Obviously don't pet service dogs. Just to be clear. This photo was intentionally photoshopped to make it appear as though the airport was saying "Travel Advisory: when traveling don't pet dogs". As in, when in the UK never touch a dog. I thought it was funny/cutesy. I didn't intend on sparking a big debate about the ethics of petting dogs or the rules about service dogs.
Don't touch service dogs.
Pet dogs if you know them or are introduced to them.
Based solely on that quote, I whole heartedly agree. Science fiction is almost always supposed to expose something about our world through a different lens. Whilst it’s not the most elegant example, the two black & white striped races in TOS arguing over “black-white stripes vs white-black stripes” was a clear allegory for racism in our country when the show came out. District 9 is a decent allegory for something like Gaza & Israel: open air prisons and what-not.
Science fiction should (IMO) make the muddy waters of morality more clear.
A more nuanced example comes from Battlestar Galactica; wherein the human members of a concentration camp use suicide bombing as a means of rebellion. The show made sure to imply the efficacy of suicide bombing. It also made sure to expose the arguments against it. But I think during a post 9/11 world, suicide bombing was looked at as the root of all evil. Perpetrators were seen as aimless villains without a cause or reason (without a rational one, anyways). But BSG did make a compelling argument for such extreme cases of terrorist violence when your back is up against the wall.
The bajorans in DS9 also make cases for terrorism as an act of rebellion against colonizers.
I think science fiction is one of the only genres they really take a look at these topics. Other genres seem to only gleam the very tips of the morality iceberg.
As per usual, this reboot lost the soul of the show. I could still laugh at it, but the show runners have no idea what made it successful.
Not enough heartfelt moments. Cheap laughs are what killed the vibe for me. Frasier has some episodes that pull at my heart strings emotionally. You gotta have good drama to have good comedy, in my opinion.
Frasier is dressed so weird. He looks like he’s trying to dress down? That’s not his style. He’d be dressed to the nine as usual. In Harvard, that shouldn’t be too unusual.
Jokes were paid off too quickly. Frasier would often give a joke quite a while before it was paid off.
Characters were simply unrealistic. Niles was goofy at times, but he had self-respect and all the arrogance of Frasier. But Niles’ son acts ten years younger than he actually is. I just didn’t believe most characters.
Set design was not great. Frasier’s home having the Rorschach wallpaper? That feels like a joke. It doesn’t seem authentic. Again, Frasier is not a “modern” man. If anything, his home should look much more like a cigar lounge than a '“contemporary” home with shrink elements. I was also disappointed by how often the set was statically shot. They did not utilize many angles. I liked the bar well enough.
Overall, I thought the show had merit on its own. But it was a poor sequel for Frasier. It was funny at times. Some moments the show did come through. The final episode was actually pretty damn close to the original thing. I loved some of the bits with the trees, the goose, Roz, and how his son surprised him. I just felt like they missed the mark on too many other episodes.
I also wish more studios would stop lighting everything so heavily. A bit of nuance in your shots isn’t such a bad thing. Every shot looks like plastic to me. It’s sort of a modern film approach. Maybe I’m a rusty bucket, but it feels uninspired to me.
I generate a random number and then use that number as a seed. I then generate a random number. Then I use that number as a seed. I then generate a random number. I divide that number by a random prime number picked in a similar fashion. I take the last n-digits of the remainder and that’s the random number I give to a user.
It’s not as good as the original Frasier, in my opinion. But it is entertaining. What the reboot needed was a willingness to dive into complex emotions. The first episode of the original series deals with anger and sadness. Frasier and his father end up fighting and they end the scene with a dramatic fade to black. The new series doesn’t take risks like that. It follows most modern sitcom conventions: too afraid to allow some drama to contrast the humor.
But it’s still very good. And they do have some dramatic moments as people navigate their relationships. But they just pull back the punch a little too easily in most cases.
I originally had all the seasons torrented on my Plex server but it broke a couple weeks ago. I lost Frasier, The Office, Babalyon 5, The Wire, a ton of movies, etc. It was such a bummer!
Frasier was the hardest to lose cause it’s difficult to find ad-free and I like to just have it on in the background.
