, because there are plenty more Duet-level episodes ahead (some of which I absolutely can't wait for, like Pale Moonlight).

@VBG - I did ask Jen what she thought of Bashir yesterday, over a game of pool. She thinks he's cute, but not really annoying. And she seems to be taking to Odo, which is cool, because he's got a great character arc, especially in the last two seasons when his loyalty is really tested.

I can really see how I started out disliking Sisko (I was so used to the mostly by-the-book Picard and Janeway) but now on the second time through, I like him a lot more. The Ferengi are no more appealing (possibly less so) to me the second time around.

Well it's like my fiancée was explaining to me about wrestling. She follows the WWE shows. She explained that there are "Faces" and "Heels" - the former you root for, the latter you boo... because one plays the hero; the other, the villain. But both are there to entertain. A good "heel" makes you hate him, but is cool at the same time. So far the best "heel" I've seen is RAW's "Edge". He's hard to like at first, but he's good at what he does.

Dukat is better still. He's a villain, but he's very likeable, even when he's at his worst. I'm going to look him up on IMDb, see what else he's in. "The Patriot" came on TV a week or two ago, and it was a trip seeing Rene Auberjonois (sp?) in a non-Trek role.

I can't wait to see John Cena kick Vince's --- next Monday.

Shane may be underrated, but I underrate any of the wrestlers who can't win without some kind of cheating. It's funny once or twice, but if it's the only way they can win, it gets old quick.

Shelton Benjamin's become like that recently, though he beat Ric Flair and RVD fair and square - while still cleverly - last night.

And no one's mentioned it yet, but Foley announced he's coming back. Good news for us, my fiancée practically worships Foley.

Has anyone here seen Clerks.? (Yep, the period is part of the title.) Came out in 1994, black-and-white psuedo-documentary about convenience store clerks? Great film, though the language might put you off if you have kids - watch it when they're not around. Also there's some adult dialogue.

Anyway, there's a little bit of Star Wars debate going on in one scene. From the script:

Your thoughts? Does Randal have a point? We didn't see any independent contractors on the Death Star, but they had to have been there. Though Vader does threaten a commander, almost implying that the Stormtroopers are actually involved with the construction, he could very well have been commanding Stormtroopers who were in turn commanding groups of independent contractors. You'd think they'd use contractors from one of the many Imperial worlds. Also given, you'd assume that they weren't paying for it, but rather using slave labor of some kind. It's the Empire for crying out loud. They're not nice people. Anyway, a customer interrupts them and has his piece to say.

He's got a point, but the point the film never makes is, why would the roofer pass the job on to his friend without warning him? I think whether he did or not would say how much of a friend he was. But he does make a good point.

More Dante and Randal on Star Wars (this is immediately before their little debate; actually BLUE-COLLAR MAN walks in right after the following, right before the first bit of script):

It should be noted that Kevin Smith, director of Clerks., has said that Empire is his favorite movie. He says Sith is darker, and is often misquoted as saying Sith is his favorite, but I believe he still prefers Empire. Which is funny, because Smith himself was originally going to play Randal (hence, Randal having some of the best lines). And Kevin Smith is Catholic, and just about all of his characters are or can be assumed to be Catholics or "recovering Catholics". In fact his later film "Dogma" is a parody of sorts, of Catholocism. Being a Kevin Smith fan, I recommend all of his films (Clerks., Mallrats, Chasing Amy, Dogma, Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back, Jersey Girl, and the upcoming Clerks. 2.) Chasing Amy has a Star Wars reference, but it's not a nice one. It's meant in jest... but for those of you interested, just google its script and do a search on Luke Skywalker and/or Lando Calrissian. (It's one character's take on the original Star Wars, with a Lando mention.) And there's a parody Star Wars battle in Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back referencing the fight between Vader and Luke at the end of Empire, with a parody mention of Darth Maul.

[source: clerks. script]

Wouldn't have a problem at all.

References aside, the stories (Star Trek and Star Wars) are pretty incompatible. Any collaboration of the stories would be cheesy at best. Without the benefit of the Force, any Trek character wouldn't fare well in the SW universe. The best plot collaboration I can think of would be if Starfleet hired some Jedi... and that would be cheesy.

But actors are just actors... it's a shame when people judge their entire career based on one role, though it does happen.

Mark Hamill was in "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back" doing a Star Wars spoof. Chris Rock: "George Lucas gonna sue somebody!"

I can't read all that ... she lost me around the fourth paragraph or so.

 

Look, I can only speak for myself, but DS9 was the BEST of all Trek series bar none. I preferred it's indepth exploration of all the characters, both main and secondary AND I really enjoyed the fact that you had to have at least a little intellect to get the show. Did a good job of eliminating the casual viewer, though, but I really don't care about that (or them). It gave me what I wanted out of Trek and now that I have all seven seasons on DVD, I can watch a seven season story arc any time I want too!

Actually, I'm trying to get a casual Trek fan (sorta - my fiancée) hooked on DS9. You really have to watch the whole thing to appreciate it, but I agree completely. There are some aspects of Voyager I miss (that's after DS9 for us... could be a couple years though) but nothing beats DS9, before or after.

On the computer? All 21 seasons of TNG, DS9, and VOY. On commercial DVD - none. It'd be nice to have in the collection though.

Another episode I thought I remembered but didn't quite. I thought in "Battle Lines" they actually, somehow, reversed the process to allow people to die - but rather, as I just watched it, left it as it was. (Just watched that and the one before it last night. )

To be fair, she wasn't a Trekkie when I met her. I'm converting her. Though resistance is futile, she isn't trying. If they ever do a con around here (fat chance) maybe I'll drag her to it... but she's more apt to go to Ozzfest or something like that. (Not that I'd mind going to an Ozzfest, but I think I'd have more fun at a Star Trek convention.)

Oh, when I said we don't even watch it all night, what I meant to say was we don't watch it every night. I work four nights a week, 10pm to 6am, and she works a different five nights a week, 3:30pm to Midnight. We get three nights that we can watch movies or Star Trek, and if we have movies to watch, those usually come first.

Not sure what she thinks of Bashir, or any of them much. I think she's liking Odo and Quark. She pretends to not like Dax, but only because she knows I think she's cute. It's a little game we play. "Her men" include Spiderman and director/comedian Kevin Smith, and I likewise pretend to be jealous of them.

I know she has an account here, she even has this board bookmarked... I'll have to try to get her to come up in here and post every now and then, get her perspective directly.

Oh yeah, we were both wondering. In "Dax", who sent the transmission? The general himself? Or the wife? They never make it very clear. Would have been a little better had we found out that that SOB who put Dax on trial was really Curzon's son. They hint at it, and the numbers add up, but the connection is not established.

And Jen had a question about the Prime Directive and something involving Bajor, but I can't remember what it is. Any Federation involvement on Bajor wouldn't violate the PD since the two are allies - I should know that. But I think it was something else. I'll have to ask her again, I'm sure one of you know. She asked me straight away as it happened, and I didn't have an answer.

Hey guys, I'm/we're back.

Jen and I have watched a few of my favorite TNG episodes, but we skipped through most of it. She's seen the whole first season, the first third of the second season, "Remember Me", "Cause and Effect", "The Best of Both Worlds" (both parts), and "All Good Things" (both parts). I'd like to show her the one with the Enterprise and the Warbird frozen in mid-battle, and "Genesis"... the Data/Lore eps are cool, too, especially the one where Dr. Crusher takes over the Enterprise. And I've watched all the movies with her, except the first one, which I didn't like at all.

So now we're on to Deep Space Nine. I don't plan to skip any of it, even if it takes a few years to watch it all. We only watch one or two eps a night, and we don't even watch it all night. So no 8-episode streaks like I was pulling, watching it on my own.

We just watched 1x07 "Q-Less" last night. So far Jen's liking it, though I don't get the impression she really likes any of the characters as much as she did Data and Worf.

Figure I ought to update my sig now...

/edit: Wow, it said "girlfriend" in my sig... Have I been gone that long? I proposed to Jen last year, the day after Christmas. We'll be getting married on the 7th of July this year. Matter of fact, she just picked out her wedding dress. We're not going to have a big ceremony, but we will have something, and we'll have a fairly decent reception afterwards. Pretty modest though. If anyone on the East Coast thinks they may be able to attend, drop me a PM.

Hmm. I do not fully understand Quarterdeck.

But while the United Federation of Planets is not a military, but rather a federation, a coalition, Starfleet (which isn't UFP) is military, and based strongly on the Navy. Most Trek characters don't really seem like the soldiers of today, but I think that's because they're "so much more evolved". Each of them is something else first, except for Worf, who is first and foremost a Klingon warrior. Picard is a sailor, Data and Geordi are scientists... they all have other roles that they play, but they do follow a chain of command... I think they're the closest thing Earth has to a military in the 24th century.

I would like to believe that saluting would be offensive to some cultures and is thus not used, as suggested in post #3. Consider the Vulcan "Live Long and Prosper" salute - Vulcans use it to greet each other and when departing, but you didn't see Tuvok doing it all the time on Voyager... presumably Spock on TOS used it as infrequently. It's like in ST6:TUC, "not all species keep their genitals in the same place"; just as Kirk wouldn't expect that to have been anything other than a kneecap, perhaps the salute we know today means something offensive in another culture.

And for the record I haven't been in the military, excuse me if I implied otherwise.

Oh god, I find myself wanting that shirt! It lists all the episodes from all the series... how geeky is that?

Bookmarked... because I just might get it. And I don't own ANY Trek shirts.

Though I would like to have a good DS9 tee, preferrably showing the station and Defiant, maybe headshots of Sisko, Worf, Jadzia, Kira, O'Brien, Odo, Quark, and Bashir, maybe Dukat and Weyoun in the background.

I saw John DeLancie in an episode of SG-1 while just flipping channels, but that's old news - pretty sure I even made a post about it. I still have the screenshots in my local gallery.

Colm Meaney's awesome, it's a shame he's not in more, like movies. I guess some of these actors, you just can't help but see them for their Trek roles, and that hurts them. It's sad, because Star Trek showcases some of the best actors on television.

The unveiling of a completely new series? One to better Voyager and Enterprise, one to the standards set by Deep Space Nine? One can only hope.

I really hope that Enterprise is not the "last" Trek we get and that it's all over, but that's what it feels like.

If the site were in danger of closing (possibly due to Paramount or TPTB as you call them here not wanting to pay to keep it up) why don't some fans or a fan who can afford it offer to take over costs and maintenance of the site. How big can it really be? Maybe drop any video clips (if any) and shutting down its forum would cut bandwidth costs, especially if it's all junk anyway, but just the images and text/code? Someone ought to mirror it, but they'd need permission.

I don't think 50% is an accurate figure at all. I think most people can do it, though, as portrayed in First Contact, it's a bit tricky the first couple times. But once you get it, you can do it no problem. Most of us, anyway.

The ring finger split thing that most people can't do is completely different. Lay your hand palm down on a table. Either hand, doesn't matter which one. Lift your thumb. Lift your pointer. Your middle finger. Your pinky. See how high you can lift them? How unrestricted? Now try the ring finger. Doesn't go very far does it? And if you keep trying, your middle finger might come up. With the middle finger up, the ring finger can go as high as any of them. With both ring and middle fingers up, try lowering just the middle finger. Not so easy, is it?

I agree with you wholeheartedly, except without the religion part. But it's always been my belief that if an invading alien race were to come to Earth, we'd be an easy target, seeing as how we're so divided. Before people from this planet go out into space to discover new life, we really ought to be unified. Not necessarily under a "world government" (a concept which scares liberals and conservatives alike), but just in peace. We can stay as we are, individual countries, but certain elements in the US/UK governments who believe in taking over the Middle East need to be removed from power before we go off into space. Basically we need to learn to accept people for their differences. Things like racism and homophobia must all be relics of the past, all but forgotten by modern mankind.

Well, if they're charging... iTMS (iTunes Music Store) charges $1.99 per episode, so that might become the standard.

While downloading them at $1.99 apiece will get expensive for downloading a whole series versus BitTorrent (a free alternative), it's a lot cheaper than buying the DVD boxed sets. But with the cost, you also have to factor in the cost of Google's servers. They're paying by space and bandwidth to allow you to get those files. When you use BitTorrent, the space and bandwidth are donated by the users on the network, and they're just regular DSL or Cable users.

LOL!

My bad... I forgot to copy the summary for last night's RAW over here... I was in such a hurry to get dinner started after posting it on my board, it just slipped my mind.

[RAW summary for 19 December 2005]

Today RAW broadcasted from Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan, as a special Tribute to the Troops. Most of the two hours was dedicated to pictures and video of the superstars spending time with the troops, playing with the equipment, and posing for the camera. I'm not covering any of that... it wasn't something I could really take notes on. You had to see it... otherwise just stretch your imagination a little and imagine US troops giving WWE superstars a tour of some of the things they're doing in the Middle East.

Lillian Garcia started off singing the National Anthem ("Oh say can you see, by the dawn's early light..."). I thought all the troops would be saluting, but only a few were. Maybe they don't have to.

The first match was Carlito and Big Show... as usual Carlito got tossed around the ring... actually tossed out of the ring after sucker-punching Big Show. Carlito gets back in, tries to slam Big Show from the turnbuckle, but Big Show just catches him, slams him, pins him, and it's all over. Big surprise there. I'm beginning to think Carlito's a walking punching bag with bad hair.

Then a funny-looking Santa Claus comes out in camo, with a bad beard, and starts badmouthing the troops, saying Santa is going to skip Afghanistan this year, and the troops can forget about New Years and Valentines Day and St. Patricks Day... he pretty much runs through all major and minor holidays (including Groundhog Day), getting booed... then a more real looking Santa comes out, and he's a lot kinder to the troops, and challenges the bad Santa to a "No Ho-ho-holds Barred Match". The match is over pretty quickly, involving the "good" Santa winning. Oh, the bad Santa was JBL, and the good Santa was Mick Foley.

The third match involves Shelton Benjamin, against someone I haven't seen before, Snitsky. This match is also over pretty quickly, with Snitsky pinning Benjamin. Next up it's John Cena and Chris Masters. They wrestle about, Masters trying to get Cena in the Master Lock, and finally he does. Cena's about to get out of it, a lot of people were thinking, when Masters releases him. Masters goes to jump on Cena off the turnbuckle, but Cena puts his foot up, they exchange some punches, Cena does the F-U on Masters, pins him. Then Coach calls out and challenges "Nature Boy" Ric Flair for his championship... Gawd this guy's old, but he obviously hasn't lost it, as he exchanges chops with this guy 20-30 years his junior, gets him in a position they call the "Figure 4", and Coach taps out.

Next we have what most of the troops will probably remember most about the whole thing. The Santa's Helpers Diva Tag Team Match... Trish Stratus and Ashley on one side, Candice and Maria on the other. The match starts with Ashely and Maria, and Candice body surfing. Maria goes to pin Ashley, but she gets up in time, and tags Trish in. Maria tags in Candice, who's back now. Trish pushes Candice out, and goes to slam her when she gets back in, but ends up slamming the ref instead. She dominates Candice for a while, slams her, then tags in Ashley, and they both slam Candice. Trish gets out, and within moments Candice has Ashley pinned, and it's over.

The next match is the 'main event', the boot camp match between Triple H and Shawn Michaels. Triple H and Shawn Michaels start out slamming one another, pretty much one to one, and then USA cuts to a break. (Well, it cut to a lot of breaks, just not in the middle of a match.) When we come back from break, both superstars have taken it out of the ring and all the way up the ramp to the tent where they come out. Michaels hits Triple H with a few sandbags placed around some military hardware, and H hits Michaels with a gas can. They brawl up the ramp to the ring, and Michaels hits H in the face with a wet mop - twice, I think. Back in the ring, Shawn Michaels tries to clothesline Triple H, but gets the ref instead. Triple H tries to pin him - Michaels, not the ref - and Michaels gets up. The ref is up, and he and Triple H are arguing back and forth - finally Triple H drops the ref, slams Shawn Michaels, gets up on the turnbuckle to get the drop on Michaels, who puts his foot up, and they're both down for about eight seconds. They get up, exchange punches back and forth. Michaels slams Triple H three times, elbow-drops him from the turnbuckle, slams him again, slams his face into the turnbuckle, and pins him - it's all over.