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Dear English 110 Students,

English 110, for me, was very different from my high school English classes. I enjoyed this class more than I thought I would because I am not an English person. The course theme, science fiction, was interesting because it isn’t really what I expected, but once we got into it I liked it.

To be successful in this course you really need to keep up with your assignments. This can be a difficult task sometimes because of the fact that it is college and there are other classes. However, although there is sometimes a lot to do when you just sit down focus and get it done, it really does not take as much time as you might think it would.

This quarter allowed me to write for new situations like keeping a blog that allows everyone to read what you write, which is very different from what I expected and what I am used to. However, I believe writing for an audience is beneficial because everyone can critique or encourage what you are writing about, which really helped me to think about what I was writing.

I hope this has been helpful.

Sincerely,

Zeke McVey

Farscape

Farscape is definitely more what you think of when you think of science fiction compared to other science fiction shows we watched in class. In Farscape the main character, John Crichton, works for IASA (basically NASA) and is about to test his own theory of being able to slingshot off of the Earth’s atmosphere. When doing this he accidently enters a wormhole which transports him to an entirely different part of the galaxy. He ends up in the middle of a battle between two alien life forms. One of which is basically human, and the other are creatures that you would normally picture when you think of aliens. John is pulled onto one of the ships and continues through some adventures with the aliens. In one instance he is able to test his theory and proved that it did work, and enabled John and the aliens to escape death.

This episode was pretty good in my opinion. It wasn’t my favorite science fiction tv episode we have watched, but I like the story behind it and the story that it set up. The show did a good job of leaving the watcher wondering how or if John would ever return to earth.

Star Trek Next Gen

After watching Star Trek Next Generation in class, I was pretty impressed having never seen a Star Trek episode before I thought it was pretty good. The episode was trying to determine if the android, Data, had rights. In the beginning it was obvious Data was very intelligent but lacked basic human intuition, as shown in the poker game where he was bluffed into losing. However, when Data is threatened to be taken apart, Captain Kirk challenges that Data has the right to choose whether or not he wants to participate in the experiment. The judge eventually rules that Data has the right to choose for himself, and we learn that Data continually learns how to act more human when he respectfully declines to participate in the experiment.

The storyline in this episode was very interesting and brought up legitimate questions about whether or not a machine that acted human could have the same rights as a human. I agreed with the ruling because it was obvious that Data could interact seamlessly with humans and should therefore be treated as one.

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The Star Trek Original Series I chose to watch was “Assignment: Earth”. In this episode, The Enterprise goes back in time and accidently intercepts a traveler to the 20^th century who seems to be an alien. The traveler argues that he is human, but has lived on another planet for an extended period of time and now is traveling to earth to prevent earth from destroying itself. Captain Kirk is unsure whether or not to trust the traveler fearing that he may be an alien from the future plotting to destroy earth. The traveler escapes The Enterprise and travels to earth to disrupt the launch of a space nuclear missile launch pad. After the launch, the traveler takes control of the rocket in attempt to knock it off course and destroy it. Captain Kirk and Spock begin to try and stop the traveler before realizing that both they and the traveler both want the nuke destroyed and Captain Kirk decides to trust the traveler, and the traveler destroys the missile.

The science fiction of Star Trek seems to be very different from the science fiction shows of today. Today science fiction seems to try and relate to everyone using symbolism in shows that everyone can relate to. In Star Trek, the focus seems to be more for every ones entertainment. I prefer the science fiction of today because although it is not directly relatable the situations that arise in it are similar to what you may come across in your life.

BSG

After a long war between humans and human created robots, the Cylons, an armistice is declared. The Cylons are banished to a distant planet and a remote space station is set up to keep up diplomatic relations between the Cylons and humans. This is where the BSG miniseries begins. It had been forty years since the Cylons and humans had any contact; however, on this day the Cylons do make an appearance on the remote space station. The lone human on the space station is very surprised by the Cylon appearance on the space station and even more surprised when he sees that they now look like humans. The Cylons, however, do not stay long. They soon destroy the ship beginning another war against the humans. The war begins by the Cylons dropping dozens of nuclear bombs on all of the major human cities. Caught completely off guard by the attack, the humans try and fight back, but the Cylons seem to have the ability to turn off human computers at will. However, the ship Battlestar Galactica is not affected by the Cylons computer virus and does rather well against the Cylons in a space fire fight.

I have never seen any of the BSG series, but from the miniseries it seems like a pretty good show. The plot behind it is really intriguing, and makes me wonder how the rest of the series goes. BSG has what seems like to me to be a kind of recurring theme among many science fiction movies and series today that humans create something to make their lives easier and it turns against them and almost destroys them. This theme is also shown in the Terminator movies where human created robots attempt to take over earth. I find this theme to be interesting for some reason. The prospect of something like this actually happening in future seems very plausible to me considering how our technology is exponentially progressing, and maybe humans should take note as to what is shown in these movies to prevent something like this from happening.

A Dream

A Dream by Edgar Allan Poe

In visions of the dark night

I have dreamed of joy departed;

But a waking dream of life and light

Hath left me broken- hearted.

Ah! What is not a dream by day

To him whose eyes are cast

On things around him, with a ray

Turning back upon the past?

That holy dream, that holy dream,

While all the world were chiding,

Hath cheered me as a lovely beam

A lonely spirit guiding.

What though that light, thro’ storm and night,

So trembled from afar-

What could there be more purely bright

In Truth’s day- star?

Poe wrote this piece in his youth, and he experienced a lot of turmoil in his young life, due to the death of his mother from tuberculosis. In this poem Poe starts by describing a dream that appears to be a nightmare, which breaks his heart. In the second stanza; however he begins to show that his nightmare follows him through the day as well as through the night. In the third stanza Poe explains that a lonely spirit makes him happier and helps him though his nightmare, because his life became a bad dream after the death of his mother, the lonely spirit could be the mother he lost. The final stanza describes Poe waking up from his bad dream, and an underlying meaning to this stanza could be that the thought of his mother could be his sun, or his truth’s day star that brings him away from the pain of his hard life.

Normal Again

In the Buffy episode “Normal Again” Buffy gets stung by what she thinks is a demon causing her to think she is in a mental hospital. For me, having only seen two episodes of Buffy this was a very interesting twist, and one that makes the series more understandable. When Buffy is in the mental hospital she learns that her parents are there and the doctor is attempting to heal her of a severe case of skitsofrenia. After Buffy returns to her “normal” slayer life she starts to doubt her surroundings thinking that they are all just things her mind has made up. These doubts start to increase and Buffy decides she wants to try and return to her real life in the mental hospital and get better. To do this she starts to try and get rid of her friends, but in the end decides to return to her life as a slayer.

For me this episode was very intriguing because of the fact that Buffy most likely is a skitsofrenic girl in a mental hospital that has created this intricate world where she is in control. This logic really makes sense because everyone knows there is really no such thing as vampires, monsters, and demons. Also, I can now see why this episode of Buffy is one of the more talked about of the series because it answers a lot of questions but at the same time creates more questions.

House

House is pretty much the only tv series I consistently watch. It was first broadcast in November 2004 and is now in its 6^th season. House stars Hugh Laurie as Dr. Greg House and Lisa Edelstein as Dr. Lisa Cuddy. House takes place at Princeton‑Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in New Jersey where Dr. House takes patients who seem to have incurable diseases or ones that he finds interesting. Finding out what is wrong with each patient turns into sort of a puzzle as new symptoms arise as the episode goes on. The episodes become increasingly complex as each of the doctors is usually undergoing personal issues throughout the treatment of the patient that usually carry on into the next episodes.

I personally only recently started watching House and now I rarely miss an episode. I know that a lot of people don’t really like it because of how it can be kind of repetitive in that a person gets sick, almost dies, and House cures him at the last minute. However, I don’t find them to be very repetitive and they are always entertaining for me.

Common Place

I think my commonplace paper is going to be about how human nature is shown through in Firefly episodes by decisions characters make, and how in general the characters interact. There are a lot of good messages in the episodes that people today could learn from. So I plan to break some of those down and relate them to current events.

Toes

I am a pretty big fan of country music, although I know many people are not. So I chose one of my favorites “Toes” by the Zac Brown Band. This song is not really the typical country song in that it doesn’t really have the heavy country accent and just has a different feel in general. The song describes someone getting ready to go on vacation to Mexico and leaving the boring confines of a city. Once in Mexico he describes relaxing and having a good time having his toes in the water, ass in the sand, and a cold beer in his hand. Once in Mexico he describes his days there as “Four days flew by like a drunk Friday night as the summer drew to an end”. Once arriving home he attempts to enjoy his home as much as Mexico by replicating what he did there saying “I'm just gunna prop up by the lake I've got my ass in a lawn chair Toes in the clay Not a worry in the world a PBR on the way Life is good today. Life is good today.”

If you haven’t listened to this song I suggest you look it up on youtube or some other way and check it out because it is a great song.

Is It Art?

Is It Art? Is an article by Gary Moeller where he discusses the Buffy the Vampire episode “Hush”. In this article, Moeller compares how this episode relates to other videos considered art. Moeller first compares how “Hush” and The Yellow Submarine showing how the two are similar because in each instance the sound is taken away from a town. Next, the article discusses how The Gentleman’s minions are similar to the monkeys in The Wizard of Oz saying “The monkeys were so incredibly creepy; some aspects of their creepiness relate directly to the Gentlemen’s minions.” This articles ends by debating whether or not “Hush” should be considered art. Moeller says yes “Yes (since, revealed through art, we do need to know all, even the most frightening), then “Hush” passes this test, at least in terms of intent.”

Grimm

The Grim Realities article discusses how throughout many of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes folk tales are used, and played out to their actual meaning. Most folk tales relate to death in some way, and in certain episodes of Buffy their meaning is actually played out instead of being referred to by a misleading rhyme. This is apparent in the Buffy episode we watched in class, “Hush”. “Hush” is an episode where a group called The Gentleman takes over a town stealing every ones voices, and then seven hearts. In the article, Grim Realities Bridges describes the fairy tale as “The Gentlemen, as it turns out, are “real” fairytale figures in the Buffy-verse, in the same sense as “Hansel and Gretel” and “Der Kindestod” are posited as real figures in previously discussed episodes.”

Hush

In the Buffy the Vampire episode “Hush” the entire town of Sunnydale loses the ability to speak. This is caused by a group of fairy tale monsters called The Gentlemen. Buffy learns through Giles that the only way to kill these monsters is by a human scream. This instantly presents a problem because of the whole town’s in-ability to speak. Buffy is able to break into The Gentlemen’s hiding place and destroy the box that holds the voices of the town and kill The Gentlemen.
Having never seen a Buffy episode before, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this episode. However, found it to be a pretty good episode. My only real complaint with it is how you kind of knew what was going to happen for the most part. After seeing how The Gentlemen stole the town’s voices it was pretty obvious to me that Buffy would most likely find a way to break in and return the voices to the town. However I did pick up on some of the clever dialogue that we have read about in articles about Buffy. An example is when Olivia arrives at Gile’s house she says her flight was a horror. This was kind of a clever way for Joss Whedon to foreshadow that maybe it wouldn’t be the only horror of her trip.

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The RPAC Aquatic Center is one place where I have been spending a lot of time lately. I haven’t really swam competitively, but have always been a decent swimmer and am trying to get back into it a little bit so I can stay in shape and the facilities are available to me now. The Aquatic Center, to me, is really an amazing place I have never seen a pool even close to that big. Also it is really interesting to watch all the people diving and playing water pole. Where I grew up these sports were not available to us, and the only time I have ever seen them is on TV during the Olympics.

Overall I think this is a great facility for anyone, even if you are not there to work out, there are hot tubs, a recreation pool, and a sauna. I enjoy going there and will probably continue to go there while I am here at Ohio State.

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The Dollhouse is a sci-fi based on people volunteering to have their memories erased and replaced with another person’s memory in order to carry out a task anonymously. I watched the 11^th episode “Briar Rose”. This episode mainly seemed based on trying to find the doll house so that they could “rescue” the people inside. Rescue in this case takes on sort of a strange meaning in that the people in the doll house have volunteered for this; however, some people on the outside feel that what the, NSA ran, doll house is doing to be immoral. For this reason they are trying to expose the NSA for wrong doing while saving people they care about.

I found the overall idea of the show very intriguing, but trying to follow the 11^th episode of the season without seeing the first ones made it difficult. However, the episode was very interesting and kept me guessing throughout the episode. The ending was the biggest twist when you find out that one of the characters in the episode is not who you thought.

Mrs. Reynolds/ But She Was Naked

The Firefly episode our Ms. Reynolds was very interesting and not at all what I expected. The morning after a party, Mal unexpectedly finds a woman on the ship claiming to be his wife. Since Mal questions this, but Sheppard confirms that in the woman’s religion they were married the previous night. The woman Mal “married”, Saffron appears to be such a nice, quiet, and innocent girl. However, it turn out that she is actually a skillfully trained criminal and sabotages the ship to the point where the crew is unsure whether or not they will be able to get the ship back on course.

The article “But She Was Naked” discusses how Saffron use of words made her the least likely suspect for such sabotage to the ship, but at the same time allowed her to easily manipulate the crew. To do this Saffron uses a combination subtle hints of control over the crew and uses their emotions against them. After manipulating Mal and Wash, Saffron is able to sabotage the ship and escape.

I found this episode to be very surprising and interesting it really kept me guessing throughout the whole episode, and I really wish I could have stayed to see the end. The article really helped bring the episode together because of how it analyzed the language used and how it gave Saffron the ability to take over the ship without anyone suspecting it.

The Train Job

Episode two of the Firefly “The Train Job” showed some different aspects of the characters that you wouldn’t expect after watching the first episode. The first seen that sort of surprised me involved the captain. After completing the train heist and learning about the crucial medicine, the captain had just stolen; he went against the threat of being killed to return the medicine to the people that needed it. This caught me off guard after the first episode because in the first episode the captain is made out to be somewhat heartless when it comes to making money, but this shows that the captain does have a kinder side.

I actually enjoyed this episode of the Firefly even more than the first one because you start to really get to know the characters and how they act. This is especially true for the captain who is becoming a more likeable character with the added nicer side.

High School is Hell

“High School is Hell” offered an interesting perspective on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It shows how metaphors were used by the creators to show problems that are actually occurring in the real world. I have never seen an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the show sounds pretty interesting from the article; however, I think that if I were to go and watch it now knowing the metaphors would kind of ruin the series for me. I like to enjoy what I am watching, not analyze, and knowing all the metaphorical references in the show I think would kind of ruin it for me. Not to say that I don’t think that what the writers achieved with the series is not great. It is amazing how deep the show is and how it relates to how teenagers in high school actually feel. However, after reading the article I feel like I would just be analyzing the story instead of enjoying it for what it is worth.

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As a reader I follow many different styles of writing, but some of my favorite authors are Tucker Max and Dan Brown. These are two of my favorite writers for very different reasons. Both Tucker Max’s I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell and Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code have been on the New York Times Best Seller List. As you can probably tell from the titles these books are very different. Tucker Max’s writings are very funny and usually extremely entertaining. While Dan Brown’s writing is more mysterious and keeps you guessing until the end. Although being very different Brown and Max’s books do have an underlying similarity in that both are very controversial, and since we Americans like controversy both have also been made into movies. The Da Vinci Code has received criticism from many Catholics because of its claims that Jesus had children and its search for the Holy Grail. I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell has also received criticism for its controversial content about women and drinking.

Personally I take both authors books for what they are meant to be, which is funny, interesting, and entertaining. Whereas I think people that oppose these writing either have not read them and are basing their information off of other sources, or are simply going with what other people believe. Either way I think both of these books are great reads or movies, as I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell just went to theaters last weekend, for anyone who might be interested.

Serenity

My impressions of the first Firefly episode Serenity were that this sci-fi show was much different from both what I expected and what I have seen in other sci-fi movies. Firefly was different in that the story is not really told from the hero's point of view, but more of the common people just trying to get by with what they can.

Some things from the show that interested me were the Sheppard and how he gave Kayley money for the trip but also a strawberry. I thought this was a little odd and I'm not sure why this caught my eye but I found it weird that she would be so excited about the fact he had a strawberry. Also, the doctor surprised me I was guessing that he was not going to turn out to be a good guy, but although he was in trouble his intentions were good.

Overall the Firefly seems to be a good show and I am interested to see how the other episodes play out. As a side note watching sci-fi tv shows is a much better English class than reading a boring book that you don't care about and attempting to write about it.